The views and opinions expressed in Cold and
Missing are exclusively those of the hosts. All
parties mentioned are considered innocent until
proven guilty in a court of law. Cold and Missing
also contains adult themes and languages. Listener
discretion is advised. I'm your host, Ali McLaughlin
-Sulkowski. And I'm your co -host, Eli Sulkowski.
And this is Cold and Missing, where we cover
cold cases and missing person cases. Hello, everyone,
and welcome back to Cold and Missing. I'm your
host, Allie. And I'm your co -host, Eli. Welcome
back, everyone. We are going to just get right
into it this week. We're on episode 124 this
week, and we're covering a missing case. That's
right, episode 124. And yes, we are covering
a missing person case today. So just as a quick
content warning at the top, this case does involve
a young person, and there are some brief mentions
of sexual assault. Today, we are talking about
the missing person case of Karen Grejeda, and
this takes place in January of 1996 in Tucson,
Arizona. But first, a little bit about Karen.
Karen is 7 years old in 1996. She lives with
her mother, Rosalba, and her younger sister,
Alejandra, in the Suararo Crest Apartments in
Tucson, Arizona. Karen speaks both English and
Spanish with ease. Her mother only speaks Spanish,
and her father lived and worked in Mexico. Her
parents were no longer together at this time.
Karen is a first grader at Elvira Elementary
School, where she was known as an outgoing child.
She liked to write poems and stories and was
talkative. The apartment complex where she lived
had a lot of other children, so there was always
someone to play with, always a friend nearby.
At this time in 1996, Karen has shoulder -length
black hair and brown eyes. She is 3 foot 5 inches
tall with a thin build. She was also missing
her front teeth. And now, a timeline of events.
On Thursday, January 11th, 1996. Karen had a
very normal day at Elvira Elementary School and
came home that evening and dropped her bag off
at her apartment. She's wearing a light pastel
flowered short and a faded purple shirt with
white writing on the front. Karen headed outside
to play. It appears that she hit all the major
childhood activities. She took her bike out for
a ride. came in and played some Super Mario on
her Nintendo and then picked up her room a bit.
She then headed back outside with her roller
skates on to keep playing with her little sister
and their friends in the complex. At around 5
.45 p .m., Karen came back in the apartment and
dropped off her skates and asked her mom if she
could go back outside to play. Her mother agreed
but reminded her that she needed to be back soon
since dinner was almost ready. Karen told her
mom okay and ran back outside to continue playing.
At around 6 p .m., so just 15 minutes later,
dinner was ready. Rosalba called for her daughters
to come in and eat. Karen's little sister, Alejandra,
came back to the apartment. When her mom asked
where Karen was, she responded with that she
didn't know. They had lost track of each other
while they were playing. They both expected Karen
to walk in the door at any moment. When Karen
didn't turn up in a few minutes, Rosalba heads
outside to look for her. There were still several
kids playing in the courtyard. Rosalba asked
them where Karen is, but they said they didn't
know. Some kids say they saw Karen walk out of
the courtyard of the apartment complex. Panic
starts to rise in Rosalba as it gets darker and
darker outside. It's unclear exactly when the
police are called that evening, but it appears
that it was pretty quickly after Karen was discovered
missing, and the police immediately spring into
action. Police search through the night looking
for Karen, but no sign of her is found. The next
day, January 12th, police start going door to
door at the apartment complex looking for Karen.
They start searching apartments in the complex
as well, checking every small space that Karen
could fit into to make sure she's not there.
But no one in the complex said they saw anything.
There wasn't any signs of struggle. No one heard
a scream. No one saw anyone strange hanging around
the apartment complex. Police talk to everyone
who lives there, all 410 units. No sign of Karen
is found. Police are focusing on searching nine
square miles around the apartment. They have
officers and volunteers searching on foot, bike,
car, horseback, ATV, anything trying to find
a sign of Karen. Investigators are also talking
with registered sex offenders in the area to
check on their alibi for the time that Karen
went missing. As news spreads of the missing
little girl, some possible sightings do come
in, but none of them lead to Karen. The most
promising was a girl matching Karen's description
was seen crying at a grocery store a few miles
away from the apartment complex on the night
that Karen went missing. However, the witness
couldn't remember exactly what time they had
seen the girl. It would have been early evening
through 6 .30. Karen last walked out of her apartment
at about 5 .45 p .m., so it's a tight window
at the end there. Karen's mother is hysterical
by her daughter missing. To complicate matters,
she's also pregnant at this time with her third
daughter. Karen's family beg for her safe return.
Since Rosalba didn't speak English, her sister
Ruth speaks for her and her family. The family
speaks to whoever has Karen, quote, have a bit
of compassion for her mother. Return her as she
is, alive or dead, because we need to end this
torment, end quote. Police are treating Karen's
case as a missing person, but it's not officially
ruled a kidnapping at this point. Police say,
quote, it's anybody's guess. We have insufficient
information to know what happened to her. You
get frustrated. You can theorize or suspect a
lot of things. To be honest, we looked at everything,
end quote. Police have theorized everything from
Karen wandering away on her own to a stranger
kidnapping. As that Friday day progresses, it's
approaching 24 hours that Karen has been missing.
There's still no sign of her, and the FBI offers
assistance in the case. Investigators start treating
her case more and more as a kidnapping with each
growing hour. Over this first weekend that Karen
went missing, police will search nonstop. They
search all through the night and keep at it in
the morning, just rotating officers out to sleep
and eat, essentially. But there's always people
looking for Karen. Volunteers come in to help
as well, and family and friends cover Tucson
and Flyers. But by Monday, January 15th, Karen
has been missing since Thursday. Police say that
they have ruled out almost every tip that has
been called in, and it's nearly 600 of them.
None of them led to Karen or gave any clue about
what happened to her. The most promising lead
over the weekend was a set of small footprints
found on the San Xavier Reservation. When investigators
take a closer look at the print, the size is
half an inch too big and the tread pattern of
the shoe didn't match the pair that Karen was
wearing. Police now are officially handling her
case as a kidnapping. They're back searching
that nine miles around the complex, and it's
reported that some drops of blood are found.
This is sent for testing, but the results are
never published, so it's unclear if this is related
to Karen's case at all. About mid -afternoon
on Monday, police end the search early and announce
that the case is being handed off to a special
team of 10 detectives who are going to work the
case. Karen's father had flown in from Mexico
to help aid in the search, and he says, quote,
I believe that she's okay. I think they would
have found something by now if that was not the
case. As long as she's alive, we can work on
handling whatever happened to her. End quote.
On Thursday, January 18th, Karen has been missing
for one week. Police announced that they got
a tip on the tip line. Someone had called in
saying that they had seen a white compact car
cruising the area where Karen had lived. Police
asked that whoever called in the tip to please
call back so they can get more information and
specifics, like when the car was seen, what time,
where, and any description of the person or people
inside the car that they could give. Parents
are scared in Tucson. Karen's disappearance was
on the heels of an attempted abduction in December
of 1995, so a month before Karen went missing.
A young girl was waiting inside her elementary
school, just inside the doors, when a man approached
and tried to get her to open the locked doors
and go with him. The girl got scared and left
and got a janitor and when they both returned,
the man was gone. Then Karen vanished in January
of 1996, just a few weeks after this. And then
one week later, on the 18th, there was another
attempted kidnapping. A mother and her daughter
were playing in the backyard when the mom stepped
inside for a moment to check on the laundry.
When she returned just a moment later, she saw
a man trying to lure her daughter over to him.
The mom and the man got into a physical fight,
and thankfully, the family's three dogs started
to attack the man until he ran off. Police release
a description of the man. He would have been
in his late teens or early 20s. He was Hispanic,
and police note that he would have had several
dog bites at this time. The special investigating
team continue to use the FBI resources to aid
in their search, but still, no big breakthroughs
in the case come and no evidence of what happened
to Karen is found. As the weeks press on and
January turns into February, Billboards of Karen's
face go up around Tucson, and this continues
to bring tips in. But again, police are able
to rule tip after tip out, and none of them lead
to Karen. It's been almost three weeks since
Karen was kidnapped, and an 11 -year -old girl
escapes an attempted abduction as well. She was
walking just a few houses over from her own house
to a friend's house so they could walk to school
together. She was between the two houses when
a man pulled up in a white, two -door, compact
car and told her that her mother wanted him to
drive her to school. The girl takes off running
to her friend's house, where the friend's older
brother was outside and saw the whole interaction.
The driver of the car was described as a white
man with short to medium -length hair, and he
was wearing a black and white checkered shirt.
As it approaches one month that Karen is missing,
police and FBI return to the apartment complex
and re -interview all the residents. Investigators
remain optimistic that Karen is still alive.
Quote, So we're pretty optimistic that she is
still alive and that someone is just hanging
onto her out there for some reason, end quote.
But the lack of leads is making it difficult
for police. The FBI wants to create a profile
of the kidnapper, but there's not enough evidence
to give them information to build the profile.
In March, so it's been over two months now since
Karen was kidnapped, and her mother begs for
her return and sends a message to her daughter.
She says, quote, Please help me find my daughter,
and I'll be grateful to you for the rest of my
life. Whatever kind of information you have,
please dial 911. Karen, it's your mommy. Wherever
you are, we will find you, darling. Go to a nearby
telephone and dial 911. We will go for you. I
and your sister love you and are waiting here
for you. End quote. Police say that their investigation
has intensified over the last few months, but
declined to give any other update. The next update
comes at the end of May, so Karen has been missing
for over four months. A police sketch is released
of a man that was wanted in a series of sexual
assaults against young girls in 1993, three years
before Karen vanished. However, police believe
that the same suspect could be connected to Karen's
case and another unsolved murder of a young girl
in the area. Eventually, police will arrest Rodolfo
Sedeno Morales and charge him in relation to
the 1993 sexual assaults. He is ultimately found
guilty in 1998 for kidnapping five girls and
assaulting three of them. He is serving a 248
-year sentence. Police tie Morales to the unsolved
murder since he does match a suspect sketch in
that case, and police link him to Karen's case
since she matches the profile of the other victims,
young Hispanic girls who all lived on the south
side of Tucson in apartment complexes. Additionally,
to further tie Morales to Karen's case, he had
lived in the same apartment complex as Karen
previously. He didn't live there at the time
of her disappearance, but he still had friends
that lived at the complex. He remains a strong
suspect in Karen's case, and really the only
suspect ever named in her case. Years go by,
and Karen's case is mentioned in the media, especially
around anniversaries of her disappearance. Her
mother is a champion of her case and keeps it
in the media, but there are no new updates, no
new leads, no new suspects. Until 2023. In 2023,
Karen has been missing for over 27 years, and
police will, without getting into specifics,
say that they are looking at some new suspects.
They still don't have anything solid in Karen's
case, but the unsolved murder that I mentioned
that we'll cover on a future episode of Cold
and Missing had had advances in forensic technology
and the police were looking at a new suspect.
Police believe that Karen's case could be connected
to this unsolved murder. However, Karen's family
believe that Morales is guilty of kidnapping
Karen. But that is all we know about the kidnapping
of Karen Grejeda in January of 1996. So if you
know anything about the disappearance of Karen
or her whereabouts today, please call the Tucson
Police at 520 -791 -4444. So that is the case
of Karen Grejeda. All of the cases that you bring
to Cold and Missing and that you cover, of course,
frighten and scare me to listen to them, but
Karen's case was one of those cases where it
immediately frightened me. I was very nervous
listening to this story because it was very easy
to imagine myself, a 90s kid, the way she...
Kind of did her little tour when she got home
from school, was very similar to mine. And this
one was very palpable and heartbreaking, very
hard to listen to. Yeah, I thought that was something
that was really familiar about the case, too,
was just how normal the after -school activity
was. Like her, you know, running in and out,
mom cooking dinner, her and her siblings, the
kids in the apartment complex playing, like...
All of that was so very familiar to me and felt
familiar to me. And I think that's, you know,
kind of aids in, like, how terrifying this case
feels because it feels familiar. Yeah, and with
the familiarity, the other side of that coin
is the predictability for someone who is trying
to commit a crime like kidnapping, knowing someone's
schedule, you know. after school schedule or
whatever the familiarity of her routine felt
there was a moment of safety in my connection
to it and immediately was you know ripped away
because I knew that there was a possibility that
maybe she was being watched while she was just
doing her thing. One thing that does kind of
feel just to pivot into this case a little bit
is that For Karen to be kidnapped, it was a very
bold move just because this is a big apartment
complex, 410 units. It kind of looks like two
squares sitting next to each other and then courtyards
in the center. So, you know, everyone would be
able to see into the courtyard from their building.
So would have been a very bold. kidnapping because
there's all these eyes there's kids running around
there's a lot of presence and you know there's
people outside so yeah this this case baffles
me in a lot of ways um and the disruption of
the routine like you were saying the watching
like all of that feels present in this case even
though we really don't know that much about what
really happened I think because we have covered
cases similar to Karen's, just from investigating
and listening, you learn the behaviors of perpetrators.
So when I listened to a case, sadly, I understood
how this would have been a perfect spot for someone
who was trying to... maybe committed kidnapping.
I think that, yes, it is very bold to do it,
you know, mid -afternoon, after school, dinner's
getting ready, a lot of people around. But also,
is it a perfect environment for someone like
that to blend in? And I think that's absolutely
possible, especially if, you know, they fit the
demographic of the folks who are already living
there. The familiarity of Maybe a white compact
car not looking out of place. Those were all
things that crossed my mind. Yeah. And that is
something that, like, I come back to. Like, the
person who did this fit in there in some way.
Like, didn't draw attention to themselves, really.
Because nobody, you know, they asked. All the
residents, did you see anything? Did you see
anybody out of the ordinary? And nobody said
they saw anybody strange. Nobody knew or unfamiliar
hanging around. So it leads me to believe that
it's either, you know, somebody in the apartment
complex proper or somebody who, you know, was
in and around it a lot and would have just blended
in. Yeah, I think that just adds another piece
to an ever -growing puzzle. The possibility of
it being a bunch of different people who may
be committed a kidnapping of Karen in such a
concentrated area can really mess with the community.
I know I'm often, I think I'm kind of hard on
law enforcement in a lot of our cases and what
we cover because You know, they are cold and
missing cases and we do see a lot of mistakes,
but I really appreciated the transparency of
law enforcement here and their willingness to
circle back, even to go back into that same community
and ask questions again, interview people again,
interview the sex offenders in that area. That
was a question that I wanted to ask you. Is that
a normal response when there is... A child who
goes missing that, you know, boots on the ground,
we're going to go to these people first. Yeah,
it is a pretty standard response. It really started
probably like mid -90s, I think, you know, once
the sex offender registry was created. published
and then the law is really starting to get enforced.
That's one thing that's talked about in this
list is that the laws around the sex registry
offender list weren't really enforced. So they
actually found a lot of people like out of compliance,
not updating, you know, where they were living,
their address, things like that. So that was
actually found through this investigation quite
a bit. Following law enforcement's timeline and
just checklist of investigative work that they
needed to do. I wanted to know if there was any
follow -up of, you know, the report of the girl
crying in the grocery store. If there was, I
know it was 96, but I was curious to know if
there was maybe footage pulled from the grocery
store just to see who that girl was. So from
my understanding, there wasn't footage in this
time in 1996. And police... I do believe tried
to follow up with this lead, but it doesn't seem
like they were ever able to really find the girl,
find exactly who the girl was that was there.
So this is like one lead that just kind of never
got resolved. Yeah, I think circling back to
it for me is just wishful thinking. Could you
bring us back to the moment where... small shoe
prints were found. I just, I want to clarify
some details there. So, you know, in the 24 hours
following after Karen goes missing, a report
comes in from the San Xavier Reservation Police
that they found footprints on the reservation.
They were small footprints and they were the
same brand of shoe that Karen was wearing. So
when investigators got there and took a closer
look at it, the shoe was half a size too big
from what Karen wore, and the tread, the pattern
on the bottom of the shoe, was different, slightly
different than the pattern that was on the bottom
of Karen's shoe that she was wearing. So ultimately,
the footprints are ruled out. Obviously, I am
not a detective, not law enforcement, but the
thought did cross my mind that maybe the The
perpetrator had the thought to change the shoes.
Now knowing more details about them being the
same but just a little bit bigger, I guess to
answer my own question or wrap up my own thought,
if a shoe was going to be changed, it would probably
be a completely different shoe. I didn't know
if you... If you had any more thoughts or feelings
about those footprints. No, I had the same thing
where I kept wanting to like come back to those
footprints and be like, well, like what if her
shoe was just a little bit bigger? But then I
found additional reports that it was the same
brand of shoe, but just the tread was different.
So like you, I was like, OK, yeah, if somebody
were to change shoes or even, you know, I don't
know, your foot sliding around when you're walking
or whatever, like. It would it would feel that
these would not be Karen. But if I remember correctly,
they were next to like a set of adult footprints.
So that was another reason that, you know, this
was thought that it could be Karen. I feel kind
of uncomfortable with what I want to say, but
I think it's because I just don't like the reality
of the sentence. But to me, Arizona. Just itself,
like the state itself, the terrain, the weather,
it seems like a good state, place, terrain to
disappear someone if that's what you are trying
to do. I hate that my brain kind of went there.
Yeah, Arizona is one of those states where you
really have all sorts of terrain depending on
where you are in the state. You know, up north
is mountainous and, you know, we'll get snow
and then more south is more desert. And, you
know, it was January when this case took place,
but Karen was, you know, in shorts and a t -shirt
because it was warm outside. So you get, you
know, the full kind of spectrum of weather in
Arizona. With that comes a lot of different terrain,
and from my understanding, there's a lot of rural
terrain. So I think there is a lot of space that's
very difficult to search and very difficult to
locate somebody. You know, it's hard just to
find lost, like, hikers in the desert where you
kind of know where their last location was, let
alone just... Trying to find somebody, period.
So, yeah, the desert is one of those spaces where
it's very easy to lose track of somebody. My
brain is bouncing around quite a bit with this
case, and I think it's the natural inclination
is to try to solve it. But my last question for
you about this case is about Karen's case. Do
you think that it was Morales? It is very hard
for me to rule him out as a suspect. You know,
something that an investigator or maybe it was
a prosecutor, I can't quite remember at the time.
But something that somebody said was that, like,
these attempted abductions and this string of
abductions that seemed to be happening stopped
after Morales was arrested. So I think there's
something to that. But, you know, he also doesn't
fit. All the descriptions like, you know, one
of the descriptions, it was a white guy. And,
you know, in that unsolved murder there, they
think that it was not somebody who was Hispanic.
So there's just like a lot of moving pieces.
And I think he's a really good suspect in this
case. And until I'm able to fully rule him out,
I think I would keep him, you know, like in the
suspect pool. And, you know, I. I hope that investigators
continue to try to talk to him. You know, he's
still in jail from my understanding. He's still
serving time. So if he is responsible, hopefully
we can get some answers someday. I think besides
not knowing where Karen is, the unbearable heartbreak
of this case is her mom and sisters at the center
of this experiencing a pregnancy. During this
time, again, very palpable. I, you know, you
can feel how she yearns for her daughter. Just
an answer, a few answers, you know, you can feel
the desperation. And I really hope that that
desperation turns into justice and answers for
this family. Some form of justice, which I think
would, just be a little bit of knowledge. Yeah,
Karen's family is still wanting answers in this
case. They still want to know where she is, what
happened to her. So I would love for the family
to get those answers and for Karen to come home
in whatever way that looks like. You know, Karen
should come home and her family should have answers.
And I hope that we're able to get them in this
case as you know, other cold cases get solved
and more and more of them get closed, hopefully
we get more information on Karen. But again,
if you know anything about the disappearance
of Karen in January of 1996 or her whereabouts
today, please call the Tucson Police Department
at 520 -791 -4444. We will have pictures of Karen
on our Instagram at coldandmissing and included
in those pictures will be some aged progressed
pictures of what she would look like into her
20s. So please check those out. Please share
them. Get Karen's name out there. Get her picture
out there just in case anybody recognizes her
and we could get some answers in this case. And
please follow along if you're not at coldandmissing
.com. We have all of our old episodes on there.
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transcripts. If you or someone you love is hard
of hearing, you can find all those at our website,
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this way. But that is all I have for you this
week. Thank you so much for listening to Cold
and Missing. I'm Allie. And I'm Eli. Have a good
week and stay safe, y 'all. Stay safe, y 'all.