UT UT - Sheree Allen, 22, West Valley, 24 January 2005

Her friends are certain Sheree Allen fought against her killer. Allen can’t speak from the grave, but when her friend James Gordon gazed down into the pink coffin at her memorial service he saw the bruises on her face. “She was an Amazon warrior,” he concludes, describing the 22-year-old whose body was found in a West Valley Dumpster in January. “Whoever killed her got some scars”...

At the Catholic St. Vincent de Paul/Weigand Resource Center for the Homeless in downtown Salt Lake City, emergency services director Jim Upton said Allen was “a sweet lady, who was fighting her demons,” which he’d heard were heroin and crack cocaine... “For three years she used our services, eating here daily, staying in the shelter and speaking with the pro bono attorney,” Upton said.

Capt. Steve Sandquist of the West Valley City Police feels that Allen’s killer will be found. Although he declines to release the cause of death and says that thus far, everyone is a suspect, “We know somebody knows about this... Our belief is that, this person has talked to somebody, and confessed it to a good friend. We are waiting for that person to come forward.”

Click to expand...

The Utah Cold Case Coalition said West Valley police zeroed in on two persons of interest, but the investigation stopped.

"One of the principal persons of interest was dating Sheree at the time," said Karra Porter with the coalition. "There were witnesses who said that she was in the process of leaving him and he was the last person to see her alive that we know of." She said that person was Carl Swanigan who died six years ago. Swanigan served time in prison and also fathered six children. "If he's involved, he had help getting Sheree's body into the dumpster," said Porter. The coalition wants to know who helped put Allen's body in the dumpster.

They are also seeking information about a man named "Pops" who once lived at the All-Star Motel in Salt Lake City back in 2005.

Click to expand...