I may not be adding anything useful but I wanted to share my thoughts. I’m from the area and lived there when this happened (but for some reason, I do not recall there being very wide news coverage at the time, though I admit I was a teenager and not keeping up with tv news at the time; my friends also don’t recall it).
Anyway, this case has intrigued me since I’ve learned about it more recently, in part because this was an area of town I frequented and, though I was too young to hang out at bars and clubs, I very shortly after became more familiar with them.
I’ve listened to quite a few in-depth podcasts about the case and read news coverage. I’ve also kept up with related crimes in the area.
Based on what is known thus far, here are my most plausible theories (fwiw):
1. Karina was killed by someone not local to the area. (This one is tied with number 2). I’ve thought about this one deeply. My reasons for this are the lack of similar crimes in the area (hang on because I have some theories here too) and the proximity to the interstate for the dumping site. Related to this, I think the person was either living locally for a short time due to higher education (this has been somewhat explored) or due to construction work. What strikes me is the use of a 50-60 gallon industrial garbage bag and a circular saw blade found with the body; while not impossible, it’s quite uncommon for most people to have casual access to these in the length of time she was killed (especially at that time period before DIY home reno was as big of a thing, particularly in that part of town… other areas & suburbs would be different) indicating she may have been attacked and murdered at a work site nearby. There also was (and still is) a lot of construction work being done in that area. I’m surprised not to see enough analysis discussed about this aspect of the case in the multiple sources I have listened to or read.
2. Karina was killed by someone who lived locally who either has never been caught or has but the dots haven’t been connected. It seems unlikely that a crime like this would be the first one for most who could do something like this, but, the more we learn about different solved cases, the less far fetched it is to consider it could be someone’s only violent crime. But, if it werent, I have a couple of theories. The most obvious is that the person was never caught. However, if this person continued to offend, I don’t think it was locally (which also connects to #1) or they moved away, or related cases must vary significantly in MO (at least from what I’ve seen, there aren’t similar cases in MA). It would not be the first time someone changed MO though.
Related to this, I think it could potentially be related to someone who was caught but the dots not connected.
-Eugene McCollom (who was caught and convicted for murdering and dismembering a female sex worker and a man separately) has been suggested and questioned on several occasions but he is sticking to the story that he had nothing to do with Karina (he claims he snapped after his brother’s murder & lack of a conviction). He was caught in Nov 2000, which is not too far off timewise. He also dismembered his victims differently, removing their head and hands (sadly the female victim remains unidentified). But this could be a case of changing MO. He also seemed somewhat disorganized since he was caught rather quickly, but this could also be due to his admitted rage and dysfunction as a result of his brother’s murder.
-There were a few other people I suspected, who targeted sex workers, but they were caught and convicted before the crime against Karina.
-Another potential suspect to me is Daniel Mason, a BU medical student charged with murder and attempted murder of two men in 2001. People talk a lot about Markoff, but he would have been too young at the time of Karina’s murder. Mason had moved back to the Boston area in 1994 after having served in the Israeli special ops, and started BU medical school shortly after (he was finishing up at the time of his convicted crime). I bring him up for two reasons: one is the medical student angle which has been suggested by some, given the accuracy of the dismemberment, and two is the lesser known history of violence. Unfortunately, we don’t know much about Mason because he and his defense team were able to successfully have that not included at trial, but some articles, including one in the Jerusalem post, provide some details including attacking a fellow student in a gym over a dispute and breaking into a girlfriends home and threatening her with murder (notably, both incidents would have been in the mid-late 1990s, based on the few details provided). He was even accused by fellow soldiers of being “hot headed.” He ultimately was convicted of murdering one man (Michael Lenz) and attempted murder of another (Gene Yazgur) over a dispute that originated in 1997. In 1997, he had attacked Yazgur (who he did not know at the time) with a knife for blocking traffic; Yazgur later won a suit against him, for which Mason vowed he would not live to see.
From the kibbutz to a US super-max prison: who is murderer Danny Mason?
I know that, ultimately, these are different crimes, but I feel there is a concerning pattern of behavior that warrants more investigation. I would hope that police have explored this angle, though it seems they are pretty tight lipped about this case.
3. Karina was killed by one of the original suspects. Since this has already been discussed at length, I won’t go into detail here, and I also think this is plausible, but I feel that, after all these years (unless tracks were very tightly covered), seems less and less likely to me. The BPD boyfriend and Frank Rapp and even john Zewizz seem like very likely suspects, but I can’t help to think that, as time passes, unless there are some really gaping missing leads (like in the case of Delphi murders recently) or extreme corruption, there wouldn’t have been some kinds of ties made amongst the evidence available (unless it’s really that lacking).
Anyway, not saying this is my final analysis, as I recognize there’s a lot that isn’t known, but, based on what is, these are my strongest theories (#1 or #2).
