Defrosting Cold Cases

Kathy Whorton’s case on TV March 10, 2013 Great news in the cold case of Kathy Whorton: her case will be discussed by Paula Zahn. The program is ”On the Case with Paula Zahn” and it will be on the Investigation Discovery Channel (I.D. Channel). Paula’s TV schedule is here but as I post this, the last [...]

Kathy’s sister Debbie Wilson is releasing a book called “Sweet Scent of Justice” to tell the story of her sister’s murder. Police found her car abandoned near the then-Northeast Louisiana University, where she was a college student. Less than an hour later, an anonymous caller led authorities to her body. Kathy had been shot twice in [...]

Can a man exonerated of capital murder sue the prosecutor who convicted him? That is the question John Hollway poses in an excellent article about the John Thompson case. An excerp: “In John Thompson’s case, there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime—the brutal robbery and murder of an unarmed New Orleans hotel [...]

The Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office (Lake Charles, Louisiana) arrested a man last Tuesday after he supposedly confirmed allegations involving a complaint made about sexually inappropriate actions with a juvenile that happened back in 1982. On July 19, 2010, officials received a complaint regarding 68-year-old John Weatherall of Lake Charles, LA. An investigation revealed that Weatherall allegedly [...]

Colorado prison inmate Roy Allan Melanson might never stand trial for the murders that his DNA says he committed in Louisiana and California decades ago. He will die in a Bent County prison for a 1974 murder that took nearly 20 years to solve, but new evidence links him to at least two other cold [...]

An Orleans Parish Criminal District Court judge today granted a new trial for Michael Anderson in the 2006 Central City massacre that left five teenagers dead, agreeing with the defense team that prosecutors violated the rules at his August trial that ended with a jury condemning Anderson to death row. “The ends of justice require that [...]

Vidocq read a disturbing article in the New York Times a few days ago. It described how in Jennings, Louisiana, USA, young women have disappeared and were later found murdered. According to the article, there have been eight cases. The women have in common that they were raised by extended family, lost their stability in [...]