five cold cases solved decades later when a crime occurs police immediately set out to solve it and catch those responsible some cases get solved right away others can take weeks or even years then there are those cases that can stretch over decades but through a stroke of luck and a little digging authorities are finally able to solve them these are five cold cases solved decades later number five Tracy Gilpin on the night of October 1st 1986 15 year-old Tracy Gilpin of Kingston Massachusetts headed to a party near by her house but 10:30 p. m. her and her friends decided to leave her friends walked with her until they reached their own homes shortly after dropping them off Tracy went inside a convenience store and bought a pack of cigarettes the clerk remembered her and said she called someone on the pay phone while there she had called the owner of the house that threw the party she asked her if she could pick her up at the convenience store and drive her home because she didn't want to walk alone anymore however the woman said there were still people partying and so she couldn't leave Tracy eventually decided to keep walking by herself but this would be the last time anyone would ever see her alive again when she didn't come home her parents and family weren't initially worried she often spent the night at a friend's house and forgot to call in but when her friends started calling and asking where she was her family knew something was wrong police were called and she was then reported missing three weeks later and 14 miles away a woman walking in miles standish State Forest and Plymouth discovered the badly decomposed body of a teenage girl it was Tracy the 15 year old had suffered a massive fracture to her head and police believe she was killed the night she disappeared for the next thirty plus years despite multiple searches and tips no one was arrested in relation to the murder but police in Boston recently announced they were working with cops from North Carolina to bring in 61 year old suspect Michael hand on the night she disappeared hand was hosting another gathering in his Brooks Dale Street home in Kingston where Gilpin was last seen Tracy melissa Cavaco hand and another man were present but he said the gathering happened weeks before she ever disappeared then later he told a story about seeing Tracy with an older man in a Ford Escort on the day she went missing the man was later identified as Henry men Holtz and he has been ruled out as a suspect hande said he and another friend followed the car to the State Forest but lost sight of the vehicle minutes later they found men Holtz coming out of the woods with a tarp and shovel however he later gave a different account of the story saying he was in the forest when he scratched himself on a rock he said he picked up that rock and dropped it on the ground and that's when he heard a thud looking down he noticed that had fallen on Tracy's head by mistake at one point hand told investigators he was sorry for not being completely honest throughout the past interviews he was then arrested and charged for the murder of Tracy Gilpin he entered a not guilty plea and is currently awaiting trial number four death of Richard Phillips and Milton Curtis on January 22nd 1957 El Segundo California police officers Richard Phillips and Milton Curtis stopped a vehicle after it ran a red light once outside the car without warning the perpetrator pulled out a gun and shot both officers three times before fleeing the scene officer Phillips fired three shots into the vehicle and radioed for help before losing consciousness officer Curtis was pronounced dead on the scene four blocks away the killer ditched his car and ran through neighborhood backyards while he got rid of two stolen watches and a gun apparently prior to being stopped the suspect had held four teens at gunpoint before he bound gagged and robbed them he also raped one of the 15 year old girls before taking their watches and stealing their 1949 Ford vehicle which was the one officers saw beating that red light a massive manhunt ensued but it led nowhere the last break happened in 1963 years after the incident when a homeowner found the gun and two watches in his backyard these items were processed and partial fingerprints were obtained but it didn't lead to any arrests the case was left open but it remained cold for more than 40 years until September of 2003 when police received a tip about the identity of the killer this was a fake call but it caused police to run the old finger prints on the newly created nationwide fingerprint database compiled by the FBI to their surprise that matched a print for a robbery held in South Carolina in 1956 done by Gerald Mason Gerald was known friends and family as a friendly man and model citizen who was a wealthy retiree with to gas stations a family and grandchildren when his fingerprint was matched with those recovered on the wheel of the stolen vehicle and his handwriting compared to the receipts for the gun purchase he was arrested when confronted with the evidence Mason fully admitted to the crime he told police he was intoxicated when he stumbled across the teens and when he encountered the police officers later that night he wanted to cover up for the rape robbery and theft he had just committed Mason pleaded guilty to the crimes and was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences he was denied parole in 2009 and later died in prison at the age of 83 number three murder of Maria Ridulph snow had begun to fall on the evening of December 3rd 1957 seven-year-old Maria Rudolph begged her mom to let her go out and play with her best friend and neighbor Kathy Sigman it was dark out but the two went on the street and played a game called duck the cars Kathy would later tell police that it was then that they were approached by a young man named Johnny he said he was 24 unmarried and asked if they liked dolls then he inquired to see if the girls liked piggyback rides Maria accepted and after Johnny gave her a ride she went inside their house to grab a doll she wanted to show him when she came back Kathy went to her house to get mittens and by the time she came back out Maria and Johnny were gone Kathy then told Maria's family and when they still couldn't find her they called police within an hour authorities were searching the area for the young girl they interviewed neighbors and witnesses but no one saw a man playing with the girls when the FBI came on board they traced the timeline and agreed Maria was likely abducted between 6:45 and 7:00 p.
m. five months later in approximately 100 miles away from Sycamore and Woodbine Illinois to tourists searching for mushrooms around US Route 20 found the skeletal remains of Maria she was wearing shirt undershirt and socks while hidden underneath a partially fallen tree since Maria wasn't taken out of the state the FBI withdrew their investigation and left it to state and local police but prior to the FBI leaving the case they interviewed potential suspects before the body was found and one of the suspects was then 18 year old John Tessier at the time of the disappearance John lived with his family just two blocks away from the rid off home he had been planning to enlist in the US Air Force when his alibi was investigated John said he was 40 miles northwest of Sycamore to enlist in the Air Force under some authority visited the Chicago recruiting station corroborated by records then spent the day site scene he returned to Rockford by train that night and arrived at 6:45 p. m.
he made a collect call to his parents asking for a ride home phone records showed a collect call was placed to the Tessier home 6:57 p. m. by someone named John after that phone call John met enlistment officers at Rockford to drop off paperwork they confirm that they did speak to him at 7:15 p.
m. and because his alibi checked out the FBI closed the file on him completely John went on to serve 13 years in the US military and later on he became a police officer in Milton Washington but in 1982 he was charged with statutory rape after abusing a 15 year old runaway he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor it was sentenced to one year probation and terminated from his job by 1994 he changed his name to Jack McCullough and by 2011 he was already in his 70s and living in a retirement home while working as a security guard in 2008 the case of Maria was reopened after Janet Tessier John's half-sister confided that on their mother's deathbed she supposedly implicated John as the perpetrator was also revealed that John allegedly raped his other half sister Jean state police reviewed the evidence and created a new timeline to make room for him as a viable suspect in 2012 John was tried in DeKalb County for the rape of his half-sister Jean and the kidnapping and murder of Maria Ridulph the former case was dismissed due to a lack of physical evidence but as for the kidnapping and murder of Maria he was charged with the crime despite a lack of physical evidence motive and indication he was in the area when the crime even happened pressure from both the rid off and the Tessier family led to the conviction where John at the age of 73 received a life sentence in 2015 he filed for an appeal Richard Shmack the County State Attorney reviewed the case and found out that key evidence pointed to John's actual whereabouts in Rockford 40 miles away from the crime scene were kept out of the trial this evidence which was the collect call he made according to phone records would have supported his alibi that he was not in the vicinity with the icy road conditions taken into consideration it would have literally been impossible for him to have driven 40 miles within it's to abduct rid off and eventually show up to drop his papers off to the enlistment officers by 7:15 p. m.
and Rockford again as a result he was immediately released on April 12 2017 John was officially declared innocent of the crime in to this day no one knows who killed little Maria Rudolf number two Dianne Jackson Diane Jackson was a 25 year old single mother from Houston Texas who headed out to work for the day on December 14th 1969 she pulled up her car into the company parking lot but she never made it into the office later that day a man named William Bell saw another man walking away from a shack located near the office building curious he decided to look inside the shack and when he peeked in he found the body of Diane during the investigation police discovered the woman had been raped strangled and then brutally stabbed to death there were no immediate suspects and the only thing police were able to collect from the victims car that could possibly point to a killer were latent prints found outside the vehicle this was then filed away and the case eventually went cold after decades of advances in technology the brother's victim David expressed an interest in retesting and re-examining the case in 1989 David had become a Texas State Highway Patrol officer and later joined the Texas Rangers he asked Houston PD to review the case and the witness reports as well to see if there were any new leads the Houston PD also ran their prints and their updated local database along with the Texas Department of Public Safety's automated fingerprint identification system but nothing came out of that search it would take another 14 years before the case received attention again this time the latent prints were prepared by examiner Jill Kinkade to be run against the FBI's newly established nationwide fingerprint database searching through over 70 million offenders it yielded 20 possible matches Jill then checked each one individually and positively identified a match and a named James Davis Davis had been in and out of prison several times throughout his life in fact he had just gotten out of prison just nine days prior to the assault and murder of Diane after a latent print identification the lead investigator found the suspect living along that Texas Arkansas border since his fingerprints were obtained on the outside of the vehicle they needed a confession to convict him when Davis was interviewed he was visibly shocked when police questioned his whereabouts between 1969 and 1970 he also became nervous when showed photos of the victims vehicle he then eventually pled guilty in court and was sentenced to 34 years to life in prison for Diane Jackson's murder and rape and be one Jacob Wetterling on Sunday October 22nd 1989 11 year-old Jacob Wetterling his brother Aaron and another friend Aaron Larsen were riding their bikes on the way home from a convenience store in st.
