ITUNES: Subscribe to Action News Jax - Project: Cold Case
When two dancers from the same Jacksonville show bar turned up dead, investigators believed it might have been the work of a serial killer.
One of those cases was solved but the other was not and now, decades later, investigators believe a murderer may still be on the loose.
In an Action News Jax partnership with the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office and Project: Cold Case, we spoke with the victim's sister and the detectives working on the case.
At the corner of University Boulevard South and Philips Highway there was a club called Sands Speakeasy Showbar.
Kathy Boswell, 27, worked there as a dancer. It was the last place she was seen alive.
The date was Feb. 22, 1984.
Her sister, Karen St. Louis, remembers that day well.
“I remember getting the phone call from my mother saying that Kathy was missing,” said St. Louis.
She said she knew right away that something was not right because of a phone call Boswell made before she disappeared.
“Kathy got off work. She called my mother and told my mother she was coming to see her,” said St. Louis.
Boswell left her daughter, Jamie, at her babysitter’s house. The babysitter later called police when Boswell didn’t show up.
“She would not ever have not picked her up. It just wasn’t in her nature to be that way,” said St. Louis.
Sgt. Dan Janson, with the Sheriff's Office, said that about four months earlier, the body of another dancer from the same club had been found in a borrow pit in St. Johns County.
The suspect in that case was William Darrell Lindsey, a convicted serial killer who died in prison in 2001.
“Can I say specifically that he’s responsible for Kathy’s case? I can’t say that at this point, but he certainly would be a person of interest,” said Janson.
St. Louis said there was someone else who made her worry about her sister.
“She had a boyfriend at the time who had a propensity for violence and we knew this and we were not happy at all,” said St. Louis.
But the boyfriend was not officially named a suspect.
A few days after Boswell disappeared, the Sheriff's Office found her car at the Lion’s Gate Apartments, less than a mile away from the club.
“There was a set of boots in the car and there were some initials written on the inside and so we were concerned about that,” said Janson.
Almost a year later, construction crews working just off of I-10 East and State Road 228 found human remains near a fence in a wooded area.
About four years after that discovery, dental records confirmed the remains were those of Kathy Boswell.
Baker County Detective Tracie Benton is now working on the case.
“She was a small female. She didn’t weigh a lot. The killer just picked her up and dumped her over the fence,” said Benton.
Benton showed Action News Jax the original case file, which contained only a few pages and did not have much information, compared to the file today, which is a lot thicker.
“Today’s file, from going through and gathering more information,” said Benton.
Together JSO and the Baker County Sheriff's Office believe the case can be solved.
Hope has faded for St. Louis, but she said it’s not completely gone.
“I forgive the person who killed her. I prayed for the person that killed her, but I would still like to know who it is,” said St. Louis.
In the meantime, she’s making sure the name Kathy Boswell is not forgotten.
If you know any information that could help police solve this cold case or any other unsolved murder, call Crimestoppers at 1-866-845-TIPS(8477).