On the afternoon of Friday, October 5th, in the small town of Rices Landing, Pennsylvania, eight-year-old Debbie Makel left Dry Tavern Elementary School and got on the bus headed toward her home a mile away. Debbie had two older brothers, aged ten and eleven, who would sometimes ride the bus with her, but on this particular day, they had walked home from school in order to go door to door in the neighborhood, selling magazines for a school fundraiser.
At approximately three-forty-five p.m., the two boys saw their sister Debbie get off the school bus and begin walking up the driveway of the Makel family home. She apparently made it inside and put her books down on the table, but moments after that, the child completely disappeared.
Debbie’s mother Charlotte arrived home from her job at a nearby clothing factory shortly afterward, and though Debbie was not in the house, nothing seemed out of place, and Charlotte was initially unconcerned, simply figuring her daughter was playing over at a friend’s house.
However, by the time five-thirty rolled around, Charlotte and her husband Duane had begun to grow worried, as it was unlike Debbie to not come home for dinner. The Makels called police, and then they and their two boys began searching the neighborhood for Debbie. As there was a high school football game going on nearby, an announcement was made over the loudspeakers to be on the lookout for the missing third-grader, and no sooner had this announcement been made than many members of the crowd fanned out of the stadium and immediately began searching the surrounding area.
The hunt went on throughout the night Friday and into Saturday, but no trace of the child could be found; that is, until around eleven-thirty a.m. on Sunday, October 7th, when volunteers spotted a green sock sticking out of the underbrush alongside a stream. Debbie Makel’s body was discovered only five-hundred yards from her home.
The eight-year-old had been raped and strangled with a length of heavy twine. She was found mostly clothed, though her shoes, underwear, and purse were never found. Detectives were never able to determine whether her killer had been waiting in the house for her when she came home from school, or whether he had somehow lured her out into the yard before snatching her.
Authorities had little idea who could have committed such a heinous crime, and floundered for suspects for months, sifting through numerous false confessions and tips that led to dead ends, even desperately consulting a psychic at one point. All their efforts were made in vain, and the case went cold before the year was out.
In the early 2000s, a DNA profile of Debbie Makel’s murderer was successfully extracted and added to the FBI’s CODIS database, though as of this writing there have been no matches to known offenders. And in 2003, an individual incarcerated for two other homicides apparently informed police that he had information regarding the killing of Debbie Makel, though officials did not release his name or what connection he may have with the crime.
The case was reopened in 2013, at which point authorities retested DNA samples taken from the crime scene against all their previously considered suspects, but again found no matches. The investigation into the child’s death continues.
Crime Immemorial 