Unsolved: Worcester: Recent Episodes
Unsolved: Worcester
Unsolved: Worcester is a podcast series examining over 70 unsolved murders and missing persons cases on file with the Worcester Police Department.
Episodes will debut on Tuesdays.
It’s around 9:15 a..m. on Sunday, October 22, 2023.
A call is placed to the Gardner Police Department. The woman on the line reports to police that her neighbor’s four children have just appeared at her door.
The children told her that they couldn’t find their father, and that their mother was in bed crying.
In under five minutes, first responders arrive at the children’s home on Cherry Street in Gardner.
Upstairs, they find the body of 30-year-old Breanne Pennington lying in bed.
She had been shot in the head.
Breanne’s husband, Aaron Pennington, was nowhere to be found.
He had fled the home roughly 30 minutes earlier. And he hasn’t been seen since.
Townsend, Massachusetts is a small town of less than 10,000 residents bordering New Hampshire.
Townsend is part of Middlesex County, but it borders the Worcester County line and the cases we explore in this episode may be closely connected to each other, and other unsolved murders from the same area and during the same time period.
We again return to 1973 and the unsolved murder of 31-year-old school teacher Judith Viewig in Townsend. Then we move forward four years to the same small town and the disappearance of 13-year-old Deborah Quimby in May 1977.
It’s just before 9 p.m. on September 30, 1973.
Jo-Anne Muldoon's parents arrive at her apartment on Intervale Road in Fitchburg after a call from a neighbor saying they could hear Jo-Anne's three month old son crying.
When they get to the second floor apartment, the door is unlocked. When the enter, the lights won't come on. The power in the apartment is out.
Using light from the flame of a cigarette lighter, the Muldoons find baby Christopher safe in his crib.
It would be their first and only sigh of relief.
They found their daughter’s roommate Deborah Johnson dead on the sofa bed.
In the kitchen, their daughter Jo-Anne was dead on the floor.
Both young women had been stabbed to death. Their throats had been cut.
More than 50 years later, their murders remain unsolved.
It’s just after 12:30 PM on June 5, 1973.
32-year-old Maureen Moynihan and her 4-year-old daughter Jennifer have just dropped off Maureen’s 6-year-old son Timothy for afternoon kindergarten in West Boylston.
Maureen and Jennifer have a day full of errands planned.
Roughly 24 hours later, Maureen and Jennifer’s bodies were discovered along a dirt road in Rutland State Park.
The mother and daughter had been stabbed to death.
And their throats had been slashed.
Maureen was found lying on the ground outside of her Ford sedan. Jennifer’s body was on the floor of the front passenger seat.
More than 50 years later, their case remains unsolved.
It’s Sunday morning, July 29, 2018. It's around 2:15 AM.
A fight involving several people has broken out in front of a three-decker home on Sturgis Street.
Witnesses told police a man came running from the side of the Sturgis Street home and rapidly fired several gunshots, striking two people: one a 28-year-old man, and the other, 23-year-old Jovanexen “Jampy” Rivera.
The shooter fled the scene, leaving Jampy and the other man laying on the sidewalk…each suffering serious gunshot wounds.
Minutes later, Jampy would be pronounced dead. It’s been nearly six years and his case remains unsolved.
It’s around 9 a.m. on November 8, 1989.
A heavy fog across Central Massachusetts is finally lifting and a tragedy begins to reveal itself.
A retired construction worker is traveling along Chocolog Road in Uxbridge when he spots a large object along the road opposite of the Route 146 south bound exit ramp.
He discovers it’s an open sleeping bag, and it appears something is packed inside of it.
Police roll back the front of the sleeping bag to find the body of 17-year-old Jessica Jones inside.
Jessica had been beaten to death and stabbed multiple times.
Her body was stuffed inside the sleeping bag and dumped along Chocolog Road.
Nearly 35 years later, Jessica’s murder remains unsolved.
It’s Saturday night in Worcester. May 26, 2018. Memorial Day Weekend.
Five teenagers are walking together along Holland Road, heading toward Main Street in the city’s Webster Square neighborhood.
At around 11:15 p.m., a vehicle pulls over on Holland Road. A man gets out of the car and fires 10 gun shots in the direction of the five teens.
16-year-old Sidney Krow Junior tries to run from the scene, but soon collapses in the road on Main Street.
He has been shot. Thirty minutes later, Sydney is pronounced dead at a local hospital.
It’s been more than 30 years since 10-year-old Holly Piiranen was abducted and killed.
Holly disappeared on August 5, 1993.
Holly was vacationing with her father and brothers at her grandparents cottage in Sturbridge. She had last been seen by her father around 11:45 a.m., heading toward a neighbor's house to play with puppies.
It wasn’t until October 23, 1993, 11 weeks later, when Holly’s remains were found by pheasant hunters in an Army Corps of Engineers flood control forest off of a dirt access road along Five Bridge Road in Brimfield.
Thanks to contributions from many of our fans and followers, we’re covering eight more unsolved cases this winter.
Unsolved: Worcester Season 7 starts Tuesday, February 6.
May 16, 2003.
Following a tip from a local hunter, part of a one piece, blue Nike bathing suit is discovered on Whiskey Hill near the Nenameseck Sportsmen’s Club on Bacon Road in Palmer, Massachusetts.
The finding launches a full scale, grid-by-grid search over three weeks along eight and a half acres of hillsides and wooded areas on both sides of West Warren Road in Palmer and nearby Ware.
In early June, the intensive search produced a second significant finding, a human arm bone.
Days later, two more arm bones and a shin bone are found.
And then a femur, two rib bones and four vertebrae.
On June 9, 2003, investigators found teeth.
That same day, Worcester County District Attorney John Conte announced the arm bone they discovered in the woods matched the DNA of 16-year-old Molly Bish.
Molly had been missing for three years.
It’s around 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 10, 2023. It’s a typical, cold January night in Central Massachusetts. Temperatures have dropped below 30 degrees.
35-year-old Brittany Tee is leaving her home at 18 Main Street in Brookfield.
She’s wearing jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. Before she leaves the house, she puts on a black winter coat and a pair of work boots.
Brittany makes sure she has her cell phone and wallet before stepping out.
Wherever she’s going, she needs to get there on foot. Her car isn’t running and needs to be fixed.
Brittany takes a right onto Main Street and heads west toward Lewis Field and Brookfield Cemetery.
Where she was heading, no one knows. Brittany Tee hasn’t been seen since.
It’s just after midnight on Saturday, June 2, 2018.
A person walking south along Reservoir Road in Holden notices something along the tree line on the side of the road.
As the person moves closer to get a better look, he finds 22-year-old Lenny Valerio lying on the ground.
Lenny had been shot multiple times. Blood stains the gravel beneath him.
The passerby called police right away and Lenny was soon taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital where he was pronounced dead.
More than five years later, Lenny’s murder remains unsolved.
It’s around 4:45 AM. January 3, 2012.
It’s a windy morning and a chilling 25 degrees outside.
A motorist driving along Stafford Road in Wales sees something lying on the side of the road.
The driver stops their car and immediately calls the police.
The body of a young man, later identified as 23-year-old Cory Cane of Worcester, lies motionless along the south side of the tight two-lane Route 19.
Cory had been struck by a passing vehicle.
Police believe his body may have been left out in the cold on the side of the road for over 3 hours.
Nearly 12 years later, and the fatal hit-and-run remains unsolved.
It’s around 2 a.m. on March 4, 1984.
The temperature has dropped below 10 degrees in Gardner, Massachusetts.
Mr. D’s, a bar and lounge in downtown Gardner, has closed up for the night.
The parking lot in the back is empty, except for one car - a 1969 Pontiac Tempest - belonging to Holly Jean Cote.
Holly had met friends at Mr. D’s around midnight when she got off her shift at a local restaurant.
When the bar closed, Holly was supposed to head over to a friend's house for a late night after party.
But she never showed up.
Three months later, Holly’s naked body was discovered by canoeists near Birch Hill Dam in nearby Royalston.
She had been strangled to death.
It’s around 6 p.m. Sunday, October 29, 2017.
As heavy rain poured and winds howled in East Brookfield, Lisa Germain left her group of friends at Dunny’s Tavern.
Lisa’s car was parked across the street from the bar.
One driver stopped to let her cross East Main Street, but the driver heading westbound didn’t slow down.
Lisa was struck by the speeding vehicle.
The driver fled the scene.
Lisa would later die at Harrington Hospital from blunt trauma injuries.
More than six years later, the fatal hit-and-run crash remains unsolved.
It’s around 2:35 a.m. on February 10, 2001.
Worcester Police officers are called to 141 Chandler Street for a report of a shooting at a late night party.
Five rounds were fired from a large, semi automatic handgun in a room on the first floor of the two-story home. As many as 50 people were at the party when the shots are fired.
When police arrive, they find 22-year-old Juan Carlos Gonzalez on the floor, bleeding from two gun shot wounds.
By the time Juan gets to the operating table at Saint Vincent Hospital, he has bled to death.
22 years later, his case remains unsolved.
Was it a poltergeist rocking the walls of a three decker home on Douglas Street?
Did Worcester have its own haunted house?
In early 1950, that’s exactly what reporters from the Worcester Telegram and the Boston Globe were trying to figure out.
The residents of 14 Douglas Street were more frustrated than scared, complaining of rattling windows, picture frames falling off the walls, radios whistling, and even a bed leaping off the floor.
On May 12, 1950, the strong vibrating of the three-story structure could be seen shaking, as hundreds of neighbors stood in the street, watching what they believed to be something supernatural.
Today’s episode combines a pair of the most recent unsolved homicide cases we’ve explored to date on Unsolved: Worcester.
19-year-old Brandon Dirsa gunned down in broad daylight on Maxwell Street on Nov. 30, 2019.
Jazmin Rosario, just 5 days from her 18th birthday, is shot and killed outside of the Big Y on Worcester’s West Side around 2:30 a.m. on Jan. 15, 2022.
There is very little new public information available in both cases. There are more questions than answers right now.
As of the time of this podcast, the unsolved murder cases of Jazmin Rosario and Brandon Dirsa aren’t on the list of the Worcester Police Department’s unresolved homicide cases.
It’s September 14, 1982.
A call is placed to the home of Charles McArthur on Tarrytown Lane in Worcester’s West Tatnuck neighborhood.
Charles isn’t at home when the call comes in.
His daughter answers the phone. The man on the other line instructs her to tell her father to get down to the Italian Kitchen restaurant on Shrewsbury Street.
When his daughter passes the message along, Charles hops into his prized Ford Thunderbird and travels straight to the Italian Kitchen as directed.
His family would never see him again.
It’s 9 p.m. on August 24, 2016.
26-year-old Jose Ortiz has just left his sister’s home in Worcester’s Bell Hill neighborhood.
He’s walking along Elliot Street, making his way to his job as a personal care assistant, when a minivan pulls up alongside Jose.
The driver gets out of the vehicle.
Witnesses say Jose and the unidentified man driving the minivan get into a heated argument in the street.
The man fires a single shot into Jose’s chest, hops back into the van, and speeds away.
Jose Ortiz is left dying in the middle of the road.
Season 6 of Unsolved: Worcester begins in Worcester before we travel beyond city limits and highlight several unresolved homicides and missing person cases from Worcester County.
The final season of Unsolved: Worcester will feature cases originating from Gardner, Uxbridge, East Brookfield, Holden, Upton and other surrounding towns.
We will explore the circumstances surrounding the 2023 disappearance of Brittany Tee from Brookfield and the season will conclude with the killing of 16-year-old Molly Bish in June 2000.
Unsolved: Worcester Season 6 starts Tuesday, October 3.
In this special episode, we are ending season 5 the same way we started: with the unsolved case of the death of 17-year-old Travis Monroe on October 1, 2006.
We had the opportunity to speak with Travis’ mother, Christi Berry.
Christi provided us with further insight on Travis’ death, including in-depth details on the 24 hours leading up to Travis’ death, and why he left his family’s home on September 30, 2006.
In this special episode, we have the opportunity of speaking with Jordan Sears, founder and director of Cold Case New England, a website aimed at bringing awareness to the many victims of unsolved homicides in the region.
Jordan is from New Hampshire and she started her research on local cold cases during the COVID-19 pandemic and officially launched Cold Case New England in November 2021.
Since then, Jordan has featured around 40 unsolved homicide cases from the New England area on the Cold Case New England website.
We spoke with Jordan about Cold Case New England, how she chooses which cases she will feature on the site, hear her thoughts on the Main South Woodsman serial killer and what needs to be done in Worcester to improve access to cold case files.
Visit coldcasene.org!
Nearly 20 years later after the remains of Carmen Rudy and Betzaida Montalvo were discovered in Marlborough, and more than a decade since Alex Scesny’s sentencing in the 1996 murder of Theresa Stone in Fitchburg, Scesny remains the only person of interest named in the Main South Woodsman serial killings.
No charges have ever been filed in the deaths of Carmen Rudy, Betzaida Montalvo, Dinelia Torres, Wendy Morello or Linieda Olivera.
Their murders all remain unsolved.
It’s the morning of September 13, 2004.
Amanda Morello walks into the Worcester Police Department headquarters to file a missing person’s report for her mother, Wendy Morello.
It has been more than a week since Wendy was last seen.
Two hours after Amanda files her report with the WPD, 100 miles north of Worcester in York, Maine, a man taking an afternoon walk discovers a green 35-gallon plastic trash bin in the middle of the woods.
He lifts the lid to find the body of Wendy Morello stuffed inside.
Wendy is considered the fourth victim in a string of homicides over a one year period, from September 2003 to September 2004.
All the victims are women taken from the streets of Worcester’s Main South neighborhood.
It’s the middle of the summer.
Worcester.
2004.
On July 18, just after 2 a.m., Andre Edmonds is shot in the chest and killed outside of the Lakeside Avenue apartment complex in Worcester’s Columbus Park neighborhood.
A month later, shortly after midnight on August 19, Sal Lopez is shot in the stomach and killed while sitting in a parked car with a friend on Hawley Street.
Police believe the murders are connected, retaliating and violent measures taken by two rival gangs in Worcester.
Nearly 20 years later, the pair of murders remain unsolved.
It’s early in the morning, around 2 a.m. on Tuesday, October 12, 1982.
A crew of Providence & Worcester railroad workers are on the Boston & Maine railroad tracks that run alongside Interstate 290 expressway and Crescent Street in Worcester.
As the workers make their way along the tracks, heading in the direction of Lincoln Square, they discover the naked body of 24-year-old Ethel Bosworh under the expressway overpass at Crescent Street.
Ethel’s body was badly beaten and mutilated.
The mother of three young boys had never returned home the night before.
And more than 40 years later, Ethel’s murder remains unsolved.
It’s just before 2 a.m. on September 21, 2008.
A fight that started at a nearby house party has spilled into the street at the corner of North Ashland and Dix streets.
In the middle of the escalating brawl, William Smith, a 19-year-old Becker College freshman, is slashed on the arm with a knife.
Moments later, as the chaos continues, William is struck again.
A knife has been driven through his chest and into his heart.
15 years later, William’s murder remains unsolved.
It’s Sunday, July 15, 1973.
At around 3 p.m., the body of 56-year-old John Lund is pulled from under the rubble.
John marks the tenth victim from a July 11 fire that destroyed the five-story rooming house at 728 Main Street. It took demolition workmen more than 72 hours to recover John’s body from the debris.
The fire was Worcester’s deadliest in its history. And officials believed from the start that it was arson. The fire was purposefully set on the rear second floor porch.
When the smoke cleared and all of the building’s tenants were accounted for, the investigation into who set the fire was underway and the City of Worcester started taking safety measures in hopes something like this tragedy would never happen again.
50 years later, and Worcester’s most notorious arson case remains unsolved.
July 11, 1973.
It’s described as "the worst night ever" in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood.
Just before 3 a.m., at the back of a rooming house at 728 Main Street, an arsonist sets a fire on the second floor of the five-story building’s wooden porch.
The fire quickly spreads, engulfing the dozens of one-bedroom apartments and the tenants that live in them.
10 tenants died in the fire. 29 people were injured.
It’s the deadliest fire in Worcester’s history, and 50 years later, the arson and murder case remains unsolved.
It’s Monday, June 15, 1992 and summer has started early in Worcester.
It’s around 12:45 p.m.. Temperatures have reached a high of 75 degrees. Worcester’s public schools are already dismissed for summer vacation and Main Street is buzzing.
Children and adults alike are outside in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood enjoying the sunny weather, completely unaware of the dozen or so Worcester police cruisers heading their way.
A young boy walking his dog down Lagrange Street has just made an alarming discovery.
At the corner of Lagrange and Main Streets, on a strip of lawn behind a Sunoco gas station, the boy found the body of 39-year-old Richard Gragowski behind a row of bushes among old mattresses and empty wine bottles.
Richard had been bludgeoned to death. His skull had been crushed. His body had been sitting there in the sun for hours.
It’s 2:15 in the afternoon on Wednesday, June 5, 2019.
Temperatures have peaked, reaching nearly 80 degrees on an overcast day in Worcester.
Police are called to Early's towing on Park Avenue. A van had been towed to their lot minutes before. The smell coming from the van, and the hundreds of flies coming out of the van, convinced Early's staff to call the WPD.
When police arrived, an officer climbed inside the van and found a plastic storage container under boxes of clothes, bags of trash and other junk.
The detective lifted the container’s lid to find the body of 56-year-old John Sousa crammed inside.
John had been missing for more than a month.
You won’t find the name Travis Monroe listed among the Worcester Police Department’s unresolved homicide cases.
On the morning of October 1, 2006, Travis’ body was found lying in the road on Fales Street near the corner of Gunnarson Road in Worcester’s Burncoat neighborhood.
Travis’ death certificate states the immediate cause of his death was blunt impact to his head with skull fractures and brain lacerations.
The Worcester Police determined Travis’ death to be the result of a hit-and-run.
The state’s medical examiner’s report states the cause of Travis' death is undetermined.
Travis’ mother believes her 17-year-old son may have been beaten to death.
For 17 years, the truth behind Travis’ death eludes them all. And his case remains unsolved.
Unsolved: Worcester returns for Season 5 on Tuesday, June 13.
The penultimate season will shine a light on 10 unsolved murder cases, including the unusual circumstances surrounding the death of 17-year-old Travis Monroe in 2006, a two-part episode special on the 50th anniversary of Worcester’s deadliest fire, and our first look at the sinister acts of the Main South Woodsman nearly 20 years later.
New episodes will be released every Tuesday.
In today’s special episode, we have the great opportunity of speaking with Bob Ward, reporter for Boston 25 News and host of New England’s Unsolved.
Bob has been awarded multiple Boston/New England Emmy awards and a Massachusetts Associated Press Award during his extensive career.
Bob joined Boston 25 in 1996 and launched New England's Unsolved in early 1999. The show briefly ran as a podcast in 2017 and Bob received an Edward R. Murrow for his work on the New England’s Unsolved podcast.
Bob shares with us how New England's Unsolved got its start, insight on the 2006 death of 17-year-old Travis Monroe in Worcester, and tells us why he thinks cold case and true crime podcasts and shows attract such large audiences.
It’s the oldest unsolved murder case on file with the Worcester Police Department Detective Unit.
March 11, 1951.
20-year-old Irish immigrant Sean Goggin is gunned down inside the entrance of a home on Fairhaven Road in Worcester’s Burncoat neighorhood.
Two men in trench coats, one wearing a handkerchief to cover his face, fired three shots into the Fairhaven Road home, with one bullet striking Sean in the chest and killing him.
As Sean slumped to the ground, the men ran off across the front lawn, hopped into a car and sped away.
More than 70 years later, the murder of Sean Goggin remains unsolved.
What would you do if someone sent you a text message of a photo of the corpse of a family member or loved one?
That’s what happened to Carmen Rivera on Easter Sunday 2009.
Carmen was on her way to Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester when she received a photo of her son, 25-year-old Luis Rosario, dead on a gurney at the hospital.
Luis had been shot twice in the chest outside of a house party on Hammond Street.
The photo of Luis dead at the hospital had been posted on social media with the caption, "Mission Accomplished.”
Walter Palmer climbed one flight of stairs to the second floor of an apartment building at 16 Millbury Street in Worcester’s Green Island Neighborhood.
It's Saturday evening, August 5,1989, Palmer was surprising his friend John Riley.
The door to John’s studio apartment was locked, so Palmer used his spare key.
When he opened the apartment door, Palmer stood there in shock.
John Riley sat lifeless in his chair. A pool of blood was at John’s feet.
John was murdered. He had been stabbed 29 times
It’s the middle of the summer. Worcester, 1987.
30-year-old Patricia Evans has just returned to the city after spending a month in a detox center in Springfield.
For over five years now, Patricia has been back and forth, in and out of treatment centers across the state.
The constant battle with her addiction to drugs had taken its toll on the young mother of four.
But leaving detox this time, there may have been some room for optimism.
But any optimism they may have existed, evaporated quickly. Just a month later, on August 8, 1987, Patricia was found dead in the empty apartment on the third floor above her family on Piedmont Street.
She was strangled to death.
It’s around 2:15 a.m. on August 1, 2003.
Worcester’s Main Street bars and clubs have closed for the night.
Kwaku Osei Owusu and four of his friends pile into his car parked at the corner of Portland Street and Franklin Street.
A sports car pulls up suddenly next to Kwaku’s black sedan. Someone in the sports car points a gun in the direction of Kwaku and within an instant, 10 shots are fired into the driver’s side of Kwaku’s car.
Kwaku and the passenger next to him, 23-year-old Frank Vanney, are killed instantly.
When police arrive, they find Kwaku and Frank dead in the front seats. The car is riddled with bullet holes.
It’s around 8:45 p.m. on February 23, 1991.
28-year-old Bruce Wood and his 5-year-old son, Bruce, Jr., are walking down Chestnut Street in downtown Worcester.
They’re heading home with their dinner from McDonalds. Bruce Sr. got his son a Happy Meal. They’re spending the weekend together.
The father and son are about 10 minutes away from Bruce’s apartment on Quincy Street when a man ran up to Bruce, stabbing him multiple times. The fatal stab through the heart.
When police arrived moments later, officers found Bruce, Jr., sitting on the sidewalk, crying next to his father’s body.
A ceremonial tree planting and plaque unveiling at Worcester’s Arbor Day celebration is being held at 10 a.m. on Friday, April 28, 2023.
We encourage our listeners to join us at the event to help honor the lives of the many women victims of murder in Worcester, both solved and unsolved.
Special thanks to Jennifer Hernandez, committee member on Worcester's Advisory Committee on the Status of Women, for joining us for this special episode.
It’s around 1 a.m. on January 13, 1993.
Worcester Police officers arrive at the Public Inebriate Program, or PIP, shelter in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood.
Police are at the shelter to arrest James Earl Johnson…he’s wanted for the murder of 42-year-old Vicki Lehtinen, whose body was found in the basement of a Pleasant Street apartment building just three days before.
Vicki had been beaten and strangled to death.
The last time Vicki was seen alive, she was leaving a Main Street bar with James Earl Johnson.
It’s just past midnight on Sept. 22, 1992.
Paulette Andrea pays her tab at Barney Google’s, a neighborhood tavern on Washington Street in Worcester’s Green Island neighborhood.
She hugs her friends at the bar goodbye and exits the front door, taking a right toward Harding Street and Ellsworth Street.
Paulette has about a 15-minute walk home to her apartment on Lawrence Street.
But she never makes it.
About four hours later, a passerby finds Paulette’s body face down in a sandbox at a playground at Crompton Park.
She had been strangled to death.
It’s around 6 a.m. on January 31, 1989.
A maintenance worker at Anderson Tool and Stamping Company on Mason Street, is taking out the trash.
When the worker steps outside and turns the corner onto the factory’s loading dock, he sees the body of a young black woman laying face down about 10 feet away below the loading dock.
The woman, wearing a black leather jacket and jeans, is covered in blood.
Later that day, she would be identified as 23-year-old Angela Jones.
Angela had been killed just hours before she is found her behind the Anderson Tool building.
She had been stabbed multiple times.
It’s the morning of October 23, 1984.
Kathleen Viviamore wakes up in her family’s apartment on Southgate Street.
Kathleen looks in to check on her daughter, Patricia Ann Gonyea, who was supposed to come home late the night before from her boyfriend’s house.
But Patricia wasn’t in her bed. She wasn’t even in the apartment.
Patricia was killed while walking home from a nearby bus stop the night before. She had been bludgeoned to death. Her body was dumped in a window well of a factory building on Grand Street, ust two blocks from her family’s first floor apartment on Southgate Street.
Nearly 40 years later, Worcester residents are still asking the same question: Who killed Patricia Gonyea?
Unsolved: Worcester returns for Season 4 on Tuesday, April 11.
The new season will shine a light on 10 more unsolved murder cases under investigation by the Worcester Police Department’s Detective Unit.
Season 4’s episodes tell the stories of 10 unsolved homicides spanning 6 decades, including a string of unsolved murders of young women in the late 80s and early 90s, and the oldest unsolved murder case on file with the Worcester PD, dating back to 1951.
In early January 2022, 15-year-old Sue Paye ran away from her Worcester home.
It’s believed Sue packed her belongings and boarded a bus at Union Station heading toward New York City.
The extensive efforts by Sue’s family to find her haven’t been successful and they haven’t seen Sue or heard from her in over 15 months.
In what will be the most recent case we explore over the six seasons of Unsolved: Worcester, Sue Paye’s story will force us to ask a question for the first time this season…does the missing person even want to be found?
In early November 1998, five-month-old baby Marlon Santos disappeared.
And for two straight days, Marlon’s foster parents failed to alert the Worcester Police Department that baby Marlon was missing.
It was around 11:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 7, 1998, that Jose and Yolanda Castillo reported Marlon missing.
The foster parents blamed not being able to find a babysitter for their children and two other foster children as the reason they delayed telling the police.
Nearly 25 years later, the Castillo’s 48-hour hesitancy to call the police may have erased any chance of baby Marlon being found.
It’s mid-September 1982.
The summer is winding down in Worcester and 27-year-old William Garlick and 33-year-old John V.J. Joyce, Jr. hop into William’s 1980 black Corvette for a quick trip up north to Maine.
But they’re not heading to Vacationland for a late-summer getaway.
The two men are on their way to collect a debt of $22,000, likely running an errand to collect money owed to a Worcester-born drug kingpin.
The day after they leave Worcester, Maine State Police find William’s corvette abandoned outside of a shopping mall in Bangor.
William and John were never seen or heard from again.
In the spring of 1991, 37-year-old Donald B. Wallace disappeared.
Donald was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a teenager and had a history of mental illness.
He had two steel rods in his back from an injury he sustained earlier in life.
But that didn’t stop him from walking everywhere. It was really what Donald was known best for in Worcester.
He was last seen on April 2, 1991 standing at the corner of Park Avenue and May Street by his mother as she was driving by in her car.
More than 30 years later…and we’re still asking the same question: Where did Donald Wallace walk off to?
It’s been nearly 14 years since 36-year-old Patricia Santos was last seen.
Patricia was a recovering drug addict. She had been clean and sober for two years and employed at a woman’s recovery program in Worcester when she went missing.
She was last seen on May 20, 2009.
Her coworkers reported her missing after she failed to show up for work for two straight days.
On May 23, 2009, Patricia’s ex-boyfriend was arrested after trying to flee from police in Patricia’s 2000 Ford Mustang.
It’s around 9 p.m. on Dec. 23, 1982.
58-year-old Marion Kerswell hangs up the phone after a short phone call with her friend.
Marion has Christmas Eve plans with her daughter for some last minute shopping and Christmas dinner preparations the next day.
But after hanging up the phone with her friend, Marion is never heard from again.
More than 40 years later, the same question still lingers: What happened to Marion Kerswell?
Where did Waldemar Feliciano go?
On a brisk fall morning in November 2005, Waldemar woke up in bed next to his girlfriend in his apartment on Eastern Avenue in Worcester.
He got out of bed, put on a pair of jeans, a t-shirt and a baseball hat…and told his girlfriend he had to go make some calls.
He left the room and has never been seen or heard from again.
What happened to Sabrina Hatheway?
Sabrina was last heard from on Dec. 20, 2014.
In the weeks following, her ex-boyfriend Kevin Crozier, with the help of two friends, tried burning down his grandmother’s home on Dixfield Road in Worcester in a futile attempt to collect insurance money.
Three months later, in March 2015, Crozier and his co-conspirators are in court facing multiple charges, including arson.
But none of the three men can provide -- or are willing to provide -- an answer on Sabrina’s whereabouts.
Arguably the missing person case that has received the most attention over the past decade in Worcester is the disappearance of 23-year-old Sabrina Hatheway.
Sabrina was last seen on Dec. 28, 2014, allegedly at the home of her boyfriend, Kevin Crozier, on Dixfield Road in Worcester.
Twelve days later, on Jan. 1, 2015, the Worcester Fire Department responded to a structure fire at the Dixfield Road home.
Officials ruled the cause of the fire to be arson.
It’s been nearly five decades since 24-year-old Vicke Lee Lamberton vanished from Worcester, leaving her husband and a rumored love affair behind.
No one has heard from Vicke since February 1974.
And it took over 35 years for a missing persons report to be filed with the Worcester Police Department.
In this special episode, we had the opportunity of speaking with Jennifer McLellan, daughter of the late Vincent Martin.
Vincent was killed outside of the three-decker he lived in on Millbury Street on Dec. 28, 1995. He was beaten to death and robbed.
We shared Vincent’s story in episode 8 of Unsolved: Worcester Season 2.
Unsolved: Worcester returns for Season 3 on Tuesday, Feb. 21.
The new season will shine a light on 10 missing person cases currently under investigation by the Worcester Police Department’s Detective Unit.
It’s around 1:30 a.m. on Sept. 7, 1973.
A man making his way across the parking lot of Seven Hills Plaza on Myrtle Street notices something at the bottom of an embankment on Salem Street.
The man takes a closer look and finds the body of 49-year-old Roland Clarkson, face up at the bottom of the embankment.
Roland’s skull had been crushed.
When police arrive, they find a large chunk of concrete near Roland’s body. He had been mutilated.
It’s February 21, 1994.
27-year-old Helen Chevalier miraculously makes it home after a harrowing night.
Helen works the street as a prostitute to pay for her drug addiction.
The night before she luckily escaped the clutches of a john who refused to let her out of the car and kept pulling her by her hair.
24 hours later, Helen leaves her home, saying she’s going out to meet a friend.
She would never be seen alive again.
It’s early Thursday, December 28, 1995.
It’s shortly before 6 a.m. and Vincent Martin is leaving his Millbury Street apartment to get to work at Red Cab Company when he’s attacked from behind.
He’s thrown to the ground and kicked several times while he’s down.
The assailants removed the cowboy boot on Vincent’s right foot and struck Vincent in the head repeatedly.
A few hours late, Vincent's body is discovered face up in the snow, a trail of blood leads the way from the Millbury Street sidewalk between two three decker apartment buildings.
23-year-old Sonia Blanco and 25-year-old Evelyn Cruz are not alone.
Not only will their deaths forever be connected - both women killed on Feb. 4, 19-93, their bodies beaten and severely bruised, both strangled to death and dumped to the curb from a vehicle - but they’re among a half a dozen or so women all killed in similar fashion over a five-year period in Worcester.
Each victim violently strangled and each murder unsolved.
Does Worcester have a serial killer?
That’s what residents were asking Worcester Police in early 1993.
From December 1992 to February 1993, four women were killed. They had all been strangled to death.
On Feb. 4, 1993, the bodies of 23-year-old Sonia Blanco and 25-year-old Evelyn Cruz were discovered just a few miles apart and within 20 minutes of each other.
30 years later, the murders of Sonia Blanco and Evelyn Cruz remain unsolved.
It’s May 1st, 1987.
30-year-old Brian MacAlister had just been in a heated argument involving three other men at Billy’s Lounge on Millbury Street.
Brian left the other men and hopped into his brown 1973 four-door Oldsmobile parked outside of the Maurice the Pants Man store.
Brian, likely intoxicated, left the driver side door open to his car as he tried to tune a portable radio and smoke a cigarette.
Brian’s killer approached the vehicle…and fired a single gun shot into the side of Brian’s head.
It’s been over 24 years since 26-year-old Eddie Wheeler was gunned down near a Honey Farms parking lot at the corner of Harding Street and Lafayette Street in Worcester’s Canal District.
It was 1:30 a.m. on December 26, 1998.
Eddie was walking down Harding Street with a group of friends when his killer ran up to him, shooting Eddie four times in the chest.
It’s Monday afternoon, October 16th, 1967.
A pair of part-time employees at Jack and Felicia’s Cafe on Millbury Street are walking through the front door of the restaurant.
They’re stopped dead in their tracks as soon as the door swings open.
There, lying dead on the floor of the bar, is owner John “Jack” Zuromski.
A pool of blood has collected around John’s head.
A sledgehammer is on the ground next to him.
It’s Saturday night, April 13, 1968.
A call is placed to the Worcester Police Department around 11 p.m.
It’s Albert Morrissette of Blackstone. He’s calling to report his 17-year-old daughter,Phyllis Ann Morrissette, is missing.
She never returned home after visiting a friend in Boston.
Phyllis Ann's body would be found the next day, Easter Sunday, floating face down in Geese Pond in Worcester.
It’s around 10 p.m. on Nov. 29, 1967.
21-year-old Sarah Cox should be boarding a public bus at Clark University.
She would be on the bus for roughly two miles, and when the bus approaches Lincoln Square, Sarah gets off and starts on foot in the direction of her apartment on Highland Street.
But she never made it.
Days later, her frozen, naked body is found in a ditch in a wooded area off Granite Street over four miles away.
In today’s special episode, we had the opportunity of speaking with Peter Vasquez, the older brother of 17-year-old Nereida Melendez, who was killed on June 5, 1989.
Peter shares what he remembers from the day Nereida went missing, the following day when her body was discovered on Bell Hill, the police investigation and shares some insight on a possible suspect in Nereida’s murder.
Season 2 of Unsolved: Worcester starts in the late 1960s and continues across four decades.
We don’t stray far from the early, darker days of the city’s Canal District and Green Island neighborhoods.
Four women found strangled to death, five men gunned down or bludgeoned to death, and the unsolved murder of a woman, whose body was discovered only after snow had melted away.
Unsolved: Worcester season 2 starts December 15.
For 35 years, Dianne Williamson worked at the Worcester Telegram and Gazette, including 10 years as a general assignment and crime reporter and 25 years as a must-read columnist.
During Dianne’s time at the T&G, she covered many of the unsolved murder and missing person cases that will be covered over the six seasons of Unsolved: Worcester.
In today’s episode, Dianne will share with us her insight into three unsolved murder cases: the 2002 4th of July murder of Candace Allen Scola, the 1992 murder of John Volungis Jr., and the 1989 murder of North High School graduating senior Nereida Melendez.
It’s the night of June 5, 1989, and a shadow is cast over the crowd at the Worcester Auditorium, as members of North High’s class of ‘89 are hearing the names of their classmates called one-by-one to receive their high school diploma.
One classmate isn’t present.
Less than a mile away up on Bell Hill, the body of Nereida Melendez is buried under a pile of wet leaves in a wooded area off Elliot Street.
What’s meant to be a time of celebration for these Worcester teens is quickly turned to tragedy.
This is Part 2 of the Nereida Melendez story.
It’s the evening of June 5, 1989.
A man walking around Chandler Hill Park finds a leather purse in the wooded area of Bell Hill.
He turns the purse into the Worcester Police Department’s Lost and Found later that night.
Less than a mile away, North High School’s graduation ceremonies for the class of ‘89 are underway at the Worcester Auditorium.
17-year-old Nereida Melendez isn’t with her classmates. She never shows up for graduation.
Nereida’s body is buried under a pile of leaves on Bell Hill.
It’s just after 9:30 p.m. on July 3, 2012.
Crowds are gathered along the lower end of Grafton Street in Worcester to watch the city’s annual Independence Day fireworks display.
Jonathan Kapulka is standing in a parking lot near the entrance to Walgreens pharmacy. He’s with a large group of family and friends. With him are his wife and two daughters.
In one of the most brazen and violent acts in recent history in Worcester, a man wearing a ski mask ran up behind Jonathan, shooting him three times.
The killer ran away up Grafton Street.
And for over 10 years, Jonathan’s murder remains unsolved.
It’s January 25, 2000.
Dominick Maiorana is notified by Worcester Police Department Records Bureau that his vehicle - a silver 1999 Lexus CS300 - was towed weeks earlier to Pat’s Service Center on Shrewsbury Street in Worcester.
Dominick's son Paul is the only person who drove the car and Dominick hasn’t seen his son since the day after Christmas, nearly a month ago.
Later that same night, Paul’s frozen body is found in the trunk of the Lexus at Pat’s Service Center.
The vehicle had been at Pat’s for over a week.
On the evening of Feb. 3, 1992, Bridget DiIorio Volungis dropped her husband off at their home on Porter Street in Worcester.
An hour later, DiIorio returned home to find her husband, John Volungis Jr., dead inside the entrance to their duplex home.
John had been stabbed 18 times. His throat had been slit.
Police believe whoever killed him was waiting inside the home for him to arrive.
It’s been 10 years since Nathan Otero was found shot dead near the Indian Lake Park beach area at the end of Clason Road in Worcester.
It was October 18, 2012 at 2:15 a.m. when Worcester Police received reports of gunshots from Clason Road residents.
The 27-year-old man was killed in the darkness at the east side of Indian Lake. He was shot in the head.
It’s been over 20 years since 32-year-old Candace Scola was found dead on the kitchen floor of her home on Knox Street in Worcester.
She had been stabbed 13 times, including multiple stabbings in her chest.
The only suspect in the case is her estranged husband.
He was the last person to see her alive.
This is Part 2 of our two-part episode series on the murder of Candace Scola.
It’s been over 20 years since 32-year-old Candace Scola was found dead on the kitchen floor of her home on Knox Street in Worcester.
She had been stabbed 13 times, including multiple stabbings in her chest.
The only suspect in the case is her estranged husband.
He was the last person to see her alive.
This is Part 1 of our two-part episode series on the murder of Candace Scola.
It’s around 9:45 p.m. on Halloween night, Oct. 31, 2007, when buzzers start ringing loudly for all apartment units at the entrance of 4 North Ashland Street.
A first floor resident -- hearing the repeated buzzing at the front door -- approaches the entrance and sees two men standing outside the door. He opens the door to see what they want. but the men force themselves in.
They sprint up the stairs to the third floor apartment where Andrew Robinson and Luis Acevedo are inside.
The intruders kick the door down to Apartment 3 and quickly fire several shots, killing Andrew and Luis.
The lack of evidence around the crime scene is nearly as peculiar as the lack of evidence on the bodies of William Vega and Elizabeth Matos. There was no murder weapon at the scene. And police couldn’t pin down a motive. The teenagers hadn’t been robbed. There were no drugs, drug paraphernalia, cell phones, beepers, or weapons on their bodies to indicate the murders were drug-related.
Unsolved: Worcester, a series of narrative episodes examining the dozens of unsolved cold cases on file with the Worcester Police Department, will release its first episode on Oct. 18, 2022.
New episodes will debut on Tuesdays and Thursdays over five-week periods in 10-episode series.