Update: Grandson Finds Grandfather Murdered

Columbia police have charged a man in connection with the murder of Frances Rawl Senior.  
  Investigators say the suspect, eighteen year old Jesse Ray Lane entered the home with the intent of robbery and killed Mr. Rawl with a blunt object.  

  A man in Columbia found his grandfather murdered, Tuesday. He got worried when his grandfather did not come into work Tuesday afternoon. Les Rawl says, “It was something that nothing could prepare you for.”
   Les has many memories of his grandfather, 91 year old Frances Rawl, Sr. Les remembers his grandfather teaching him to putt on the greens of the Sedgewood Country Club in Hopkins. It’s a club owned by the Rawl family. Les remembers his grandfather’s war stories. Rawl, Sr., an Army colonel, was in the Battle of the Bulge. The family says he also served in the State House. Those are the memories Les wants people to know about, not the horrible way he found his grandfather Tuesday. He says, “I haven’t closed my eyes since.” Les went to his grandfather’s house on Woodlawn avenue Tuesday afternoon after Rawl, Sr. did not show up as usual to the country club. “Dispatch told me she needed to know whether she needed an ambulance or a coroner, and I begged, and I pleaded and I said I’m shaking, I’m scared, and I didn’t go check his pulse, I couldn’t do it, I peaked around the corner, and that’s all anyone needed to see.” Rawl, Sr. died from blunt force trauma to the head from a beating, according to the Richland County Coroner. Rawl Sr.’s neighbor, Toby Minick says, “We’ve just been so close for so long.” Minick lived two doors down from Rawl, Sr. Toby says Rawl, Sr. was well-off financially, but he lived a simple life, and he was a bit of a humanitarian. Minick says, “He did let me live here for free. He never charged me no rent,” he says crying. He goes on to say, ”That in and of itself shows something about his character.” And leaves a mystery as to why he was killed.
   Les says, “He’d have given them this golf course. I couldn’t understand how or why, but all I care about is that not happening to anyone else. They need to find this person.”