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Friends,
The world is filled with evil. True Crime Sunday is not to pay homage to the people who committed the crimes, but to remember the victims. Their lives deserved to be remembered.
The Alphabet Murders
In the early ‘70s, three young girls from Rochester, New York, met their end in a very peculiar fashion. Not only were they all assaulted before losing their lives, but each of their first and last names began with the same letter. Even stranger, their bodies were discovered in towns that also started with that letter.
Carmen Colón
The first victim, Carmen Colón, went missing on November 16, 1971, only to be found two days later near Churchville.
At 4 p.m. on November 16, 1971, she walked two blocks to a pharmacy to pick up a prescription for her grandfather, reported the Statesman Journal. While waiting for the prescription, she left the drugstore and never returned. Carmen was spotted one last time about an hour later on Route 490 West, about 12 miles away from her neighborhood. Witnesses say she was nude, waving her arms, and running away from a car backing up on the shoulder of the road, according to the Statesman Journal.
“Would you believe it, nobody stopped,” Police Captain Andrew Sparacino told The New York Times in 1973. “People told us they were going too fast; they were in a hurry to get home.”
“I know they feel horrible (they didn’t stop) and they were courageous enough to come forward after the fact,” Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Investigator Patrick Crough told the Democrat & Chronicle in 2009. He additionally noted that cell phones were not in use, so that no one could have quickly called for help.
Two days later, two teenage boys on bicycles near Churchville, about 35 miles southwest of Rochester, found her lifeless, naked body in a ditch alongside a road, at first thinking it was a “broken doll,” according to newspaper reports. The autopsy results revealed she had been raped and strangled by hand.
Wanda Walkowicz
Next, Wanda Walkowicz disappeared on April 2, 1973, and was discovered the next morning in Webster.
On April 2, 1973, 11-year-old Wanda Walkowicz walked to the grocery store by herself on the east side of Rochester at around 5 p.m. Wanda bought some groceries nearby and started to walk north on Conkey Avenue, according to the store owner. A witness spotted her near the market about an hour later, holding her groceries and hesitating at the door of a stopped car.
The next day, at 10:15 a.m., a New York State Trooper found her fully clothed, dead body at the bottom of a hillside at a rest area off State Route 104 in Webster, about fifteen miles northeast of her home. Autopsy results showed she was strangled by a belt or a similar ligature, sexually assaulted, and chillingly, fed before she was murdered.
Michelle Maenza
The last victim, Michelle Maenza, was last seen on November 26, 1973, and found two days later in Macedon.
Months after Wanda went missing, on November 28, 1973, 11-year-old Michelle went to her school nurse’s office in tears on the Monday after Thanksgiving. The New York Times reported in December 1973: “Michelle and her younger sister were tormented by their classmates because they obviously were not required to bathe regularly and their clothing was ragged and dirty.”
The nurse let her leave school, and she was last seen about a fifth of a mile from campus by classmates, according to the Democrat & Chronicle in 1973. Police received a tip that a girl who looked like Michelle was spotted at a hamburger stand in a man’s car. The witness said the man had “dirty hands” and returned to the vehicle carrying a bag and a cup, according to Real Crime.
Witnesses later saw a similarly looking man driving a car with a flat tire, as well as a girl matching Michelle’s description in the back seat, according to the 2009 Democrat & Chronicle report. Witnesses told the police what the man looked like, providing the first description of a possible suspect.
Two days later, Michelle’s lifeless, clothed body was in a ditch in plain sight in Macedon, about 20 miles northeast of Rochester. She had been strangled with a ligature, and the autopsy revealed she had eaten a burger at some point before her death.
Final Thoughts
Despite a long list of possible suspects, the case remains unsolved. But, even though it has been over 50 years, four different law enforcement agencies are refusing to give up hope and are still investigating the cold case.
* Information obtained from Oxygen True Crime Website originally posted on October 18, 2023, by Grace Jidoun.
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere
Martin Luther King Jr.
Until tomorrow, my friends- Keep Reading and Stay Caffeinated.
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