When a crime is committed and there isn’t enough evidence to identify a perpetrator, it often turns
into a cold case that remains unsolved for years and in some cases, decades. But occasionally,
unsolved mysteries are finally solved years later thanks to small, seemingly inconsequential details
and those responsible are finally made to pay for the crimes that they committed.
5. David Berkowitz
The crimes of David Berkowitz, also known as the Son of Sam,
puzzled investigators for over a year before they were finally solved thanks to a New York
City woman who was walking her dog at just the right time and in just the right place.
From July 29th, 1976 to July 31, 1977, police were hunting for an individual who had ended
the lives of at least 6 people, but they were left baffled by who was responsible.
The crimes were heavily publicized in the press, often featuring on the front
pages of reputable newspapers, such as the New York Post and Daily News.
In April of 1977, police found a note near two of Berkowitz’s victims in which he taunted them
and stated that he would be continuing his spree of killings,
but even this discovery got them no closer to identifying the culprit.
But on the 5th of August, 1977, Cacilia Davis was walking her dog near one of the crime scenes
when she noticed patrol officer Michael Cataneo ticketing a car that was illegally
parked close to a fire hydrant. Moments later, a man walked past her from the direction of the car
and she described him as studying her with some interest.
She noticed that he was carrying a dark object in his hand
and when she heard a weapon being discharged behind her,
she ran back to her house. She wouldn’t report the incident to police until 4 days later and
they decided to check every car that had received a ticket in that area that evening.
Among the cars that were investigated was Berkowitz’s 1970, 4-door, yellow Ford Galaxie
and on the 9th of July, detective James Justis
contacted Yonkers police to schedule an interview with him. They then learned that
Yonkers police had suspected Berkowitz of other strange crimes in the area.
The following day, police investigated his car which was parked outside of his
apartment building and spotted a firearm in the back seat along with maps of the crime
scenes and another threatening letter addressed to Inspector Timothy Dowd.
Police waited for him to exit the building and climb into his car
before approaching him and when they did so, he merely said: “Well, you got me”. After being found
competent to stand trial following three separate mental health examinations, he would ultimately
receive 25-years-to-life in prison sentences for each of the crimes that he committed.
4. Federico da
Montefeltro
The mystery of a 500-year-old cold case was finally solved in 2001 by Marcello Simonetta
(see moh nee tuh), an Assistant Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures with the use
of an ancient family heirloom that had been passed down through the Simonetta family for generations.
The heirloom in question is a code-breaking journal
left behind by Cicco (Chico) Simonetta. It was common during the Italian Renaissance
for people to communicate through coded correspondence, as letters were often intercepted
and read before being delivered. This manual would have been used to decipher such letters.
And so, Simonetta deciphered a letter written during this time
that he found while doing research for his doctoral dissertation,
involving two feuding families – the Medicis (muh dee chez) and the Pazzis (Pah zee). The
Medicis had been in power in Florence for around 45 years by the time the letter was written.
Upon studying the letter with the use of the code-breaking manual,
Simonetta discovered that the writer had conspired to overthrow the Medici family
with the help of Pope Sixtus IV, along with other members of the Pazzi family.
The letter stated that the Medici brothers, Lorenzo and Giuliano were to be executed and
although historians have always been certain that the Pazzi family was involved in the plot,
not many details were available on what exactly transpired.
Once the brothers were out of the way, Montefeltro had planned to seize the city
with the help of 600 well-trained soldiers and on Easter Sunday of 1478, Giuliano’s life was
ended with his brother narrowly escaping after a friend stepped in to fend off his assassins.
The attack resulted in a riot by the city’s residents who ended the
Archbishop’s life. Allies of the Pazzi family then declared open war on the city of Florence
but Lorenzo would go on to triumph and rule over Florence during its golden age.
It would be Lorenzo who ultimately discovered the amazing talents of artist Michelangelo and
thanks to one of his descendants, his brother’s execution was finally solved.
3. Tim Bass
In June of 2013, Heather Backstrom
and Merrilee Anderson who live in Acme near Bellingham in Washington
had taken their children to Birch Bay Waterslides where they were spending the day having fun.
They were part of a group of women who were discussing their lives in Acme when one of
the women brought up an unsolved cold case that had rocked their tight-knit community years ago,
the murder of 18-year-old Mandy Stavik.
Mandy had been home from college in 1989 when she decided to go for a jog following
her Thanksgiving meal, but she never returned home. After a three-day search, she was found
deceased by Detective Ron Peterson, 3.5 miles away near the shore of the Nooksack River.
When male DNA was found at the scene, the area was scoured for possible suspects
and 30 men gave samples to be tested but no matches were found and the case quickly went cold.
Backstrom and Anderson, who barely knew each other at this point,
were still talking about the case when Backstrom suddenly exclaimed
that she knew who had committed the crime and Anderson replied that she did too.
Both of the women were stunned at the other’s revelation and they went on to
discuss their individual encounters with a local man around the time that Mandy’s life was ended.
Anderson stated that the man, Tim Bass, was a friend of her husband’s and he had
stopped by their house one night, a few years after Mandy’s case and knocked on the door.
He explained that he had been hunting and needed to use their phone and she let him
into the house. But Anderson figured out that he had dialled a fake number
and after following her into her bedroom, he confessed that he drove by her house all the time
and that he had been in love with her for some time.
She told him that, if he didn’t leave immediately, she would phone the police
and managed to get him to leave. Backstrom then replied that her encounter took place
just months before Mandy’s case when Bass had aggressively flirted with her
in the presence of her boyfriend who she would eventually marry.
She stated that she felt very uncomfortable at the time
and the incident always stuck in her mind, causing her to avoid any contact with him from then on.
Anderson knew that they had to go to the police with this information
and she contacted a Whatcom Sheriff’s Office Detective who she had known since high school.
It was found that Bass, then 22, had moved away from the area
shortly after the attack and had never been contacted by police. Upon being questioned,
he stated that he had never heard of Mandy – a statement that immediately rang as a lie.
He refused to give a DNA sample, stating that he didn’t trust the police
and he immediately became a suspect, but nothing could be done without his DNA. Police contacted
Bass’ co-worker, Kim Wagner at the bakery where he was a delivery driver and asked her to help out.
She kept an eye on Bass, noticing that he wore gloves on his deliveries
and suspiciously took his rubbish home with him. But on one occasion, she saw him drinking from
a plastic cup which he discarded in a bin. She retrieved it and placed it in her desk drawer,
placing another, empty cup in the bin in case he decided to retrieve it.
She delivered the cup to police who had it sent away for analysis and Bass’ DNA was found
to be a one-in-11 quadrillion match to the DNA retrieved at the crime scene. In December of 2017,
Bass was arrested, 28 years after committing his terrible crime and he pleaded not guilty,
but he would ultimately be sentenced to 27 years in prison, thanks to a discarded cold drink cup.
2. Stacy
Littleton
On the 11th of October, 1986, a passerby in Lemon Grove, California
stumbled upon Cyrus Jefferson and realized that he was deceased.
They immediately contacted police who found that the man’s wallet, shoes, shirt and car
were missing, leading them to believe that his life was ended in a robbery that had gone wrong.
Detectives quickly identified a suspect, a man named Stacy Littleton, after friends
of his told police that they had seen him with Jefferson at the Ha’ Penny Inn in National City
earlier that day. When he returned later that day, he was alone and driving Jefferson’s car.
Littleton was arrested, but the District Attorney’s Office
didn’t feel that there was enough evidence to charge him. He was released and over time,
the case grew cold. Then, in 2017, a cold case detective
decided to have a glove that had been found at the crime scene sent away and tested for DNA evidence.
Jefferson and Littleton’s DNA was found on the glove and Littleton was arrested again,
just hours after he had been arrested on several misdemeanour charges. At his trial,
Littleton’s defence lawyer argued that the presence of his DNA didn’t prove that he had
committed any crime and indicated that Littleton’s friends had lied in their statements to police.
This tactic didn’t work, however, and Littleton was eventually sentenced to
one year behind bars on a weapons charge and 25 years in prison for ending Jefferson’s life.
At his sentencing hearing, he maintained that he was innocent and addressed Jefferson’s
family saying that he was sorry for their loss and that Stacy was his friend too.
1. Theodore Dill
Donahue
On the 12th of November, 1991,
27-year-old Denise Sharon Kulb was found after her life had been ended in a remote area
of Birmingham Township, Pennsylvania, close to the Pennsylvania-Delaware border. She was found under
a pile of clothing that included two pairs of pants, a T-shirt, jacket and one pale-yellow sock.
Two weeks earlier, Kulb and her boyfriend, Theodore Dill Donahue
had moved in together and when she was discovered, he told police that he had
last seen her on the 18th of October when they were robbed by a man with a blade.
He stated that Kulb ran for help, leaving him with the robber
and he never saw her again. Kulb’s family members stated at the time that they last
saw her the following day when they were attending a funeral.
On the same day that Kulb was found, Donahue decided to return all the clothes that she had
left at his apartment with the exception of one yellow sock that matched the one found at the
crime scene. Since he was considered a person of interest, his apartment was searched and police
found the missing sock, but he insisted that he had nothing to do with the case.
Then, in 2015, the sock was sent to Temple University’s photography department
who used photographic enhancements to link the two socks to each other.
While awaiting trial, Donahue passed away while in police custody.