The Connecticut River Valley Killer (also known as the Valley Killer) is an unidentified serial killer who operated in the Connecticut River Valley region, primarily between New Hampshire and Vermont (USA), from 1978 to 1988. He is believed to be responsible for at least 7 murders of young women, with a consistent pattern: most victims were stabbed multiple times, often with deep cuts to the throat and chest/abdomen. Many bodies were dumped in remote, wooded areas near Interstate 91.

Key victims:

Catherine Millican (27, 1978): Was birdwatching in New London, NH. Found with at least 29 stab wounds near where she was last seen.

Mary Elizabeth "Betsy" Critchley (37, 1981): Disappeared while hitchhiking near the MA-VT border. Body found in Unity, NH.

Bernice Courtemanche (17, missing 1984): Nurse’s aide who hitchhiked in Claremont, NH. Remains found in 1986 in Kelleyville with stab wounds and slit throat.

Ellen Fried, Eva Morse, and others found in similar wooded dump sites.

Lynda Moore (36, 1986): Brutally stabbed inside her home in Saxtons River, VT, in a frenzied attack.

Barbara Agnew: Found in Hartland, VT.

Several bodies were discovered in a short period in 1985-1986, alerting authorities to a possible serial killer. Victims were often in vulnerable situations (hitchhiking or alone in isolated areas).

The case became even more notable on August 6, 1988, when Jane Boroski, 22 and seven months pregnant, was attacked in a parking lot in West Swanzey, NH. A man stabbed her 27 times, but she miraculously survived (along with her baby). She is the only known survivor and provided a description of the attacker. The killings stopped after this incident.

The case remains unsolved to this day. There is some debate about whether all cases are definitively linked, but the similarities in MO, locations, and wound patterns are compelling. No conclusive DNA or arrests have been made.

Are they going to find this person

Crime

After 17 years, the case of a Galveston County rape and murder could be solved, invetigators say

Bridgette Gearen, 28, was found raped and strangled on Crystal Beach

Author: Matt Dougherty

Published: 10:09 PM CDT April 4, 2024

Updated: 1:11 PM CDT April 5, 2024

GALVESTON COUNTY, Texas — Cold case investigators in Galveston County said they’re getting closer to bringing justice to the family of a woman who was killed on Crystal Beach 17 years ago.

Bridgette Gearen was on vacation at the beach in 2007 with her daughter, Kyra, who was 2 at the time, and her co-workers. Kyra’s dad, Bridgette’s fiancé, Brandon Portie stayed home. She was from Orange and worked for an attorney's office in Beaumont, according to files from our sister station, KBMT in Beaumont. 

Portie said Bridgette and some of the others decided to go for a walk on the beach one night. She was the first to leave the beach house.

“By the time she left the beach house and went downstairs, within like a minute, she was gone,” Portie said.

The others looked for her throughout the night but to no avail. Her body wasn’t found until the next day. She had been raped and strangled to death.

“Paramedics were camping on the beach that night and found her floating in the water the next morning,” Portie said.

In the years that followed, no arrests were ever made. Although there have been suspects in the past, no charges have ever been filed.

“I’m tired of hearing, ‘We’re getting close,’ and I’ll say something to Kyra about it, and a year, year and a half goes by and we haven’t seen nothing or heard nothing,” Portie said.

Portie has heard it before and has gotten his hopes up too many times to count, he said. Investigators said there are more than 1,000 pages of documents and reports for Bridgette’s case. They saaid it’s not a cold case, they call it an old case, one of the most brutal they said they’ve ever seen. Portie has been there since the beginning -- closely following the investigation for all these years. He has an idea about what happened.

RELATED: Relatives mourn slain Crystal Beach woman on birthday; crime still unsolved

“My thought is they probably ran into each other on the beach earlier that day,” Portie said. “And you know, they followed her to where she was staying and waited, and then when she came down the stairs, there was more than one dude. I’ve been told up to about four. And they grabbed her and that was it.”

Investigators will only say they’re close to finally solving the case. They said new evidence obtained in the past year could finally help to bring this mystery to an end. They won’t share what that evidence is, and they said no arrests have been made, no charges have been filed and a grand jury has not been presented the case yet.

“Someone needs to answer for what they did in this life,” Portie said. “Not the afterlife, this life. They don’t need to be going through life just living their life. They took one, it’s not their right to do that.”

Portie and Bridgette’s family can only hope that this time will be different; that the closure they’ve dreamed of for so many years is almost here.

“I really want to see these guys brought to justice,” Portie said. “For her mother’s sake, for Kyra’s sake, and for Bridgette’s sake. Something’s got to happen.”

OG POST FROM THE 1ST OF JULY. Update July 3rd, 8:26 German standard time The myanimelist account is a different person and does not want to be associated with this case.

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Update. I will not encourage or discourage discussion on this post, however, if you harass the remaining partner, who is a minor and probably suicidal, you need to stop and check yourself. I do not support that kind of behavior. If you wanna continue to help, find the very obvious missing persons case from Poland, find the 16yos parents and message them that their minor daughter is in Germany. Harassing a deeply mentally unwell 16 yo is not the right call and never will be. I won't be joining discussions like that.

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Update July 2nd, nearly 4h after the first update: The police took down the manhunt. They have probably found her or given it over to Poland police. If someone sees polish police post about this, let me know.

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Update July 2nd, 3 hours after the first update: We have found a twitter and myanimelist account for the person from tiktok. They seem to be from Poland and not from Germany. Their partner speaks German tho. They seemingly posted about double suicide on their Twitter. I did not know that beforehand. This post is about a potential murder case, but it seems more like suicide. I cannot change the title anymore.

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Update July 2nd, one hour after the first update: Update, a person on tiktok has been found. Police has been informed of the Homurica account on tiktok. Loved ones are in shock. We don't fully know it's them but the tattoos are a very close match and visible in the videos.

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UPDATE, 2ND OF JULY: THE POPULAR PHOTO FROM SOCIAL MEDIA WITH A FULL BODY SHOWING A PERSON COSPLAYING HOMURA IN THE HALL OF DOKOMI IS NOT THE MISSING DEAD COSPLAYER FROM THE RHINE. THIS PERSON HAS RESPONDED PERSONALLY AND IS PROVEN TO BE ALIVE. NOTHING IS CONFIRMED BY POLICE YET. ESPECIALLY NOT THAT PIC SINCE THIS PERSON IS PROVEN TO BE ALIVE.

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Case Details:

German Police (North Rhine Westfalia/Nordrhein-Westfalen) published a webpage report, where they stated they need help solving a case. Every year, Germany hosts one of Europe's biggest conventions, the Dokomi in Düsseldorf, and right after this convention, two days later, a body was found washed ashore in Cologne, wearing a cosplay. The river Rhine (Rhein) connects Düsseldorf and Cologne (Köln), where the police found the body.

They put the webpage online on the 30th of June (a day ago, I am posting this on July 1st), and ask for help from the public. The body of the deceased cosplayer washed ashore at the 2nd of June and was retrieved by firefighters.

Stats of the victim, according to police:

- gender: biologically male, but presenting female (painted nails, wearing a skirt and long hair)
- Age: Between 20 - 30 years old (assumed)
- Place of retrieval: Rheinkilometer 694
- Height: 180 cm
- hair color: brown
- eye color: brown
- weight: slim

- attributes: female appearance, with long hair, skirt and painted nails, red earring and silver ring
- clothing: two jackets, one beige, one black. Shirt with a manga character on it. short skirt with a white belt and black leggings.

My input, research and additional details (subjective):

- Character that was potentially cosplayed: Homura Akemi - Madoka Magica
- Definitely a cosplayer outfit, but missing a wig (probably was washed away in the Rhine)
- Huge Bruises in the face, from several hits to the face before being dumped in the water
- cause of death is unclear until now, police has no additional info but the stuff I put above and the pictures in the case link
- thinly shaved eyebrows
- piercing on the lower lip, embedded in the lip
- close-up of the face shows a heart shaped face tattoo
- there is a white shoe in the picture of the face provided in the link below, could potentially be the shoe the person wore
- person had more than 3 black lined tattoos with no color, showing resemblance to anime and cartoon adjacent media. One of them is clearly Alastor from Hazbin Hotel.
- tattoos covered one of the arms show to have self-harm scars. Pictures of the tattoos are included in the report below
- race: White, Skin color: White

- many people come to dokomi from neighboring countries and there are also posts in both German and English going around on all socials right now. If you know the person shown in the report below, contact police in Cologne. Even if you are not from Germany, this could be your classmate or friend, or child. After a month, no one has reported this person missing or contacted police. This is very uncommon, since people who don't return home should usually be missed and police should be contacted when your loved one is missing.

- there is currently a post going around from a user from a Facebook group. They claim police has already established who this is, but no, I have called police this morning personally, and they told me they have not yet identified this person. It could be someone not from Germany who visited internationally.

- i also asked police to provide a full body picture but they told me they couldn't do that because since the photos were taken on the beginning of June, the corpse has changed too much (decaying process, I assume).

All Links and sources:

TW the pictures in this manhunt from NRW Police are graphic!!

https://polizei.nrw/fahndung/208247

Hii everyone, I need some crime case recs to make a documentary on.....but I can't seem to pick one....

Most true crime fans know the big names — Bundy, Gacy, Dahmer — but Belle Gunness rarely comes up, and honestly I think that’s a mistake. She might be one of the most prolific killers in American history, and the ending to her story still isn’t settled.

Gunness ran a farm near La Porte, Indiana in the early 1900s. She’d place ads in lonely hearts columns targeting single men with money, lure them out to her property under the promise of marriage, and then they’d simply vanish. Investigators eventually found the remains of at least 11 victims buried on her land — some estimates go much higher, into the dozens, when you factor in how long she may have been doing this and how many men just quietly disappeared without anyone looking too hard.

In 1908, her farmhouse burned down. Inside, they found the bodies of her three children and a headless female corpse that didn’t quite match her dental records or height. The official story is that she died in the fire. A lot of people who’ve looked closely at the case don’t buy it. The body was conveniently missing the one thing that could have definitively confirmed identity, and there were reported sightings of her afterward in different states for years.

What gets me about this case isn’t just the body count — it’s how methodical and patient she was. This wasn’t impulsive violence. It was a long-running, profit-motivated operation, and depending on what you believe, she may have just walked away from it scot-free.

What do you think actually happened to her? Did she die in that fire, or did she get away with it?

What happened to Kyle Vaughan?

Kyle was 24 when he disappeared from Newbridge, South Wales, on 30 December 2012. His damaged car was found on the A467 between Risca and Crosskeys. The case later became a murder investigation, but no one has been charged.

I’ve put together a sourced write-up of the case here, focusing on the known facts and the impact on his family with links. I’d be grateful for any corrections, additional sources, or respectful discussion.

https://open.substack.com/pub/shannongwyer/p/what-happened-to-kyle-vaughan?r=8nxyy8&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

First time poster here. I graduated from George Washington High School in 1975. In March of my senior year, a young girl I only peripherally knew from one of my classes was murdered and her body discovered at a farm in Wrightstown, Bucks County. Her name was Valerie Seibert (or Siebert - uncertain of correct spelling) and she was a year behind me.

She and I had the same typing class and we both used to ride the 84 bus to and from Washington. I knew her well enough to only say “Hi”, partially because she was gorgeous and I definitely wasn’t. She was a tall, auburn-haired, better-looking version of a teenage Barbara Streisand who always seemed to me to be either preoccupied or aloof.

Upon learning of her family life following her death, I had a much clearer understanding of my perception of her. Her mother was arrested shortly after her killing for receiving stolen property and drug charges (if memory serves) and suspicion arose that she may have either had a hand in or inadvertently caused her daughter’s death. She may have had some affiliation with the Pagans or Warlocks motorcycle gangs.

As far as I know, no one has ever been charged with her murder. She was found at that farm in Bucks County with gunshots in her arm and her side. It’s been 51 years since her killing and I’d like to know if anyone has any info or updates about the inquiry into her death.