{"id":335492,"date":"2026-07-10T09:00:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T09:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/335492\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T09:00:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T09:00:17","slug":"70-year-old-man-accused-of-beating-mom-to-death-in-1987","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/335492\/","title":{"rendered":"70-year-old man accused of beating mom to death in 1987"},"content":{"rendered":"

A 70-year-old man has been arrested in the 39-year-old killing of Melissa Ellison in her Westside mobile home, Sheriff T.K Waters says.<\/p>\n

Gary Edward Glowacz was arrested after calling the Clay County Sheriff\u2019s Office on Wednesday and saying he wanted to provide information about Ellison\u2019s death, the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office said in a news release.<\/p>\n

Glowacz, a Clay County resident, was taken to Jacksonville, where detectives interviewed and arrested him. He was charged with murder and burglary with assault.<\/p>\n

Waters announced the arrest at a news conference Thursday as members of Ellison\u2019s family sat in the audience.<\/p>\n

Clubbed to death<\/p>\n

Ellison, 20, was clubbed to death in her bedroom. Her then-13-month-old daughter Casie was uninjured, police said<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s family joined First Coast Crime Stoppers<\/a> and police in January to push for new leads in the murder. That plea bore fruit, Cold Case Detective Ray Reeves said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is some information that did come (out) that played a pivotal role in this,\u201d Reeves said.<\/p>\n

First Coast Crime Stoppers<\/a> played a role, and \u201cbecause of that, we did gather some information,\u201d he said.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Sheriff T.K. Waters announces a cold case arrest on Thursday, July 9, 2026. He is joined by Cold Case Detective Ray Reeves, right; the leaders of Project: Cold Case; and First Coast Crime Stoppers, left. | News4Jax<\/p>\n

Ellison, known by many as Missy Taylor, married out of high school, then had Casie. Ellison and her husband separated, and she lived with Casie in a mobile home on Coljean Court off Normandy Boulevard, with two other roommates, according to Project: Cold Case<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Just before 5 a.m. Dec. 28, 1987, someone broke out a window to get in, then hit Ellison in the head with what police later said was a charred log from her fireplace.<\/p>\n

Ellison\u2019s roommates found her body in her bedroom. Casie had been moved out of the room to a couch in the living room, where she was found surrounded by pillows. The log was left at the front door, family members said.<\/p>\n

At the news conference in January, Casie Ellison asked the public for help. She said someone should know what happened to her mother.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was unarmed; she was not engaged in criminal activity; she posed no threat to anyone,\u201d Casie Ellison said then. \u201cNo one has been held accountable. That means someone has lived for 38 years knowing exactly what happened while our family has lived for 38 years without the truth. Someone knows who did this.\u201d<\/p>\n

The news conference included Project: Cold Case, an organization begun in 2015 to log and publicize Jacksonville\u2019s unsolved murders.<\/p>\n

Glowacz has an extensive arrest record from the 1980s and 1990s, including charges of burglary and grand theft, according to court records. He has listed addresses in Jacksonville and Middleburg.<\/p>\n

The Sheriff\u2019s Office provided no information about Glowacz\u2019s activities over the past 39 years. His arrest report was not available Thursday.<\/p>\n

Glowacz remains jailed without bail awaiting his first appearance before a judge on Friday, jail records show.<\/p>\n

During the news conference Thursday, Waters said the arrest illustrates his department\u2019s commitment to \u201cseek justice for victims no matter how long achieving that justice takes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese cases shatter the loved ones left behind, and they also weigh heavily on those of us charged with bringing these murderers to justice,\u201d the sheriff said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 70-year-old man has been arrested in the 39-year-old killing of Melissa Ellison in her Westside mobile home,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[265,6121,43323,116,118,117,1415,52066,115,10315],"class_list":["post-335492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-crime","tag-criminal-justice","tag-distribute","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-jacksonville-sheriffs-office","tag-jaxtdy3","tag-news","tag-westside"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}