Funeral is held for slain golf pro Gene Siller

By Ralph Ellis, CNN

Funeral services were held Monday morning for Gene Siller, the Atlanta-area golf pro who was fatally shot July 3, according his employer, Pinetree Country Club.

The funeral was closed to the media and details were unavailable. A celebration of life was scheduled for later Monday at the club. Siller, 46, had a wife and two children, 6 and 7.

The community has been mourning Siller, who was known as a man of compassion, said Rand Eberhard, a pastor who knew him.

“It’s a big void that is left in our community to lose such an important guy,” Eberhard told CNN.

Siller was killed when he went to investigate why somebody had driven a pickup truck onto the 10th green at Pinetree Country Club north of Atlanta, Cobb County police said.

Police have said investigators believe that Siller was killed only because he had witnessed a crime in progress.

Police have not said what the crime was, but the bodies of two bound and gagged men were found in the bed of the pickup. The suspect fled.

Bryan Anthony Rhoden was arrested Thursday afternoon in connection with the killings of the two men, Paul Pierson and Henry Valdez, as well as Siller.

Police have not given a motive for the killings. Pierson, 76, of Kansas, and Valdez, 46, of California, appeared “to have no relation to the location at all,” police said. Pierson was identified as the truck owner.

Rhoden was arrested in Chamblee, a town outside Atlanta, and “has ties to the metro Atlanta area,” Cobb County Police Chief Tim Cox said.

Rhoden’s initial court hearing was held Friday. Cobb County Magistrate Judge Donald Hicks set a bond hearing for July 27.

Rhoden was charged with three counts of murder, three counts of aggravated assault and two counts of kidnapping.

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Madeline Holcombe, Dakin Andone, Devon M. Sayers, Pamela Kirkland, Gregory Lemos and David Close contributed to this report.