2 Women Were Forced at Gunpoint to Dig Their Own Graves Before Being Shot: How 1 Victim Survived

A Missouri woman who survived being kidnapped and shot by hiding under her friend’s dead body until her attackers left has now testified against one of them.

The Springfield Daily Citizen reported this week that Melissa Pugh testified against Steven Chase Calverley, who was one of nine people charged in the August 2020 kidnapping that killed her friend Sarah Pasco and nearly ended her own life, as well. Calverley was ultimately convicted of second-degree murder and other charges.

Pasco, 27, was shot in the head and killed after her kidnapper Gary Hunter Jr. and eight accomplices forced her into a well in Lawrence County, Missouri, that was located in the middle of the woods. Pasco died instantly, according to the outlet, and Pugh made the life-saving decision to lay still underneath her friend’s body and wait until her attackers left them behind in the well, believing both to be dead.

Hunter Jr. was sentenced to 40 years in prison in 2022 after pleading guilty to second-degree murder and first-degree kidnapping charges, according to The Associated Press. Local KY3 reported that Hunter Jr. took a plea deal to avoid facing a possible death sentence after being the ringleader and initiating the kidnapping, which eventually enveloped eight other members of what authorities believe to be a local gang.

After a week-long investigation, according to KY3, authorities arrested all nine people involved in the haphazard kidnapping and murder plot. 

Calverley, 33, was the only defendant whose case went to trial, according to the Daily Citizen, and Pugh told a jury she “forgave” him for his involvement in her kidnapping and friend’s murder. However, she still questioned why Calverley, a former Purple Heart-winning U.S. Marine, did not intervene and stop Hunter Jr. during the kidnapping.

“I know God spared my life for a reason,” Pugh told the courtroom, according to the Daily Citizen. “But I don’t understand why none of them tried to help us. … Especially with Mr. Calverley being a war hero.”

The incident began when Hunter Jr. approached Pasco and Pugh while they were sitting idle in their vehicle at a street corner in Stotts City, according to local outlet KOLR 10. The outlet reported that Hunter Jr. asked the two women if he could get into their car. But once inside the vehicle, he pulled a pistol on them and forced them to drive to the home of Christina Knapp, one of the eight accomplices who later faced charges. (Knapp ultimately pleaded guilty to robbery and kidnapping, according to reporting by KY3 and the Associated Press.)

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One-by-one, the eight accomplices gradually became involved in the kidnapping, as Hunter Jr. threatened Pasco and Pugh and forced them to begin digging their own graves in Knapp’s yard. Eventually, all nine suspects involved in the kidnapping traveled together in two separate cars to a wooded area in Miller, Mo., according to local KOLR 10, where Hunter Jr. forced the two victims into an abandoned well, where he later shot Pasco as Pugh hid under her body.

Once Hunter Jr., Calverley, Knapp, and the others left the scene believing both women to be dead, Pugh escaped the well and called 911.

“I’m not asking you to forgive me. But I want you to know I am sorry,” Calverley said after his conviction, reading from a letter he wrote to the families of Pasco and Pugh, according to the Daily Citizen. “I’m sorry I was a coward and didn’t try harder to stop him. I’m sorry I didn’t call 911 and report it. I’m sorry I didn’t try to put myself between him and you guys.”