YOUNGSTOWN Detective reopens old torture slaying

Evidence has been taken out of storage and could now yield clues that it didn't so long ago, a detective says.
By PATRICIA MEADE
VINDICATOR CRIME REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- The voice of a woman tortured and killed 11 years ago has been calling out from the grave, a detective says.
At 11:30 p.m. on Sept. 15, 1989, an unidentified man phoned police and told them where to find a woman's body. He said he'd stumbled upon the corpse while walking.
Police followed the man's directions to a barricaded dead-end path near Commonwealth Avenue behind Harrison Elementary on the East Side.
There, on the dirt path, lay 29-year-old Judith Ann Wright, fully clothed except for shoes and socks. She had on dark-blue pin-striped jeans and a blue sweatshirt, soaked with blood.
Wright, known as "Sissie," had been shot several times, beaten over most of her body and had cuts on her face, neck and right hand. Her strawberry blond hair was matted with blood, and the skin around her eyes had swollen and turned a deep purple.
She had remnants of green duct tape on her right wrist and an abrasion on her left, a sure sign to police that she had been bound.
The bullet holes indicated a small-caliber gun had been used. Two days after the homicide, a .22-caliber revolver was found in weeds in the 1300 block of Albert Street, not far from the crime scene.
At the time, police concluded that Wright likely had been killed where she was found and hadn't been dead very long when discovered. They weren't sure of her address, listing West Marion Avenue and Jacobs Road.
Case reopened: Detective Sgt. Delphine Baldwin-Casey, fortified with new information, has reopened the investigation and recently had it featured in a recent Vindicator "Crime Stoppers" feature.
"It's as if this woman has been calling me from her grave," Casey said as she sorted through evidence collected more than 11 years ago. "I've been thinking about the case over and over."
Casey, commander of the Crisis Intervention Unit, said a records room officer went to the police department's basement to find the stored physical evidence.
He turned up a large dust-covered shopping bag with individually wrapped packages and a box that contains tests taken to determine if the victim had been raped.
"When you open a cold case, you have to go over every detail," Casey said. "There's a lot you can do with DNA now that you couldn't back then. I need to find the report of that rape kit. It's possible she was raped, then tortured and then killed."
Casey put on thick blue rubber gloves and gently opened each of the sealed evidence packages on a table near her office in the Wick Building. Police had collected a shoe, clothing and dirt samples.
Profound effect: "I don't know what to tell you about what I'm feeling," she said as she unfolded Wright's sweat shirt. "Evidence tells you a lot about a crime scene. This was a crime of passion -- a stranger wouldn't torture."
A state Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation report shows that Wright's companion, a 55-year-old Youngstown man, tested positive for gunpowder residue on his hands after the homicide but was never charged. Just because he fired a gun at the time didn't mean he fired the gun that killed Wright, Casey said.
The duct tape found on the dead woman's right wrist failed to reveal any latent finger or palm prints that contained sufficient ridge detail for fingerprint comparison purposes, reports show.
Casey said any unsolved homicide is worth review and, in this case, she has two individuals willing to come forward with information about the primary suspect. The evidence then, as now, points to the same man, she said.
One of the individuals, terrified and in hiding out of state, has given Casey a videotaped statement. "I got chills," the detective said of what she heard.
Possible witness: There's the possibility of new tangible evidence and also that someone was with the killer when the crime occurred, she said, but declined to elaborate.
Aside from the two individuals who have come forward, Casey thinks there is "someone out there" who saw what happened. "That person needs to come forward," she said.
Joe Fajack, a retired detective who worked on the case, passed on what he could to Casey a few months ago. Casey is also searching for his notes.
Notes prompt memory: Fajack's partner at the time, Lt. Dave McKnight, said he couldn't recall details of the crime without a look at notes he made at the time. It's like being asked to sing your high school fight song -- once you look at the words, it all comes back, he said.
To charge someone now would require strong evidence, such as witness statements, McKnight said. Also, if tests show the suspect's DNA in Wright's body and he denied being with her, it's another step up the ladder, McKnight said.
"It would be a hard thing for him to overcome," he said. McKnight also described the Wright homicide as a crime of passion.
Casey, meanwhile, addressed the possible motive by saying that Wright, who had been in the county jail until two weeks before she died, had been cooperating in an arson investigation while there. The arson suspect, who learned of her betrayal, is also the prime suspect in the homicide, Casey said.
Jail records show that Wright, convicted of unauthorized use of a vehicle, served most of a six-month sentence. He was released Aug. 31, 1989.