Augusta woman investigated in deaths of her five husbands

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Augusta woman investigated in deaths of her five husbands

By Danielle Johnson djohnson@nbcaugusta.com

It's a story that's making national headlines. An Augusta woman accused of hiring a hit man to kill one of her husbands is now being investigated in the deaths of her four other husbands.

Betty Neumar is in a North Carolina jail charged with solicitation of murder in the 1986 killing of Harold Gentry, her husband at the time.

Whether Neumar will be charged in connection with the death of her other husbands remains to be seen, but investigators with the Stanly County Sheriff's Office tell NBC Augusta they have concrete evidence Neumar had her fourth husband shot to death 22 years ago.

Investigators in five states are now working together to determine if Neumar played a role in the deaths of all of her five husbands. Neumar is charged in the murder-for-hire plot of her fourth husband, Harold Gentry.

Gentry's brother, Al, says he's relieved that investigators reopened the case after 22 years and Betty Neumar's is behind bars.

“I'd like for her to know that's the prettiest outfit I've ever seen on her that orange outfit with those pretty silver bracelets,” said Gentry.

All five of Neumar's marriages ended with the deaths of her husbands.

In 1952 her first husband died under what investigators called "suspicious circumstances" in Ohio.

Neumar remarried another man from Ohio and two years later he was found shot to death.

Neumar remarried and moved to Florida where her third husband Richard Sills was also shot to death in 1965. At the time, police said Sills killed himself.

After the shooting death of Harold Gentry, Neumar's fourth husband, in 1986 in their home near Charlotte, she married John Neumar. He died last October of a bacterial infection in Augusta. Richmond County investigators have sent his remains to be tested for arsenic poisoning.

“He was never sick a day in his life until after he married her,” said John Neumar’s son.

John Neumar’s son, who's also named John, says Betty kept him from his father for the last 15 years. He's glad investigators are looking into the deaths of Betty's other husbands.

“This is something that took place in different states so it’s very easy to hide your tracks but now with national exposure anyone that knew this woman needs to come out," he said.

John Neumar will be on the Nancy Grace show Wednesday night on CNN Headline News. Thursday night he is scheduled to appear on Larry King Live and he is doing an interview with People Magazine.

He, like many family members that have spoken with the media, just want clear answers to what really happened in the deaths of their loved ones.

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