Man Charged in 2005 Murder of Teacher and Former Beauty Queen

Man Charged in 2005 Murder of Teacher and Former Beauty Queen
Missing teacher Tara Grinstead is prominently displayed on a billboard in Ocilla, Ga., on Oct. 4, 2006. (AP Photo/Elliott Minor)
The Associated Press
2/24/2017
Updated:
2/24/2017

Teacher and former beauty queen Tara Grinstead vanished from her south Georgia home in 2005, leaving a mystery that had stumped investigators for nearly 12 years—until a tip led to an unexpected arrest.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation announced Thursday that a former student at Irwin County High School, where Grinstead taught history, has been charged with her murder.

The suspect, 33-year-old Ryan Alexander Duke, was being held at the Irwin County jail in Ocilla, about 165 miles southeast of Atlanta.

“We always believed that it would be solved,” Connie Grinstead, the missing woman’s stepmother, told reporters at a courthouse news conference Thursday in which the GBI announced the arrest. “We just did not know when.”

The arrest provides some answers for a small farming community that has long grappled with Grinstead’s strange disappearance.

“When I heard, I just broke down in tears of relief, of anger, of sadness and frustration,” said Wendy McFarland, a fellow teacher and friend of Grinstead’s. “Everything that had been carried for the last 11 years and four months just bubbled to the surface.”

Ryan Alexander Duke, in Georgia on Feb 22, 2017. (Georgia Bureau of Investigation via AP)
Ryan Alexander Duke, in Georgia on Feb 22, 2017. (Georgia Bureau of Investigation via AP)