The I-70 Killer
Indianapolis, Marion County, Indiana · 1992
Over 29 days in the spring of 1992, an unseen gunman walked into small shops a few miles off Interstate 70 and shot six clerks in the back of the head, then vanished before anyone learned his name.
Overview
The I-70 killer is an unidentified American serial killer who is known to have killed six store clerks in the Midwestern United States in the spring of 1992. The spree began on April 8, 1992, in Indianapolis, Indiana, with the murder of 26-year-old Payless ShoeSource manager Robin Fuldauer, and continued through Kansas, Indiana, and Missouri, ending on May 7, 1992. The victims were usually young, petite, brunette women, all shot in the back of the head with a .22-caliber handgun; one victim was a man believed to have been mistaken for a woman. The killer's nickname derives from the fact that several of the stores in which his victims worked were a few miles from Interstate 70. The case remains unsolved, with no suspect publicly named.
Where it stands
The case is unsolved and no suspect has been publicly identified. Witnesses described the gunman as a thin white man in his twenties or thirties, 5'7"-5'9" tall, with lazy eyelids and sandy blond or reddish hair, and a composite sketch was produced; in 2021 the St. Charles, Missouri police department published age-progressed versions of the original composite sketch to show what the killer may look like today. In 2021 a multi-agency task force met with the FBI to review evidence using advances in forensic technology, and detectives began submitting items for advanced 'touch' DNA testing. As of a February 2022 report, the initial DNA results from the Terre Haute scene where Michael McCown was killed came back without definitive findings, and the investigation has continued to generate new tips.
Sources
- I-70 killer
“The I-70 killer is an unidentified American serial killer who is known to have killed six store clerks in the Midwestern United States in the spring of 1992.”
- '6 people at 5 different scenes': Search for I-70 serial killer continues 32 years later
“When this initially happened, DNA wasn't really as far as processing and extracting. It wasn't really a thing yet.”
- The I-70 serial killer: Will DNA nab him? Detective speaks out after initial results come in
“We are now able to take samples where skin cell DNA taken from someone that has handled something and use it to obtain DNA from those handled items.”
- The Ongoing Search for the I-70 Killer of the 1990s
“As of right now, the DNA has been a dead end for everything they've tested.”