An eight-hour visitation for Christopher Rhoden Sr., 40; Christopher Rhoden Jr., 16; Clarence “Frankie” Rhoden, 20; Dana Rhoden, 37; Hanna Rhoden, 19; and Kenneth Rhoden, 44, will start at noon today.
The burial will be held at noon Tuesday at Dry Run Church of Christ in West Portsmouth.
Services were held Sunday morning at Union Hill Church for the second time since eight people part of or connected to the Rhoden family were murdered on April 22.
Union Hill Pastor Phil Fulton said the community has continued to support the surviving members of the family.
“I have been visiting the family about every day,” he said. “Others have been trying to visit, of course they’ve got the road closed off, but as much as possible. Food is coming in. We’ve taken food, we have a fund set up at First State Bank in Peebles for the funeral expense. Others have been giving money to me, and we’ll be taking up a love offering (Sunday) for the family.”
A church member named Liz, who declined to give her last name, said the past week has been difficult for the community.
“I’m not afraid or anything like that,” she said. “It’s something bad that happened in our community. It’s something that would be really hard for a family to deal with.”
Memorials for the victims, a small batch of purple and yellow flowers and a cross, sit on Union Hill Road near Route 32. The intersection, which leads to one of the main crime scenes, remained closed on Sunday. A Warren County deputy was stationed in front of the road block to limit access. He checked the identification of drivers and passengers in each vehicle to see if they matched his roster of residents who lived on the street.
Warren County’s sheriff’s office is one of many law enforcement agencies from around the region that continue to offer support and manpower. A Butler County Sheriff’s Office Incident Command Post trailer was parked in the Pike County Sheriff’s Office parking lot Sunday along with sheriff’s deputy vehicles from various counties including Mahoning and Meigs.
On Saturday, Hannah Gilley, the only victim of the Pike County massacre who was not a member of the Rhoden family, was laid to rest near her childhood home, in the Scioto County town of Rarden. She was the fiancee of Clarence “Frankie” Rhoden. Ruger Lee Rhoden, Gilley’s 6-month-old son, was found unharmed next to his mother.
Autopsies showed the victims suffered from 32 combined gunshot wounds. One victim was shot nine times.
Gilley’s funeral was held the day after hundreds of people from around Pike County attended a vigil and memorial fundraiser for the Rhoden and Gilley families. Some of the people who attended the vigil wrote messages of love and prayer on balloons and later let them go.
Visitation for Gary Rhoden was held on Thursday at Crockett L. Reed Funeral Home in South Shore, Ky. He was buried at Miller Cemetery in South Shore later the same day.
Three young children survived, ages 4 days old, 6 months old and 3 years old, and are with the county children services agency.
Marijuana grow operations were found at three of four crime scenes, and the murders were “pre-planned executions,” Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine has said. He characterized the murders as a sophisticated operation.
“Family means a lot to me,” Leonard Manley, the father of Dana Rhoden, said in an interview with WHIO-TV. “But when someone takes eight of them away from you at one time, it hurts.”
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