ABC NEWS
Three Bodies Found at Sam Donaldson’s Ranch
Thu Jul 8, 2004 01:06
64.140.159.92

Gruesome Discovery
Three Bodies Found at Sam Donaldson’s Ranch

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/WorldNewsTonight/donaldson_ranch_040707.html

July 7, 2004— Three bodies were found at a New Mexico ranch owned
by ABC newsman Sam Donaldson, and authorities said they were treating
the case as a triple homicide.

The bodies of a man and two women were found Tuesday on Donaldson's remote ranch north of Hondo, the Lincoln County Sheriff's Department said.

"My wife Jan and I are shocked by the apparent triple homicide that took place on our ranch in Hondo, New Mexico, sometime over the Fourth of July weekend while we were away in Santa Fe," Donaldson said in a statement. "We understand the investigation is continuing, and we have been asked by authorities not to comment further at this time."

Donaldson called the sheriff's department at 5 p.m. Tuesday after he went to the house of his ranch manager and found an "obvious crime scene," Sheriff Tom Sullivan said.

Sheriff's deputies sent to the ranch searched the area and found the bodies in a shallow grave, Sullivan said. The victims' identities were being withheld pending notification of relatives.

Donaldson and his wife are not suspects, Sullivan said.

Donaldson's ranch is in the south-central part of the state, between Roswell and Ruidoso. He is a native of El Paso, Texas, and his father bought farmland in New Mexico in 1910. Donaldson has added to the property over the years.

Donaldson joined ABC News in 1967 and covered the administrations of presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan as chief White House correspondent. He also was the anchor of World News Sunday and hosted news programs including This Week and Primetime Live.
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Wednesday, July 7, 2004 · Last updated 6:27 p.m. PT

Boy arrested in deaths at Donaldson ranch
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/tv/aptv_story.asp?category=1401&slug=Donaldson's%20Ranch%20Death

ABC Television newsman San Donaldson questions White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry during the daily White House briefing in the White House briefing room in this Jan. 12, 1998 file photo. Three people were found slain on a New Mexico ranch owned by ABC newsman Sam Donaldson, authorities said Wednesday, July 7, 2004. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

HONDO, N.M. -- The 14-year-old son of the manager of ABC newsman Sam Donaldson's New Mexico ranch was arrested Wednesday on charges of murdering his father, stepmother and stepsister, authorities said

Cody Posey was arrested at a friend's home in the Hondo area around 5 p.m., Sheriff Tom Sullivan said.

The bodies were found at the ranch after Donaldson went to the manger's house on Tuesday and discovered an "obvious crime scene," Sullivan said earlier. Deputies searched the area and found three bodies in a shallow grave.

The dead were identified as Delbert Paul Posey, the teen's father; his stepsister, Mary Lee Schmie, 14; and his stepmother, whose name was withheld because her relatives had not been notified, Sullivan said.

"My wife Jan and I are shocked by the apparent triple homicide that took place on our ranch sometime over the Fourth of July weekend while we were away in Santa Fe," Donaldson said in a statement before the arrest.

The Lincoln County ranch is in rolling pastureland about 125 miles northeast of Las Cruces.

Donaldson, a journalist with ABC since 1967, owns three ranches in south-central New Mexico and has extensive ties to the state. He grew up on a cotton farm in New Mexico and graduated from New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell.