NY NY - Leslie Zaret, 17, Bayside, Queens, 17 Aug 1974

Neat! I hope they get the information they are looking for. But I wonder how they found out someone was talking about her in the first place...
 
I wonder what the conversation was really about? Let's face it, it only takes one nosey person (like all of us who read and post religiously hear at WS) to strike up a conversation about her. A group of people who all remember her getting a discussion going is not suspicious to me at all.

Now, on the other hand, if the conversation had a sinister twist to - "She got what she deserved" type stuff - different scenario.

I hate to say this, but I would look hard at the "popular, jock crowd" from her school.

Hope they can resolve it!!
 
9239558b-8262-4fa1-89c3-6ce293fee1a9_zps567594f5.jpg


http://www.qchron.com/editions/nort...cle_1965d796-fd92-5975-93d5-a0a55d9fc9dc.html

A 40-year-old cold case murder of a Flushing teen in Bayside is being fired up anew by the NYPD.

Police are asking the public’s help in solving the murder of Leslie Zaret, 17, whose body was found on the PS 203 playground on Springfield Boulevard in Bayside on Aug. 17, 1974. Her body had been stripped and the cause of death was strangulation. Leslie’s clothing, a blue blouse with a flower print, jeans and beige platform shoes, were in a pile nearby...

Evidence showed that Zaret was not raped or had sex, but that she had been abused with a hairbrush. Police have partial DNA from the brush.
 
wow--my old neighborhood!!!!!! I know where all these locations are-----they should focus on the bar---likely that is where she met the killer/s--------was it a cop hangout, firemen hangout, Local 3 electricians hangout, Queens college/St Johns Univ. or Queensboro hangout-----old mans drinking bar or even a highschool hangout-drinking age was 18 back then.
 
another few thoughts as well-------what about the law schools close by---York and St Johns Law---possible
and JIB Lanes on Parsons Blvd was very active and still is--maybe a bowling league -----and Fort Tryon I think is in Bayside as well---maybe some soldiers were out for a beer
The outfit Leslie had on sounds very pretty----something to wear on a date--it may have been her real intention to meet her boyfriend-----where was he that night?????????
 

Were they able to decide the sex of the killer from the partial DNA?
If they have not, there is a possibility the killer was a woman/women.

Some issue over jealousy perhaps. On her way home from the bar, they mentioned she may had gotten into a car, could had been a car of women. The hairbrush, was it hers or not?...........Stripping her for humiliation and using the hairbrush for humiliation. Classmates, friends of classmates etc perhaps. The hairbrush was found where left, and the legiture used to strangle her was probably left at the scene also. The hairbrush left inside her when found was also for humiliation when she was found from reading.

If the partial DNA proves to be male. Than all of the above can be deleted.
 

NYPD Det. Jim Osorio of Ronkonkoma said John Bowne High alumni who attended the school from 1970 to 1975 are of particular interest to police because Zaret's murder was a topic of discussion at a 2000 reunion. Some former classmates even pointed fingers at a possible suspect, police said.

It certainly seems it was someone she knew, as they say she wouldn't have gotten into a car late at night with a stranger. She was only a few blocks from her home. She wasn't old enough to drink. I wonder what they used as a lure to get her in the car?
 
Cannot access the article, but it looks interesting..
How This Cop’s Dream About a Murder Reopened a Cold Case
How This Cop’s Dream About a Murder Reopened a Cold Case

191229-daly-jaffe-tease_qywgwf

Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast/Getty
"Forty-five years ago, a teenager was brutally raped and strangled in a quiet Queens community. But one cop never forgot her.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/author/michael-daly
Jan. 01, 2020
Part I: The Dream
In her dream, NYPD Chief Joanne Jaffe could hear the murdered girl calling to her for help.

“From the grave,” Jaffe would recall."
 
Wondering if the dna collected indicated the perp's race and gender? speculation, imo.
2014
NYPD chief: 1974 killing can still be solved
"On a summer morning, a custodian at PS 203 on Springfield Boulevard discovered 17-year-old Leslie Zaret's body. Zaret, a popular student at John Bowne High School in Flushing, had been stripped naked and strangled. Her clothes -- blue blouse and pants, and platform shoes -- were piled nearby.

As community pressure mounted to find the killer, police pushed the investigation. But after some promising leads and information about a number of persons of interest -- including a man who lived on Long Island -- the case went cold."

"Osorio said that while there was no evidence that Zaret had sex or was raped, the abuse of her body by the hairbrush suggested that the killer may have had impotency problems. Detectives followed a lead to some transsexual clubs in Greenwich Village but came up empty.

For Valencia, who has been consulting with detectives, the new push in the investigation is heartening.

"Every detective has a case, and this is mine," he said. "I could never rest until this case is finally solved."

The NYPD is asking people with information about the case to call 800-577-TIPS."
 
Re-post of very lengthy and interesting article, no paywall.
Jan. 03, 2020 rbbm.
How This Cop’s Dream About a Murder Reopened a Cold Case
''part I: The Dream
In her dream, NYPD Chief Joanne Jaffe could hear the murdered girl calling to her for help.

“From the grave,” Jaffe would recall.

When Jaffe awoke, she figured she must have been dreaming of the teenager who had been raped and strangled just down the block from her childhood home in Queens.

Jaffe had only the haziest memory of the killing, but she did recall talk of one disturbing detail: a hairbrush up the girl’s vagina.

The dream haunted her, so Jaffe asked her mother and her sister whether they remembered the decades-old murder. Neither did. Jaffe phoned a friend who was a sex-crimes prosecutor at the Queens District Attorney’s office, suddenly doubting whether the girl had been real, or if the dream was just some craziness on her part. She guessed the slaying would have been around 1970, when she was 12.''

''At 8:20 a.m., a custodian found Leslie’s body six miles away, lying face up on the concrete schoolyard behind PS 203 on Springfield Blvd. She was completely naked save for a gold necklace, two gold earrings and two gold rings. Her only visible injuries were bruising and scratches on her throat. Her long-sleeved, blue, flower-print blouse, blue jeans and underthings had been folded and placed in a neat pile along with her beige platform shoes, just past her bare feet. Her legs were splayed. The handle of the hairbrush was visible where it had been inserted between them''.

''Remph subsequently told detectives that the gate to the fence surrounding the area was locked at off-hours. Only somebody familiar with the school or neighborhood would have known about the holes that vandals had cut into chain link at the far side of the yard, adjacent to a wooded patch that separates the school from Queensborough Community College beyond''.

''An autopsy confirmed that she had been strangled''.

''The woman told Valencia that she had encountered the suspect in Manhattan at Club 82. Once a mob-owned drag queen venue frequented by Hollywood stars ranging from Elizabeth Taylor to Judy Garland. It had since morphed into a rock music spot featuring artists like the New York Dolls and Debbie Harry.

By the woman’s account, the suspect bummed a ride with her when she left the club. She told Valencia that they stopped at the 24-hour Hilltop Diner in Queens. He asked her if she wanted to go buy some pot and maybe smoke a little.

She agreed and he directed her to Cunningham Park in Fresh Meadows. She was beginning to realize that the pot was just a ruse to get her to a dark and secluded spot when he knocked her down and pounced. He tore off her clothes and attempted to rape her, but was unable to achieve an erection.

At that moment, he suddenly turned her over face down. He grabbed her comb and inserted it into her rectum.

The suspect was fully aroused when he then rolled her over again. He proceeded to rape her while throttling her with both hands. She almost certainly would have been murdered, Valencia figures, had she not managed to knee him and break free. She escaped and reported the attack and went to a hospital, which confirmed there had been a rape.

The woman had been interviewed by detectives back then regarding both her case and the Zaret case, but she may have simply been too embarrassed to mention the comb. She was in tears as she now told Valencia that she was giving a full account of the attack for the first time.''
 
Also, see this 2014 Newsday article:
NYPD chief: 1974 killing can still be solved
Scroll down to the comment about LZ's high school reunion. Very interesting.

Re-post of very lengthy and interesting article, no paywall.
Jan. 03, 2020 rbbm.
How This Cop’s Dream About a Murder Reopened a Cold Case
''part I: The Dream
In her dream, NYPD Chief Joanne Jaffe could hear the murdered girl calling to her for help.

“From the grave,” Jaffe would recall.

When Jaffe awoke, she figured she must have been dreaming of the teenager who had been raped and strangled just down the block from her childhood home in Queens.

Jaffe had only the haziest memory of the killing, but she did recall talk of one disturbing detail: a hairbrush up the girl’s vagina.

The dream haunted her, so Jaffe asked her mother and her sister whether they remembered the decades-old murder. Neither did. Jaffe phoned a friend who was a sex-crimes prosecutor at the Queens District Attorney’s office, suddenly doubting whether the girl had been real, or if the dream was just some craziness on her part. She guessed the slaying would have been around 1970, when she was 12.''

''At 8:20 a.m., a custodian found Leslie’s body six miles away, lying face up on the concrete schoolyard behind PS 203 on Springfield Blvd. She was completely naked save for a gold necklace, two gold earrings and two gold rings. Her only visible injuries were bruising and scratches on her throat. Her long-sleeved, blue, flower-print blouse, blue jeans and underthings had been folded and placed in a neat pile along with her beige platform shoes, just past her bare feet. Her legs were splayed. The handle of the hairbrush was visible where it had been inserted between them''.

''Remph subsequently told detectives that the gate to the fence surrounding the area was locked at off-hours. Only somebody familiar with the school or neighborhood would have known about the holes that vandals had cut into chain link at the far side of the yard, adjacent to a wooded patch that separates the school from Queensborough Community College beyond''.

''An autopsy confirmed that she had been strangled''.

''The woman told Valencia that she had encountered the suspect in Manhattan at Club 82. Once a mob-owned drag queen venue frequented by Hollywood stars ranging from Elizabeth Taylor to Judy Garland. It had since morphed into a rock music spot featuring artists like the New York Dolls and Debbie Harry.

By the woman’s account, the suspect bummed a ride with her when she left the club. She told Valencia that they stopped at the 24-hour Hilltop Diner in Queens. He asked her if she wanted to go buy some pot and maybe smoke a little.

She agreed and he directed her to Cunningham Park in Fresh Meadows. She was beginning to realize that the pot was just a ruse to get her to a dark and secluded spot when he knocked her down and pounced. He tore off her clothes and attempted to rape her, but was unable to achieve an erection.

At that moment, he suddenly turned her over face down. He grabbed her comb and inserted it into her rectum.

The suspect was fully aroused when he then rolled her over again. He proceeded to rape her while throttling her with both hands. She almost certainly would have been murdered, Valencia figures, had she not managed to knee him and break free. She escaped and reported the attack and went to a hospital, which confirmed there had been a rape.

The woman had been interviewed by detectives back then regarding both her case and the Zaret case, but she may have simply been too embarrassed to mention the comb. She was in tears as she now told Valencia that she was giving a full account of the attack for the first time.''
 
Also, see this 2014 Newsday article:
NYPD chief: 1974 killing can still be solved
Scroll down to the comment about LZ's high school reunion. Very interesting.
Very interesting..
Are they sure that a male attacked Leslie? speculation.
''NYPD Det. Jim Osorio of Ronkonkoma said John Bowne High alumni who attended the school from 1970 to 1975 are of particular interest to police because Zaret's murder was a topic of discussion at a 2000 reunion. Some former classmates even pointed fingers at a possible suspect, police said.

Osorio said that while there was no evidence that Zaret had sex or was raped, the abuse of her body by the hairbrush suggested that the killer may have had impotency problems. Detectives followed a lead to some transsexual clubs in Greenwich Village but came up empty.''
 
Trans men are more apt to be murdered themselves than to murder women, I'd say.
But this caught my eye from the 2014 Newsday article NYPD chief: 1974 killing can still be solved:
"NYPD Det. Jim Osorio of Ronkonkoma said John Bowne High alumni who attended the school from 1970 to 1975 are of particular interest to police because Zaret's murder was a topic of discussion at a 2000 reunion. Some former classmates even pointed fingers at a possible suspect, police said."

Someone at that 2000 reunion must have related that very interesting chatter re a possible suspect to NYPD. Maybe I'm wrong, but a 2000 reunion would not have been LZ's, since she graduated in 1974. The large-scale versions of these events tend to be held at five-year intervals. unless John Bowne HS has yearly reunions--some schools do have yearly informal get-togethers. So I wonder what year's graduates were holding that get-together. Were they finger-pointing about someone from their year? Twenty years later the killer could still be alive. A class that had a 2000 reunion would have one this year, too, barring COVID-19 complications.
 

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