Unsolved: Worcester

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.