Criminology - Holly Branagan

Episode Date: March 28, 2021

High school senior Holly Branagan was murdered inside her Bethlehem, Pennsylvania home on March 28, 1979. She was brutally stabbed to death in a horrific manner, but, her murder case was overshadowed by the partial meltdown that same day at Three Mile Island. The police pieced together the timeline of Holly's murder through phone calls that she made that day. But, they have been unable to catch her killer. Join Mike and Morf as they discuss the brutal murder of Holly Branagan. The police believe that Holly's killer used her home as an advantage. The two-story home had a strange layout and it was very secluded and sat away from the road. There were no signs of a sexual assault and this teenager didn't have to seem to have any enemies, so, developing a motive has been difficult. The one thing that seemed to be true is that, from the manner of the stab wounds, this murder appeared to be very personal. But, the question still remains over 40 years later, who killed Holly Branagan? You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hello everyone and welcome to episode 152 of the criminology podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Mr. Mike Morford, what's going on with you? Not much, just hanging in there like the rest of us trying to get through the day and doing some episodes. How about you? Yeah, same, man. You and I do a lot of podcasting. So that's basically a big part of our life is researching, writing, editing. I mean, that's what we do. Yeah, that's it. But, you know, there's a lot worse jobs in the world. So we definitely can't complain too much.

Oh, yeah, you definitely will not hear me complain about it. I will say, you know, up where I am in the north, the weather's getting better. I got the motorcycle out this week. So, you know, that's been very nice to be able to get that out. and just kind of ride for a little bit. It's a big stress reliever. Anytime he can get out of the house and find a little break to do something for you, that's, you got to take advantage of that. Yeah. Yep.

We continue to see some great Patreon support. Let's give some shoutouts. We had Richard Banbury. Melinda Williams jumped out to our highest level. Amanda Wardle, Jessica Pickle, Haley Bell, Samantha Callist, and Keith Kerth jumped out to our highest level.

So that's a lot of great support. We really appreciate it. Yeah, we say it every week, and I'm amazed by how great our listeners are that support us. We can't thank you enough. If anyone out there would like to support the show, they can do so by going to patreon.com slash criminology. All right, we got that out of the way. Let's jump right into this episode. Wednesday, March 28, 1979 is a historic day in American history.

Maybe infamous is a better word. the three mile island nuclear generating station suffered a partial reactor meltdown and began leaking radiation near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania as the largest nuclear accident in U.S. history, even though there was technically no catastrophic meltdown, it gripped the rest of Pennsylvania and eventually the nation in this episode. We are going to talk about a cold case murder that occurred that same day and was overshadowed by that industrial accident. It's the murder of Holly Branigan in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, about 100 miles away. This case has remained unsolved for over 40 years now.

In fact, the 42-year anniversary of Holly's murder is the day after this episode airs. The town of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania is true to its biblically named Roots. The town officially founded in 1741 by the Moravian Church when they created a mission community on Christmas Eve. The Moravian Church owned all Bethlehem property, and only members of the church were able to purchase any plots until sometime in the 1850s. The Hotel Bethlehem, the town's first building, has an 81-foot-wide steel Christmas star that lights up, a tradition that earned the town the nickname Christmas City, USA, long ago. Since the 1990s, the star has been lit from 4.30 p.m. till midnight daily. Bethlehem has multiple higher education institutes, including community colleges and universities.

Historically, Bethlehem, known for its steel production, has had a staggeringly low crime rate when compared to its neighboring cities Allentown and Easton, Pennsylvania. The population peaked at around 75,000 in 1960, and then began to fall quite steadily until the 1990s. Bethlehem had a population of about 70,000 in 1980. It was still the kind of place where most people knew each other, and there was no need to lock your doors at night. As it changed through the years, the small, close-knit community aspect remained. Just 50 miles north of Philadelphia and 80 miles west of New York City,

Bethlehem was still another quaint town where horrific things just didn't happen. Holly Moira Branigan was born on December 8, 1962. in 1979, she was a senior at Freedom High. She was an alto in the school's choir, and she was the manager of the boys' soccer team. Most described Holly as being nice with no enemies. Her father said that she was a good student. She was athletic, and he remembers her great sense of humor. She had plans to attend Penn State for college.

Most refer to Holly as a good girl and cannot fathom any reason for her to have ever been harmed. Holly had learned to fend for herself and take care of her family during her mother's long and serious illness. Her mother peg passed away from leukemia in 1976. Holly often found herself trying to take care of her dad Richard and her older brother, Sean. On March 28, 1979, Holly Branigan was at home alone. She had taken the bus from school and arrived home sometime around 2.45 p.m. At around 4.30 p.m. She was in her upstairs bedroom talking to a friend, Cynthia Boeve, on the phone. A very common thing for her to do, as was the case with most teenage girls her age. Holly interrupted the conversation with Cynthia after the doorbell rang.

She told Cynthia to hold on just a moment and sat the phone down. A couple minutes after that, Holly picked up a different phone somewhere downstairs in the house to continue the conversation with Cynthia. She told Cynthia she had to go because someone was at the door, but she didn't mention who it was, or whether she had been expecting anyone that evening. This was around 4.40 p.m. Just five minutes later, Holly called Lone Star, where her father worked, to check on the status of his travel for business in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He had already left for New Jersey, and as far as we know, Holly only discussed her father's travel plans with his secretary. This call was the last time Holly was heard from. About 20 minutes later, at around 5 p.m., Cynthia, who Holly had been speaking with

earlier, tried to call her back, but the phone just kept ringing. In 1979, when someone didn't answer the phone, if they didn't have an answering machine, the phone would simply keep ringing until the caller hung up. Holly had already made plans for that evening with a different friend, so it wasn't all that odd to Cynthia that she might not be. be home when she called Holly back. An hour later at 6 p.m., Holly's friend that she was supposed to go get pizza with arrived to pick her up. The friend knocked but didn't get a response.

This friend noticed that the family car was gone. And as it turns out, Holly's brother, Sean, took it out for the evening. He had plans to spend the night with a friend. The next morning on March 29th, Holly's friend's friend Sally Sigfried arrived. did the Brannigan home to give Holly a ride to Freedom High School, something that they had previously planned. Holly didn't come out, so Sally honked the horn and then knocked on the front door. Holly's dog, Clancy, was inside the home, scratching at the door and windows. Sally got a bad feeling that something wasn't right, and she wanted to climb the outdoor stairs to the home's second

story and looked through the windows to see if Holly was in the kitchen. But for some reason, still unknown to her, the bad feeling she had made her pause and she had. turn around. She left the Brannigan residence. Later that same morning, Holly's older brother, Sean, who had stayed overnight at a friend's house, arrived home with his friend. When he walked into his house, he was greeted with an awful sight. Sean found his 17-year-old sister, Holly, face down, dead in their kitchen. He was terrified. And Sean and his friend immediately ran to a neighbor's home to phone police. And they never went back into the house. Police arrived and began investigating the scene around 10.45 a.m.

Holly had been stabbed to death in what looked like a fit of rage. She had about 20 total wounds, 15 stab wounds to her chest and back, which would have been fatal, three less serious stab wounds, and a few defensive cuts to her hands. She had been stabbed so violently that the blade of the 10-inch knife, she was attacked with had actually broken off in her back. It was determined that the knife used to kill her came from the Branigan Kitchen. Investigators believe that Holly may have let someone she knew and trusted into her home that night.

And for whatever reason, she herself ended up grabbing the knife, possibly out of anger or for self-defense. And unfortunately, her attacker gained the upper hand and was able to use that same knife to kill Holly. A clock was found stuck at 540. Police felt that this time, 5.40 p.m., is a probable time for the attack to have occurred, based on the timing of Holly's last phone calls and the coroner's estimation that she had died before sunset, which was around 6.30 p.m. that day. For quite a long time, it was unclear what kind of clock it was,

and how it was damaged. And this led to a lot of speculation. Many thought it could be something like a small countertop clock that could be picked up, perhaps wielded as a weapon, or a grandfather clock that you could actually slam into, rather than a clock hanging high on a wall. Some early reports claim that a grandfather clock was damaged, with its pendulum on the floor. But years later in 2019, authorities clarified the clock situation, and it turns out that a cuckoo clock that had to be wound each night

had probably come unwound and stopped, and it hadn't been damaging the attack. It seems to be coincidental that the time, time it stopped at fell into the window that Holly would have been attacked. As an analog 12-hour clock, it could have also been 12 hours earlier or later that the clock stopped. Holly was found fully dressed and there were no signs of sexual assault. She had cuts and nicks on her hands, apparently defensive wounds from the struggle. There was nothing missing from the house. No evidence of forced entry or anything that indicated a burglary or home invasion.

There was no useful or significant forensic evidence found at the scene and no witnesses came forward. The questioning of neighbors didn't provide any clues. Whoever killed Holly managed to come and go from her house unnoticed by neighbors who didn't remember any unusual vehicles or activity at the Brannigan house that day. However, it is very important to mention that the Brannigan home on Pinetop Trail was very secluded. surrounded by woods and greenery. It was an exclusive and affluent neighborhood. The neighboring homes on either side had thick trees that divided the properties, and the home behind Hollies was separated by a dense swath of woods.

The one neighboring home with any view from across the street would not have had a good vantage point of the Brandigan home itself due to the angles of the homes and the location of the Brannigan house elevated on top of a hill, the ground floor of the Brannigan home was obscured by bushes. And the driveway was so long that unless someone parked toward the end of it, you might not have even noticed them as you drove by again due to the incline the house was built on. There also appears to have been a split driveway that went around to the other side of the home, which was also hard to see from the street level. level. There were no sidewalks. Unfortunately, the Brannigan home was a very private place.

It also had a pretty unusual layout. It was not a cookie cutter type tract home. The house had two stories, but the main part of the home was all on the top floor. The front door had tall, thin windows on either side, but the first floor had only the garage and utility rooms. The top floor had a deck on the front and back, and the kitchen at the rear of the home was the only real place to see inside the house from the outside. Only the back deck was accessible from the exterior of the home by stairs. The layout of the home and property likely helped the killer move undetected. Aside from the two friends looking for Holly, her killer had time on their side because Holly's brother and father didn't come home that night. She was dead for around 18 hours before she was

was found by her brother, leaving ample time for any cleanup, as well as an easy escape. Although the attack was savage, it was contained to one area of the home with no signs of Holly running to other parts of the house. And although the attack resulted in a lot of blood loss, the scene was somewhat clean, indicating perhaps that the killer had cleaned up after the attack. No prints were found on the knife handle, which appeared to have been wiped clean. There were unidentified fingerprints found at the scene, but they have never matched to any. anyone in any database. Some sources, but not all, claim that the only light on in the house when police arrived at the scene was the bathroom late. If this is true, it makes sense that two

people would have come to see Holly, got no answer, and assumed she wasn't home, rather than in the home not responding to their knocks. It also raises the question of whether Holly's murder was still in the home, perhaps in the bathroom cleaning up, around 6 p.m. This would have been the time when Holly's friend arrived to take her out for pizza. The phone in Holly's bedroom was off the hook when police investigated the scene. It's been suggested that possibly in shock, Sean ran away from the phone in the kitchen and into his sister's room to call the police and that he may have left the receiver off the hook. However, multiple sources state that Sean and his friend immediately ran to a neighbor's house for help.

The phone being off the hook had to have happened after. Holly called her father's secretary. We know that prior to calling her dad's secretary, Holly had been speaking with Cynthia and sat the phone down and went downstairs picking up the downstairs phone to end her call with Cynthia. To make the call five minutes later to her father's secretary, Holly or someone else, potentially even her killer, would have needed to put the upstairs phone back on the receiver in order to make an outgoing call. This may mean that the phone rang sometime during the attack, maybe around 5 p.m.,

when her friend Cynthia called Holly back, or that the attacker already knew that Holly had a phone in her bedroom. In the 70s, most phones were in the kitchen or a hallway, and personal phones for children were somewhat rare, often a privilege or sign of status. Holly was killed in the kitchen. So this suggests her murderer, then walk to her bedroom to leave the phone off the hook so it would appear to anyone calling that Holly was simply gabbing away all evening. But one thing that is known is that the phone was not off the hook at 5 p.m.

When Holly's friend called because the phone rang through instead of giving a busy signal. This leads to a couple possibilities. Was Holly dead by the time Cynthia called back or did her? killer spends some time in the home before the murder happened. If Holly's killer was still inside, they would have ignored the 5 p.m. phone call from Cynthia, and possibly the 6 p.m. knock at the door from the friend that came to pick Holly up for pizza. One theory is that Holly's killer rang the doorbell or knocked at the door while Holly was talking with Cynthia, and Holly answered it, and the killer entered the home, either with or without Holly's permission. Perhaps the killer forced

Holly to end her call with Cynthia and then forced her to call her father's work to ensure he wouldn't be coming home that evening. The other possibility is that Holly knew the person and willingly let them in, and for whatever reason didn't tell Cynthia who it was. And then Holly willingly called her dad's work to check on his schedule. So we don't know when the upstairs phone was taken off the hook or who removed it. We also don't know which phone Holly used to call her dad's work. Remember, the attack seems to have been isolated to the kitchen area. And there is no evidence that the attack happened in Holly's room. Perhaps the killer led Holly upstairs, but she ran to the kitchen, maybe to try to get a knife,

and that's where the murder occurred. Curiously, and adding to the murkiness of the phone timeline is that the morning Holly was found, March 29th, 1979, neighbors in the Pine Top Trail neighborhood were receiving calls intended for the Brannigan home. The phone line. in the neighborhood had somehow been crossed. A bell telephone operator who was repairing the lines in the neighborhood that day was questioned by police and subsequently cleared. Apparently, shoddy phone line worked led to the lines being crossed. Police had lingering questions that they tried to make sense of.

One was why Holly would call her father at work just after this person arrived at the door during her call with Cynthia. Was the visitor perhaps for him? If so, why would one of her father's associate? have any reason to attack Holly, or to have made her fear them to the point she felt the need to defend herself with a kitchen knife. If she's the one that grabbed it. Holly's father worked as a sales rep for a cement company. Some believe Holly may have tried to call her father to verify the story of whoever was at the door. Perhaps it was someone claiming that her father had

made some sort of home improvement or maintenance appointment, and Holly wanted to verify, but her father wasn't in the office, and by then her fate had been sealed. Or maybe Holly wanted to make sure that her father was actually going to be gone for the entire night, either at the request of the killer or for her own benefit. It may be that she wasn't checking on whether her father was leaving, but more importantly when he was coming home. Holly was almost 18, and teenagers are pretty well known for fiercely valuing their privacy and independence. She may have wanted to do something or see someone in secret. Authorities and Holly's father believe that Holly knew her killer. Richard Branigan did not believe his daughter would have opened the door for a stranger

and noted that when you were inside the home, you were able to see who was standing at the door prior to it being opened. Another question is, where was the Brannigan's dog, Clancy, during the attack? No sources note any injuries to Clancy and nothing about his barks or pawing at the door seemed to alert Holly's friends to danger. Is it possible that Clancy knew and trusted Holly's killer. The floor of the crime scene was covered with bloody paw prints, indicating that Clancy walked around, stepping in Holly's blood after the murder. We also have two different people who went right up to the door after Holly was dead, according to the coroner. If Holly's murderer was a bloody mess, as you would expect after someone is fatally stabbed, they didn't

leave any obvious traces of blood near the front door or down the driveway. There is never a mention of Clancy. When Holly's friend arrived to take her for pizza that evening, was Holly's murderer keeping Clancy quiet when her friend arrived for their dinner date? Police were puzzled. Holly wasn't sexually assaulted and she was fully dressed. Nothing. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered.

I wonder which emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsublished. solved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, Blood and Water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. Was missing from the home. They couldn't determine a motive.

Who would have attacked Holly, a popular and well-like teenager, and why? While not every senseless death has a motive, this kind of crime in 1979 Bethlehem, Pennsylvania was unheard of. This attack seemed very personal, with Holly's attack are only stopping because they literally couldn't use the knife anymore after it broke off in Holly's body. Although police have never named the suspect publicly, locals and internet commenters have provided some potential theories and suspects. As is typical in any murder investigation, police start with those closest to the victim and then expand out from there. In Holly's case was no exception. Sean Branigan was heavily questioned in his sister's murder. he was known to be a car enthusiast who liked to repair his own cars. And for some reason back then in this small town,

though he attended Liberty University and had no criminal record, in the minds of some, his hobby made him kind of a shady character. And it's really this hobby of repairing cars that seems to be really the only reason that a lot of people pointed fingers at him, other than his familiarity with the home and Holly. and having a sleepover at a friend's house as his alibi, both parents of the friend backed Sean's story and agreed that Sean was at their home

when the attack would have happened. In fact, Sean had been trying to reach Holly by telephone that night to let her know that he planned to sleep over at his friend's house and wouldn't be home. However, each time he called, he got a busy signal. But he wasn't worried because he knew that his sister was often on the phone. But when he continued to get a busy signal in the morning, Sean and his friend decided to check on Holly. Tragically, just six months after Holly's murder, Sean died when the gas station he worked at. Reiner's mobile exploded. Many people were immediately suspicious of the explosion.

But the fire marshal determined that a pressure washer, being turned on, ignited gas fumes, and subsequently caused the explosion. The workers routinely cleaned the floor with gasoline or something. solvent, and the garage bay doors were closed, allowing enough fumes to build up that a spark was possible. Sean suffered third-degree burns over 30% of his body, and his lungs were damaged from smoke inhalation. A second young man, Mark Viola, was also injured in the explosion, but he recovered from his injuries at home. Despite the deadly explosion being ruled an accident, that didn't stop some people, including Richard Branigan, from thinking that there was more than meets the eye. Richard believed that his son was making someone nervous because he had been trying

to get his sister's murderer to confess by creating rumors that he and the police knew who killed Holly. Sean also said the police were closing in. What he was doing was basically a form of trolling before the internet existed. Before the explosion, Richard was afraid the killer would attack Sean for his comments. After the explosion, Richard still believe that Holly's murderer may have wanted to silence Sean and render him incapable of helping the police in their investigation. Sean died nine days after the explosion at Sacred Heart Hospital Center's burn unit. It would have been a very complicated plan to try and put gasoline somewhere in the generator or sabotage the generator in some way and to know that Sean would be the one injured. The generator also belonged to a nearby

restaurant and had been borrowed. It wasn't something Sean was sure to use. And it didn't really silence Sean immediately. He was able to answer questions for the police. Police do not believe Sean had anything to do with Holly's murder because on his deathbed, he shook his head no to two questions about if he or anyone he knew was involved in Holly's murder. Eventually after news of the deadly explosion faded, Holly's case cooled down. According to Bethlehem Police Commissioner Stanley Zawiffel, 80 people had been interviewed at the time in this case, but nothing came from these interviews that led to any arrests. Authorities believe that not everyone they interviewed was completely honest or forthcoming with

them. Unfortunately, some of the teens who knew Holly are reported to have not been fully cooperative with police because there are parents immediately hired lawyers for them, which obviously Morf was their right. I think you and I have even talked about this in multiple episodes, how, you know, if our kids were being interrogated by the police, we'd want them to have an attorney present knowing what we know about false confessions and tunnel vision. and all of that. Police found themselves examining all aspects of Holly's life trying to find her killer. Holly tracked her menstrual cycle in her daily planner. She had apparently been sexually active three days before she was murdered. While talking about the sex life of the teenage girl is not really something we

want to do, it's important here because many people believe that this could be a clue due to the lack of apparent sexual motivation during the attack, and also the overkill involved in stabbing someone multiple times with nearly all fatal wounds. We don't know if the person that Holly was sexually active with, three days prior to her murder, was identified by police or question. A very small amount of marijuana was also found in her pocketbook, but the autopsy results publicly mentioned don't clarify if any drugs were found in Holly's system. Police ruled out any drug involvement in her murder. It seemed to police that the murder was personal. Some believe that Holly was murdered by a teenage girl, perhaps even a friend.

They point to the choice of murder weapon, a knife that might be indicative of a female killer. If a teenage girl killed Holly and found herself bloody, she could have easily changed into Holly's clothes and fled without drawing attention to herself. Holly's killer being a friend seems to be a possibility since as far as we know, the killer didn't bring a weapon to the scene and may not have planned to kill Holly. The amount of injuries and the way that the attack ended

point to someone very angry, very frenzied. A friend who came over and got into a very heated argument with Holly would fit the circumstances of having to be led in and unseen. Some people tried to point the finger at Holly's friend Cynthia because she had been on the phone with Holly and provided the narrative of Holly answering the door in the first place. It's reported that Cynthia lived on the same street as Holly. We have to assume that police checked incoming and outgoing calls to the Brinigan home,

which should have been able to corroborate Cynthia's account of hanging up with Holly at 4.40 p.m. and calling her back at 5 p.m. The phone had to be hung up between 4.40 and 4.45 in order for Holly to have been able to call her father. People speculate that her friend Cynthia made, mentioned the phone call, the visitor at the door, and the fact that she said the phone rang through when police found it off the hook to create an alibi and a story to point away from herself. But it's hard to believe that a teenage girl could fool investigators.

And as far as we know, there's no indication that Cynthia is a suspect. Authorities also believe that whoever killed Holly would have had a major personality or behavioral change after the murder and would have likely been injured themselves since the knife Holly was stabbed with had no handguard on it. Perhaps the killer would have had injuries to their hand or fingers that were witnessed in the days after the murder. There are some rumors and theories that Holly believed she was pregnant. Despite the autopsy finding that Holly was not pregnant, a lack of actual pregnancy doesn't mean that Holly, a teen, wasn't convinced she was or couldn't have told people she was.

In 1979, the most common way to tell if you were pregnant was to make a, doctor's appointment and have a blood test conducted. The first at-home pregnancy test was only released the year before Holly was killed and looked more like a chemistry set than today's easy stick test. Even if you could get your hands on a test, it took two hours to develop the results in a tube and a positive result still required a doctor's confirmation. And a negative result meant waiting for your period to start or retesting. Holly may have been feeling ill or just off and was convinced.

It was due to her sexual activity. In this theory, Holly could have confronted the person that she had been sexually active with, maybe even told this person that she was pregnant. So then more if I think you're into the area of, okay, the parents of that boy, if they had anything to lose from an unwed teenage pregnancy, maybe a jealous girlfriend, an ex-girlfriend. Again, all of this is just rumor and speculation, but it's out there. Some locals and online commenters actually point to a specific male that could have been sexually active with Holly.

They've also pointed the finger at the family as possibly helping this male cover up Holly's murder. However, the boy in question and his father, both of whom will leave unnamed, help create the Holly Brannigan reward fund. Proponents of this theory will say that this was simply an attempt to cast attention away from themselves. While this local boy and his family may not be the right suspects, any potential sex partners of Holly are considered as potential suspects. Others have speculated that there's a possibility Holly was involved with an older man,

maybe even a married man. Holly had a journal in which she used code. She referred to certain men she was dating by numbers rather than their names. One code was 32. Some people asked the question, could Holly have been seeing a 32-year-old man, and thought she was pregnant with his child? Perhaps he was a prominent figure in the area like a politician or professor, or he was married and didn't want his marriage to be destroyed.

If this kind of theory is right, whatever situation in life, getting a teenage girl still in high school pregnant wouldn't be good for him. Along those lines, one local professor has been seen as suspicious for a long time. He was known to have had a temper in history of being somewhat inappropriate with young women, but he has since passed away, and it's not known if police looked at him as a suspect. We have talked a lot about the possibility that Holly knew her killer. But what if investigators were wrong, and Holly didn't know her attacker at all? There are two other similar cases in Pennsylvania that bears some striking similarities to

Holly Branigan's case that may be worth looking into for possible connections. And more if you and I have discussed both of these cases in past episodes. These are the 1975 murders of Lindy Sue Beakler in Manor Township, Pennsylvania, just 80 miles from Bethlehem. And the 1987 murder of Dana Bailey in, State College, Pennsylvania, about 170 miles from Bethlehem. Lindy Sue Beakler was 19 years old when she was stabbed the death in her living room on December 5, 1975.

She was last seen bringing groceries in her apartment around 7 p.m. and found by her uncle less than an hour later at 7.46 p.m. She had defensive wounds on her hands and had suffered 11 serious stab wounds from two different knives, one of which was found still inside Lindy's neck. That knife was a butcher knife. from our own kitchen, just as in Holly's case. Authorities were able to recover DNA from semen in Lindy's underwear and have since created a genetically developed portrait of the suspect.

Dana Bailey was a 21-year-old student at Penn State University, the school that Holly wanted to attend. In 1987, Dana was murdered in her apartment on March 4th. She was nude, bound, on top of bedding, laid out on the floor and blindfolded. She had been stabbed in the chest. and breast area with her own butcher knife. She had not been sexually assaulted and she was still wearing her engagement ring. Police believed that someone broke into her home through a window.

Dana Bailey lived on the second floor. Holly's home was two stories, so it had a ground floor entrance, but it also had kitchen sliding glass doors on the deck accessible to the exterior ground floor. Dana's murder is the most different of the three, and it also happened much later than the other two murders. If the same person is responsible for all three murders, they could have been emboldened by getting away with killing Lindy and Holly and escalated their methods. A long shot, but also worth exploring in Holly's case, is serial killer Timothy Crager, who committed known murders from August 1977 to June 1982. He killed Myrtle Rupp in Temple,

Pennsylvania, just 38 miles from Bethlehem in 1979. The same year Holly was murdered. It took 30 years from Myrtle's murder to be solved. Crazier also has ties to Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania, which is in the area that Bethlehem is in. Interestingly, Crazier was known to pretend to be a police officer in order to get into the homes of his victims. Even if Holly wouldn't have answered the door for a stranger, a 17-year-old girl home alone almost certainly would feel safe

or obligated to answer the door for a uniform police officer. Perhaps Holly did answer the door for someone she didn't know, but also trusted like a man in a uniform. Perhaps a far reach, but often talked about online in Holly's case, is organized crime. The mafia is well known for working around New Jersey and for using cement to dispose of adversary.

So there are some people that have thought Holly was killed by someone connected to organized crime. Maybe not the actual mafia, but her dad was in the cement business. He did do business in New Jersey. A person involved in, involved in organized crime would probably bring their own weapon to attack someone with, rather than hope that they would be able to find a knife in the kitchen.

More if I also think that, you know, this type of person would probably choose a more efficient way to kill someone. So I think for all of those reasons, police have never really given this line of thought any serious consideration. In 2009, 30 years after Holly was killed, heroin fibers from the crime scene, were sent to a lab for analysis. No further news about the analysis has ever been released. In 2014, authorities announced that they finally had a clear suspect in the 1979 cold case,

but never released a name. Detective Thomas Galloway, head of Holly's case since 2009, confirmed that he did indeed have a suspect, but was not yet ready to move on that information. He believed the suspect was a mal acquaintance of the Branigan family. Northampton County District Attorney John Morganelli relayed to the media that authorities believe Holly was killed in a crime of passion, not any home invasion or premeditated murder.

Just two years later in 2016, Holly's father, Richard Branigan, passed away without any closure or knowledge of who killed his only daughter. He was 97 years old. He had held on to the hope that someone would confess, understanding how much the crime would weigh on to, someone daily as it weighed on him each day of his life. As time went on, Richard Branigan started asking the press to just let the police handle

the investigation, saying he didn't want anyone else to get involved. After staying in a hotel for a few days while police investigated the scene at the home, Richard Branigan moved back into the Pinetop Trail home where Holly was killed and lived there for another 35 years. He did eventually remarry after Peg, and it was by all accounts a happy relationship. And Morp, I think you have to really feel for this man. In very short order, he lost his wife, his daughter, and then his son. And he had to live with all of that for decades.

So no doubt, very tough on Richard Brannigan. Morph, to me, I go back to moving into that house. I don't know that everyone would be able to do that. that. Actually, I know not everyone would be able to do that. It can't be easy to live with the fact that your daughter was murdered and police haven't found the individual or individuals responsible for her murder. I think living in that house every day seems like it would make it even tougher. But on the other hand, maybe he took solace in the fact that, you know, this is where the memories were made. I think it would affect everyone different. And each individual person would have to make that decision for

themselves. Yeah. And maybe he wanted that reminder. So it would keep a flame lit in him to one day aspire to see his daughter's killer caught by living in that home and knowing every day that what happened there, it might have inspired him to keep going and not give up hope. Yeah, definitely could have. Like I said, I think it would be different for different people. In 2019, an investigative grand jury convened and looked over the evidence in multiple cold cases, including Holly's case. The grand jury heard testimony from a total of 35 witnesses. No leads, breaks in the case, or suspects resulted from these hearings. Retired state police officer Robert Egan believe that this grand jury investigation may have been the final chance to solve Holly's murder.

due to the age of any possible witnesses and degradation of any forensic evidence. Egan believed that the killer's DNA exist in the evidence. There just hasn't been good enough technology to discover it yet. There's been no apparent movement or progress in the case since the grand jury result. Unfortunately, investigative techniques and protocols in 1979 were not anywhere near, as advanced or careful to preserve the scene and evidence as they are today. Investigators did not wear gloves. DNA testing was not even a thing yet.

So oftentimes items that may have contained DNA were not even collected unless a piece of evidence had obvious fluids like blood or semen. Some investigators back then did think to preserve evidence that would later one day produce DNA. But I don't know how anyone could have predicted how groundbreaking the technology would be. at the home on pine top trail. About a dozen people were in and out of the kitchen with no shoe covers or gloves. Only about 24 photos. Equivalent to just one roll of 35 millimeter film were taken of the crime scene. Some people very close to the case say that a bloody towel was found at the scene

and that it probably contains the blood of the killer who was likely injured in the attack as well. But authorities have been pretty quiet on this point. If it doesn't exist, can't be tested, or doesn't contain any useful DNA, a confession is probably the only thing that will ever solve Holly's case. And none of her family would even be there to see her get justice. After Holly's death, a page was dedicated to her in the 1979 Freedom High Yearbook, and the Holly M. Brannigan Award was established, given to one senior in the Freedom High Choir, who is a shining example of Holly's jubilant personality. Unlike many other cold cases, there is no still publicized reward in Holly's case. There was the Holly Brannigan Reward Fund in the 1980s, but it's uncertain if that still stands. Though Holly Brannigan Reward Fund Incorporated is still an active registered non-profit in Pennsylvania.

If you have any information about Holly Brannigan's murder, you can call Bethlehem Police Criminal Investigations Division at 610-865-7162. You can also call the Northampton County District Attorney's Office at 610-559-30-20. There's a lot of things in this case that jump out to me that nag me or I have questions about. The one thing is the complete lack of a motive here. There's no indication that Holly had a beef with anyone or anyone had issues with her, yet it seems like this was a savage and personal attack that someone was very angry with her. And we just don't see any evidence of anyone in her life that would have been that angry with her. Yeah. And you said it more if I mean, you really don't want to have to talk about the sexual history of a teenager who has been murdered.

But I think in this case you have to because there is that lack of an apparent motive. a lot of the things online kind of center around relationships that Holly may have had with people. And could it have been one of those relationships that turned sour or provided the motive for someone to want to harm her? And I think that goes back to whether or not Holly willingly let someone into her home. Was that knock at the door a stranger? or someone asking for directions or was it someone that she knew and trusted enough to let them in? And what happened once they came in? Was it quickly an attack or did they start talking about something that led to an argument?

There's a lot of things we'll never know about the case unless the case is solved somehow. And I think this is a tough one to solve. As far as I know, it's not been made public that they have any usable DNA. So without that, it's hard to believe that we would see a break in the case using the latest in DNA technology, as we've seen in so many other cases. Obviously, if you don't have DNA, you can't use all those great techniques. You can't use the genetic genealogy and all of that stuff. And so you are at that point maybe relying on a confession. But because this case is so old, I think the likelihood of that,

diminishes every single year because people in cases this old who have connections, they die. And so the information that they have, if they haven't disclosed it to someone else, it dies with them. And that's a sad thought that, you know, some of these old cases, they just continue to get, what's the word I'm looking for here, more of less likely to be solved because of age and things like that. Yeah, we talked a little bit about it, the evidence, you know, you can only store that for so long, where it starts to deteriorate. And you have to wonder if that's been done, if it's been preserved properly to begin with. Because, as we also mentioned, they didn't know about DNA back then. So the collection methods and storage methods

that were done early on could play a big part into what can be done down the line as far as any new technologies that come along. Yeah, yeah, no doubt. But tough case, tough case all around because, you know, you talk about Holly and she was such a great person. And then you talk about her father, Richard, that's a lot for one guy to have to go through. I mean, that's a lot of misery, a lot of heartache. Thanks goes out to Sunny Landon for writing and research assistance in this episode. As always, if you love the show, take a minute, go out, give us a five-star rating. You can leave a review. Keep telling your friends. A word of mouth about the criminology podcast goes a long way. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod.

You can also find us on Facebook by searching for Criminology Podcast or by searching for Criminology Podcast discussion and fans. All right, Morph, that is it for our episode on the murder of Holly Branigan. But we'll be back with everyone next Saturday night with an all new episode. So until then, for Mike. And Morph. We'll talk to you next week. Take care, everyone.