Who killed these people?

Murder cases may be cold, but families still seek justice

By Mara Stine

The Gresham Outlook, Nov 13, 2009, Updated Nov 14, 2009

Jim Clark / Gresham Outlook

Debbie Mendive keeps a deck of cold-case murder cards, which are issued to prison inmates. One of the cards features Mendive's daughter, Amatha Mendive-Boyle, who was murdered in November 2008. It’s hoped inmates will have information about victims that they’ll share with officials.

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It began when an import store employee found the body of a young woman by the Dumpsters behind a church in the 16100 block of Southeast Stark Street early on Friday, Nov. 14, 2008.

Amatha Mendive-Boyle, 37, of Gresham was a newlywed and a mother of three who’d relapsed into drug addiction.

The following weekend, Saturday, Nov. 23, Abel Delgado-Morales, 35, of East County was shot to death while coming out of the bathroom at a friend’s apartment at Southeast 158th Avenue and Stark Street.

Police say the murder was part of a burglary and issued aggravated murder warrants for two East County coworkers on a crew digging ditches for a plumbing and drainage company. Jose Santiago Carvajal-Mota, 21, is behind bars after being extradited from an Arizona jail cell last December. The man prosecutors call the shooter – Cristobel Medrano-Alvarado, 21 – remains at large and is believed to have fled to Mexico.

Then on Saturday, Nov. 29, a Snow-CAP volunteer delivering a meal found the body of Roland “Rolly” Dir, 54, in his renovated garage apartment in the 15500 block of Southeast Stark Street.

The close proximity and rapid succession of murders in the Centennial neighborhood within a 15-day period put local residents on edge.

Now, a year after the first killing, two of the three cases remain unsolved, said Detective Mary Wheat, Portland Police Bureau spokeswoman.

There are no suspects in Rolly’s and Amatha’s murders. No new leads in any of the three killings. And no closure for the victims’ families.

Family in pain

Debbie Mendive (pronounced Mendiva) has had a year for the shock of her daughter’s murder to wear off. But Amatha’s birthday on Nov. 5 brought it all back. Now she’s bracing for the one-year anniversary of her daughter’s murder on Saturday, Nov. 14.

“It’s just a difficult time,” she said. “It’s just a day-by-day kind of thing. I’m not very good at this. They’ve taken my baby away from me, and I’m just left here hanging.”

Raised in Troutdale, Amatha loved dance, music and anything artistic. But when she was 10, her father died in a plane crash. The girl never recovered. She battled depression and was diagnosed as bipolar.

After years of drug abuse and trouble with the law, Amatha’s life was turning around. She’d cleaned up, fallen in love and had a baby. She married the child’s father, Brandon Boyle, in July 2007 in the same Wood Village church where her parents wed. She paid regular visits to her two older children, Kamylli and Timmy, who live with Debbie, outside of Sandy.

Then a back injury required painkillers and Amatha relapsed. She returned to her life on the streets. And there she died.

Her husband remains close.

“We still function as a family, but a family with a big loss,” Debbie says. “It’s affecting all of us.”

Timmy, now 14, can’t articulate his grief. His big sister is a rock, afraid people will feel sorry for her. And the baby, 3-year-old Chance – well, he just breaks Debbie’s heart.

“You know, my mama is gone,” the boy told her the other day. “She went away.”

Dad Brandon didn’t miss a beat.

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