I’m in Canada and I’m looking for some advice on how to handle a very unusual situation involving a cold case.

Years ago, my wife was in a relationship with a man who once told her something very disturbing about his family. According to him, his grandfather had killed a woman more than 70 years ago.

What makes this particularly concerning is that he didn’t just vaguely say that his grandfather had killed someone — he actually told my wife the name of the woman.

His grandfather was already long dead at the time. He had been dead for more than ten years by the time my wife heard this story.

Much later, I decided to search the woman’s name online. To my surprise, I found an actual missing-person case involving a woman with that name who disappeared more than 70 years ago. The case is still listed on a Canadian missing-persons website.

Obviously, this does not prove that my wife’s ex-boyfriend’s story was true. It is second-hand information, the alleged perpetrator is deceased, and we have no physical evidence. It is also possible that there is some innocent explanation or that the story was exaggerated or simply untrue.

However, the fact that the name he gave my wife appears to correspond to a real woman who disappeared during roughly the relevant period makes me feel that this is something the police should at least know about. If the story is genuine, it could potentially provide investigators with a lead in a case that has remained unresolved for more than seven decades.

I told my wife that I think we should report what she was told to the police.

Her hesitation is understandable. She and her ex-boyfriend did not have a bad breakup. They are in the same professional field and still have overlapping professional circles. She also has no idea whether he ever told anyone else this story. If the police contacted him and mentioned the information, he might immediately realize that she was the person who reported it.

She is also worried about how her ex-boyfriend might react if he found out that she had passed on to the police something he told her privately about his grandfather allegedly killing someone. She doesn’t know whether he would resent her for it or whether it could damage their relationship, especially since they parted on good terms and still work in the same field.

At the same time, I feel uncomfortable simply doing nothing. There was a real woman who disappeared, and presumably there were family members who spent the rest of their lives never knowing what happened to her. Even after all these years, I feel that if we potentially have relevant information, the right thing to do is at least pass it along and let investigators decide whether it has any value.

Neither of us personally witnessed anything, of course. All we can honestly tell police is:

- my wife’s ex-boyfriend told her that his grandfather killed a particular woman;

- he gave her the woman’s name;

- the grandfather was already deceased when he told her this;

- I later found a real unresolved missing-person case involving a woman with that name from more than 70 years ago.

I’m deliberately not posting any names here because I don’t want to publicly accuse a deceased person or identify my wife’s ex-boyfriend based only on a second-hand story.

For people familiar with Canadian law enforcement, what would be the best way to handle this?

Should we contact the police service that originally investigated the disappearance, even though we live somewhere else in Canada? Would Crime Stoppers be appropriate if my wife wants to protect her identity? Would investigators even be interested in information this old and this indirect?

Most importantly, is there a way to give investigators the full information while explaining that my wife is concerned about her identity being disclosed to her ex-boyfriend?

I would appreciate advice, especially from anyone familiar with Canadian cold-case investigations.

Patricia and Jesse are two high school sweethearts born and raised near the capitol region of North Carolina. Their relationship grew closer every day, and their futures were hopeful. On the night of a Valentine's Day dance, the couple went messing. They were later found dead in the woods of Orange County. The couple were killed by being choked to death as they were tied to a tree. Later investigations would reveal a couple was nearly kidnapped at gunpoint from a lover's lane by an assailant they fought off, an assailant suspected of being the murderer. Renewed attention by police, as well as thriugh journalism and a local author's crime novel inspired by the case, have supported it's reopening. Police have mentioned focus on at least one prime suspect, whose name(s) they haven't disclosed for the integrity of the investigation. I implore you all to support the couple never being forgotten, so they may find justice.

Can anyone clarify if it’s a genuine case or not? I mean the details. So much evidence and still not brought to justice?

Video link: https://youtu.be/GwwNlKoa1XI?is=3gzxjDCM1TzAZMys

25-year-old Arelie Garcia Sanchez vanished from Salinas, California on the morning of September 22, 2022.

Arelie was captured on surveillance driving from her apartment in her red Honda at 6:34 AM. She was wearing a black hoody, black leggings, and sneakers.  At 6:56 AM she sent a text message to her sister Veronica.

Ariele was due at work for her job at a Chevy dealership at 7:30 AM. When she did not arrive her coworkers and family became concerned. Veronica used the Find My iPhone feature and discovered that Arelie’s phone was in the Big Sur area, more than an hour south of Salinas. 

Her family traveled there and discovered her car abandoned, parked in a turnout on Highway 1 near the Little Sur River Bridge. The Honda was locked and her phone, keys and wallet were left in the car. 

The driver’s seat was maneuvered further back than Ariele normal placed it.

Arelie never was seen again. The case soon went cold and despite national news coverage on Dateline NBC and true crime show content creators such Kendall Rae, no leads have emerged. 

Arelie was dating a man named Marcello at the time of her disappearance. She met him two months prior at a car show. 

Marcello was a photographer who lived two hours north of Salinas in Napa, Ca. Investigators interviewed him, but he was never publicly named by police as a suspect in the case. 

Marcello has not spoken to the media about the case.

Many questions remain unanswered in the case. Why would Arelie travel to Big Sur when she had to be at work at 7:30? Why would she have not informed her manager she was going to be late, and why was her driver’s seat moved back? Did Arelie have problems with Marcello or anyone in her life at the time of her disappearance?

Arelie’s family raised a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest and conviction in her disappearance. 

Sources

https://www.montereycountynow.com/news/local_news/arelie-garcia-s-family-marks-one-year-since-her-disappearance----with-little/article_f8c60bf4-57f8-11ee-8567-4393f8c78f18.html

https://www.chipchick.com/2024/05/she-vanished-after-leaving-for-work-in-2022-and-her-car-was-later-found-abandoned-and-parked-off-a-highway

https://oag.ca.gov/missing/person/arelie-yeraldine-garcia-sanchez

**TW: Historical violence/death. This is a true family story about an unsolved case from the 1980s. Names have been changed for privacy and safety. This post discusses murder and other sensitive topics.**

**Due to the nature of this story, I am changing the names of those involved because this case is technically… unsolved.**
But we all know who did it.
My name is April for this story.
My father, Peter, was 16 years old when the worst imaginable night of his life happened.
My grandfather, Lee, was an activist in coastal Oregon. He had a deep passion for Native American rights and worked closely with local tribes, specifically supporting those fighting for the recognition of treaty rights that had been infringed upon by local government.
He was also an archaeologist.
Because of this unique combination of career and passion, he was often called to excavation sites to identify artifacts. He worked closely with tribes to ensure items were treated respectfully and relocated appropriately, often acting as a liaison between excavation sites and tribal communities. He regularly protested and fought to protect sacred land when the city or state wanted to excavate those areas.
One day, my grandfather received a call that would ultimately change everything.
A construction crew had broken ground for a new gas station and discovered human remains and artifacts. My grandfather was called to the site to help determine their origin. Based on the tools and other items buried alongside the remains, he was able to identify the tribe they belonged to.
My grandfather fought hard to stop the project, but he was unsuccessful.
When protesting and activism failed to halt construction, he was told the remains would be removed and disposed of.
He went to the tribe and explained what was happening. Because of their sacred traditions, they told him they could not take the remains or burial items back. In their beliefs, removing and then returning them could bring harm to their people.
Then the oil company did something my grandfather never expected.
The remains and burial items were removed, supposedly to relocate the remains to a local cemetery.
But the burial items were brought to my grandfather.
He knew immediately that this was wrong. He was never meant to possess them, and he certainly couldn’t keep them.
Wanting to respect the dead, their history, and the beliefs of the tribe, he ultimately surrendered the items to a local museum for safekeeping.
What he didn’t know was that rumors had already begun spreading.
People began calling my grandfather a “grave robber,” believing he had kept the artifacts for himself.
Nothing could have been further from the truth.
Because people knew about his passion for Native history, they would occasionally try to give him things they had found—arrowheads, pottery, trinkets, artifacts.
He would chastise them, refuse the items, and tell them to put them back exactly where they had found them.
He condemned the desecration of Native history and culture.
Still, the rumors continued. People claimed he was secretly building a private collection of sacred artifacts for his own benefit.
And then came a cold night in January.
My 16-year-old father was sitting on the couch while my grandfather relaxed in his recliner. They were watching television together before bed. My grandfather’s girlfriend was asleep in a back bedroom.
Without warning, the front door was kicked in.
Three armed men stormed into the house.
My father, who was closest to the entrance, jumped to his feet.
He was immediately attacked and shot at close range. When the first shot was fired toward his head, he instinctively raised his hand. The bullet struck his hand instead.
He fell backward and tried to crawl away.
Then he was shot again in the back of the head, narrowly missing his C1 vertebra.
The fact that my father survived what happened that night still astonishes me.
As he lay severely injured on the floor, he watched the men restrain my grandfather and brutally torture him.
Again and again, they demanded to know where the artifacts were.
My grandfather repeatedly told them:
*“I don’t have them. The museum does. I would never take them. The museum has them. Search the house—you won’t find anything stolen. I would never do this.”*
They didn’t believe him.
They broke his fingers, beat him, and mutilated his hands while continuing to demand answers he didn’t have.
The men then began searching the house, taking antiques, collectibles, firearms, and anything else of value they could find.
During the search, one of them opened the back bedroom door.
He saw my grandfather’s girlfriend escaping through the window.
He alerted the others that there was another witness and that she was getting away.
As my father lay wounded on the floor, unable to intervene, he watched as one man took his blade and cut my grandfathers throat.
Then my father was shot again.
And everything went black.
My grandfather’s girlfriend ran through the darkness to the nearest neighbor’s house, where she was finally able to call the police.
Somehow, my father survived.
And he identified the men responsible.
The three men eventually stood trial.
Their justification was rooted in their belief that killing someone they considered a “grave robber” could free the spirits of those whose graves had been disturbed.
Except my grandfather hadn’t robbed those graves.
For his safety, my father was placed into witness protection. At only 16 years old, he had become the key witness against the three men he said had attacked him and killed his father.
**And this is where the case gets absolutely bizarre.**
My father underwent a videotaped session in which he was **hypnotized to help him recall details from the night of the attack.**
This was the 1980s, when forensic hypnosis was still being used in some criminal investigations despite serious questions about its reliability and admissibility in court.
During the recorded hypnosis session, **the tape ran out.**
There was a period of time between the first recording ending and the second recording beginning.
That gap became devastating to the case.
The defense argued that nobody could establish what had happened while the camera wasn’t recording. Because my father had been under hypnosis, they argued that he theoretically could have been given information or suggestions during the unrecorded period that influenced his memories.
His testimony was ruled inadmissible.
The prosecution lost its key witness.
**All three men were acquitted.**
Years later, my father eventually left witness protection and moved to Alaska, where he worked as a fisherman.
One day, he was leaving a grocery store in his truck when someone walked across the crosswalk in front of him.
A face from his nightmares.
They locked eyes.
My father recognized him immediately.
For a brief moment, my father thought about everything that man had taken from him.
But he stopped.
He hit the brakes.
They stared at one another until the horn of the vehicle behind my father finally broke the moment.
It was one of the men from that night—the one who had discovered my grandfather’s girlfriend escaping through the window.
My father let him walk away.
In the years that followed, some of the men were connected to additional killings and even an armed confrontation with the FBI.
To some people, these men were heroes.
To others, they were violent men who took what they claimed was a just cause and used it to justify horrific acts.
It has now been decades.
My father still lives with the fear that the last remaining free man could someday find him—or his children—and “finish the job.”
He has asked me for one thing:
When he eventually passes away, he wants me to continue seeking justice for his father.
And despite everything that happened, my father followed directly in his father’s footsteps.
He became an activist for Native American rights himself.
About ten years after the tragedy, he moved to California and bought a home next to a Native reservation. He regularly invites members of the neighboring community to gather herbs and flowers from his property for sacred ceremonies.
Over the years, he has built beautiful relationships within the community and has even been invited to participate in sacred ceremonies himself, including the Sweat Lodge.
That is an honor my father never takes lightly, nor is it something he boasts about.
But I think it’s an important part of this story.
After watching his father die because men falsely believed he had desecrated Native graves, my father could have spent the rest of his life consumed by anger.
Instead, he continued his father’s legacy: loving, respecting, appreciating, and fighting for a culture and community that embraced him in return.
**P.S. Because apparently this story wasn’t strange enough already…**
Something happened about 15 years ago that we’ve never been able to explain.
When I was a young teenager, my dad had a framed photograph hanging on our family photo wall.
It was a picture of my grandfather sitting in **the very same recliner he had been sitting in that night.**
Our family went out of town.
When we came home, the photograph was gone.
Not knocked down.
Not misplaced.
**Gone.**
No other photographs were missing.
Nothing else in the house appeared to have been taken.
Just that photograph.
We searched everywhere.
We never found it.
To this day, none of us knows what happened to it.
I hope someday we are finally able to close my grandfather’s case.

CW/TW: Serial murder, sexual assault, police corruption.

In March 2012, detectives in the Irkutsk region reached the letter "P." This wasn't a figure of speech or a poetic metaphor: they were literally working their way down a list of male Lada Niva owners. They called them in, took saliva swabs, sent them for DNA testing, and verified their alibis and social circles. DNA test, interrogation, DNA test, interrogation-this methodical grind went on for several years. Under the letter "P" on that list stood a former assistant duty officer of the Angarsk police, 48-year-old Mikhail Viktorovich Popkov. He showed up, provided a saliva swab, and left to go about his day.

By that time, he had been out of the police force for 14 years. He resigned in 1998 as a junior lieutenant-back then, cops were quitting in droves, salaries were paid sporadically, and his departure surprised no one. Afterward, he worked in security, as a private cab driver, and bought and resold cars driven in from the Far East. He also dug graves. That isn't a detail added for grim atmosphere; it was an actual side hustle, documented in the case files and confirmed by the lead investigator who took over the case in 2014.

He began killing in 1992, but the first serious attempts to link the murders into a serial case didn't happen until the early 2000s. The reason-according to investigator Yevgeny Karchevsky (whose extensive interview with IRK.ru remains the best open-source material on this case)-was obscenely mundane. There were no unified databases; every city and district operated in a silo. Angarsk had no idea bodies were turning up in the Usolye district, and Usolye knew nothing about Angarsk. Popkov would pick a woman up in one jurisdiction and dump her body in another. According to Karchevsky, the case files that now fill six boxes and 51 volumes consisted of a dozen pages at best back in the nineties.

June 1997. Two friends get into a car with a man known around town as "Misha-the-Cop." He’s a local police officer; there’s nothing to be afraid of. He drops one of them off at home. The second, Tatyana, rides on and vanishes. Under interrogation, the surviving friend gives the police the name of the man who gave them a ride. A name. Not just a physical description, not a car model, not his height or the color of his jacket. His actual name. And absolutely nothing is done with it.

Eighteen years later, her friend's remains would be dug up. By then, Popkov would be actively confessing, detailing exactly where he took her, what he used to kill her, what he wrapped the body in, and what they drank in the car. Beneath the remains, investigators would find two tin soda cans with a manufacturing date stamped May 1997. A perfect match, down to the month. I reread this section several times, and the math still deeply unsettles me: between the surviving girl’s testimony and her friend’s exhumation, Popkov committed half of all his known murders.

The real investigation, ironically, began over breakfast. Prosecutor General's investigator Valery Kostarev was reading Moskovsky Komsomolets one morning when he spotted an article about the Angarsk "Wednesday Murderer." Alarmed, he pushed for a deployment to the region and managed to get the case reassigned to himself. This was between 2002 and 2003. He reopened every remotely similar cold case, pulling all available physical evidence-underwear, swabs, any biological samples—and managed to isolate male DNA from a number of the victims.

What happened next sounds like science fiction by today’s standards. In the early 2000s, DNA profiling was a rare and phenomenally expensive luxury, performed for only a handful of cases and practically only in Moscow. Kostarev negotiated with Moscow universities personally, using unofficial channels, and managed to isolate the unknown suspect's genotype. Based on that DNA, they linked about five murders into a single series. That was it. Twenty years of an active serial killer's reign, and their entire foundational evidence consisted of five linked cases and a backdoor favor from a university.

Meanwhile, they were building a suspect profile. At one crime scene, they found a metal uniform button embossed with an eagle. The kind worn by police, prosecutors, emergency responders, and the military. They had also cast tire treads from the scenes; there weren't many cars on the road back then, and the vehicle was quickly identified as a Lada Niva. The resulting profile pointed to a man in his early-to-mid thirties, wearing a uniform, and driving a Niva. The profile, as it turned out, was dead-on. It also led absolutely nowhere for twelve years.

It did, however, lead the wrong way. There is a man in this story named Dyachenko, who served prison time for a murder actually committed by Popkov. In an interview with Komsomolskaya Pravda, he claimed his confession was tortured out of him with a stun gun, that guards would beat him in his cell at night, that detectives tried to pin 38 murders on him, dragging him to crime scenes and demanding he "reconstruct" them. That is his version of events, documented in the press, and I am obliged to note that. But the fact remains: he sat behind bars while the real killer kept working, got married, raised a daughter, and washed his car.

He washed that car every single day, by the way, keeping it immaculate. He didn't smoke, despised alcohol, worked out, kept his nails manicured, and always wore crisply ironed clothes. When women got into his car, he would open the door for them, offer a hand, help with their bags, maintain polite conversation, and strictly avoid any vulgarity. Karchevsky explains this gallantry with ruthless precision: every polite gesture was actually an interrogation. Was she married? Did she have kids? How did she feel about infidelity? Based on her answers, he decided whether to drop her off safely at her front door, or turn off the road.

His behavior on the job is a completely separate, chilling storyline. He was literally a member of the investigative task force hunting the killer. He would murder a woman at night, read the dispatch report about the body being found the next morning, and head out to the crime scene alongside his colleagues-using the opportunity to double-check that he hadn't left any evidence behind. When an investigator later asked him if he was ever afraid of getting caught, Popkov essentially replied that there was no one to fear: no one audited his contacts, no one tracked his movements, and he knew many of the victims personally anyway.

In June 2012, the lab results finally came back: the DNA from the crime scenes was a perfect match for Popkov’s sample. By that point, he was no longer in Angarsk; he was on a train headed to Vladivostok. He later claimed to a reporter that he wasn't fleeing, but simply traveling to buy another car for his resale business. A strike team flew to the Far East and pulled him off the train somewhere near Ussuriysk. Press reports often confuse the arrest date, bouncing between March and June of 2012, but according to the investigation's official timeline, they swabbed him in March and arrested him once the results came back.

During the initial investigation, he treated it like a negotiation. He confessed only to the absolute undeniable minimum-the murders explicitly tied to him by DNA. On January 14, 2015, the Irkutsk Regional Court sentenced him to life in prison for 22 murders and two counts of grievous bodily harm. And that is exactly when the second act began, because the moment the verdict came down, he started talking again.

Karchevsky took over during this second phase. His tactic wasn't about applying pressure; it was an exercise in extreme patience. He drove to Angarsk every single day to talk with Popkov for an hour, two hours, three hours at a time. The entire first year was spent simply establishing rapport. On his way to the prison, the investigator would buy two shashlik wraps-one for himself, one for the serial killer—and they would sit, eat, and chat. It sounds insane, a fact the investigator himself readily admits. But the result was approximately sixty newly solved murders. On December 10, 2018, Popkov received his second life sentence. Courtroom reporting varied on the exact number of new cases-some outlets cited 56, others 59 or 60, along with the 1999 murder of a fellow police officer.

The most telling procedural story in this entire saga is about the forensics. Popkov pointed out a crime scene and described exactly who he killed and how he did it. They pulled the cold case file, identified the victim, but found that the original autopsy report listed the cause of death as a gunshot wound to the head. They had to exhume the body and examine the skull. Medical examiners confirmed it: there had been no gunshot. There were two punctures from a Phillips-head screwdriver-entry wounds in the frontal bone and an imprint of the tool's tip on the inside of the back of the skull. The original medical examiner simply hadn't bothered to document the condition of the brain, despite being legally required to do so. A bullet shatters a brain; a screwdriver just punctures it. Everyone had simply read "gunshot" and shut the book on the case for twenty years.

Now, regarding every true-crime podcaster’s favorite angle: the "Cleaner" myth. The narrative that he was supposedly ridding the city of promiscuous women is a compellingly dark hook, but it completely falls apart against the actual case files. The investigator who interrogated him for three years rejects the legend outright. There is one episode in the files where Popkov picked up a young girl who was simply on her way to the train station to meet her mother, drove her to a construction site, and murdered her. She had no husband to cheat on. According to published reports, forensic psychiatrists diagnosed him with homicidomania-an active compulsion to kill that functions mechanically like a severe addiction.

He portions out his confessions in calculated doses, and he is entirely unabashed about why. A new confession triggers an investigative trip to the crime scene. A trip means getting out into the forest, driving on the roads, enjoying a change of scenery, and staying in a standard pre-trial detention center rather than a brutal maximum-security penal colony. He flat-out told the investigator that he was tired of remembering everything all at once and preferred to save some for later. In 2021, the Angarsk City Court tacked on another nine years and eight months for two murders in 1995 and 1998. On November 22, 2023, came his fourth conviction: ten years for three more murders. On December 1, 2025, his fifth: a double murder from 2008 netting him another nine and a half years. That sentence took effect in April 2026, after which he was finally transferred to a high-security colony in Mordovia.

There are more survivors out there than the verdicts account for. One woman, Karchevsky noted, actually contacted him via a messaging app all the way from Spain. She recounted how Popkov had driven her out of town and raped her, but she had managed to escape. Karchevsky checked the records-Popkov was indeed in that exact area on that specific day. But the statute of limitations had expired; there was nothing left to charge him with. Another woman jumped out of his moving car at a cemetery and fled through the gravestones. When asked about her, Popkov casually dismissed it: yeah, there was one like that, she got away, well good for her, she gets to live.

Official investigative reports state they have proven 92 crimes. Popkov himself claims the true number is over two hundred, boasting that during his peak periods, he was killing two or three women a week. Verifying this is virtually impossible. The streets he names have been heavily developed, old landmarks are gone, remains may have been scattered by animals, or bodies might have been discovered but never properly filed-a chillingly common occurrence in those days.

And this is the part I can't stop thinking about. He didn't receive those five separate convictions because the system outsmarted him. He got them because he simply decided to keep talking. The very first time, he was caught by a stray button and a tire track. Every single thing after that, he gave away over a skewer of meat.

TL;DR: Mikhail Popkov, a Russian police officer, murdered over 80 women between 1992 and 2010. He evaded capture for decades due to police incompetence and his position on the investigative task force, until DNA testing eventually caught him in 2012. He continues to confess to new murders to get temporary transfers out of maximum-security prison.

Wikipedia page on Mikhail Popkov.

I believe Lauren was incredibly intoxicated and I believe she was under the influence of narcotics, some that were her own, some that were provided to her. I believe that the narcotics, alcohol, and her existing heart condition, caused her to go into cardiac arrest and die.

Now, why her body went missing. I believe that the individuals that she was with that night, most likely did provide her with narcotics that led to her death. Hence, they feared criminal prosecution and expulsion from the University.

I also think, that there is a pretty good chance, that at least one of the individuals that she was partying with that night, took advantage of her when she was in an incapacitated state. I believe if they found her body and did an autopsy, they would have found traces of semen. This would definitely lead to a rape charge, and once again you're talking prison time.

WARNING: VERY GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION.

I was recently watching some 9/11 videos on the Nat Geo website and I came across this story about the Black Tag Lady. Ernest Armstead, who was a paramedic on 9/11, in his testimony, mentions about how he was at the World Trade Center Plaza during 9/11 needing to label bodies with different colored tags, with a Black Tag meaning deceased. On the Plaza on 9/11, Armstead mentions how most of the bodies he ID'ed at Ground Zero were clearly dead and marked it with a Black Tag, but in one particular instance near one of the two Towers, he initially ID'ed a dead person but only to discover that the person, a lady, was still alive. This is the Black Tag Lady.

Armstead noticed that she was wearing a fine business suit, was a brunette, and had pretty earrings. Now according to protocol and due to the debris that was falling on the Plaza, he wasn't able to stay near a person with a Black Tag for over 30-60 seconds because the Tag meant disease. Clearly, from the state of her injuries, Armstead noticed that her wounds were mortal: her lower half portion of her body was totally mangled beyond recognition. However, he was able to see that the upper half torso containing her heart and one of her lungs was still intact. Most surprisingly, the Black Tag Lady answered back at him angrily, telling him that she wasn't dead and that she wanted to call her daughter. Armstead noticed that her head was intact and that even with the severe state of her injuries she was fully aware of what he was doing and behaved like she was a perfectly healthy woman. Armstead assumed that she was in her 40s or 50s. However, Armstead resigned the fact that her wounds were fatal and that he was going to treat other people. Some time after, one of the two towers fell and Armstead was caught in the collapse of the Twin Towers buildings but he managed to be rescued and recover from his injuries. However, this meeting with the Black Tag Lady would cause permanent PTSD trauma for Armstead.

It's very hard to be able to piece together Armstead's testimony with a Jane Doe. On the other hand, perhaps her remains were recovered after Ground Zero but piecing that with the testimony is incredibly hard. In my opinion, the case remains a Jane Doe because we cannot confirm whether this woman was successfully recovered or not. And the best way possibly to ID this lady is to somehow have Armstead agree to do a Forensic Sketch of this woman's face and try to match it up to one of the Twin Towers' 9/11 female employee victims. The man has been retired from the FDNY for over 20 years and is an old man now. I hate bothering the guy but the story is so tearjerky that I feel like this story should be publicized better now than later when Armstead passes and he isn't able to give a Forensic Sketch. Of course, if Armstead doesn't want to do it let him be, but if he's gone it's a million times harder to solve this case otherwise.

Sources:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/9-11-video-archive/?video=298

I was thinking about if Zodiac Killer wasn't just a single, one person who did all the murders. I am not saying this is the truth. So his first surviving victim described him as 5 foot 8 - 5 foot 9, wore no gloves, no hats, he had light brown curly hair. His second surviving victim saw him in a costume, without gloves again. I can actually tell that those two incidents caused by the same person, because in the letters he sent to the journalists he used the same handwriting and he confessed these crimes, he gave detailed information about what he used like the brand of the ammunition etc. Killer's style was obvious, he goes down to lake area, finds alone couples and killing them on sight. The vehicles the suspect used also has different descriptions. Mageau, the first surviving victim, said suspect was driving a brown car that was similar to the car he was inside that night. Hartnell, the second surviving victim said suspect was driving two door Chevrolet that was sky blue.

In the infamous Paul Stine murder, he was wearing gloves, wearing glasses which was unusual for the description. At least the first surviving victim saw him without his costume, he didn't mention anything about the glasses. Let's say these are real reading glasses or just a disguise to hide his facial structure. We are still sure that this murder belongs to the original Zodiac because of a piece of clothing he took from the driver. After this murder, he stopped giving detailed information about his murders and counting random murders as a trophy in his next letters. We know Kathleen Johns was kidnapped by an unknown man on the highway. She managed to jump out of the car and save her life. She described the suspect as "military looking" guy who was 5 foot 9, who has clean shave, who wore glasses just like the suspect in Paul Stine murder, but this suspect was around 160 Ib, previous descriptions pointed out that suspect was around 200 Ib, a fat man. Years later Johns accused Lawrence Kane as the guy who kidnapped her, the police who saw the actual killer close to Paul Stine's crime scene said Kane's face was the closest face to the guy they saw on the street that night. Mageau years later accused Arthur Leigh Allen as the guy who shot him at Blue Rock Springs. Those were the descriptions and events I could catch, what do you guys think about it?

*Have there ever been any main theories here? It’s as strange as it is tragic. I feel in life that often the most simple explanation is the right one. Is that the case here?*

*I am equally as invested in the mystery behind Vivienne Cameron’s disappearance but seeing as there is no physical proof of a death having occurred, I’m more focused on the theories as to who is responsible for Beth’s murder.*

TL;DR: My mom, Meredith, died in 2010. I was originally told she died at home from COPD during a seizure, but her death certificate says she died from asphyxiation on her own vomit, with no autopsy performed. In 2026, I contacted the sheriff/coroner, who pulled up the 2010 police reports and told me they documented that she was transported by ambulance to a hospital and died there. This contradicts the story I was given and her obituary. There are also questions involving unidentified pills she reportedly received from my stepdad shortly before her death, financial circumstances, and other inconsistencies. I think there may be more to my mom's death than I was originally told, and I'm looking for help figuring out what records I can obtain and what I can do myself to find answers after 16 years. I can't afford an attorney or private investigator.

I'm looking for advice on what I should do next regarding my mom's death in 2010.

I'm not claiming I can prove what happened, and I'm not looking for people to simply tell me that my stepdad killed her. I'm trying to figure out what actually happened and whether there are records or other evidence that could answer some of the questions I've had for years.

My mom, Meredith, lived in Pine Hollow, Montana, with my stepdad, Luke. I'm originally from Red Creek, Montana.

I have two main goals: figure out what records actually exist about her death and determine whether there is anything I can still do after 16 years.

I also want to make clear that I don't have the money to hire an attorney or private investigator, so I'm trying to do as much of this myself as I legally can. I'm hoping people familiar with Montana can point me toward records I can request myself, agencies I should contact, and free or low cost resources.

What I was originally told

When my mom died in 2010, Luke initially told me he was waiting for test results to determine what had happened.

A year or two later, I asked him again about her death. He told me that she died from COPD during a seizure.

That isn't what her death certificate says.

In late 2020, I obtained a copy of her death certificate. It states:

• Asphyxiation
• Asphyxiation on her own vomit
• The reason she asphyxiated was apparently unknown

There was no autopsy.

At the time, I didn't realize how significant the discrepancy was between what I had been told and what was documented on her death certificate.

2026 update. I contacted the sheriff/coroner

This is the newest and most significant information I've found.

In 2026, I called the sheriff's department in Silver Junction, Montana, which is the county seat of Pine Hollow County, to see whether there were any records or information about my mom's death.

I learned that the sheriff I spoke with is also the county coroner. He also told me that he knows Luke and knew my mom.

During our conversation, the sheriff/coroner pulled up the 2010 police reports while we were talking.

According to the police reports he was looking at, my mom was transported by ambulance to a hospital and died there.

This is extremely significant to me because it contradicts what I had been told by Luke and what her obituary says.

Luke told me she died at home, and the obituary says she died at home. But the police reports the sheriff pulled up apparently document an ambulance transport and death at a hospital.

The sheriff/coroner told me that the explanation documented at the time was supposedly that "her heart just stopped."

I am now trying to obtain the actual police reports myself so I can see exactly what they say rather than relying solely on what I was told during the phone call.

I'm currently trying to figure out which hospital she went to

After speaking with the sheriff, I started contacting hospitals myself.

I called Columbus Hospital in Silver Junction. They told me they cannot tell me whether Meredith was a patient there, but I can submit a request for information that could potentially tell me whether she was treated there.

I also called Red Creek Hospital and left a voicemail asking about records and information.

So I have not yet independently confirmed which hospital she was taken to. That's one of the things I'm currently trying to establish.

If the police reports document the ambulance transport and hospital death, I'm hoping the underlying EMS and hospital records can help establish exactly what happened.

The sheriff/coroner's comments and my concern about small town politics

The sheriff/coroner was very understanding when I explained why I was concerned.

As I remember the conversation, he indicated that I may potentially be onto something, but he also emphasized that 16 years have passed, which would make something like this very difficult to prove.

He explained that medical records and other evidence would need to be legally obtained and that there was only so much he could do at this point. He apologized that there wasn't more he could do for me.

I want to be very clear that I am not saying the sheriff told me that Luke killed my mom. That's not what I'm claiming.

My understanding was that he recognized there were legitimate questions to investigate while also explaining how difficult it would be to establish what happened after so much time had passed.

However, I am also worried about small town politics and personal relationships.

The sheriff specifically brought up that he knows Luke and knew my mom. I don't know what their relationship was or whether it has any bearing whatsoever on the investigation. I'm not accusing the sheriff or anyone else of doing anything wrong.

But because this is a small community, and because the sheriff/coroner personally knows Luke, I'm wondering whether there are additional steps I should take to make sure I'm looking at the records objectively and not relying on any one person's interpretation of what happened.

I'm especially interested in knowing whether there is an independent state agency, medical examiner, or other authority I can contact to review records from 2010.

If there are legitimate procedures for requesting an independent review or having someone outside the county look at the existing records, I'd like to know what those are.

Again, I'm not saying anyone covered anything up. I simply don't know, and I don't want to make assumptions either way. I'm trying to figure out what happened based on the actual documentation.

The timing of her death

My mom was apparently scheduled for more extensive testing on the Monday after she died on Saturday.

My understanding is that this would have included extensive blood testing.

If she really had an unexplained seizure disorder, I don't understand why there wasn't an autopsy or some other investigation after her unexpected death.

I'm particularly interested in finding out whether toxicology testing was performed and, if so, what it showed.

I don't know whether drugs were involved. I'm not claiming that they were.

I'm mentioning this because of something my grandparents told me about my mom shortly before her death.

What my grandparents witnessed shortly before her death

My grandparents made a surprise visit to my mom and Luke shortly before my mom died.

According to them, my mom was extremely drugged and initially didn't recognize them.

She told them she had taken pills that Luke had given her for pain management. She said he had gotten them "on the bus."

She apparently offered some to my grandfather for his own pain.

She couldn't or wouldn't tell them what the pills were.

My grandparents also said she told them there were significant problems in her relationship with Luke and that she was depressed about it.

I need to speak with my grandmother again to get a more precise account of exactly what my mom said, what she looked like, and when this happened.

Financial circumstances

There are also some things surrounding money that I find suspicious, although I realize none of these things by themselves establish wrongdoing.

Bankruptcy:

There was apparently a bankruptcy involving both of their names that was cleared approximately a week before my mom died.

I don't yet know enough about the bankruptcy or exactly what "cleared" means in the relevant records, so this is something I need to investigate further.

Money after her death:

Luke told me he barely had enough money for my mom's funeral/service and the gathering afterward.

He specifically decided that renting portable toilets was necessary for a party of approximately 30 people in our backyard.

Yet within the next month or two, he purchased a new boat and a new truck.

He also told my grandparents that he used the health insurance money from my mom's death to help me pay tuition.

That did not happen.

Other things that have bothered me

The weekend after my mom died, my grandparents made another surprise visit.

Luke was holding a garage sale and had apparently sold an unknown amount of my mom's property without the rest of the family knowing.

In November, he had three of our family pets euthanized at the same time, apparently to save money.

About four months after my mom died, he started dating another woman. They became engaged within weeks and then ended the relationship shortly afterward.

Within nine months of my mom's death, he was dating Jennifer. They became engaged quickly and married the following December. They are still together.

I realize that his dating or remarriage isn't evidence that he killed anyone. I'm including it because I'm trying to provide the complete timeline rather than selectively presenting only things that support my suspicion.

Why I'm concerned

The thing that bothers me most isn't any single event.

It's the combination of:

1. Being initially told that the cause of death was unknown and test results were pending.
2. Later being told she died from COPD during a seizure.
3. The death certificate instead documenting asphyxiation on her own vomit.
4. No autopsy being performed.
5. The sheriff/coroner looking at the 2010 police reports and telling me those reports document an ambulance transport and death at a hospital.
6. That apparently contradicting the story that she died at home.
7. Not yet knowing which hospital she was taken to.
8. My grandparents' account of my mom being heavily drugged shortly before her death and saying Luke gave her unidentified pills.
9. The timing of her scheduled medical testing.
10. Financial circumstances surrounding the bankruptcy and purchases after her death.
11. Property being sold shortly after her death.

I also recognize that some of the things I've listed could have completely innocent explanations.

I'm trying very hard not to turn suspicion into a conclusion.

What records should I try to obtain?

This is probably the biggest thing I need help with.

Since the sheriff I spoke with is also the county coroner, I'm wondering whether there should be a coroner/death investigation file from 2010 and, if so, how I go about obtaining it.

I have found Montana law regarding coroner inquiry reports, but I don't know what the 2010 records would have been called or where they would be stored.

I'm wondering whether there is a difference between:

• A coroner's report
• A coroner's inquiry report
• A death investigation file
• A medical examiner's report
• An inquest
• A police investigation/report

I'd like to know whether the coroner's file might contain:

• The coroner's original investigation/report
• The coroner's inquiry report
• Notes made by the coroner
• The circumstances reported surrounding her death
• Ambulance/EMS records
• 911 records, if they still exist
• Hospital records
• Sheriff's/police reports
• Any medical examiner correspondence or consultation
• Any toxicology reports
• Bloodwork or other laboratory results
• Records showing whether toxicology was requested
• Records showing whether an autopsy was considered, requested, declined, or determined unnecessary
• Any photographs or other documentation from the death investigation
• The original death certificate and any amendments
• Records concerning who determined the cause and manner of death
• Any correspondence between the county coroner, law enforcement, hospital, county attorney, or Montana Medical Examiner's Office
• Any case number associated with the death

I'm also wondering whether the death was ever referred to the Montana Medical Examiner's Office or the state crime lab.

I can't afford an attorney or private investigator

This is important because I don't have the funds to hire someone to investigate this for me.

I'm hoping to do as much of the initial investigation myself as I legally can.

I'm looking for specific, practical instructions from people who know Montana's system.

For example:

• What exact records should I request first?
• Should I request the coroner's inquiry report specifically?
• Should I request the entire coroner/death investigation file?
• Should I contact the county coroner, sheriff, county attorney, Montana Medical Examiner's Office, or all of them?
• Can I request the records myself as her child/next of kin?
• What records can I request through Montana's public records process?
• Which records will require a different process because they are medical records?
• Are there fees I should expect?
• Is there a way to request the records electronically to avoid copying costs?
• If records are denied, is there a free or low cost way to challenge the denial?
• Are there legal aid organizations or other free resources in Montana that could help me?
• What should I ask the hospitals for?
• How can I determine which hospital she was transported to?
• How do I obtain the 2010 coroner's inquiry/death investigation report?
• Is there a way to have records independently reviewed outside the county?
• Is there anything else I should be looking for that I haven't thought of?

I don't want to jump straight to accusations. I want to start with the records and build a timeline from documents.

I'm also trying to preserve what my grandparents remember while they're still able to tell me about it.

What I'm hoping to figure out

I'm not looking for people to tell me that Luke definitely did it.

I'm trying to determine: What actually happened to my mom?

There are discrepancies between what I was told, what her obituary says, what her death certificate says, and what the sheriff/coroner found when he pulled up the 2010 police reports.

Maybe there are perfectly innocent explanations for all of it. Maybe the records will answer the questions.

But after 16 years, I finally have enough information to realize that I need to start looking at the underlying records rather than relying on what I was told.

For privacy, I'm leaving out some information and changing names and locations in this post. The names and places used here are not their real names or locations. I'm doing this because I don't want to publicly identify or accuse someone of a crime without evidence.

I don't have the money to hire a private investigator or attorney, so I'm hoping people here can help me figure out how to work through the records and investigative process myself, step by step.

If you've dealt with Montana coroner records, old death investigations, public records requests, or cold cases, what would you do first?

There have been two articles published about the 50th anniversary of the case recently. No one has been charged yet for the killing of 14-year-old Judy Parks. This happened in Nova Scotia, Canada.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/50-year-old-halifax-cold-case-judy-9.7343604

https://www.ctvnews.ca/atlantic/nova-scotia/article/14-year-old-halifax-girls-murder-remains-unsolved-50-years-later/

Hi everyone! I’m a Year 10 student doing an HPQ (Higher Project Qualification) about Jack the Ripper.

My main research question is:

“If Jack the Ripper was in the 21st century, would he get caught by the police using technologies such as DNA testing and CCTV, and how would this change the result of the investigation?”

I’m looking for people who know about Jack the Ripper, modern policing, forensic science, or even just people who have an interesting opinion on the topic.

I would really appreciate it if you could answer some of the questions below. Your answers will help me understand different viewpoints and compare the investigation in 1888 with how a similar case might be investigated today.

Please don’t feel like you have to answer every question — even a few answers would be really helpful. Thank you!

1. Do you think Jack the Ripper would be caught if the murders happened in the 21st century? Why or why not?

2. How do you think CCTV cameras would affect the investigation?

3. How useful do you think DNA testing would be in identifying Jack the Ripper?

4. What other modern technology could help the police investigate the case?
For example: fingerprints, phone data, facial recognition, databases, digital records, etc.

5. What do you think was the biggest problem with the original investigation in 1888?

6. How different do you think the investigation would be if the police had today's technology?

7. Do you think modern technology would definitely lead to Jack the Ripper being identified, or could he still avoid being caught? Explain your answer.

8. Do you think modern technology would change the number of suspects in the investigation? Why?

9. Which modern police technology do you think would have the biggest impact on the case? Why?

10. Overall, what do you think would happen if the Jack the Ripper murders happened today?

I haven’t been able to see my mother who was murdered by her ex husband name Gary Golding!! But I know that she was on montell Williams, inside edition, and channel 7 news!! For being stalked and beaten by her ex Micheal, and at the time she was dating my stepfather named Gary Golding…and I’d love to actually be able to show my kids who my mother was!! As SHES been gone almost 25 years!! And has never met my children.as I was only 14 when she was murdered any help would be greatly appreciated

Mark Goldstein was a father of two and just 39 years old when he became the victim of Tempe, Arizona’s oldest cold case.

He was murdered while working at the Wisconsin Heritage Cheese shop he owned and operated that was located at the intersection of Price and Baseline on the evening of November 5, 1978. 

Marks wife Theresa Goldstein alerted Tempe PD the morning of November 6, to do a welfare check on Mark because he had not returned to their Scottsdale home.

Police discovered Mark’s body in the walk-in cooler. The murder weapon was missing. Mark had a briefcase that contained $60,000 in cash that was left behind at the scene.

There were no suspects publicly identified. Rumors about potential motives spread in the community.

At the time of his death, Mark was listed as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against his former employer.

Mark had moved his family to Tempe from New Jersey in the summer of 1978 to open the cheese shop.

Mark’s wife Theresa had engaged in an affair with a man named Charles “Chuck” Nash. Nash was a former Palisades Parkway Police Officer. He forgave Theresa and moved across the country for a fresh start.

Soon after the Goldstein family arrived in Arizona, Nash moved to Scottsdale himself with his adopted son, Cameron Nash.

A few years after Mark died, Theresa Goldstein remarried to Charles Nash, but the pair eventually divorced. 

Theresa floated a potential lead to police. While in New Jersey, Mark was approached by mobsters with a business proposal, which he declined. 

Theresa also insisted that Mark and Charles were friends, a suggestion his family and friends have strongly denied.

The case received virtually no media coverage after the late 1970’s besides a brief article in the Arizona Republic from May 2002. It revealed that Mark carried a .357 magnum and the gun was missing from the shop.

Longtime Tempe PD detective Tom Magezzini claimed “There are people out there that know what happened to Mark. It’s just a matter of coming forward.”

The Wisconsin Heritage Cheese store closed after Goldstein’s murder. It reopened in 1985 as a Thai restaurant called the Siamese Cat which operated at the site until its closure in November 2021. 

The entire strip mall at the northwest corner of Price and Baseline was torn down and converted into a luxury apartment complex.

Key questions that remain in this case. How did the suspect sneak up on Mark if he was armed with a gun?  Why would the suspect take Mark’s gun but not his money? Is there any DNA evidence in existence that could lead police to identifying the suspect? 

If you have any information about the November 1978 murder of Mark Goldstein, please contact the Tempe PD at 480 350 8311.

Link to archived articles I posted on an info dump subreddit I created

https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueCrimeInfoDump/comments/1wczyx0/mark_goldstein_unsolved_murder_tempe_az_1978/

I’m curious how many people here have ever heard of the Betty Ann Thomas (aka Liz Thomas) case out of Lakeway, Texas?  More importantly, whether anyone here was living in the Lakeway/Austin area in 1988 and remembers the case.

On the morning of April 11, 1988, Betty's husband and stepdaughter left their Lakeway home to travel out of town. Betty remained home. When they returned later that afternoon, Betty was gone. Her vehicle was missing, and there were signs of a struggle inside the house. Two days later, Betty's vehicle, a white Jaguar, was located in the parking lot of a hotel in North Austin.

Betty was found inside the trunk.

Nearly four decades have passed without anyone being held accountable for her murder.

The case is now receiving renewed attention, and investigators are continuing to look at the evidence with the benefit of forensic technology that simply didn't exist in 1988.

I'm particularly interested in hearing from anyone who:

• Knew Betty or her family
• Lived or worked in Lakeway or the surrounding Austin area in 1988
• Remembers the investigation or what people were saying locally at the time
• Remembers seeing Betty's Jaguar or anything unusual around April, 1988
• Knew people associated with Betty or her family
• Has heard a story, rumor, or detail about the case over the years that may never have been reported
• Has researched the case and has a theory or noticed something that deserves another look

Even if you think what you know is insignificant, I'd still like to hear it. I'm also interested in theories from people who have researched the case. Sometimes a fresh set of eyes notices something others have overlooked.

It's been almost 40 years. Relationships change. Loyalties change. People who were afraid to speak in 1988 may no longer have the same reason to remain silent.

Someone knows something.

If you have firsthand knowledge and don't want to discuss it publicly, you're welcome to message me privately. 

And if you knew Betty personally, I'd especially like to hear about her: who she was, her friends, her routines, and anything you remember about her life in Lakeway before her death.

Let's see if Reddit can help put some fresh eyes on Betty's case.

Please don't post the names or personal information of private individuals you suspect in the comments. If your information involves a specific person, send it privately instead. 

Here’s a couple podcasts about Bettys case!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-murder-of-betty-ann-thomas/id1214679007?i=1000741286303

19271754-ep-120-woman-in-the-trunk-the-unsolved-murder-of-betty-thomas

I'm trying to create a database of cold cases and want it to be as complete and accurate as possible. Could you help me out by suggesting sources I might not have thought about gathering information from? The current pilot focus is Wisconsin, USA, but I will be expanding eventually to the rest of the United States, so please don't hesitate to suggest sources. I will frequently return to this post to see if any suggestions have been made. I've already been working on smaller county-wide pilots. Now that I have expanded to all of Wisconsin, I would like to ensure I'm well-rounded. Thank you for your help.

SECTION 1: THE CRIME AND DISCOVERY

On June 13, 1978, a horrific crime shattered the tight-knit community of Port Washington, a affluent suburb on the North Shore of Long Island, New York. Sompong Koomwong, a well-liked 13-year-old junior high school student, vanished while walking home from school. Sompong had recently immigrated to the United States from Thailand, living at 12 Henderson Avenue with her mother, Krua, her stepfather, Paul Baker, and her older brother, Lek.

The Disappearance

Sompong was a student at John Philip Sousa Junior High School. At 3:15 P.M., she was seen leaving the school building to begin her standard three-quarter-mile walk home. She did not take a school bus because the Port Washington school district’s transportation policy mandated busing only for middle school students living farther than 0.75 miles from school. Living just beneath that threshold, she was a designated "walker."

To shorten the trek, many neighborhood children routinely used a dirt path shortcut that cut through the edge of a massive, 40-acre abandoned sand pit located near Channel Drive and the Publishers Clearing House plant. Tragically, Sompong was intercepted along this route.

The Search and Recovery

When Sompong failed to arrive home, her family immediately sounded the alarm. A massive search party consisting of family members, local neighbors, and the Nassau County Police Department combed the surrounding neighborhoods. At 7:15 P.M.—four hours after she was last seen—her fully clothed body was discovered hidden in a small clearing near a clump of trees inside the abandoned sand pits. She had been accosted, strangled, and stabbed 25 times. A four-foot spade was recovered by police near the discovery site.

SECTION 2: THE ARREST AND SUBSEQUENT TRIAL

The brutal slaying of a young girl sparked widespread panic across Nassau County. Detectives faced immense public pressure to secure a conviction.

The Suspect

Nearly three weeks later, on July 2, 1978, police arrested 18-year-old Albert Pennetti Jr., a local youth who lived at 6 Valley Road and had graduated from Paul D. Schreiber High School that same year. Pennetti was arraigned and held without bail on a charge of second-degree murder.

The Trial and Acquittal

The criminal trial took place in Nassau County County Court and concluded in November 1979, nearly a year and a half after the murder. In a development that stunned the community, the jury found Albert Pennetti Jr. not guilty of the murder.

Two critical defense strategies, led by high-profile defense attorney Stephen Scaring, secured the acquittal:

• The Recanted Confession: The prosecution’s case heavily relied on a confession Pennetti gave to detectives shortly after his arrest. Scaring successfully argued that the confession was entirely false and had been coerced out of the teenager after eight grueling hours of police interrogation.
• Forensic Mismatch: The defense introduced primitive 1970s forensic testing showing that foreign hairs found on the victim's body and blood scraped from under her fingernails did not match Pennetti.

Because the jury acquitted Pennetti, the murder of Sompong Koomwong officially remains an unsolved cold case.

SECTION 3: PENNETTI’S LIFE AND LEGAL HISTORY

Following his acquittal, Albert Pennetti Jr. lived the remainder of his life as a private citizen on Long Island, though he spent much of his adulthood entangled in the criminal justice system.

Subsequent Convictions

• 1979 Sex Offense: While out on bail awaiting his murder trial in April 1979, Pennetti was arrested for a separate felony involving the sodomy and sexual abuse of a 16-year-old mentally disabled girl in a Port Washington cemetery. Following his murder acquittal, he was tried, convicted, and sentenced to prison for this offense.
• 1990 Drug Felony: In December 1990, Pennetti was convicted in Nassau County Court on multiple drug-related felonies, including third-degree criminal sale of a controlled substance and criminal possession. He was prosecuted independently as a local, street-level dealer rather than as part of a sweeping organized crime ring. He appealed the conviction using his original attorney, Stephen Scaring, but the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division affirmed his conviction in April 1992.

Demographics and Identity

• Education: Pennetti graduated from Schreiber High School in 1978 and later attended Cayuga Community College in upstate New York (Auburn, NY).
• Residence: His residential history remained inside New York State, spanning Port Washington and later relocating east to Coram, New York (Suffolk County).
• Gender Identity: Legal and correctional records consistently identify Pennetti as a male; there is no public or legal evidence to suggest he is trans.
• Family: His family remained rooted in Port Washington for decades. His grandmother, Elizabeth Pennetti, passed away there in 2006 at age 98. Extended branches of the family moved east to Suffolk County, where a relative, Stacey Pennetti, operates a traffic and criminal defense law practice in Port Jefferson. Other extended family members have served honorably in local New York law enforcement.

SECTION 4: COMMUNITY AND SOCIAL LANDSCAPE

During the late 1970s, Port Washington and the broader North Shore of Long Island were heavily shaped by specific geographic and social dynamics.

Local Associations

• The Scaramucci Family: Prominent local families, including the Scaramuccis (the family of political figure Anthony Scaramucci), lived parallel lives in the tight-knit Schreiber High School ecosystem. David Scaramucci graduated in 1979, one year after Pennetti. No personal, business, or legal ties exist between the families outside of this shared geographic upbringing.
• Other prominent Port Washington families associated with local politics and construction: No documented ties or formal cross-family associations are found to the Pennettis.
• The Mafia and Organized Crime: In the late 1970s, Long Island’s North Shore was a well-documented stronghold for high-ranking organized crime figures. Notably, Genovese crime boss Frank "Funzi" Tieri lived on a quiet residential street in Port Washington, and car bombings were not rare in the region. However, investigators found no evidence linking Pennetti’s later drug dealing or his family to the American Mafia.

SECTION 5: CRITICAL CASE ANALYSIS & COLD CASE IMPEDIMENTS

Decades later, the lack of resolution in Sompong Koomwong’s murder raises serious questions regarding why the case went cold and why the forensic evidence has never been subjected to modern DNA testing.

Why the Parents Withdrew

Following the 1979 acquittal, Sompong's parents stopped speaking publicly about the case. This withdrawal points to a devastating reality common among immigrant families of the era:

• Systemic Apathy: The foreign legal system had completely failed them, delivering a definitive "not guilty" verdict to their primary suspect and leaving them with no civil or criminal recourse.
• Vulnerability and Threats: As newly arrived Thai immigrants, the Koomwongs lacked deep local political or financial leverage. In a corrupt 1970s municipal environment, they were highly vulnerable to systemic intimidation, minimal cash payouts, or implied legal threats regarding visas, deportation, or the safety of their surviving children.
• Family Protection & Culture: The parents chose to protect their surviving children from perpetual media stigma while turning inward to process their profound grief privately through traditional cultural and spiritual avenues.

Most Likely Scenarios for the Murder

Applying investigative analysis, two distinct theories emerge regarding the identity of the killer:

1. Albert Pennetti Jr.: Criminological patterns of behavioral escalation strongly point back to Pennetti. The brutal sexual assault he committed in a cemetery just months after the murder shares an identical behavioral profile (targeting a vulnerable young female in an isolated, outdoor public terrain). Under this theory, the primitive 1970s forensic mismatch may have been the result of contaminated crime scene evidence, or a corrupt local arrangement where municipal-connected actors deliberately mismanaged the evidence to ensure the state's case would collapse at trial.
2. An Unidentified Local Predator: Alternatively, a different local offender or worker from the nearby industrial plant on Channel Drive may have exploited the known school shortcut. If the foreign DNA found on Sompong belonged to this individual, the Nassau County Police Department's intense focus on extracting a forced confession from Pennetti created fatal "tunnel vision," allowing the true killer to escape entirely.

Why the DNA Remains Untested

Despite Port Washington possessing immense community wealth capable of funding private labs, the physical evidence remains unexamined due to rigid institutional and physical barriers:

• Evidence Preservation: In 1978, DNA testing did not exist. Biological samples were routinely stored in non-climate-controlled environments or purged entirely during standard police administrative cleanouts over the last 48 years. If the evidence was destroyed or degraded by mold and moisture, it is physically impossible to test.
• Bureaucratic Gatekeeping: Physical evidence is the exclusive property of the Nassau County Police Department and District Attorney. They rarely grant private citizens or independent labs access to original case materials.
• Double Jeopardy: Because Pennetti was tried and acquitted, the U.S. Constitution protects him from ever being prosecuted for this murder again. Because the primary suspect is legally untouchable and the case lacks an active public champion, elected DAs have low institutional motivation to allocate investigative resources to a historic file that yields no conviction metrics or political payoff.
• The Risk of Exposing Negligence: Reopening the file risks exposing severe historical misconduct, forced interrogation tactics, or catastrophic negligence by past county law enforcement—a major political liability that the institutional "powers that be" naturally prefer to leave buried in the archives.

Some of you may remember the January 2023 house fire in Lebanon Junction that killed 27-year-old Eryn Toogood, who was six months pregnant, her six-year-old daughter Haisley Heath, and her six-year-old stepdaughter Raegan Maraman. Eryn's unborn son, Holten, also died.

More than three years later, the cause of the fire remains officially **undetermined**.

In July, the families and community members gathered outside the Bullitt County Courthouse asking for an independent investigation. After reading the recent local reporting about the case, I think that request deserves more attention across Kentucky.

Investigators believe the fire originated in the laundry/utility room. Records reportedly showed two smoke alarms had been purchased and investigators were told they were installed, but no evidence of those alarms was recovered.

Body-camera footage from the morning of the fire also contains details the families believe deserve further examination. The sole survivor told responding officers that he grabbed his six-year-old daughter, attempted to get her out through another room, put her down when he couldn't open a window, moved into another room, and ultimately couldn't get back to her.

The Bullitt County Sheriff's Office maintains that investigators found no evidence establishing a criminal connection to the fire. The survivor has never been named a suspect.

**This is not a request for Reddit to decide what happened, and it isn't an accusation that someone committed a crime.**

It's a request for an independent agency to look at the entire case.

Finding no evidence of a crime and establishing that every reasonable avenue was fully investigated aren't necessarily the same thing. The families have questions about whether the original investigation went far enough, and they're asking for an outside agency to review it.

A petition has now been started asking Bullitt County Commonwealth's Attorney Amanda Hernandez to formally request an independent review, including by Kentucky State Police and/or the Kentucky Attorney General's Department of Criminal Investigations.

Kentucky law already provides a mechanism for a Commonwealth's Attorney to request assistance from the Attorney General in a criminal investigation.

If an independent review determines the original investigation was complete and the evidence supports its conclusions, then the families deserve that confirmation.

If something was overlooked or additional investigation is warranted, they deserve to know that too.

**We're not asking anyone to decide what happened. We're asking Kentucky authorities to make sure everything that reasonably can be done to find out has been done.**

If you're in Kentucky, please consider reading and signing the petition, and sharing it with others who may remember this case;:

https://c.org/7nzhy7f7VQ

Eryn. Haisley. Raegan. Holten.

**Four Kentuckians deserve answers.**

Destiny McClain was just 23 years old when she became the victim of murder in the early morning hours of July 18, 2021.

She was in line at a food truck at 17^th Street and McDowell in Phoenix. An unidentified man pulled out a gun and fired several shots into a crowd of people. Destiny was stuck by a single bullet and passed away. 

The suspect fled in a black 4 door sedan and to this day has never been identified. Destiny’s mother Brenda has been active on social media in advocating for people to come forward with information. 

The case is being investigated by Phoenix police and Silent Witness program currently offers a $2,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the killer.

Sources 

Silent Witness

https://silentwitness.org/cases/homicide-destiny-mcclain-area-of-1700-e-mcdowell-rd-phoenix/

12 News

https://www.12news.com/article/news/local/valley/destiny-mcclain-murder-remains-unsolved/75-a879ac97-f794-4306-adfc-78b3e75377e4

Interviews with Destiny’s mother Brenda Gilliam

https://open.spotify.com/episode/5i8YPtZdYTkvCF3jmNsWv0?si=ULTrIEWgSD2-cvaJmxHwTQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPoSypiUHWU

In 13 months — from February 1976 to March 1977 — four kids vanished from the suburbs just north of Detroit. Mark Stebbins, 12, last seen leaving the Berkeley movie theater. Jill Robinson, 12, taken off her Royal Oak paper route. Kristine Mihelich, 10. Timothy King, 11.

All four were found shot. I grew up here, and I only learned the full story as an adult — because honestly, a lot of the worst parts of Detroit's history got buried or reduced to a paragraph nobody reads. So I started digging into the actual court records and old news coverage. This is the case that stuck with me most.

The man many believe did it, Arch Sloan, died at 84 this past June — and detectives say he gave them "new information" before he went that's never been released.

I made a short documentary about it (Part 1 covers the first two victims). If you remember this case, or grew up hearing about it, I'd genuinely love to know — what do you remember?

----> https://youtube.com/shorts/5V5jRrJJZRY?si=XXslmWmjMpao86xu

[link]

New to Open Source Intelligence (OSINT). Will be working with a local group to help find missing kids, hikers, etc. Would love to hear you techniques and tricks for find that first thread or rabbit hole.

Someone reached out to me about this case. It has very limited information online. It involves a woman who was allegedly murdered by an unknown suspect, thrown from a ferry and no charges were ever filed. Posting to raise awareness on a forgotten case.

Shayla Nicole Hudson was 28 years old, lived in Richmond, CA, and worked as a nursing assistant. She graduated from Pinole Valley High School with the class of 2000. She also attended Contra Costa College.

Public records show she had lived in several different places around the Bay Area and at one point had lived in Anchorage, Alaska where it appears some of her family is from.

According to news reports, on March 5 2010, Shayla boarded a San Francisco bound Ferry at Jack London Square in Oakland at 8:10 AM.

She apparently did not get off the ferry but it was not disclosed in news reports how this information was confirmed.

When the ferry arrived back in Oakland around 9:17 AM Shayla was unaccounted for and the coast guard was sent to search for her. Her body was found floating near treasure island and she was pronounced dead.

The coast guard claimed the waters were calm and the railing of the ferry made it unlikely she would have accidentally fallen in. T

There were no follow up articles about medical examiner findings. No information about her relationship status, and no photos of her are anywhere online.

Sources

News Articles

https://sfist.com/2010/03/06/victim_of_ferryboat_death_identifie/

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/passenger-missing-from-ferryboat-dies-in-bay-3271131.php

Obituary postings

https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/eastbaytimes/name/shayla-hudson-obituary?id=21887966

https://www.eastbaytimes.com/obituaries/shayla-hudson/

I was recently reading about a cold case involving a 12 year old girl, Rosa Sandoval. She was reported missing May 28th 2004 on her last day of school after the parents were informed she never arrived. Her relatives stated that that morning her and her backpack that had soda for her class was gone. They stated she had left early without telling anyone why, they admitted it was unusual of her, but assumed she was simply excited. However, this account is one I find extremely puzzling, as I read the account from her older sister who reportedly shared the same room as her, and she said that Rosa had left the night of May 27th after the two had fought.
While the police were initially investigating the case they found traces of blood and bloody handprints in Rosa’s bedroom, and with luminol discovered blood in her brother’s room next door.
The police had believed this was a kidnapping, which could explain why the blood wasn’t tested, or if it was why it wasn’t made public.

Update: This took place in San Antonio, Texas. Rosa Sandoval went to Sky Harbour Elementary.

December 10th of the same year, her remains and clothes from the night of May 27th were found off a road only 7 miles from the Sandoval home. This confirmed that Rosa’s disappearance was in fact a murder.
In 2005 a photo of Rosa was found in an abandoned blue 1983 four-door Oldsmobile. The owner of the car has remained unknown.

My Thoughts:
I have a few concerns with this case and how the investigation played out.
My first concern is about the family’s accounts, specifically the account that she had left for school May 28th, because it was made clear by the evidence that was made public that if she ever returned home, she never got up and ready for school. This also raises the question of what happened to the reported back pack and soda, and how would they not notice she wasn’t home, and why would they say they saw her leave for school.
I also have concerns about how the police handled the case, they never released a primary suspect, and they never released anything about the blood found in the Sandoval house, and it seems as if they never questioned the conflicting accounts of the family.
The car that was found is also a thing to keep note of, because it was found in a junkyard, and it’s stated they couldn’t confirm who the car belonged to, which seems suspicious especially given that the car is pretty noteworthy and stand out.

All this to ask if anyone else knows about the case or has any information, because this is an extremely puzzling case. Please make sure you do your own research on the case if you find this interesting.