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One year ago today, Heidi Childs and David Metzler drove to Caldwell Fields to build a campfire and talk about the future.
The Virginia Tech sophomores, both Lynchburg, Va., natives, were found dead the following morning, victims of a crime that extinguished two bright stars of the campus ministries.
The crime, which is being investigated by a special task force, remains unsolved.
The community, spread across a remote corner of Montgomery County, remains unsettled.
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A passerby found Childs and Metzler shot dead Aug. 27, 2009. By mid-September, authorities assembled a task force to investigate the crime.
Last week, the task force of 15 investigators from eight law enforcement agencies, which have been investigating the case for the past 11 months, held a press conference asking for continued help from the public in the pursuit of solving the case.
Thus far, the task force has followed more than 1,100 leads and traveled more than 500 miles on one occasion to conduct interviews.
FBI Special Agent Kevin Foust, a member of the task force, praised local residents for their reaction to the case.
“Our thoughts and prayers continue to be with the Childs and Metzler families and the entire Virginia Tech community,” Foust said. “You have embraced them as if they were your own children, your own family.”
The community will once again embrace the memories of Childs and Metzler tonight in a vigil at Caldwell Fields, the site of the murders.
Blacksburg native Lisa Gardner organized the vigil, which is not affiliated with the university or the Childs or Metzler families. Instead, she said the community wants to pay its respects.
“When this happened it touched our community in a personal way,” Gardner said. “I felt a sense of responsibility or obligation to the kids and their families.”
In the days following the crime, Gardner set up a Facebook page to help solve the case, but is now using it in an attempt to unite the community in remembrance of Childs and Metzler.
She said the vigil, which is scheduled for 7:30 p.m., would attempt to create a positive atmosphere. Gardner said attendees should bring LED battery-operated candles to avoid using an open flame.
A version of this article appeared in the Aug 26 issue of the Collegiate Times.
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