The Alphabet murders (also known as the Double Initial murders) are an unsolved series of child murders which occurred between 1971 and 1973 in Rochester, New York.
All three victims were girls aged ten or eleven whose surname began with the same letter as that of her first name. Each victim had been sexually assaulted and murdered by either manual or ligature strangulation before her body was discarded in or near a town or village near Rochester with a name beginning with the same letter as the victim's name.
Murders
Carmen Colón
At 4:20 p.m. on November 16, 1971, a 10-year-old Puerto Rican child named Carmen Colón disappeared while returning home from an errand in Rochester, New York. According to eyewitnesses, Colón entered the pharmacy her grandmother had instructed her to visit on West Main Street, but left the store upon learning the prescription she had been instructed to collect had not been processed, informing the storeowner, Jack Corbin: "I got to go. I got to go." She was then observed entering a car parked close to the pharmacy. Colón was reported missing to the Rochester Police Department at 7:50 p.m.
Approximately fifty minutes after Colón exited the pharmacy, scores of motorists driving along Interstate 490 observed the child, naked from the waist down, running from a reversing vehicle believed to be a dark-colored Ford Pinto hatchback, frantically waving her arms and shouting in an attempt to flag down a passing vehicle. At least one of these witnesses observed Colón being submissively led back to this vehicle by her abductor.
Two days later, two teenage boys discovered Colón's partially nude body in a gully not far from Interstate 490, and close to the village of Churchville. This location was approximately 12 miles from where Colón had last been seen alive. Her coat was discovered in a culvert some three hundred feet from her body; her trousers were later discovered on November 30, close to the service road near where numerous motorists had observed her attempting to escape her abductor.
An autopsy revealed that, in addition to having been raped, the child had suffered a fracture to her skull and one of her vertebrae before she had been manually strangled to death. Furthermore, her body had been extensively scratched by fingernails.
Both the murder of Colón and the fact no individual who had observed the child attempting to flee from her abductor alongside Interstate 490 had attempted to offer her any assistance generated intense public outrage. Two New York newspapers, the Times Union and the Democrat and Chronicle, initially offered a combined reward of $2,500 (equivalent to $19,875 in 2025) for information leading to the arrest and conviction of her murderer, and all information each publication received was relayed to police. Numerous local businesses and residents added private donations to the reward fund, gradually leading the sum to exceed $6,000 (equivalent to $47,699 in 2025). Although police interrogated several suspects in the months following Colón's murder, including her uncle, no individual was charged with her murder and by December 21, the number of investigators assigned to the case on a full-time basis was decreased to three.
In early 1972, five large billboards—each measuring 30-feet-by-12-feet—were erected alongside major Rochester expressways. Each bore an 8 feet (2.4 m) high picture of the child alongside the headline: Do You Know Who Killed Carmen Colón? Free use of these billboards was given for one month by the Rochester Outdoor Advertising Company. Each offered a $6,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Colón's murderer or murderers in addition to displaying the telephone hotline number and postal address—each established the previous November to encourage the public to submit anonymous information. Although this tactic generated several new leads, all failed to bear fruit.
Wanda Walkowicz
Seventeen months later, at approximately 5:00 p.m. on April 2, 1973, 11-year-old Wanda Walkowicz disappeared from the east side of Rochester while returning home from an errand. According to the owner of the delicatessen Walkowicz had been instructed to visit, the child had purchased the groceries she had been instructed to buy at approximately 5:15 p.m. before she had begun walking alone down Conkey Avenue. Walkowicz was reported missing by her mother, Joyce, at 8:00 p.m.
Police immediately launched an intense search to locate Walkowicz. Almost fifty detectives searched several square miles of the terrain around her home, the delicatessen, and areas around the Genesee River where she had been known to play. These searches failed to locate the child, although several neighborhood residents recalled observing Walkowicz, struggling to carry the bag of groceries, walking just north of Avenue B. Three classmates specifically observed her bracing the bag against a fence so that she could improve her grip as a brown vehicle drove past her.
Walkowicz's fully clothed body was found by a police officer at 10:15 a.m. the following day, discarded at the base of a hillside alongside an access road to State Route 104 in Webster, approximately seven miles (11 km) from Rochester. The position of her body indicated she had likely been thrown from a moving vehicle, with her body rolling down the embankment.
An autopsy revealed she had been sexually assaulted, then strangled from behind with a ligature, most likely a belt. Several defensive wounds indicated Walkowicz had fought her murderer. In addition, her body had been redressed after death. The autopsy also revealed traces of semen and pubic hair on the child's body. Furthermore, several strands of white cat fur were found upon her clothing, although the Walkowicz family did not own a pet with fur of this color.
As had been the case with Carmen Colón, investigators established an anonymous telephone hotline in addition to distributing numerous flyers throughout Rochester appealing for information. A reward of $10,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Walkowicz's murderer was also established.
These police inquiries produced an eyewitness who informed investigators that as Walkowicz had walked home from the delicatessen on the evening of April 2, he had observed the child standing alongside the passenger door of a large brown vehicle, conversing with the driver. This eyewitness was unable to obtain a clear view of the occupant of the vehicle, although the location of this sighting was just two-tenths of a mile from the Walkowicz home. Another individual who contacted investigators following the installation of the anonymous hotline informed investigators she had observed a man forcing a red-haired girl matching Walkowicz's description into a light-colored Dodge Dart on Conkey Avenue between 5:30 p.m. and 6:00 p.m. on the evening of her disappearance.
The Rochester Police Department dismissed any suggestion of a link between the murders of Colón and Walkowicz, although a sheriff's sergeant who had been assigned to investigate Colón's murder (by this stage still an open although largely inactive case) was reassigned to the task force implemented to investigate the murder of Walkowicz.
In September 1973, local television network WOKR announced plans to broadcast a televised reconstruction of Walkowicz's abduction and subsequent recovery of her body. This 30-minute episode was broadcast on 21 October, accompanied by public appeals for witnesses to contact authorities. Although this program resulted in the Rochester Police Department receiving over 200 calls from the public, no useful leads were gained.
Michelle Maenza
Seven months later, on the evening of November 26, 1973, 11-year-old Michelle Maenza was reported missing by her mother, Carolyn, after she failed to return home from school. Subsequent investigations would determine Maenza was last seen by her classmates at approximately 3:20 p.m. walking alone en route to a shopping plaza located close to her school with the intention of retrieving a purse her mother had left inside a store within the plaza earlier that day. Approximately ten minutes later, a witness observed Maenza sitting in the passenger seat of a beige or tan vehicle traveling at high speed on Ackerman Street before turning onto Webster Avenue. According to this witness, the child had been weeping.
At 5:30 p.m on November 26, a motorist observed a man standing by a large beige or tan vehicle with a flat tire, parked alongside Route 350 in the town of Walworth, holding a girl he strongly believed to be Michelle Maenza by the wrist. When this motorist had stopped to offer assistance, the individual had deliberately "grabbed the girl and pushed her behind his back", also obscuring his license plate from the motorist's view as he stared in his direction with such a menacing expression on his face that the motorist had felt compelled to drive away.
Maenza's fully clothed body was discovered at 10:30 a.m. on November 28, lying face down in a ditch alongside a rural road in Macedon, approximately 15 miles (24 km) from Rochester. Her autopsy revealed that in addition to receiving extensive blunt force trauma to her body, Maenza had been raped, then strangled to death from behind with a ligature, possibly a thin rope. Numerous strands of white cat fur were discovered upon her clothing, and leaf samples matching the foliage where her body was discovered were recovered from within one of her clenched hands, indicating she had likely been strangled to death at or near the location where she was found. Investigators were able to retrieve a partial palm print from her neck and traces of semen on her body and underwear. A forensic analysis of the semen samples determined she had been raped by one individual.
An analysis of the contents of Maenza's stomach revealed traces of a hamburger and onions which had been consumed approximately one hour before her murder, giving credence to earlier reports of a girl matching Maenza's description having been seen in the company of a Caucasian man with dark hair, aged between 25 and 35, approximately 6 ft 0 in (1.83 m) tall and weighing 165 lb (75 kg) both at a fast food restaurant in the town of Penfield at approximately 4:30 p.m. on the afternoon of her disappearance, and alongside Route 350 approximately one hour later.
Funerals
Carmen Colón, Wanda Walkowicz, and Michelle Maenza were each laid to rest in Rochester's Holy Sepulchre Cemetery.
Colón's funeral was conducted on November 22, 1971. Her funeral Mass was attended by 200 mourners. Walkowicz was laid to rest on April 6, 1973. She was laid to rest in a small white and gold casket following a service officiated by the Reverend Benedict Ehmann. Maenza's funeral was held at the Corpus Christi Church on December 1, 1973. Her open-casket funeral service was attended by scores of mourners. At the conclusion of Michelle's funeral service, her father, Christopher Maenza, stated to other mourners: "She was a sweet little girl. She didn't fight much."
Investigation
All three child murders generated intense public outrage; each received intense publicity. Following the murder of Michelle Maenza, investigators released a composite drawing of the individual seen with the child by numerous witnesses to the media. They also installed a telephone hotline exclusively devoted to the manhunt for the perpetrator, whom they strongly suspected had committed all three murders. Anonymity was again offered to any caller offering information, and a reward was again offered for any information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator. Although these efforts resulted in numerous calls from the public, no credible suspect was located.
Although investigators interrogated more than 800 potential suspects in relation to the Alphabet murders, the perpetrator or perpetrators of the homicides was never caught, and the case remains unsolved. As each child hailed from a poor Catholic family, had few friends, and had recently experienced issues such as bullying or poor academic performance at her school, investigators have not discounted the possibility the murderer may have been employed by, or held knowledge of the practises of, a social service agency in his efforts to initiate contact with and/or gain the trust of each victim.