Slain chief's wife: He put family first
When Saxonburg Police Chief Greg Adams was shot and killed in 1980, his wife was at home with the flu.
Mary Ann Jones, now 63, said in an interview that the borough secretary called her and told her Adams was shot. The secretary then came to pick Jones up and take her to the hospital.
When they arrived there, Jones was told that Adams had died.
Adams, 31, was killed Dec. 4 of that year making a traffic stop. He allegedly was shot twice and beaten by 52-year-old Donald Eugene Webb of Massachusetts. He died on the way to Butler Memorial Hospital.
Webb, who spent nearly 26 years on the FBI's most wanted list, never was found.
Jones, who married Adams in 1976 and had two sons with him, said she never thought something like this would happen to Adams as chief.
“Not in small town Saxonburg,” Jones, 63, said.
When Adams worked for a few years as a police officer in Washington D.C., she said she considered it might happen there.
Jones said she never was concerned about her safety with Webb still wandering freely, but said she would have liked for him to be caught so she could know exactly what took place.
“But it never happened,” Jones said.
After Adams was buried, Jones said going through life without her husband was hard. She mostly focused on work and raising her sons.
“I honestly don't remember the first year,” Jones said. “I don't remember 1981.”
At the time of Adams' death, their older son, Benjamin, was 2 years old and their younger son, Gregory, was 7 months old. Jones said Benjamin claims to have some memories of his father, but she is not sure how much he remembers.
She never really thought she would remarry, However, she met her current husband, James Jones, on a blind date through friends. They married in 1989.
In addition to her two sons, she has two stepsons and six grandchildren.Jones lives in Florida during the winter and in Penn Township the rest of the year.She remembered Adams as someone who put his family first. Even when he worked in Washington, he would regularly come home to visit family members.“Very family oriented,” Jones said.She also said he felt strongly about his job, and was loyal and motivated.Jones attended the memorial for Adams on Friday. She has gone to the memorials the borough has had in the past, and said it is nice when they occur.Jones said they can bring up some bad memories, but she also recalls the good ones.
