Person Of Interest In Brooke Henson Disappearance Found Dead
Shaun Shirley, the person of interest in the disappearance of Brooke Leigh Henson in 1999, was found dead in his residence on Dacusville Road in Marietta on Tuesday morning (October 1st).
Greenville County deputies responded to the Dacusville Road residence shortly after 5 a.m. in reference to an unresponsive male. Once on the scene deputies discovered the male found by a parent in the upstairs of the home. Deputies discovered the male was dead and there was no immediate indication of foul play involved in the death. The male has been identified as Shaun Shirley.
The manner and cause of death as well as the disappearance of Brooke Henson remains under investigation. by the sheriff's office and the Greenville County Sheriff's Office. An autopsy will be conducted but it could take as long as six weeks to determine the cause of Shirley's death.
On July 4th 1999, Henson left her home on Henderson Drive in Travelers Rest, in the wee hours of the morning, after telling her mother that she was going to walk to a store to buy cigarettes. She was never seen again. During the course of the investigation the Travelers Rest Police Department was informed that she had been seen at a bonfire party on Bald Rock in northern Greenville County, but investigators at that time could not confirm that information.
Shirley was the boyfriend of Henson and was at a party at the Henson home on July 3-4. He spent the night in the Henson girl's room and was reportedly asleep when she left the home walking to the store. A note was found in her room stating, "Gone walking, follow me if you care." At around 9 a.m a vehicle pulled up at the Henson home and someone picked Shirley up and drove away.
Travelers Rest police confirmed Shirley was interviewed by them in reference to the case several times. But, a former TRPD investigator said, "He would always lawyer up and we couldn't get anywhere with him." A few years ago TRPD announced they had turned the investigation over to the Greenville County Sheriff's Office and new information would be released soon - that information, whatever it was, never came out.