21 years later: Halifax County detectives solve cold case of young mother who was murdered

More than 20 years have passed since Sherald Taylor died in her bed, a case later ruled a homicide by asphyxiation. On Friday, 46-year-old Lewis Turner Jr. was arrested and charged in her death.

Turner was a friend of Taylor and her family at the time, according to the Halifax County Sheriff's Office.

Turner, who would have been 21 at the time of Taylor's 2002 death, has just two other criminal charges on his record, assaults from when he was a teen. In both of those cases, he got probation.

On a charge of voluntary manslaughter against Tayloer, Turner was being held at the Halifax County Jail under $250,000 bond.

Taylor's daughter, Justice Ausby, was 7 when her mother died. She has been working Rich Somogyi, cold case specialist at the Halifax County Sheriff’s Office, toward closure that is now one step closer.

"Unbelievable. unbelievable," Ausby said. "We never knew this day was coming."

Ausby and her grandmother were overjoyed when they learned that the man who had killed Justice's mother had finally been arrested.

Justice was just seven years old when she found her mother dead in her bed in 2002.

For 21 years, she and her grandmother had searched for answers, but the case had gone cold.

That changed when Sheriff Tyree Davis hired Detective Sgt. Somogyi as Halifax County's dedicated cold case investigator. Somogyi poured over the case files and interviewed witnesses, and he eventually developed leads that led to the arrest of Turner Jr.

Turner was someone who was close to the family, and he had been a person of interest in the case for years.

Justice Ausby is grateful to everyone who helped bring her mother's killer to justice, and she is glad that she can finally have some closure. She said, "I'm just so thankful for everyone that participated and helped me get closure for my family because today is a good day."

Somogyi credited the community with helping to develop leads in the case. He said, "Even a small piece of information people think is not important, I may have other pieces of that equation."

Somogyi told WRAL News in May 2023, "They deserve information as to what happened, holding somebody accountable,”

It was his digging – into the death of Ausby's father, John Ausby – that led to the finding that Taylor's death was a homicide.

Somogyi said he has some leads in the death of John Ausby as well.