In NE Pennsylvania, dozens of unsolved crimes remain open, haunting both investigators and families. These cases reflect lives interrupted, questions unanswered and justice still out of reach.
This page serves as a starting point for exploring Pennsylvania cold cases, with a special focus on Northeast PA (NEPA) communities like Wilkes-Barre, Scranton and the Pocono region. Whether you’re a local resident, an amateur sleuth, or someone searching for a missing loved one, the cases collected here are curated for clarity, depth and respect.
Explore these subcategories:
Unsolved Murders — From small towns to city streets, these are Pennsylvania homicide cases where no suspect has been charged.
Missing Persons — Disappearances that remain unexplained, including long-term missing adults and children across NEPA.
Unidentified Bodies — Cases involving unidentified remains in Pennsylvania, many of which may be linked to open missing persons reports.
Each post is part of a growing missing persons and cold case database for Pennsylvania, aimed at keeping these stories alive and discoverable. Some cases, like that of Robert Baron in Old Forge, have been solved, but many others still need your eyes, your memory and sometimes your voice.
If you recognize a face. If a detail sounds familiar. If a name rings a bell. Say something.
Last update: October 31, 2025, 12:54p.m. The summer of 1969 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, was a time when kids still roamed free, neighborhoods felt safe, and a 14-year-old girl like Joan Dymond could go to the park after supper without a second thought. But for George and Anne Rose Dymond, that summer was the start of…
Lots of things don’t add up in the John Leonard murder case. Here’s one of them: How is it possible that nobody heard the five gunshots that killed John Leonard?
Imagine if you were a child when your father is shot to death in broad daylight. The killer takes off before anyone finds the scene. The crime seems completely random, making it just about impossible to solve. Even though it’s huge news in your tiny town, the case grows cold fast. Then settles into a decades-long deep freeze. No leads. No justice.
The Leonard family launched a GoFundMe campaign with a painful but necessary goal: exhuming their parents’ remains to finally get answers through modern forensic testing. They hope it will finally yield the answers denied to them by decades of stalled investigations, lost records, and what they allege is a systemic cover-up.
Lori Leonard, daughter of John and Madeleine Leonard — whose 1970s murders in the Poconos remain unsolved — has been seriously ill in recent months, but she is undergoing treatment and hopes for a full recovery. Even in the face of personal hardship, Lori and her husband Randy Zona continue to advocate not just for their own family, but for other victims’ families as well.
Her remains were found in Black Creek Township, about 30 miles southwest of Wilkes-Barre, in 1973. Local lore has it her spirit haunts the stretch of highway where she was found. It’s August 9, 1973, and a tourist decides to pull off Interstate 80 near Sugarloaf in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, for a walk in the…
The autopsy was inconclusive for Debra “Debbie” Jane Fox, 69, whose remains were found behind the All Host Inn and Suites in Wilkes-Barre on March 26, 2024. The coroner could not determine what caused her death or whether her death was accidental, homicidal, suicidal, etc. This ruling can be changed if more evidence comes to…
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania On March 12, 2024, authorities retrieved a body from the Susquehanna River near the Kirby Park side of the Market Street Bridge. Since then, there have been no updates regarding the identity of the individual or the circumstances surrounding their death. The body was found floating face-down in the swiftly flowing river, which…
HOMICIDEJuanita Marie Todd13 Academy StreetWilkes-Barre, PennsylvaniaLuzerne County22 years oldSeptember 28, 1972 This post is an overview of the Juanita Todd case, and the first in a series about 1970s NEPA true-crime mysteries. Future posts will go into more detail about this tragic unsolved murder. Case Overview One of the most disturbing unsolved homicides in Northeastern…
