WICHITA, Kan. (KAKE) - The Wichita Police Department is hoping with your help and with its renewed effort, cold caseswill get answers.
The goal is to successfully close cases with new information, updated testing or witness cooperation that could lead to prosecution.
KAKE's Hannah King went to City Hall and was invited in to check out WPD's "Cold Case Room."
“Everyday that we come in, there are 200+ cases that we work around every single day. We don’t want to forget these victims. The families and friendshave not. The police department should not either," Det. Addie Perkins with the Wichita Police Department said.
The room houses a couple hundred boxes with material related to unsolved Wichita cases. It's also the office for two WPD Homicide detectives, Det. Perkins and Det. Chisholm.
“We are busy. We juggle a lot," Det. Addie Perkins said.
“We are located within the police department floors. Over the last few years, we have compiled all of the cold cases into one area. That is something that has been an issue over the years. Detectives have worked cold cases in the past many years, but the problem is, they never compiled them. They never got them all in one place," Det. Perkins added.
Some (of the boxes) are packed with delicate details of a criminal matter, others have dwindled down to mere papers. Each represents an unsolved case, including homicides and/or missing persons cases, of which the department continues to work.
With the revamped efforts, a website with victims names and a summary, along with a picture, if provided, can be found here.
The cases start in the late 60s, early 70s, and contain environment-sensitive files.
"... some of these contain old photographs. The paper is very thin in some of the printouts."
Regardless of what’s inside the boxes, they’re here. They’re safe.
“We do want to have these in an area, so they are easily accessible for when we do get information," she added.
Technology, among many things, has evolved over the years. More and more information is scanned in and digitized.
“These files from 2000s+ are smaller than the 70s and 80s because, back then, most things were printed off. There's a lot more paper. So the boxes are larger, as opposed to what they look like today," Det. Perkins added in relation to the width of the files.
“….back in the 70s early 80s, DNA wasn’t a thing they focused on. Obviously, we do today."
The cases are unsolved, but they are not lost.
“This room has worked out extremely well for us," Det. Robert Chisholm, another WPD Homicide detective, shared about the space.
"They are not forgotten. They are in our office and we see them every day. Hopefully, we will get some information on them and we will pull them off the shelf and we can start working on them," Det. Perkins said.
These two cold case detectives work on the cases as often as they can, but only in spare time.
“We work new and old cases. Any of the old cases, and tips that come in, they come to us and we try to look into them," Det. Perkins said.
That precious time includes finding cases, organizing information and navigating previous record-keeping systems spanning decades of former department detective work. But.. it's allthere.
“It’s nice to know exactly where they are at," she shared.
Detective Addie Perkins and Detective Robert Chisholm are also in the rotation for any new murders that occur in Wichita, something they’ve each done for years now. The Cold Case Unit, though, is fairly new.
"We created this for the victims and their families, but I also want the people who committed these crimes to know that Wichita hasn’t forgotten about these cases. We are looking at them. They might have thought 10, 20, 30 years ago that nobody’s knocking on their door… no one is looking into the cases... but we are now.”
Now… not only can they find old information, reports, and people who were once of interest, it's also possible to find the criminals who’ve somehow remained hidden.
“We can still find them. We can still knock on their door sometime."
"We wanted to take on this task, this project, and look at them and try to see what we could do. Over the years, other detectives have grabbed some of these and worked them, but they never compiled them in one place and I think that that is beneficial to us that we know exactly where to walk to when we get a call about a case.”
In these boxes are also hopes; hopes of re-testingandhopes of re-interviewing.
Was there DNA? Was it tested? Can it be re-tested? Those are just a few questions these two have when fresh eyes take another look.
"We come in. We can look at the names. We see them on a daily basis. We can think about them. We can look at cases and think ok.. we have some time.. what do we start doing? What cases can we pull? Who can we find go out and talk to again?" Det. Chisholm added.
"If we solve these cases, when we solve these cases, we will take these files off of these shelves. Ideally, we will scan them so they are digital and we will move them out of here. There will be resolution. That is what we want. We want these cases to have some answers. To go to court," she said."We want an end to this case. We want answers. Obviously, the friends and families want justice.”
Some of the deaths, and horrific events, have had nationalexposure accompany alongside them.
"This is not something that just Wichita or Sedgwick County can benefit from. We might come across a case to wheremaybe we get an answer or solve a case here in Wichita, but it might be linked to another town, another city, another state," Det. Perkins said referring to Patricia Mager and Patricia Smith, who were victims of the I-70 Serial Killer.
The reward is what could be revealed, but in these boxes it doesn't happen often.
"The rewarding part, for me, is being able to tell the family that at least we know what happened," Det. Chisholm said.
"I'm realistic, I know we won’t solve all of these. There is a small percentage of cold cases in the United States that do get solved every year," Det. Perkins said.
Rarely even, but they still try.
“We are still going to be trying to figure out who these guys were, these people were, who did these murders and track them down and try and hold them accountable at least, so that the families can say we know what happened.”
The room also serves as a meeting space for additional detectives as well.
“...everyone in the homicide section has access to it. They can come down here, anytime they want, if they have time, to look through cases. The room is something we are able to use to open that kind of conversation. If these were just stored in a closet. You wouldn’t get that interaction…”
When people think of a “cold case”… there’s really no time frame that has passed for something to be cold… it's labeled that when every effort regarding the case has been exhausted and there’s nowhere else for investigators to turn.
Also, created with this project was the creation of the cold case email and a website with all of the open cases along, with a brief summary. If there is a photo, that is included as well.
If you have any tips or any information on any unsolved case in Wichita, you are encouraged to contact the Cold Case Unit.
Cold Case Detective Addie Perkins
316-268-4379
Detective Robert Chisholm
316-268-4609
coldcase@wichita.gov
