Unsolved News Round-up: 11.10.20
Your weekly update on all True Crime news from around the world
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Africa
🇬🇭Ghana: Officials still not advanced enough to use DNA
Despite DNA evidence being widely accepted as the most advanced technique to solve crimes gloabally, training of officials in Ghana has been limited. More here.
🇱🇷Liberia: High ranking financial officials keep mysteriously dying
Speculation is growing in the African nation as the latest death of an internal government official appears to heap more suspicion on a spate of mysterious deaths. Emmanuel Barten Nyeswa, the Director of the Internal Audit Agency apparently fell only 15ft (4.57 m) to his death from his own home through a conspicuously narrow door. Adding to the mystery the property’s eight surveillance cameras were ‘out of order’. More here.
🇿🇦South Africa: Twins accused of terrorist activities denied bail
The Thulsie twins were accused of planning multi-national attacks and proving to be a flight risk after attempting to board a plane to Kenya. More here.
Asia
🇱🇧Lebanon: Lebanon seeks Interpol arrest warrants for Russian pair linked to Beirut explosion
The country is seeking help from international authorities to bring charges against the crew of the ship that brought thousands tonnes of explosives into the country resulting in the massive explosion in August killing nearly 200 people. More here.
🇹🇭Thailand: A zoo, a rare albino deer and a murder
The mysterious death of a rare Albino deer at Songkhla Zoo in Feburary has apparently led to murder. The head of the Zoological Park Organization of Thailand was shot dead on Saturday morning during a meeting called to investigate the unsolved disappearance of the rare albino barking deer. More here.
Europe
🏴England: Tina Hill’s murder in 1989 is being re-investigated
Suspects were well known, though nothing was able to connect them definitively to the crime at the time. There are also possible links to the murder of another schoolgirl just a year later. More here.
🏴Scotland: New book names alternative suspect in murder for which man served 30 years
Margaret McLaughlin was murdered in a small town outside of Glasgow in 1973. A swift police investigation led to the arrest and conviction of local man George Beattie — who ended up serving 30 years for the murder. However, a new book Signs of Murder points to police corruption, incompetence and provides a viable alternative suspect. More here.
North America
🥇California: Can the Zodiac & Doodler serial killer cases ever be solved?
The bay area has some of the most notorious unsolved serial killings in history. Police continue to work the unsolved crimes and are hopeful new DNA techniques may help infamous cases such as the Zodiac & Doodler killings finally resolve. Will these cases go the way of GSK? More here.
🌰Connecticut: Paper Ghosts podcast investigates four missing girls
Decades ago four girls went missing in rural Connecticut, the podcast aims to piece together their stories and build a picture around a central suspect. More here.
🍑Georgia: Victim identified after nearly 40 years probable serial killer victim
The remains have been identified as Patricia Parker, who was 30 years old at the time she was killed. Notorious serial killer Samuel Little — who has also been dubbed the most prolific killer in the US, confessed to killing a woman in Chattanooga in the early 1980s — the police finally managed to link the two together. More here.
🚢 Massachusetts: Body exhumed in unsolved murder of 10-year old
The family of Holly Piirainen is hopeful new developments in the murder of their little girl in 1993 will lead to some resolution. DNA has linked to a deceased possible suspect. More here.
🧤 Michigan: Police hope social media push will help find killer in 1978 cold case
Gail Webster was brutally beaten to death in her own home on Oct. 28, 1978. The significant men in her life were all cleared of the murder and no one has ever been caught. The popular 48-year-old, by all accounts led a pretty normal life. Could her murder be the work of a serial killer? More here.
🖼️Oklahoma: Mum of murdered woman still searching for justice 16 years on
Brittany Phillips was raped and suffocated in 2004 in a Tulsa apartment. Her mother, Maggie Zingman took her search for the killer on the road with "Caravan to Catch a Killer" tours garnering much attention in her quest. Since the pandemic however Zingman has not been able to be out on the road, she is however, still fighting. More here.
🌾Tennessee: Unsolved Murder week appeals for leads in cold cases
Unsolved Murder Week attempts to bring new attention to unsolved cases in the state. More here.
Oceania
🇦🇺Australia: 1995 cold case of Italian tourist murder is an enduring mystery
50 people visited the Beaumaris Beach in Tasmania the day 20-year-old Italian tourist Victoria Cafasso was murdered but no witnesses came forward. Victoria was in Tasmania taking a break from her law course and hanging out with her cousin when she was stabbed to death. Two years earlier a German tourist also went missing but a serial killer was ruled out. Why? More here.
🇳🇿New Zealand: Suppression order lifted on accused murderers of pregnant mother in 1995
Angela Blackmoore, 21, was nine weeks’ pregnant when she was bludgeoned and stabbed 39 times at her Christchurch home on August 17, 1995. It has taken an outside investigation by media to bring the case to a conviction. David Hawken has now been named as one of three accused of murdering her. The trial continues. More here.
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