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Vanessa Richardson
Foreign this is Crime House. During the week of February 24, 1957, the body of a four year old boy was found in a cardboard box on the outskirts of Philadelphia, igniting a decades long search for his identity. Almost 40 years later, a different tragedy occurred when 23 year old Jody LeCornue was found shot to death in her car in Baltimore. Despite eyewitness accounts and forensic evidence, her killer was never found, making this week's theme Cold Cases. Welcome to Crime House the Show. I'm Vanessa Richardson. Every Monday we'll be revisiting notorious crimes from this week in history. From serial killers to mysterious disappearances or murders, every episode will explore two true crime cases that share a common theme. Here at Crime House. We know none of this would be possible without you, our community. Please support us by rating, reviewing and following Crime House the Show wherever you get your podcasts and for ad free and early access to Crime the Show plus exciting bonus content, subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. Once again, today's theme is Cold Cases. We'll start Today's episode in 1957 when the body of an unidentified child who would become known as the Boy in the Box was found in a wooded area in Philadelphia. Then we'll jump to 1996 and dive into the mysterious murder of Jodi LeCornu, who was shot to death in a Baltimore parking lot for seemingly no reason. In both cases, it seemed like there was enough evidence to catch the killer. Sadly, there wasn't. In time, each investigation stalled, leaving detectives with decades of unanswered questions. But that didn't mean it was the end of the road. Thankfully, the Boy in the box and Jodi LeCornue had family and friends who weren't willing to give up. They held out hope that a break in the case was just one detail or one discovery away. And for at least one of these victims, that's exactly what happened.
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Vanessa Richardson
On February 24, 1957, a 26 year old college student was walking through a patch of woods in Philadelphia's Fox Chase neighborhood. The area was sort of a junkyard with old appliances and trash scattered everywhere. According to the student, he'd ended up there by chance. A rabbit had jumped in front of his car, and when he chased after the animal to make sure it was okay, it ran into the junkyard. While he poked around the underbrush, he noticed something strange among the piles of garbage. A large cardboard box wedged beneath some underbrush. Something about the box caught the student's eye. He wandered a little closer and realized there was something inside. It looked like a doll. At the time, the student didn't think much of it. Still, it was eerie enough to drive him out of those woods. But later that day, he heard about a missing girl from New Jersey. He thought back to the doll in that box. The student couldn't put his finger on it, but something had just seemed off about the whole thing. He wondered if maybe what he'd seen hadn't been a doll after all. He decided to call the police and tell them about that dollar box in the woods, just in case. The police arrived at the junkyard the next day. It didn't take them long to find the box, but when they looked inside, they didn't see a doll. They didn't see the missing girl from New Jersey either. Instead, they found the body of a young boy, between four and six years old, wrapped in a faded plaid blanket. Because the cold weather had slowed the rate of decomposition, the officers couldn't tell how long he'd been dead, but they were able to figure out a few other key details. They saw that the skin on his fingertips was pruny, and they were tufts of hair stuck to him. It suggested he'd recently been given a bath or a shower and gotten a crude haircut, which was odd considering a later examination revealed he'd been malnourished and physically abused before his death. That abuse may have been what killed him. It appeared that he died from blunt force trauma, but aside from that, there weren't any obvious clues that told them who the boy was Let alone who killed him. Without much else to go on, investigators focused on the biggest piece of evidence, the cardboard box the boy was found in. It was from JCPenney and originally contained a white baby bassinet. Within three days of the boy's discovery, authorities learned 11 or 12 of these particular bassinets had been sold at a nearby JCPenney. Once they located the store, they were able to contact most, but not all of the people who'd bought the product. Of those they were able to find, none had any connection to the boy. While those investigators chased down Leeds, the authorities launched a massive search of the junkyard and its surroundings. The area was a remote wooded section of Pennypack Park, a nine mile stretch of greenery that cuts through Philadelphia. It's not clear how much of this ground they were trying to cover, but the Police called in 270 police academy recruits to do it. But they didn't have to look far to find some promising evidence. Investigators discovered a corduroy cap just a few feet away from where the box had been. They noticed the hat had a special belt sewn into the back of it. Thanks to that small detail, they were able to trace the hat back to a store two weeks later. The owner immediately recognized it. She'd sewn the belt on herself. Not only that, she also remembered who had bought it. She gave the police a description of the customer. According to her, he was a man around 25 years old and about 5ft 11 inches tall. Unfortunately, the trail ended there. Police were never able to find him, which was incredibly frustrating. But luckily, he wasn't their only lead. In the early days of the investigation, a woman recalled being on a bus with a suspicious looking man accompanied by a sleeping boy. She found it notable because both of them were very unkempt. Another witness said she saw a woman and child who looked to be around 12, reaching into a trunk on a road near the junkyard. This happened just hours before the boy was found. Unfortunately, neither of these reports led detectives to a suspect. The only person they could confirm had been at the scene was the college student who found the box. However, authorities ruled him out after he passed a voluntary lie detector test. The most frustrating aspect of the case was that no one seemed to know who the boy was. In the days and weeks after his body was found, authorities checked orphanages and foster homes and canvassed neighborhoods. They turned up empty every single time. There wasn't even a record of a missing child that matched his description in the area. And because the boy was so young, between four and Six. He didn't have much time to leave a paper trail behind. This gave 29 year old bill Kelly, the fingerprint expert assigned to the case, an idea. There was one place that would have those kinds of records. A hospital. Bill wanted to compare the boy's footprints with the maternity records of hospitals in the area to see if there was a match. Sadly, he came up empty. With none of their leads panning out, detectives decided to turn to the media for help. In early March, a few weeks after the boy was found, authorities took the extraordinary step of dressing the boy's body in children's clothes and photographing him. They sent the photo to newspapers around the area, and the Philadelphia Inquirer distributed around 400,000 flyers with the picture around the city. Before long, the image of the so called boy in the box was hanging from street corners, in stores, even tucked inside gas bills. Soon there were thousands of tips coming in, and not just from Philly either. With all the media buzz around the case, people from around the country were calling. But despite all the attention, none of those tips had any information useful to the investigation. The lack of developments confused the authorities. They couldn't understand how no one recognized him. No teachers, no neighborhood friends, no family looking for him. Nothing. At some point, the police published an article about the victim in a pediatric journal. The boy in the box had some healed over surgical scars, so they were hoping the doctor who'd performed the surgery would see the article and remember him. But no one did. By the summer of 1957, several months had passed since the boy in the box was discovered in the woods. Since nobody had come to claim the body, the boy was buried in a cemetery for unidentified or unclaimed bodies. Philadelphia detectives donated their own money to buy a headstone. It reads, heavenly Father, bless this unknown boy. It was a touching gesture. The officers working on the case, many of whom were parents themselves, were deeply affected by the boy's murder. The least they could do was give him a place to rest. But burying him didn't mean authorities were giving up. Especially not 36 year old Remington Bristow. Remington was an investigator in the medical examiner's office, and he'd become consumed by the case. Obsessed even. He'd lost a child himself, so it's very possible he felt connected to the boy on another level. And in 1958 or 1959, a year or two after the boy was found, Remington decided to do some additional sleuthing on his own. And in a pretty unorthodox way, he published an article claiming authorities believed the boy's death was accidental. And since his family didn't have the money for a funeral, they left his body in the woods, hoping someone would bury it for them. It's not clear if they actually thought that. Either way, Remington figured if the perpetrator believed they wouldn't get in trouble, they might come forward. The plan was a bust. Nobody took the bait. But Remington wasn't even close to giving up. The following year, in 1960, he tried another unconventional method. He consulted a psychic. Apparently the psychic gave Remington information that led him to a foster home in Philadelphia close to where the boy was found. Whether it was truly psychic intuition, or maybe the woman knew more than she was letting on, Remington thought it was worth checking out. When the home had an estate sale, Remington jumped at the chance to poke around. He got inside and saw something that made his jaw drop. A white bassinet. Have you ever spotted McDonald's hot crispy fries right as they're being scooped into the carton and time just stands still? Great days start with great underwear. And Tommy John makes the greatest. With Tommy John, you make each day better than the last. And with over 20 million pairs sold and thousands of five star reviews, guys everywhere love their Tommy John. Plus, you're fully covered with Tommy John's best pair you'll ever wear or it's free, guaranteed. Grab 25% off your first order now at tommyjohn.com Spotify Save 25% at tommyjohn.com Spotify See site for details In 1960, about three years after the Boy in the Box was found, 39 year old Remington Bristow made a discovery he thought would crack the case wide open. After a psychic led him to a foster home in the Philadelphia area near where the boy was found, Remington discovered something major. A white bassinet. Because the boy had been found inside a cardboard box that once held a white bassinet, Remington thought he was on the right track. And his suspicions only grew when he discovered blankets in the home that looked just like the one the boy in the box had been wrapped in. Remington looked into the couple who ran the home and found out they had a 20 year old unmarried daughter. She had four children and Remington theorized the unknown boy could have been a fifth secret son. He took his findings to the police, but after doing some more digging, they weren't able to come up with any hard evidence. Remington tried to prove it himself, but was never able to. Even then, it wasn't enough to convince him to move on. In 1965, eight years after the boy's body was discovered. 44 year old Remington joined forces with the case's fingerprinting expert, Bill Kelly, who was now 37. Neither of them had been able to forget the Boy in the Box. Despite all the dead ends, they knew someone out there held the key to solving the case. Since the boy didn't have any lasting marks on his arms from vaccines as was common back then, they wondered if his parents were transient workers or immigrants. It would also explain the lack of a paper trail. With this in mind, Bill started to comb through newspaper records. And soon he found an article from 1956. It was about refugees coming to the US looking for a safe haven after the Hungarian revolution. The article contained a photo of a child who Bill thought looked exactly like the Boy in the Box. He reached out to Immigration and Naturalization Service and poured over thousands of passports. Finally, he found the boy's documentation. Bill learned his family had ended up in North Carolina, but their son went with them. He was alive and well. He wasn't the Boy in the Box. The setback must have been a huge disappointment for both Bill and Remington. For his part, Remington continued to obsess over the case for the next few decades. He even kept a plaster mold of the boy's face by his desk. Sadly, Remington never got the answers he was so desperately looking for. In 1993, he passed away at 72 years old. With Remington's death, one of the Boy in the Box's biggest champions was gone. But that same year, the investigation got an unexpected boost when the V Doc Society took on the case. The group had been founded three years earlier in Philadelphia by a group of retired law enforcement officers who specialized in cold cases. And in 1998, they got permission to exhume the Boy in the Box and and take a DNA sample from his body. But before it could be of any use to them, they had to find someone related to the boy to compare it to. In the meantime, they had the boy reburied. He was moved to a nicer cemetery and given a new headstone. America's Unknown Child. After his reburial, his grave was often covered with flowers and toys from citizens and investigators who had followed the case for years. It was a reminder of how many people were still waiting for answers. Little did they know investigators were finally inching closer. In 1999, 42 years after the Boy in the Box was found, the authorities got a new lead. And it was very promising. That year, a local psychiatrist called the Philadelphia Homicide Division A According to the doctor, one of his Clients knew the boy in the box. Over the next few years, this psychiatrist facilitated several meetings between investigators and his client. And eventually, the woman was ready to tell her story. The V Doc Society, along with 71 year old Bill Kelly, who had recently joined the group, got to speak with her as well. According to the woman, in 1954, when she was 12, her mother bought a baby named Jonathan from a family looking to give him away. She said her mother abused Jonathan for years until one night he threw up his dinner. Baked beans. She was so angry, she beat him to death, then gave him a bath. There were details from the story that made investigators hopeful. The autopsy had revealed the boy ate beans before his death and his fingers were pruny when he was found, which would line up with the bath. There was also the witness who'd seen a woman and what looked like a 12 year old child at the scene hours before the boy in the box was found. Still, the woman's account was hard to prove. A lot of her story could have been retrieved from public record. And since she wasn't actually related to the boy in the box, there was no way to corroborate things via DNA. Not to mention her mother was dead. So all detectives had to go on was the woman's word. It was difficult to come to terms with. It seemed like investigators had been so close to finally solving the case. But even though this particular lead didn't pan out, the boy in the box continued to stay on everyone's mind. Over the next few years, countless books, articles and websites were created in the hopes of finding the boy's killer, or at least his identity. In 2016, the National center for Missing and Exploited Children even released a facial reconstruction image of the boy. At that point, it had been 59 years since the boy in the box was found, making him Philadelphia's oldest open case. But the end was within sight. In April 2019, the boy was exhumed once again. DNA testing had come a long way since 1998, and detectives were hoping to create a new, more advanced DNA profile for him. But since so much time had passed since the boy died, his DNA was incredibly degraded. So over the next two and a half years, an international team of experts worked to patch together a sample and create a profile. When they finally got one, they uploaded it to a genealogy site called Gedmatch to see if they could find any relatives connected to the boy. Lo and behold, one of the boy's cousins had a DNA profile on the database. This allowed investigators to find even more relatives and by testing them, investigators were eventually able to identify the boy's actual mother. Although she was dead by then, authorities were still able to get a court order to retrieve her maternity records. They found out she'd had three children. Two were still alive, and the third was the boy in the box. In October 2021, after 64 years of looking, investigators finally learned the boy's name, Joseph Augustus Zarrilli. It was an incredible moment. But their work wasn't over just yet. Before they announced their breakthrough to the public, investigators spent the next 14 months researching Joseph and his family. They found his father's name and learned that Joseph was born in 1953. They also discovered that Joseph once lived in West Philadelphia and was born out of wedlock, so it's possible he'd been put up for adoption. Finally, in December 2022, investigators held a press conference. They revealed Joseph's name and everything they'd learned about him. After 65 long years, the anonymous boy who had endured so much in his short life got one step closer to justice. But there was still one major question to answer. Who killed him? It's unclear if Joseph's parents are the murderers or if they're associated with any other theories, like the woman who claimed to be his adoptive sister. At the moment, authorities aren't revealing the parents identities for privacy reasons and to protect the investigation. So for now, we're. We'll just have to hope that more answers are coming. But we can rest assured there are people out there who won't give up until they find them. Up next, we'll shift gears from Philadelphia to Baltimore, where 23 year old Jody Lecornu was shot to death in a parking lot in 1996. After a bizarre account from several witnesses and a series of dead end clues, investigators were left baffled. But decades later, the search for Jody's killer continues.
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Vanessa Richardson
When it comes to cold cases, you never know when you'll make a breakthrough. For Joseph Zarelli, it took 65 years. Years. But for this next case, the victim's loved ones hope they won't have to wait that long. This one took place in Baltimore, 100 miles and 50 years from the discovery of the Boy in the box on March 2, 1996, sometime before 4:00am The Baltimore Police received a flurry of emergency calls. Someone had been shot in the parking lot of a strip mall in the north end of the city. It was snowing when police arrived at the crime scene. There they found a white Honda Civic. Inside the car was a woman they identified as 23 year old Joanne Jody LeCornue, slumped over the steering wheel. She'd been fatally shot in the back. They learned that Jody was a student at nearby Towson State University and was working part time at a bank while she put herself through school. Her family referred to her as a Sunbeam, a bright, friendly person who people gravitated towards. She had three sisters. One of them was an identical twin named Jennifer who lived in California. But despite her sunny moniker, Jody struggled with anxiety and alcohol abuse. Her drinking was actually the reason she'd gotten into a fight with her fiance, Steve a few hours before before she was shot. We don't know the nuances of the argument, but it was bad enough that on Friday, March 1, after Jody finished her shift at the bank, she decided to go to a bar. Instead of going home, Jody and a friend went to a favorite spot of hers, the Mount Washington Tavern. It's not clear what she did or who else she talked to, but she stayed there until closing time, which was probably around midnight. She must have been friends with the staff there because she gave one of the bar employees a ride home. But her night wasn't done yet. Once she dropped him off, she went to an atm, got some cash, and bought some beer from a liquor store. Afterwards, she went to the Drum Castle Shopping center on York Road. She parked in the lot, then sat in her car to make a few calls. Sometime after 3am a man in a white BMW drove up next to her. It seems like the two had an exchange of some kind because Jody's window was rolled down. After their interaction, he pulled out a gun and fired a shot through Jody's open window. The bullet hit Jody in the back, but she still had enough strength to try and flee. She put her car into gear and made it all the way across the street to another shopping center before she passed out and the car rolled to a stop. Her attacker slowly followed after her and parked beside Jody's car. Then he got out and casually approached her open window. He reached inside to turn off the lights and put it in park. He also seemed to grab something from the interior. After that, he got back in his BMW and took off. Several witnesses heard the gun firing and saw the scene play out. One of them was a man named Vince Rains. He was across the street unloading a truck when the attacker first fired the shot. Vince didn't have a cell phone, so he jumped in the truck and drove to a local gas station and told the police what he'd seen. Unfortunately, he didn't get a plate number for the killer's car, and none of the other witnesses did either. But he remembered it was a white BMW and had gotten a decent look at Jody's attacker. He was a black male in his 20s or 30s, around 6ft tall and over 200 pounds. He was dressed in a green army camo jacket. This description was blasted out over the police radio as first responders rushed to the crime scene. Once Jody's body was secured, investigators started looking for evidence. They were able to lift fingerprints from the interior and exterior of her Honda, but they didn't match anyone in the police database. Their next hope was to find some surveillance footage from one of the nearby stores. But in a terrible coincidence, most of the cameras around the shopping center weren't working. Investigators did find one functioning system, but it was snowing that night, so the footage was too blurry to make anything out. It doesn't seem like anyone at the bar matched the killer's description, and neither did Jody's fiance, Steve. But the police still wanted to talk to him. It's not clear if he said anything about their fight, but he told them he'd gone out to a work party and that Jody didn't tell him she was going that night. When she didn't come home, he assumed she'd gone to stay with her parents, who lived nearby. Even though Steve was eager to help the investigators, it doesn't seem like his information gave them any leads. For the moment, all they had to go on was the evidence at the crime scene. They thought it might have been a robbery, since Jody's purse was gone. Most likely the killer had taken it when he went back to her car. There was also the possibility that it was a drug deal gone wrong. Since Jody had struggled with substance use in the past, however, the police were able to rule that one out as well. But at some point, they considered an alternate theory. Maybe Jody's murder wasn't about her at all. Perhaps she was just collateral damage. Her father, John Lecornue, worked as a prosecutor in nearby Annapolis. His specialty was drug and violent crimes. The police wondered if at some point during his career he made someone so angry they wanted revenge. And Jody paid the price. After 23 year old Jodi LeCornue was murdered in March of 1996, police wondered if her father's career was a motivation for her killer. John Lecornue had been a prosecutor who worked violent crime and drug cases. It was certainly possible that someone had a grudge against him and decided to go after Jody. Investigators looked into people he'd put behind bars or for anyone who might want to hurt their family. But in the end, it didn't lead to any likely suspects. After this latest dead end, John decided to get personally involved in his daughter's case. He channeled his grief into helping however he could, looking over newspaper articles and crime scene photos. Even when the case stalled, he remained the point person between the family and the detectives working on the investigation. But at some point after Jody's death, he got some more devastating news. He was diagnosed with cancer. His sickness didn't stop him from searching for his daughter's killer. He worked hard on the case, but didn't make any breakthroughs. Neither did the authorities. Over a decade passed without progress. By the time John passed away from cancer in August 2007, 11 years after Jody's murder in it didn't seem like police were any closer to finding her killer. But that didn't mean her family was going to stop looking for answers. After John Lecornue passed away, Jody's now 32 year old twin sister Jennifer Carreri eventually took up his mantle. But she didn't jump in right away. Jody's death was still too painful for her. Jennifer was the younger twin by two minutes and felt like Jody was her other half. Because of their bond, Jennifer's whole life changed after her sister's murder. She was stunned at first, but then became terrified that someone would come after her too. She lived across the country in California with her husband and kids. But the distance didn't help her forget about Jody and what happened to her. When she thought about the case, Jennifer was unimpressed with the investigation. She didn't understand how a crime scene with six Witnesses, video footage, fingerprints, and a description of the suspect had gone cold. She also felt like there were aspects of the case that hadn't been explored, like her sister's behavior that night. According to Jennifer, Jody's anxiety led her to be very safety conscious. Jennifer didn't think it was like Jody to go to a deserted parking lot alone in the middle of the night. She also wouldn't have rolled her window down if the driver of the BMW was a stranger. Because of this, Jennifer felt like her sister knew her attacker. So she may have been afraid to get too involved in the investigation. By 2016, 20 years after Jody's death, Jennifer was finally ready to get involved. That year, the Baltimore Police Department tried to generate some new leads. This time, they turned to the public and released previously confidential photos of the crime scene. They were hoping there was someone out there who would feel more comfortable coming forward forward now than they did back in 1996. Perhaps invigorated by the renewed activity, Jennifer finally reached out to the authorities for a meeting. She was hoping to work with investigators and maybe find a clue they'd missed along the way. But they told her there was no use. Their effort to find new information had failed, and they were completely out of leads. Jennifer figured if the police weren't going to keep working on the case, then she'd do it herself. In August of 2016, she requested her sister's case file, but the police said no. According to them, Jody's murder was still an open case, and sharing that information would put solving it in jeopardy. But Jennifer refused to take no for an answer. She filed a civil suit against the Baltimore Police Department and crossed her fingers that a judge would let her see the file. But by 2018, she still hadn't been granted permission. Jennifer had to find another way to make some headway on her sister's case. That year, she saw something that gave her a jolt of inspiration. A movie. She watched the Oscar winning film Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri, where a mother put up a trio of billboards outside her farm to provoke the police into looking for her daughter's killer. Jennifer decided to do the same thing for Jody. She spent $3,000 on a billboard that went up near the strip mall where her sister was killed. It had a picture of Jody on it and promised a $32,000 reward for information. There was also a message, find my killer. The following year, 46 year old Jennifer put up more billboards and offered a higher reward. The next month, she added another one near City hall that specifically addressed the Governor of Maryland. And yet another that begged the state attorney to release Jody's records. They never did. By this point, it had been 23 years since her sister's death. Jennifer had spent thousands of dollars on legal fees and even more on the billboards. But her efforts to keep her sister's case alive were more than monetary. She created Facebook groups and websites for updates and met with prison inmates to discuss leads. She even contacted a lab that specialized in advanced DNA testing. After talking with Jennifer, the lab agreed to work on Jody's case for free. It's not clear if the authorities took that specific lab up on their offer, but. But they did go ahead with a forensic analysis of Jody's clothes in 2021. Unfortunately, the lab couldn't get a DNA profile of Jody's killer from them. So many people had handled Jody's clothes by that point that the lab couldn't build a conclusive sample. So DNA wasn't going to help find Jody's killer, at least not for the moment. The hope was that if technology advanced and tests became more capable, they could try again in the future. As of this recording, Jodi LeCornue's death is still unsolved and open. It's one of the area's biggest cold cases, and there are still cash rewards on the table for anyone who can provide meaningful information about her killer. If that's you, visit Metro Crimestoppers online or call 1-866-2587 to leave a tip. As for Jennifer, it doesn't seem like she's moving on anytime soon. According to her, she's always hoping that one day when the phone rings, there will be some answers on the other end of the line. When we reflect on the cases of Joseph zarrelli and Jodi LeCornue, it's a reminder of the challenges that accompany cold case investigations in terms of finding the culprit, but even more so in terms of emotions. Cold cases can be devastating because of how long it takes to get any kind of closure or. Or answers. And sometimes those answers never come. As the years go by, the people involved, like witnesses, suspects, investigators, slowly disappear. They retire, they die. They move on. Which is why each decade that passes creates more of an uphill battle when it comes to information. In Joseph Zarrilli's case, it took 65 long years to even know his name. While that got us one step closer to finding him justice, there's still the obvious pressing question. Who killed him? For Jodi Lecornue, the circumstances of her death and the available evidence made it seem like there would be a quick arrest. But then her loved ones had to wait in frustration as the case inexplicably stalled. Now it's been 28 years, and it doesn't seem like the authorities are any closer to finding her killer than they were in 1996. All that's to say, it takes a huge amount of resilience to invest time, money and emotion into a case that has been open for decades. But more than that, it takes a lot of hope that one day your patience will be rewarded with answers Crime House the Ship show is a Crime House original. Powered by Pave Studios. At Crime House, we want to express our gratitude to you, our community, for making this possible. Please support us by rating, reviewing and following Crime House the Show. Wherever you get your podcasts, your feedback truly matters. And for ad free and early access to Crime House the Show plus exciting bonus content, subscribe to Crime House on Apple Podcasts. We'll be back next Monday. The show is hosted by me, Vanessa Richardson, and is a Crime House original. Powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the Crime House the Show team Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Alex Benedon, Natalie Pertzovsky, Sarah Carroll, Kate Murdoch, Haniya Saeed and Russell Nash. Thank you for listening.
Crime House True Crime Stories: Episode Summary
Title: COLD CASES: Boy in the Box & The Baltimore Billboard Murder
Host: Vanessa Richardson
Release Date: February 24, 2025
In this gripping episode of Crime House True Crime Stories, host Vanessa Richardson delves into two harrowing cold cases that have baffled investigators for decades. Centered around the theme of unresolved mysteries, the episode explores the tragic discovery of the Boy in the Box in 1957 and the unsolved murder of Jody LeCornue in Baltimore in 1996. Both cases highlight the relentless pursuit of justice by determined individuals and the enduring hope that one day answers will emerge.
On February 24, 1957, Freddy Richardson recounts how a 26-year-old college student stumbled upon a cardboard box in the wooded outskirts of Philadelphia's Fox Chase neighborhood. What initially appeared to be an ordinary doll turned out to be the lifeless body of a four-year-old boy, later dubbed the "Boy in the Box."
Vanessa Richardson narrates:
"The abuse may have been what killed him. It appeared that he died from blunt force trauma, but aside from that, there weren't any obvious clues that told them who the boy was or who killed him." [01:45]
The police faced immense challenges in identifying the boy. The only substantial evidence was the JCPenney bassinet box and a corduroy cap found nearby. Despite tracing the cap to a store and obtaining a suspect description—a man around 25 years old—the police couldn't locate him. Additional eyewitness reports failed to yield useful leads, leaving the case cold.
Despite numerous dead ends, Remington Bristow, an investigator in the medical examiner's office, became obsessed with the case. His relentless efforts included unconventional methods such as consulting a psychic, which led him to a foster home where he discovered a white bassinet matching the one from the box. However, these leads proved inconclusive.
Years later, in 1999, advancements in DNA technology provided a new avenue for solving the case. An international team successfully extracted a degraded DNA sample, which was then uploaded to the genealogy database Gedmatch. This breakthrough allowed investigators to identify Joseph Augustus Zarrilli as the boy in the box in October 2021:
"In December 2022, investigators held a press conference. They revealed Joseph's name and everything they'd learned about him." [25:45]
While identifying Joseph was a monumental achievement, the search for his killer remains ongoing. Authorities are still piecing together the circumstances surrounding his death, with privacy protections delaying the disclosure of his parents' identities.
Transitioning to Baltimore, Vanessa Richardson outlines the chilling murder of 23-year-old Jody LeCornue on March 2, 1996. Jody, a student at Towson State University, was found shot to death in her white Honda Civic in a strip mall parking lot. Despite eyewitness accounts describing the assailant as a black male in his 20s or 30s wearing a green army camo jacket, the case quickly went cold.
Richardson quotes Jody's father, John LeCornue:
"I channeled my grief into helping however I could, looking over newspaper articles and crime scene photos." [30:15]
Investigators explored various motives, including robbery and potential retaliation related to John's role as a prosecutor, but no substantial leads emerged. Jody's sister, Jennifer Carreri, frustrated by the lack of progress, took matters into her own hands years later.
Inspired by the film Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Jennifer launched a campaign to keep her sister's case in the public eye. She invested thousands of dollars in billboards offering rewards for information and utilized social media platforms to gather support. Despite these efforts, advancements in DNA technology yielded no new evidence, and the investigation remains unresolved.
Jennifer reflects:
"She's always hoping that one day when the phone rings, there will be some answers on the other end of the line." [40:20]
The case of Jody LeCornue underscores the emotional toll that cold cases take on victims' families and the enduring hope that justice will eventually prevail.
Vanessa Richardson concludes by highlighting the immense challenges inherent in solving cold cases. The stories of Joseph Zarrilli and Jody LeCornue illustrate not only the difficulties in gathering and preserving evidence over time but also the profound emotional impact on those seeking closure.
She remarks:
"Cold cases can be devastating because of how long it takes to get any kind of closure or answers. And sometimes those answers never come." [45:50]
Despite the passage of time and the fading of initial investigative leads, the unwavering dedication of individuals like Remington Bristow and Jennifer Carreri serves as a testament to the enduring human spirit in the quest for justice.
This episode of Crime House True Crime Stories poignantly captures the relentless pursuit of truth in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Through meticulous storytelling and emotional depth, Vanessa Richardson honors the memories of Joseph Zarrilli and Jody LeCornue, reminding listeners of the importance of perseverance and hope in the darkest of mysteries.
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