Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for September 1, 2007 COLD CASE FILES

Police Announce Arrest in Cold Case

By: Carly O'Keefe & Associated Press

CARBONDALE, Ill. - Carbondale Police investigators announced an arrest made in a 25-year-old murder of an SIU student Friday.

They've arrested 62-year-old Timothy Krajcir in the 1982 strangling death of Deborah Sheppard. On April 8, 1982 Sheppard, then 23, was found in her Carbondale apartment naked with the door ajar and the telephone line severed. Sheppard was a senior marketing major from Olympia Fields when her naked body was found on the floor of her apartment in Carbondale.

Police and the Jackson County Coroner initially did not suspect foul play. Her family did not believe a 23-year-old girl died of natural causes under such suspicious circumstances. The family had her body flown to Chicago to undergo an autopsy by the Cook County Medical Examiner. He found she had been beaten on the head and strangled.

The break in the 25-year-old case when Carbondale police checked a piece of evidence collected back in 1982 to the Illinois state police crime lab. The evidence was analyzed for DNA and a match was found in the state police DNA database.

After 25 years, there was a solid suspect. Krajcir's been an inmate in the Big Muddy Correctional Center in Ina since 1985 and is being held as a sexually dangerous person. Officers interviewed Kritcher in prison and police say his statements plus the DNA gave officers enough evidence to finally make an arrest.

On the Southern Illinois University campus a student footbridge stands as a memorial to Susan Schumake. She was a 21-year-old SIU student found raped and strangled near where the bridge now stands on August 17, 1981. Her case went unsolved for more than 20 years, but due to DNA technology her killer was finally brought to justice in March 2006.

The murders of the two SIU students, both from Chicago suburbs, took place only eight months apart, but took decades to solve.

DNA aids police in arrest

By Bethany Krajelis, The Southern

CARBONDALE - A 25-year-old piece of evidence led police to an incarcerated Pennsylvania man, who was arrested and charged Thursday with the 1982 murder of Southern Illinois University Carbondale student Deborah Sheppard, officials said at a Friday press conference.

Timothy W. Krajcir, 62, of Allentown, Pa., has been charged with four counts of murder for his alleged involvement in the slaying of the 23-year-old marketing major from Olympia Fields, a village near Chicago. An Illinois Department of Corrections spokesman said Krajcir "admitted to the crime." On April 8, 1982, a friend found Sheppard's naked body lying on her bedroom floor, Carbondale Police Chief Bob Ledbetter said.

Because the case is pending, Jackson County State's Attorney Mike Wepsiec said he and police could not comment about evidence, adding that more information will come out at Krajcir's preliminary hearing, which is slated for Thursday. He would not comment on what piece of evidence led police to Krajcir, but did say advances in DNA technology were able to provide a male DNA profile that matched DNA from Sheppard's murder.

Sheppard's father, Bernie, said that while he has waited more than two decades for some form of justice, he's not satisfied with the possible prison sentence Krajcir could face. If found guilty, Jackson County State's Attorney Mike Wepsiec said Krajcir would be sentenced under statutes at the time of the murder, which carry a minimum of 20 years and a maximum of 40 years with the possibility of a natural life sentence.

"I want to see a trial take place and I want to see a verdict come in and I want to see an execution take place," Bernie Sheppard said from his Olympia Fields home.

"I'd like to see him on a gurney with a lethal injection in his arm. It won't bring my daughter back. Nothing can change that, but there are far too many people spending their natural lives in prison enjoying themselves and spending taxpayers' money for committing horrendous crimes," he said.

The day after his daughter was murdered, Bernie Sheppard said he went to her ground-level apartment and saw her bedroom window screen leaning next to the building. He said police told him Krajcir peeped through windows of apartments in the area and may have seen that Deborah Sheppard was alone when she got out of the shower, providing an opportunity for him to strangle her.

"That, to me, is unforgivable," Bernie Sheppard said. "'A Time to Kill,' that movie encapsulates what I feel should be done."

Krajcir has been incarcerated in the Big Muddy Correctional Center in Ina since January 1988 and recently approached prison staff, implicating himself in the crime, said Derek Schnapp, Illinois Department of Corrections spokesman.

Carbondale Police Lt. Paul Echols said he and another officer went to the Ina facility last week to interview Krajcir after DNA testing had been completed. Officials would not comment on what Krajcir said during the interview.

Krajcir, who was a 37-year-old studying administration of justice and psychology in 1982, remains in IDOC's custody on a $1 million bond. He is scheduled to face his first court appearance Thursday afternoon at the Jackson County Courthouse in Murphysboro, Wepsiec said.

At the time of Sheppard's slaying, police said there was a suspect in the case, but no arrests were made. Krajcir was not an original suspect, Wepsiec added. He also said there was no relationship between Sheppard and Krajcir, other than a murderer and a victim.

Krajcir, who is listed as a "sexually dangerous person" on IDOC's Web site, was incarcerated at the Ina prison in Aug. 1979 after a Jackson County conviction. Schnapp said he was sentenced to an indeterminate term and Wepseic added that Krajcir served two years before a judge conditionally released him in 1981.

Wepsiec said Krajcir stayed in the Carbondale area for two years and in 1985, was again taken into custody.

Schnapp said an Illinois judge transferred Krajcir's conditional release sometime in 1982 to the Pennsylvania correctional system. When he violated his parole there, Schnapp said IDOC brought him back to Illinois in January 1988 to serve his indeterminate term.

Wepsiec charged Krajcir with four counts of murder, alleging he "strangled Deborah Sheppard with his hands, thereby causing the death of Deborah Sheppard." Another count states Krajcir strangled Sheppard "while committing a forcible felony rape."

Echols, who placed a framed photograph of Sheppard next to the podium in the Carbondale Civic Center where the press conference took place, said that while the arrest may be able to provide closure to Sheppard's family, they now have to relive the pain of losing their daughter once again.

Police optimistic about city's other cold cases

By Bethany Krajelis, The Southern

Police continue to investigate Carbondale's unsolved murders and are still asking anyone with information to contact the police department at 457-3200 or the Carbondale-SIUC Crime Stoppers tip line at 549-COPS.

CARBONDALE - With Thursday's arrest of a man suspected in the 1982 slaying of Deborah Sheppard, Carbondale Police are one step closer to solving a string of murders that occurred more than two decades ago.

While it may have taken some time, Carbondale Police Lt. Paul Echols said the department does not and will not stop working on the city's unsolved murders, also known as "cold cases."

"I'm optimistic we will be here again soon," Echols said during Friday's press conference that announced the arrest of Timothy W. Krajcir, 62, of Pennsylvania. He was arrested and charged Thursday with four counts of murder in connection with the April 1982 death of Sheppard, a 23-year-old Southern Illinois University Carbondale student from Olympia Fields.

Carbondale Police Chief Bob Ledbetter said the city's unsolved murders don't just sit in a box, explaining that cold cases like Sheppard's are assigned to a detective at all times.

He said Friday that the unsolved July 2006 stabbing of Ryan Livingston, 22, of Carterville and the 2006 shooting death of Falon Taylor, 21, of Marion are the department's top priority right now.

"We are confident that those persons who caused these terrible crimes will be arrested and brought to justice," Ledbetter said.

Livingston was found bleeding from a stab wound at about 10:40 p.m. on July 13, 2006, on a sidewalk in the 300 block of West Walnut Street in Carbondale. He was taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 1:14 a.m. on July 14, 2006. Taylor was shot twice at about 12:30 a.m. on Jan. 6, 2006, in a home in the 400 block of East Oak Street.

Echols said the case of Susan Schumake is proof of what police, crime scene technicians, prosecutors and advanced technology can solve.

Schumake, a 21-year SIUC radio-television junior from Chicago Heights, was one of three Chicago-area women murdered in Carbondale during the early 1980s. Sheppard was one and Joan Wetherall, 30, a former SIUC student from Elmhurst, was the other.

Wetherall was found in June 1981 strangled and nude in an isolated area in Carbondale. Two years later, inmate John Paul Phillips told his cellmate he killed Wetherall. He was convicted and sentenced to death in 1986, but died while waiting on death row.

Schumake's body was found in August 1981 in a grassy area near U.S. 51 and the railroad tracks. Echols said advances in DNA technology, which he also attributed to the arrest of Krajcir, helped solve Schumake's murder.

In 2004, a Michigan man was arrested and charged with killing Schumake after DNA from a cigarette butt matched DNA from the 1981 crime scene.

"The case of Susan brought hope and is a classic example of what can be done," Echols said.

Sheppard's father, Bernie, said the work of the Carbondale Police Department, specifically that of Echols, "was no less than phenomenal" in his daughter's unsolved murder case.

"They brought this case from the cold case files to active files to closed files," Bernie Sheppard said.