Franklin cold case: Detectives renew plea for information in 1991 Hardee’s shooting

Franklin, Tenn. (WSMV) - More than 35 years after Peggy Cox was shot and killed at a Hardee’s drive-thru, Franklin police are again asking the public for information in what remains the city’s only unsolved homicide.

Cox, 49, was a widowed mother of three and an active church member. She was working the drive-thru at the Hardee’s on Murfreesboro Road on the night of Feb. 1, 1991 — her birthday — only because another employee had called out and she was filling in. Her son, a cook at the restaurant, was also working that night.

After 11 p.m., a man placed an order at the drive-thru. Moments later, two shots were fired. Police believe Cox was killed instantly. Her son was present at the restaurant at the time of the shooting.

Investigators have said they have never identified a motive and believe the killing was random.

Franklin Police Department Detective Matthew Thompson said the passage of time is now the investigation’s biggest obstacle.

“Eyewitness accounts change — memories change, memories come up and they fade away the more time you add in between, especially when you are looking at several decades,” Thompson said. “Those eyewitness accounts are becoming less and less.”

Thompson said he wants more than recollections.

“I want someone to come forward and provide actual evidence of what happened,” Thompson said. “I want the killer to come forward and tell me what happened.”

DNA testing was not widely used in 1991. The Hardee’s, which remains open at the same location, was one of the only businesses open at that hour along Interstate 65, meaning the suspect could have been traveling in any direction.

Franklin police and the FBI are offering rewards for information leading to the identification of Cox’s killer.