PARSONS, Tenn. (AP) – The young woman’s smiling face peers out from pink and green signs stationed along a Tennessee country road, demanding “Justice for Holly Bobo.”
Lampposts, bus-stop benches and mailboxes in the small city of Parsons are adorned with bows, symbols of support for Bobo’s family after the 20-year-old nursing student was abducted from her home in April 2011. All over this community of 2,400 people nestled on the banks of the Tennessee River between Memphis and Nashville are reminders of the case that tore Parsons apart.
Last week, more than six years after Bobo had vanished, some justice came in the form of a guilty verdict for Zachary Adams, 33, one of three men charged in her kidnapping, rape and murder.
After the verdict was read, Bobo’s father smiled for the first time in six years, according to his wife.
Serenity has begun to return amid the green fields, piney woods and winding roads where law enforcement agents, family friends and volunteers once searched frantically for Bobo, who sang in her church choir and was popular in her hometown.