Who killed Albert Woolfolk? New leads uncovered in 2003 Columbus cold case
It was July 16, 2003, at a sports bar called Coach’s Corner that was — at that time — in the Gentian Corners shopping center.
Albert Carter Woolfolk left the bar with three unidentified men around midnight. It was the last time anyone reported seeing him alive.
Thirty-four hours passed before his mother and a worker for his aluminum siding company found the 45-year-old dead about 10:15 a.m. July 18 in his home at 2634 Habersham Avenue, off Macon Road north of Cross Country Plaza.
For 17 years the murder case has languished, frustrating Woolfolk’s family, particularly his brother Gene, who created a Facebook page devoted to solving the crime. Their mother Frances High Woolfolk, a longtime Muscogee County music teacher, died in 2011.
Now the longstanding cold case is reheating, as Columbus police say they have new leads that could identify the men with whom Woolfolk last was seen.
“There are some new things that have developed in this case – multiple things,” said Detective Stuart Carter, a semi-retired investigator now devoted to pursuing Columbus’ cold case murders.
Carter first was assigned to the Woolfolk case in 2016, when he still was working murder cases full time, but soon was diverted to help with more current homicide investigations.
“The priority always goes to the current cases, because you don’t want those to go cold,” he said in an interview Thursday.
He set the Woolfolk file aside in 2017, retired in 2019, and within weeks was back, working part-time on other duties. This past January, he again was assigned to homicides. “I was completely devoted to nothing but cold cases,” he said.
He already has one set to go to a grand jury for indictment, he said. The Woolfolk case is next in line, and this time, police are hopeful it can be cleared.
One man was ‘a heavy drinker’
Carter has found witnesses who well remember one of the three men who left Coach’s Corner with Woolfolk. The man was described as a heavy drinker and billiards player known to frequent Columbus bars and cause trouble, the detective said.
A character like that tends to draw notice and leave an impression, Carter said, though he acknowledged drunk troublemakers are not a rare breed: “You’re going to have drunks in bars, and drunks are going to start fights.”
But the folks who worked at Coach’s Corner still remember this one, so others who ran into him may as well, the detective said, “and they might have had a negative encounter with him.”
At the time he was described as 25 to 28 years old, 5-foot-10 to 6 feet tall with a medium build and clean shaven with “a possible military styled haircut.” Police call him “a heavy drinker with a violent temper who enjoyed playing pool.”
Besides Coach’s Corner, he was known to frequent a neighboring Gentian Corners bar called Red Rider, also a pool hall, and to hang out at Scooter’s, then a bar and restaurant on Sidney Simons Boulevard off Airport Thruway. Scooter’s was adjacent to a nightclub known as “Al Who’s.” Both are gone now.
Carter cautions that the haircut description doesn’t mean the man was a soldier. “No one’s come forward and said this guy’s actually in the military,” he said.
The man today would be in his 40s.
Witnesses unfamiliar with the other two men who left with Woolfolk did not find them as noticeable, so police have scant details on their appearance.
Both were described asin their early 20s. One was tall, about 6 foot 4 with an afro hairstyle, Carter said. The other was said to be shorter under 5 foot 10.
Carter said Woolfolk was driving a silver Jaguar convertible, and the others were in a brown sedan. He would not say whether any of the men were seen in Woolfolk’s car.
Was there a robbery and a murder?
Police believe Woolfolk was killed in his home within hours of leaving the bar, sometime in the early morning hours of July 17, 2003. Woolfolk was married with a newborn son, but his wife and child were not home.
Robbery is a possible motive, Carter said.
“Things were taken from the house,” although he would not specify what was stolen.
Carter also would not say how Woolfolk was killed, not wanting any suspect later identified to see that on the news.
But the Facebook page Woolfolk’s brother devoted to the homicide says the victim had “multiple stab wounds.”
Though the suspected timing of the slaying would indicate the men went straight to Woolfolk’s home from Coach’s Corner, Carter said he can’t be sure of that. They may have gone somewhere else before Woolfolk was killed.
“They were obviously socializing together at Coach’s Corner,” he said, so they could have made another stop.
If they did, others who’ve yet to come forward might have seen them.
“You know there are going to be witnesses out there who’ve never been interviewed,” the detective said. “Obviously this goes back to some new leads that have come up.”
Police now are urging anyone who from 2000 to 2004 might have encountered the aggressive pool player or his two companions to contact them immediately.
Carter can be reached at 706-225-4319 or stuartcarter@columbusga.org.
He’s now focused strictly on this homicide, he said:
“The good thing about coming back, working cold cases now is, I can devote all of my time to a specific case, and not have the distractions of having to juggle multiple cases at one time.”
This story was originally published September 18, 2020 at 5:55 AM.