Tuesday, June 17, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal
Hunt for sister's killer gets boost
Woman raising two orphaned nephews hopes $10,000 reward helps solve slaying
By RICHARD LAKE
REVIEW-JOURNAL
From the moment her sister Gina was found slain in 2001, Geneva Holliday knew she had a responsibility to raise her two nephews. "There was never a question," she says. Holliday holds a photo of 4-year-old Edward Gomez, left, and 3-year-old Xavier. They are sitting with Mark Klaas, whose daughter, Polly, was kidnapped from her Petaluma, Calif., home in 1993 and murdered.
Photo by Clint Karlsen.
Anyone with information on the slaying of Gina Holliday can contact CrimeStoppers at 385-5555. For more information or to donate to the reward fund, visit forgina.com.
At a news conference Monday to announce a $10,000 reward for information leading to a killer's arrest, police Lt. Tom Monahan joins family and friends of Gina Holliday, who was slain in 2001.
Photo by Clint Karlsen.
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Geneva Holliday wonders what it must be like to be a child and know that your mother will never come home again.
"Every day, that's Geneva's motivation," noted her mother, Cheryl, as her daughter addressed the media Monday morning. "That girl right there has some serious motivation. She's the Energizer Bunny, just keeps going, and going, and going."
Geneva Holliday, 25, is now raising two boys that she did not intend to raise. Edward, 4, and Xavier, 3, are her nephews.
Their mother, Gina Holliday, has been gone for more than two years. She was found dead in February 2001, her hands tied behind her back, in the desert.
Whoever killed the 20-year-old remains free, and Geneva wants to do something about that. She and a group of Gina's family and friends came together Monday on the steps of the Clark County Courthouse to announce a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the killer.
Las Vegas police Lt. Tom Monahan, commander of the homicide unit, came to lend his support.
"We're hoping that maybe somebody who knew something they thought was insignificant will see about the reward money, and maybe that will pique his interest," Monahan said.
He said the case, though it is still open, has gone cold. Only one phone tip has come to police in the 28 months since Gina Holliday's slaying, one of 138 in the department's jurisdiction in 2001.
"The only hope we have in solving cold cases is continuing to generate public interest in them," he said.
And that's where Gina's big sister Geneva comes in.
Geneva, who is raising her nephews in Atlanta, where she moved to attend college in 1995, flew into Las Vegas on Friday and is leaving today.
She and other family members and friends posted fliers noting the reward, along with Gina's picture, all over the area near where Gina's body was found, Sahara Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard.
They gathered the news media together on the courthouse steps and asked passersby for help.
"Geneva's definitely the driving force," said Bree Dolciame, a longtime friend of Gina's who attended Monday's news conference. "They're not going to stop until they find who did it."
Cheryl Holliday said the entire family has pledged to do whatever it takes to catch Gina's killer.
"We are all motivated because Gina's death was so senseless. The people that did this to my daughter have to be brought to justice. They left her out there like a dead dog, out in the desert."
She addressed Gina's killer, saying, "All I want is your freedom to be taken away. I don't even want the death penalty. I just want you locked up forever. I don't want anybody else's mother to have to cry and go through the heartache that I have gone through."
Geneva said she put her law school plans on hold to raise her nephews, who she said sometimes don't quite understand that they'll never see their mother again. She hopes that, one day, she can offer them an ending to the story of what happened to Gina.
She and family members who have been gathering donations for the reward fund got a $5,000 boost when the Carole Sund/Carrington Memorial Reward Foundation gave to the cause. The foundation was formed in the wake of three murders in Yosemite National Park in 1999.
"I feel it's my obligation to try to do this for my boys," Geneva said. "I stay awake at night sometimes just thinking about it."
