Episode Transcript- The Double Intials Murders Part 1

[Amanda] Hey everybody, this is Amanda and I'm breaking in ahead of this episode to just give a quick correction to some of the information in this episode. I realized when I was recording and editing part two that I had some of the dates wrong in the first part of this case. Wanda Walkowicz was murdered on April 2nd, 1973. When I recorded part one, I said in error that her murder took place in 1972. At one point in the episode, I also say that Michelle Maenza was murdered in 1983 but it was 1973. I apologize for my error and will make sure that I do some better proofreading and editing in the future. Thank you!

[Amanda] Hey everybody, I'm Amanda, and you're listening to New York’s Dark Side.

[Intro Music]

[Amanda] Today, we're going to be covering the case known as thelphabet murders or double initial murders from the early 1970s in Rochester NY. Unfortunately, this case is still unsolved, and I am going to give a trigger warning that the victims in this case were all young children and there are some parts of this that may be difficult for some listeners to hear. So, if this case isn't for you that's okay, I hope you'll join us for an upcoming coverage of dark history or something that's more of your style. For this case, I used two books as well as several articles websites and a couple of YouTube videos for my source material. The books were: ‘Alphabet Killer: The True Story of the Double Initial Murders’ by Sherry Farnsworth and ‘Nightmare in Rochester: The Double Initial Murders’ by Michael Benson and Donald Tubman. I linked my blog post in the episode description where you can find a full list of all resources and source information for your reference. The case of the double initial murders is one like I said earlier that unfortunately remains unsolved to this day and it has some pretty wild details that I wasn't aware of until researching for this episode. There are three victims, all thought to be linked to this case. So there is some debate around the first victim which we'll get into later and I'll be honest when I first started researching for this case I didn't realize that this was a serial killer. When I was looking at unsolved cases on the New York State Police website I had come across the photo of Wanda Walkowitz and when I started looking into her story, I realized that there were two other victims thought to be connected to her. The first victim is 10-year-old Carmen Colon in 1971, and the second victim is 11-year-old Wanda Walkowitz from 1972, and the last is 10-year-old Michelle Maenza in 1973. All three girls were abducted during the afternoon in broad daylight from well populated areas. They were sexually assaulted and later found discarded in remote areas. And we'll start from the beginning with Carmen. On November 16th, 1971, ten-year-old Carmen Colon was reported missing by her family after she failed to return home from an errand. Carmen was described as a friendly energetic girl who always had a smile. She was born and spent the first five years of her life in Puerto Rico and then had moved to the Rochester NY area. And it's unclear if her primary residence was with her mother Guillermina or with her grandparents. It sounds like she had a very complex early start to her life and moved between the two homes quite frequently. Carmen 's mother Guillermina became pregnant with Carmen at the age of 14, her father, Justiano was 32, and was married to Guillermina’s older sister Carmen at the time of her conception. In the book ‘Nightmare in Rochester: The Double Initial Murders’ it's reported that the conception was not by Guillermina’s choice and that the relationship between Guillermina and Justiano was not romantic in nature. Guillermina’s sister Carmen was also pregnant by Justiano at the same time. Guillermina and her daughter Carmen moved from Puerto Rico to Rochester with Justiano’s parents Felix and Candida. Guillermina was in a relationship with Justiano's younger brother Miguel. It's very confusing, like I said. And the situation seems to vary a little bit based on the source material. The neighborhood that they resided in was referred to as ‘Bulls Head’ and it was called this because there was a statue of a bull’s head in the area. So, in the early 1970s the area was of a lower socioeconomic status. It was once a shopping district and at the time of Carmen's murder was becoming an area populated by transients and drug addicts. Carmen had a lot of family in the area. She would spend time playing with her cousins at her grandparents’ house and at her aunts and uncles houses. Carmen's grandparents lived at 746 Brown St. and her mother Guillermina had an apartment at 72 Roman street which was about a 14-minute walk. Carmen had her own bedroom at her grandparents, and it was adorned with a religious décor. Information about Carmen varies based on the source material and that seems to have happened with all three of the victims that we end up discussing. English was Carmen's second language, her first being Spanish and because of this she is said to have been of a lower intelligence. In some of the source materials that I read, Carmen was placed in special education classes, which seems to have been a common theme for schools to do in this with English second language students. And it doesn't necessarily mean that Carmen herself was of a lower intelligence it just sounds like this was a common practice due to the lack of resources at the school for students that were English second language. All the sources I read said that Carmen was very friendly, pleasant, and energetic. She was well liked by her peers and always smiling. She also suffered from frequent night terrors and because of this she would often wake up other members of the household with her screaming. And sometimes, this was so violent that she would fall out of bed to the floor, but her family had become so accustomed to it that it said they would stop going in to check on her.

[Amanda] Tuesday November 16th started out like any other day. Carmen woke up and she went to school after school she went and played at her cousin’s house who lived very close to her grandparents. Guillermina stopped by with Carmen 's younger sister Luz who was ill and had an ear infection and she needed a prescription filled. Carmen, hearing that her mom needed to fill this prescription, begged to be allowed to go pick it up for her mom and her mom told her no multiple times before finally agreeing to let her go to the pharmacy. And this was not uncommon for Carmen to be allowed to help with errands, she often went with her grandfather Felix to go complete these types of errands and Carmen either this day didn't tell Felix that she was going to the pharmacy, or she didn't wait for him. I saw it cited as both. Either way Carmen left that house alone that day and unfortunately this would be the last time that she was seen alive by her family. When Carmen left the house, she was wearing white sneakers, green pants, a purple sweater, she was also wearing a red wool coat. She left the house around 4:30 PM. The pharmacy Jax's drugs was two blocks away on the corner of West main and Genesee Street. And this is the intersection according to the book ‘Alphabet Killer: The True Story of the Double Initial’ murders where the bull’s head statue is. And I did find an article in the Democrat and Chronicle there's photos of this neighborhood from over the years and it does have a picture of a bull’s head statue at the address of 898 W Main Street, but I'm not sure if that statue is still there today in 2023. Again, the pictures are from 1982 and I did link that article in my blog post. The article isn't really relevant to this case, but I like to sometimes see that visual Carmen made it to the drug store. She dropped off the prescription, but the pharmacist told her that it would take about 1/2 hour for it to be ready because he needed to run the paperwork for the insurance coverage. In an interview later the pharmacist would report that Carmen was very upset, she seemed very distracted, and she told him that she was in a hurry, and she needed to leave and then she left the store. Carmen did not return to pick up the prescription and later one witness would come forward to say that he saw a girl matching Carmen's description getting into a car without a struggle. No other reports of seeing anything suspicious at this time came to law enforcement from the area around the pharmacy.

[Amanda] What happens next though is just truly wild and it shakes me to my core. So about an hour later around 5:30 PM on November 16th, drivers were met with a terrifying scene on Interstate 430 W near exit 3 to Churchville. A girl matching Carmen's description was reported to be running frantically away from a car that was reversing in her direction. This girl was naked from the waist down and she was carrying her pants. None of the drivers would report this to law enforcement though until three days later, after news broke about Carmen's murder and this right here was initially insane to me. And I really struggled to process this, but then I also told myself that I need to keep in mind that this was the 1970s, it's a very different era, there were no cell phones, so it's not like anyone could have immediately called to report what they were seeing to law enforcement. They may not have processed initially what they were seeing. There's been many times that I've been driving along and saw something on the road and not have noticed until like 1/4 or a half a mile later what I actually saw. So it's easy to pass judgment on a situation that happened 50 years ago, in a day and age that I didn't really experience, and it's hard to say that if someone had reported it if it would have had any impact on Carmen 's fate. It would have taken time for any of those drivers to get to a phone and call in the event and it would have taken even more time for police to respond. And in her book ‘Alphabet Killer: The True Story of the Double Initial Murders’, Sherry Farnsworth does a dive into this event, and she talks about the phenomenon known as crowd apathy and how that is likely what led to no one taking the time or initiative to call this into law enforcement. Likely people assumed that someone else would step in and either intervene and make the call. It's also likely that people were driving very quickly. This was the Interstate, so they're going 65-70 miles an hour and it would have taken them a while to actually process what they were seeing and by that time, again, they could have assumed that someone else had either intervened or already called law enforcement. I remember a couple years ago seeing a bunch of videos on social media of people doing different social experiments and recording different things like people cutting in line or taking someone’s bag or purse or you know attempting to abduct somebody, just to see what people would do and if anyone would step in and try to intervene in the situations. And in those situations, there was a lot of times that people wouldn't step in and that's similar to what happened in this case as well. And that's why in high stress emergency events there really has to be clear communication as to who's doing what. So, when you first learn like CPR one of the first things they teach you is that if you are responding to a medical emergency, you know, someone goes down and is unresponsive in front of you, you have to clearly announce who should be contacting first responders by pointing at them and saying “you call 911”. In the book ‘Nightmare in Rochester’ the authors talk about the psychological effect that the drivers who witnessed this would have had to go through after finding out about Carmen's murder and that what they saw was likely her running away and knowing her fate. So, it's just a truly, truly tragic situation for everyone involved, not just Carmen, but also the drivers who had to live with this. Of one more interesting note regarding this before I move on, some of the reports that were received later stated that there were actually two adults in the car that Carmen was seen running from- a man and a woman. But there doesn't appear that there was any ability to make composite sketches of either of these individuals and there were also some varying descriptions of the car that were reported. Back at home, Guillermina really began to worry when Carmen hadn't returned from the pharmacy around 5:00 PM, and she initially sent an uncle to the pharmacy to look for her. And when he couldn't find her at the pharmacy the family began to search the neighborhood looking for her and then after not being able to find her on their own Guillermina called police at 7:47 PM and reported her missing. The report of Carmen being missing was taken very seriously and police responded and started doing a door-to-door search very quickly. After Carmen 's disappearance her uncle Miguel was looked at pretty heavily as a suspect when reports of the car seen backing up after Carmen came out one of the reports matched the description of a car that Miguel Colon had recently purchased. In the book ‘Nightmare in Rochester’ it’s detailed that investigators did search Miguel’s car and found that the trunk had been washed out, so, they interviewed the dealership where Miguel had bought the car and the dealership reported that this had been done after the sale of the car. They also found one of Carmen's dolls in the car, but the families stated that Carmen rode in the car pretty frequently that didn't necessarily mean that this was a suspicious finding.

[Amanda] Carmen was found two days later on November 18th, by 15-year-old Mark Allen and 13-year-old James Gillen while they were out riding a motorcycle in an area they rode frequently. She was found on the Riga side of the border of Churchville and Riga in a rural area. She was naked from the waist down; her head was lying against a large rock. When they found her, the boys returned to Jim's house and reported what they found to Jim's father who then notified police. She appeared to have been placed there rather than thrown her coat was found later in a separate location, appearing to have been thrown from a car. Her pants were found on November 29th. Carmen had been sexually assaulted and had fingernail scratches over her entire body, her skull was fractured, and she had been strangled from the front. They would also find several light-colored cat hairs on her body at her autopsy when news broke of Carmen's murder several organizations and people came forward to try to help provide rewards for information leading to an arrest and to help support the family. On Saturday November 20th police were called to Sidley, Lindsay, and Curr department store where graffiti said on a men's room wall “I killed a 10-year-old girl who will be next?” but no public leads ever came from this. 

[Amanda] Carmen's funeral took place on Monday November 22nd. She was laid to rest in holy sepulcher cemetery in February of 1972. Citizens for a decent community which was an anti-porn and anti-abortion organization in the Rochester area put up five billboards in the areas where Carmen was abducted from and where she had been seen on the western expressway. Each of the billboards featured a photo of Carmen and read “do you know who killed Carmen Colon? Please help before it happens again. Rewards for information total $6000, Be a secret witness, no clue is too small” with a phone number for a secret witness phone line and the option to write in tips to the citizens for a decent community PO box address. This helped bring more tips for investigators to look into. In March of 1972, investigators and District Attorney Jack B Lazarus boarded a plane to Puerto Rico to interview Miguel Colon. Miguel had a long criminal history and had left Rochester not long after Carmen's murder. A witness came forward stating that Miguel had told him that he needed to leave the area because he had “done something wrong in Rochester” however when they got to Puerto Rico, they were unable to locate him. A newspaper in San Juan, the San Juan Star, had run articles announcing their arrival because the Democrat and Chronicle newspaper in Rochester had reached out to them trying to get an update. Miguel left his restaurant job and failed to pick up his last paycheck and there was speculation that he was hiding in the jungle from investigators. Miguel would ultimately end up turning himself in on March 26 about 6 miles outside of San Juan. And in the book ‘Nightmare in Rochester’ the authors detail that investigators had told Miguel that they had his mother in custody and they were gonna keep her until he turned himself in, which triggered him to then turn himself in. He was brought back to Rochester arriving on March 27th. Miguel maintained his innocence and stated that he had gone to Puerto Rico in November, and he did not know that he was being looked at for connection to Carmen's murder and when he couldn't be found when investigators had gone down to look for him it was because he was visiting a sick aunt. He requested and took a polygraph exam which he passed and thus Miguel was released, and they did not charge him with anything due to lack of evidence and unfortunately no further leads in Carmen's case would come at this time.

[Amanda] Unfortunately for the Rochester area, Carmen was not to be the only victim. Our next victim is Wanda Walkowicz. Wanda was born on August 4th, 1961, she was the oldest daughter of Richard and Joyce Walkowicz. Her father Richard passed away from a heart attack at the age of 30 when Wanda was six. A year after her father passed her mother, Joy, moved Wanda and her younger sister Rita to an apartment at 132 1/2 Avenue D off Conky Ave, in Rochester. Joyce was unemployed surviving off her deceased husband Social Security checks. Joyce's sister Joanne would discuss in the nightmare in Rochester book that Wanda's maternal grandmother had been heavily into alcohol, to the point where she lost custody of her children. Joyce and Joanne grew up mostly in separate foster homes and Joyce took after her mother in a lot of ways. In her 20s, after she lost her husband, she also lost her sobriety she later moved in her boyfriend Junior, a man with a criminal history and mental illness. The pair are described as being consistently drunk. In the book, ‘Alphabet Killer: The True Story of the Double Initial Murders’ by Cheri Farnsworth, it's recorded that life could be very difficult for Wanda. Often Wanda and her sister Rita assumed responsibility for helping to run errands to help their mother like Carmen before her Wanda was also in special education classes. She was described as being a good student, well-liked by her peers, but shy she's also described as being a fighter and not afraid to take on older boys if she felt the need due to the responsibilities she took on at home. Wanda would unfortunately miss school frequently and this likely accounted for her being placed in special education classes.

[Amanda] On April 2nd Wanda was asked to run out to get some pet food and some diapers for her younger sister Michelle who was two at the time of Wanda’s disappearance, as well as milk, bread, and some other items for dinner. She left the apartment around 5:10 PM and headed for the Hillside Delicatessen at 213 Conkey Ave. The delicatessen was just over three blocks away, about a four-minute walk from the apartment and it was a route that Wanda often walked as it was right near her elementary school. On the day of April 2nd, she was wearing a blue and white checkered dress, white socks, and sneakers. There are some articles that reported she was also wearing a red and green coat, but then later article said she wasn't wearing a coat. On the way to the store Wanda came across three friends from school who would later report seeing Wanda leaning the bag of groceries against a fence trying to adjust her grip while a brown vehicle passed her Wanda made it to the store and she gathered the items she was asked to retrieve 2 quarts of milk, a package of diapers, bread, cupcakes, soup, tuna fish, and both dog and cat food. The bagger at the delicatessen William Van Orden put everything in one bag so that she would only have to carry one bag home and the store clerk Richard Checchi would later tell investigators that everything seemed normal. Everyone at the store- employees and customers would report that they all saw Wanda leave carrying her bag between 5:15 and 5:30 heading north on Conky Ave. towards home. 

[Amanda] When Wanda didn't come home in the time that Joyce expected her to Joyce sent Rita down to the store to check on her. One of Rita's friends and neighbors joined her for the trip around 6:45 PM. They arrived at the delicatessen and asked about Wanda, and they were informed that she had been in earlier Rita bought some of the same groceries that Wanda had bought and then returned home. Wanda was reported missing on April 2nd by her mother Joyce after failing to return from her errands at around 7:47 PM. With this call Joyce was told she needed to look around the neighborhood for her first and then call back. So, Joyce also went to the delicatessen, and she also stopped at some of Wanda's friend's houses looking for her. She called police a second time around 8:15 and this time they reportedly took the disappearance seriously and they immediately initiated an intensive search of several square miles around her house, the delicatessen where she had been seen buying groceries, and areas where she had been known to play. Several witnesses would tell police that they had seen her walking towards home struggling to carry the bag of groceries there were also reports of her being passed by a brown vehicle during the investigation. It was brought up that Wanda and another friend had been stalked on March 31st by an unknown suspect while walking home the man had been following them home around 10:00 PM and jumped into some bushes when they turned to look at him. They couldn't give a good description other than he had buckles on his shoes the mother of Wanda's friend called the incident into police on the night it occurred.

[Amanda] On April 3rd the morning following Wanda’s disappearance, Wanda would unfortunately be found by state trooper Thomas Zimmer. Her body was located about 10 miles from Webster Ave. alongside an access Rd. to State Route 104 in Webster. She was fully clothed, face down, and appeared to have been tossed from a moving vehicle. She was found so quickly that media hadn't even reported her missing to the public yet. Her autopsy would reveal that she had been sexually assaulted, with traces of semen and the pubic hair found on her body. Her cause of death was strangulation, likely due to a belt from behind. She also had marks on her neck and body indicating that she had struggled with her attacker. They also found several white cat hairs on her body although the Walkowicz family did not have a pet with white colored fur. It was also reported that she had traces of custard in her stomach, something that she wouldn't have gotten from home. There was speculation about whether Wanda had gotten into a car willingly or if she had been forced. One thing that was noted was that the bag of items Wanda had purchased were never found. Investigators would question many of the same people they had interrogated after Carmen Colon's murder. And once again the citizens for a decent community organization would put up billboards this time with Wanda's picture stating: “It happened again, who killed Wanda Walkowicz? Rewards for information total $10,000” with the secret witness phone number and address promising that identity would remain secret. By Friday April 6th the secret witness line had received more than 200 tips. An eyewitness would come forward stating that he had observed Wanda speaking with the driver of a large brown vehicle as she walked home on the evening of April 2nd. Another individual called the anonymous tip line and said that they had observed a man forcing a girl matching Wanda 's description into a light colored Dodge Dart on Conkey Avenue between 5:30 and 6:00 PM. The man was white and medium height, he was potentially armed with a knife, the papers had requested this witness call back to the tip line for more information, but the witness would not call back. Another witness would call and report seeing a similar car near where Wanda was found, and these two callers are not known to be connected. Investigators did put out a BMW lookout for a light-colored Dodge Dart.

[Amanda] Wanda's funeral took place on Friday April 6th at Saint Michael's church on North Clinton Avenue. She would be laid to rest in Holy Sepulchre cemetery, the same as Carmen. It was revealed on Sunday April 8th, that a suspect had been taken into custody and interviewed for over 10 hours. He provided a solid alibi, and he would also pass the polygraph. He was not charged in anything related to Wanda's murder but was charged with endangerment of a child in an incident that was separate. Unfortunately, this would be the only solid lead that police had in the case at this point and the case would go back to a standstill when the killer struck again.

[Amanda} On Monday November 26th, 1983, ten-year-old Michelle Maenza was walking home from school. This time there would be a witness to the abduction, but unfortunately even almost 50 years later this case is still unsolved. Michelle lived on Webster Crescent with her mom, Carolyn, and her two sisters Marie and Christine. Michelle also had two brothers Angel and Steven who lived with their father about a mile away. Michelle was a special education student at school 33 on Webster Avenue. Michelle was unfortunately bullied and verbally abused regularly by her classmates. They had nicknamed her “stinky”… and this breaks my heart. On the day of her abduction Michelle spent most of the afternoon in the nurse's office because she had been bullied so severely at recess that she spent the afternoon crying. Michelle's mother Carolyn would normally walk her and her sister home from school but on this day Carolyn couldn't, because Michelle had to stay after school. She was released between 3:20 and 3:30 PM and began walking southwest from the school towards home. She made it to the intersection of Webster Avenue and Ackerman Street, and this is where she would be seen by one of her classmates.

[Amanda] Michelle was wearing a three-quarter length purple hooded coat with silver trim purple pants with a zigzag pattern and knee-high black boots. The classmate that saw Michelle at the corner of Webster and Ackerman would leave that area and when she came back, she saw Michelle now in a car with a man. The classmate needed to jump back from the intersection because the man was driving so erratically, he almost hit her. The car almost hit a second car as it turned the corner off Ackerman Street onto Webster Avenue. When Michelle didn't come home Carolyn was frantic. She called Rochester police from a neighbor's house at 5:40 PM. Police again took this disappearance very seriously and would begin canvassing the neighborhood searching for Michelle. One of Michelle's uncles would report seeing her near where she was abducted and stated that he offered her a ride which she turned down. Multiple people would also come forward seeing Michelle all over the city. 

[Amanda] Michelle's body would be found at 10:30 AM on Wednesday November 28th in a ditch off Eddy Road in the town of Macedon by Fire Chief Gene VanDeWalle. She was found lying partially on her side fully clothed, but her coat was missing. It appeared that her body had been dropped from the top of the incline and that she had rolled to where she lay her coat would be found about 1/2 mile away later that afternoon by a sheriff's deputy Michelle appeared to have been stripped and redressed. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled from behind and had bruises all over her neck. Once again, she had white colored cat hair on her body. The area where Michelle was found would be canvassed and a couple of leads were obtained. One of the neighbors reporting seeing a light colored 1966 Chevy parked on the shoulder of Eddy Road facing the wrong way. Another neighbor said that she heard a bang and dogs barking around 1:00 AM on Wednesday morning. A third reported she saw a car driving slowly about 10:30 Tuesday night.

[Amanda] Michelle's autopsy was performed by Doctor William Welch, and he confirmed that she had been raped and strangled. After the autopsy they began to feel the murders of Michelle and Wanda were completed by the same killer. Doctor Welch had been assisted with Michelle's autopsy by Doctor Edland who had done the autopsies of both Carmen and Wanda which helped assist in this connection. Doctor Edland attempted to find fingerprints on Michelle's body using an iodine and silver mixture and was able to get a print of a wrist and a portion of the palm. They also found remains of a cheeseburger in Michelle’s stomach, which was mostly undigested and likely eaten about an hour and a half prior to her death and likely given to her by her abductor. Michelle had bruises on her face, upper arms, and shoulders and they were able to get a semen sample from her autopsy as well. Unfortunately, in the 1970s there was no DNA testing, but they were able to examine the samples from all three cases and got a blood group, so the killer was either a secretor or non-secretor. Secretors secrete their blood type antigens into the body fluids like semen while non secretors do not.

[Amanda] The double initials connection in the cases was first mentioned publicly in an article in the Democrat and Chronicle on November 28 1973 by Bob Minzesheimer. Minzesheimer did question the police about this possible connection and Detective Fantigrossi stated that he thought it was a coincidence and that these were not planned crimes. They were looking into sex offenders, school employees, and welfare workers. Investigators would interview the classmate of Michelle's that had potentially seen her abduction and at first police were somewhat skeptical, but then a couple of drivers who had been involved in the near collision with the erratic driver would also come forward and corroborate the event. Another witness would come forward stating that he had read about Michelle's abduction and murder in the paper and added some additional information. The witness said that he saw a light-colored car parked on a Wayne County Road on Route 350 near the intersection of Eddy Road. The witness thought that the man was having car trouble so he stopped to see if he could help, and he noticed that there was a girl in the car. The man attempted to hide the girl behind him as the witness approached and refused the witnesses assistance and even raised his fists at him. The witness would ultimately work with a sketch artist to give a composite sketch.

[Amanda] Michelle's funeral would take place on Saturday December 1st at Corpus Christi church, and she was laid to rest at Sepulchre Cemetery with Carmen and Wanda before her. And this is where we're going to wrap up the first part of this case. In Part 2 we're going to cover the suspects that were looked at and you may recognize some of the names that came up and were ruled out from other high-profile cases. Before researching this case I never realized how many serial killers were tied to New York. It's truly wild. Most of all I hope that hearing this case might trigger someone to remember something that might help solve this case. It breaks my heart that these three girls have not been given justice and that the remaining families of these girls don't have closure to what happened and though it's been 50 years since this happened, I hope that someone out there knows something even if it's a small detail it might help solve this case. If you have any information on the case of Carmen Colon, Wanda Walkowicz, or Michelle Maenza please call the New York State Police Troop E headquarters at 585-398-4100. Please don't forget to connect with me by following the New York's Dark Side Facebook page, on Twitter and Instagram @NYDarksidePod; you can e-mail me at nydarksidepodcast@gmail.com. I hope you keep listening and I hope most of all that you stay curious.