Unsolved: Worcester

24/07/2025

The Essex District Attorney’s Office said the remains found off I-95 in 1992 are that of a local teenage boy who went missing nearly four decades ago.

18/07/2025

21 years ago. It’s the middle of the summer. Worcester. 2004.

On July 18, just after 2 a.m., Andre Edmonds is shot in the chest and killed outside of the Lakeside Avenue apartment complex in Worcester’s Columbus Park neighborhood.

A month later, shortly after midnight on August 19, Sal Lopez is shot in the stomach and killed while sitting in a parked car with a friend on Hawley Street.

Police believe the murders are connected, retaliating and violent measures taken by two rival gangs in Worcester.

The pair of murders remain unsolved.

It’s the middle of the summer. Worcester.2004.On July 18, just after 2 a.m., Andre Edmonds is shot in the chest and killed outside of the Lakeside Avenue apa...

11/07/2025

Watch the accompanying video for part 1 of Unsolved: Worcester's two-part episode special on the 50th anniversary of Worcester's deadliest fire.

52 years ago today, July 11, 1973, 10 people died in a five-alarm fire at a rooming house at 728 Main St. in Worcester's Main South neighborhood.

Police suspect arson.

Watch here:

July 11, 1973.It’s described as "the worst night ever" in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood.Just before 3 a.m., at the back of a rooming house at 728 Main ...

05/07/2025

July 5, 2002.

23 years ago today, 32-year-old Candace Scola was found dead on the kitchen floor of her home on Knox Street in Worcester.

She had been stabbed 13 times, including multiple stabbings in her chest.

The only suspect in the case is her estranged husband.

He is the last known person to see her alive.

Watch here:

It’s been over 20 years since 32-year-old Candace Scola was found dead on the kitchen floor of her home on Knox Street in Worcester. She had been stabbed 13 ...

03/07/2025

13 years ago today. It’s just after 9:30 p.m. on July 3, 2012.

Jonathan Kapulka is standing in a parking lot near the entrance to Walgreens pharmacy on Grafton Street in Worcester to watch the city’s annual Independence Day fireworks display.

He’s with a large group of family and friends. With him are his wife and two daughters.

A man wearing a ski mask ran up behind Jonathan, shooting him three times.

The killer ran away up Grafton Street.

It’s just after 9:30 p.m. on July 3, 2012. Crowds are gathered along the lower end of Grafton Street in Worcester to watch the city’s annual Independence Day...

27/06/2025

On May 16, 2003, following a tip from a local hunter, part of a one piece, blue Nike bathing suit is discovered on Whiskey Hill near the Nenameseck Sportsmen’s Club on Bacon Road in Palmer.

The finding launches a full scale, grid-by-grid search over three weeks along eight and a half acres of hillsides and wooded areas on both sides of West Warren Road in Palmer and nearby Ware.

On June 9, 2003, investigators found human teeth.

That same day, Worcester County District Attorney John Conte announced the arm bone they discovered in the woods matched the DNA of 16-year-old Molly Bish.

Molly had been missing since June 27, 2000.

May 16, 2003.Following a tip from a local hunter…part of a one piece, blue Nike bathing suit is discovered on Whiskey Hill near the Nenameseck Sportsmen’s Cl...

27/06/2025

Watch the accompanying video for Unsolved: Worcester Season 5, Episode 3 - "Bludgeoned to Death Behind a Gas Station."

On June 15, 1992, a young boy discovered the body of 39-year-old Richard Gragowski behind a Main Street gas station among old mattresses and empty wine bottles.

Richard had been bludgeoned to death.

Watch the video here:

It’s Monday, June 15, 1992 and summer has started early in Worcester.It’s around 12:45 p.m.. Temperatures have reached a high of 75 degrees. Worcester’s publ...

23/06/2025

The unsolved murder of 56-year-old John Sousa in the spring of 2019 is the most recent cold case on the list of the Worcester Police Department’s unresolved cases.

John’s body was found inside of a plastic storage bin in the back of a work van that had been reported missing more than a month before:

It’s 2:15 in the afternoon on Wednesday, June 5, 2019.Temperatures have peaked, reaching nearly 80 degrees on an overcast day in Worcester. Police are called...

18/06/2025

SOLVED!

For the first time since our podcast launched in 2022, we are pleased to announce a previously unsolved homicide has been solved.

Today, a Worcester County Grand Jury returned a murder indictment against Marquis Brown, 40, of Worcester, in the death of 19-year-old Becker College student William Smith.

Additionally, Steven Black, 39, of Worcester, was indicted on one count of perjury as a result of the investigation and arraigned in Worcester Superior Court on June 6, 2025, and released on $5,000 cash bail with a GPS monitoring device and conditions of release.

On Sept. 21, 2008, Smith was stabbed in the chest and killed during a fight that started at a house party and spilled into the street at the corner of North Ashland and Dix streets.

Watch our episode here:

It’s just before 2 a.m. on September 21, 2008.A fight that started at a nearby house party has spilled into the street at the corner of North Ashland and Dix...

15/06/2025

33 years ago today. It's Monday, June 15, 1992 and summer has started early in Worcester.

It’s around 12:45 p.m.. Temperatures have reached a high of 75 degrees. Worcester’s public schools are already dismissed for summer vacation and Main Street is buzzing.

A young boy walking his dog down Lagrange Street has just made an alarming discovery.

At the corner of Lagrange and Main Streets, on a strip of lawn behind a Sunoco gas station, the boy found the body of 39-year-old Richard Gragowski behind a row of bushes among old mattresses and empty wine bottles.

Richard had been bludgeoned to death. His skull had been crushed. His body had been sitting there in the sun for hours.

It’s Monday, June 15, 1992 and summer has started early in Worcester.It’s around 12:45 p.m.. Temperatures have reached a high of 75 degrees. Worcester’s publ...

06/06/2025

52 years ago today. June 6, 1973.

The bodies of 32-year-old Maureen Moynihan and her 4-year-old daughter Jennifer are discovered along a dirt road in Rutland State Park.

The mother and daughter had been stabbed to death.

Their case remains unsolved.

It’s just after 12:30 PM on June 5, 1973.32-year-old Maureen Moynihan and her 4-year-old daughter Jennifer have just dropped off Maureen’s 6-year-old son Tim...

05/06/2025

36 years ago today. It’s the evening of June 5, 1989.

North High School’s graduation ceremony for the class of ’89 is underway at the Worcester Auditorium.

17-year-old Nereida Melendez isn’t with her classmates. She never shows up for graduation.

Nereida’s body is buried under a pile of leaves on Bell Hill.

It’s the evening of June 5, 1989.A man walking around Chandler Hill Park finds a leather purse in the wooded area of Bell Hill. He turns the purse into the W...