PORTLAND, OR -- An Oregon Sheriff's Office hopes a new cold case website will lead to useful tips in decades' old murder investigations.
"If law enforcement detectives don't speak for those that have lost their lives, then those cases never come to resolution for their families," says Multnomah County Detective Sgt. Brad Robertson. His agency has around two-dozen unsolved cold cases, "Where you don't have any other leads that are producing results, as far as provability." While MCSO has helped other agencies close cold cases, Robertson says it's been at least a decade since its resolved one of its own.
The Multnomah County Sheriff's Office launched a new website this week, dedicated to cold case homicide victims like Charly Richards, who disappeared August 21st, 1992. His body was found 10 days later. "He was working as a cook at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and he was last seen alive leaving his job," sayd Detective Tamari Johnson, "His body was actually discovered by hikers in a wooded area in Troutdale."
Richards is one of three murder victims featured on the site, in an effort to draw attention to an estimated two-dozen cold case homicides. Det. Sgt. Robertson says more cases will be added as time allows, "With technology, it's very much benefitted us now, but 20, 30, 40 years ago with these cases, we still have cases that have polaroid photos, things on microfilm, so that takes a massive amount of resources to go through, categorize and digitize that information."
Tips can be submitted through the webpage. Robertson says any information could be a possible lead, "If a person knows one of these individuals, or knew them prior to their death, they might not know exactly what sort of information they have is useful. But at the very least, we need to interview them and find out what they did know."
There's a new focus on old cases, because of modern technology. Portland Police revived its Cold Case unit earlier this year. "DNA technology has advanced significantly and there are new processes and new methods," says Robertson, "And I'm no expert in it, but there's evidence that we didn't even know that we might necessarily have had in the past that we're able to now re-evaluate and potentially develop a suspect." He says MCSO dissolved its dedicated Cold Case Unit about five years ago, due to retirements. The agency now relies on its 10 detectives to investigate those cases in addition to current ones.
The cases featured on the new site all date back to the early 1990s. Robertson says Detectives are working with those surviving family members and, "Try to make sure that expectations are realistic and that we're going to do the best we can with the resources that we have. But also, trying to assure those families that we want to minimize any additional pain."
