A double homicide case from 1956 in Great Falls, Montana, was finally closed after investigators used DNA evidence to determine who the killer was.
Patricia Kalitzke, 16, and her boyfriend Lloyd Duane Bogle, 18, were found dead with fatal bullet wounds to the head near Bogle’s car in 1956. The case stumped investigators for 65 years until forensic evidence recently led them to believe they found the identity of the perpetrator, Kenneth Gould. Gould, a Great Falls native, was born and raised near one of the victims, Kalitzke.
“It was such a big case,” Cascade County Sheriff’s Office lead investigator Sgt. Jon Kadner said in a Wednesday interview with CNN.
“Two popular kids who were essentially gunned down in a Lover’s Lane situation,” he added.
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In the investigation, detectives developed a DNA profile of a suspect in 2001 using forensic evidence from Kalitzke’s 1956 autopsy. The evidence was then compared to DNA in commercial databases.
“They built a family tree backward and then forward to develop (the link to) Kenneth Gould,” Kadner said.
When Gould was determined to be a prime suspect, investigators still had no method to confirm that he was the killer directly using DNA as he died in 2007 and was cremated.
As an alternative, authorities located two of Gould’s children who submitted DNA samples that matched the evidence collected in 1956.
Kadner, who took over the case in 2012, said he believes his department has solved the oldest homicide case using this type of genetic review.
The sergeant added that he knew the killer would likely be dead by the time he was found but said he felt compelled to solve the case after reviewing years of files collected by past detectives.
“They poured their heart and souls into that case, and it just made you realize how hard investigators had worked,” he said. “The same thing happens to you, essentially.”
A motive for the killing has not been determined. But the victims’ families expressed their gratitude to know some answers after more than six decades, Kadner said.
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The Washington Examiner contacted Kadner for additional details but did not immediately receive a response.
