Clark County cold case team solves 1962 double murder

CLARK COUNTY, Wash. (KPTV) - More than 60 years after a brutal double murder near Battle Ground, investigators finally have answers.

Clark County detectives have cracked a 1962 cold case, identifying two suspects and bringing long-awaited closure to both the victims’ families and the suspects’ own relatives.

“Uncle Charlie is a part of the family and now we know what happened to him, we know exactly what happened to him, and who is responsible for it,” said Ralph Hale Inman. “It’s a closure.“

Ralph Inman only met his uncle once and he’s the only living person in his family who ever had the chance.

”Charlie is the only in the last century which means 1900s at this time that died violently,” said Inman.

According to the Clark County Sheriff’s Office, in June 1962, Charles Hale and Lester McCollum were found dead at their home near Battle Ground. Investigators determined Hale was shot in the head and McCollum killed from suffocation due to strangulation.

For decades, the case sat cold. But sixty years later, old evidence met modern DNA technology.

“They didn’t actually have that in ’62 but they had collected the evidence and kept it secure and were able to go back and use that original evidence to precure that DNA that actually led them to the perpetrators,” said Inman.

A day after the murders, investigators found Hale’s dumped car in Seattle—recovering cigarette butts and fingerprints. In 2017, a print on the rearview mirror finally matched suspect Barton Stebbins. Deputies interviewed an 80-year-old Stebbins in 2025, and a DNA sample linked him to twine used to tie up one of the victims, as well as cigarette butts in the car.

But in June 2026, just two days before detectives planned to secure an arrest warrant, Stebbins died. Still, investigators pushed forward, discovering Stebbins did not act alone.

“It’s life-altering, I just keep thinking that we do pay for the sins of our parents and and I’ll live with this for the rest of my life,” said Sara Henderson.

DNA from the cigarette butts matched Walter Stain—both Stain and Stebbins were teenagers in 1962.

Stain died in 2019.

“It’s too bad that the perpetrators are dead but then again, that’s solved the problem, they don’t have to go through the trial or anything else. But now we know, we know who did it, we can rest easier than Uncle Charlie is probably on the other side of the veil,” said Inman.

Henderson is Stain’s daughter and said she never knew her father’s dark past.

“It’s hard news to swallow, it’s a big pill to swallow,” said Henderson.

She said he struggled with alcohol, and she felt he carried a secret he could never escape.

“I think he used alcohol as a way to bury his feelings or to not have to deal with the past and I know he lived with regrets and I think the regrets are what made him a tortured soul,” said Henderson. “His life was not a good life he was tortured over this day and night I know he was.”

With both suspects dead, it was Henderson’s own DNA that gave investigators confirmation. She hopes that choice offers some measure of peace to two grieving families.

“I do honestly feel good that it was my DNA that helped bring this to a closure because in a strange way I feel like that maybe I helped the families of the deceased,” said Henderson.

Sixty-four years later, Inman said that peace has finally arrived.

“Closure for me is that they have identified, even though the perpetrators are dead, they’ve identified them, and the case is officially closed. And Uncle Charlie can finally rest in peace I think,” said Inman.