Unsolved Murders Near My Hometown


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THE FOLLOWING IS A SYNAPSIS OF 7 MURDERS NEAR MY HOMETOWN:

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  1. Carol Bosch 

Date of death: March 4, 1981

Age 48

4th Grade Teacher at Meagher Elementary School

Crime scene: Town of Ulster/Hillside Acres/Kingston, NY

Mrs. Bosch was my 4th grade teacher. She was shot and killed inside her residence on the evening of March 4, 1981…(when I was in 5th grade.) I will never forget when I walked into school to find out the sad news the next morning. It was awful.

Basically, Mrs. Bosch was home alone that night. I am fairly certain that her house was on the market..For Sale sign in the yard. Police suspect she heard a noise in her garage and when she opened the door she was shot by an intruder. Mrs. Bosch was able to dial her telephone and dialed the operator. The operator then patched her to Kingston City Police. She requested an ambulance and stated she had been shot. Kingston Police then contacted State Police. When the State Police arrived on the scene she was found dead. 

I am unsure of any conclusions that the investigators have made regarding this case. Was it a robbery gone wrong? I don’t know.
What I DO know, from a close source, is that there were a handful of home break-ins in the Hillside Acres neighborhood around that time. The break-ins mysteriously stopped after the murder.

This case is still unsolved.

All of my Meagher School friends will never forget Mrs. Bosch. She was a wonderful teacher.

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2. Albert D. Barnhart, Jr.

Date of Death: December 6, 1987

Age 13

Crime scene: Port Ewen, NY

Albert was 13 years old at the time of his death. He was found in an area known to locals as 40 Bumps. It was a wooded area that some teens used as a hang out.

Albert was found about 300 feet from a burned out campfire at 40 Bumps. He was missing for a few weeks before being found. It was reported that he died with severe burns over 90 % of his body. 

Police definitely suspect this was a homicide. There is a lot of information regarding suspects (people who were with him that day) and their stories.. I will let you all google that information.

So far, nobody has been charged for causing his death.

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3. Linda Holgerson

Date of death: November 4, 2007

Age 57

Last seen: Kingston, NY

Location where body was found: Prattsville, NY

Linda Holgerson was developmentally and physically disabled. She went missing on October 19, 2007. She was last seen leaving The Bank of America branch on Broadway in Kingston. She was seen leaving the bank before getting into a white vehicle driven by someone else. 

Her body was then discovered 16 days later … On November 4th, 2007…. 50 miles away in Prattsville, NY. Her body was discovered just off Rt 23A. The autopsy ruled the death a homicide without giving out any details to the public.

3 dozen officers and investigators from State Police, City of Kingston Police, and Ulster County Sheriff’s Office worked on this case.

This case is still unsolved.

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4. Michael Kleiman

Date of death: July 25, 2008

Age 59

Crime scene: Town of Ulster/(East) Kingston, NY

A fire call had come in from a person across the Hudson River who reported black smoke coming from a wooded area in the distance. When the firefighters arrived on scene at about 2:45 in the afternoon, they made a gruesome discovery. They found a burning pick up truck way back on a makeshift road that was between two parallel roads in East Kingston (Between 1st Ave. and Rt 32) . They discovered there was a body burning in the back of that truck. It was later released that the body was decapitated and without hands.

Investigators used DNA to identify the body due to the condition of the remains. They had suspected it was Michael Kleiman because the truck was in his name. 

Here is some information about Michael Kleiman. He lived in Kerhonkson, NY. He worked for a children’s mentally ill facility in WestChester County, NY. Also, Michael was gay and he lived a quiet lifestyle. He did not use much technology. This makes it even harder to solve this case because investigators have no cell phone or computers to use to track Michael’s activities.

The police have released some information to the public, over time, to help them solve the crime. Most recently they released a photo of a missing ring that was on Michael’s hand hoping someone would recognize it.

This case is still unsolved.

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5. JOHN DOE CASE FROM 1970 IN WEST SAUGERTIES, NY

John Doe

Date body discovered: February 1, 1970

Location of body when discovered: West Saugerties, NY

State Police, 50 years later, are still working on putting a name to a man whose body was found within a few days of his death.

On February 1, 1970 ….John Doe’s body was found – dumped – 50 feet down a steep embankment below Platte Cove Rd. in West Saugerties. He was shot in the back of the head.

Check out what this guy had on !!! He was dressed in layers.

He was wearing a raincoat topped over a green pinstriped suit… Topped over a pair of pajamas. He had on black dress shoes covered with those rubber overshoes that people put on in the rain. He had on a silk tie with the label “Playboy.” He had on a very fancy watch, a gold ring, and a fake ruby ring. He also had $156 in his pocket. Much of the brands of clothing he was wearing was Brazilian. Even the bullet that he was shot with was from a Brazilian brand of bullets (say that 10 times fast).. 🙂

Word on the street is .. Back at that time, there were members of the mob who owned homes at the top of Platte Cove Rd. Perhaps it was mob related.

Still, no one has come forward to identify John Doe.
He is currently buried in the Blue Mountain Cemetery in West Saugerties. 

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So, I was thinking of 2 additional cases that were actually considered solved… But, they do not have closure for the families.

  1. Nicole Palmer. Age 24. (Kingston, NY) Police know who killed Nicole, but the suspect is already in prison for life and he was never convicted of murdering Nicole. He was convicted of killing young Rickel Knox back in 1995. I will let you google the details of Nicole’s death. It was gruesome. Her family has seen so much tragedy.. Even beyond Nicole’s passing. I only wish they would have had closure. I remember Nicole from Meagher School. Her fun personality and her beautiful smile is what I recall the most. We would sometimes walk the same route home from school and that is how I will always remember her.
  2. Mrs. Yim L. Eng. Age 43. (Hurley, NY) This is disturbing and sad. Basically, she was kidnapped by employees of her husband’s restaurant from her home in Hurley. She was never to be seen again. There was ransom money involved.. . People were arrested and charged, but Mrs. Eng has never been found. See article and link below …

Also- Read this legal info about the Eng case … (click link)
https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/594/248/1900365/

Please feel free to drop a comment below about your memory of these cases or if you found this post interesting, etc. Thanks !

The Boarding Pass

Last year I received a random message from a Facebook friend. His name is Jim. He is a friend from middle school and high school. Jim is now a contractor who specializes in kitchen remodels.

The message read “Did you lose an airline ticket? I just found it.”
He included a photo of an old fashioned looking boarding pass.
The boarding pass info:
Pan American Airlines
Passenger: Colleen Dymond
Departing: JFK International Airport
Arriving: Beijing Capital International Airport, China
Date of flight: December 3, 1973


I didn’t know Jim enough to have his cell number. So I replied to him. “I am so confused. Can you call me? 845-399-****

Jim called me pretty much right away. He explained that he is remodeling a kitchen. He just blew out one of the walls and found this behind it.

It didn’t take me long to realize that the people who now own my childhood home are remodeling their kitchen and this was in the wall ……

Here is the problem.
I would have been 3 years old at the time of this boarding pass being purchased.
I’ve never been to Beijing.
No one in my family has ever been to Beijing.
My parents (who are now deceased) had never even been on an airplane.
I’ve never owned a passport or traveled outside of the U.S. until 2019.
And this was found in our wall !!
What ???!!!!!!!

Jim stopped by my job at the YMCA when he took a lunch break and gave me the airline ticket.

The ticket is exactly as you would imagine it would look. It is rectangular shaped. It has the “Pan Am” logo in the upper left corner.. It has a very dingy color with old stains on it. The stain is round like a can or a glass left it there. It has the perforations on the right side of it so it can be torn when boarding the airplane.

The first thing I did was text my siblings. I texted the photo and explained the situation. They were all confused and curious. They have no idea how this even exists and why it exists.

I started to get a little freaked out.

I started to make a list of people who could give me some answers to this mystery.
Perhaps extended family, neighbors, or old friends could help me.


My memory doesn’t really go back as far as 3 years old.
Yet, I still found myself trying to think if there were any sketchy people hanging around at my house when I was a little kid.

Was I part of some weird adoption? Was someone planning to abduct me? Was someone using my identity? Was this a joke?

I decided to start my research by using common sense. I asked myself “Why would someone secretly purchase an airline ticket for a 3 year old girl?” So, I decided to go down the rabbit hole of a possible attempted abduction.

How was I supposed to research this situation? This dates back way before computers and the internet.

One thought I had regarding any of my immediate family members being affiliated with JFK airport (the departing location) was my father. He was a tractor trailer driver for IBM and delivered the computers down to JFK on a daily basis. That quickly got ruled out. He would never be involved in shady behavior.

I also have a memory of my parents losing my birth certificate and some guy came to our house to help them fill out papers to get a new one for me. But, I have no idea who that was and none of my siblings remember that.

So, then I got thinking about any family friends who visited our house. I literally could only think of all the teenagers who hung out with my older siblings. No way. They wouldn’t have the means to pull any stunts like that.

Next, I thought about how my parents would have neighbors over for breakfast when I was a little kid.. They did this almost every weekend. They always sat around the kitchen table and had crumb cakes, hard rolls, and coffee. There is only one neighbor who came over who is still alive. I contacted her. She was literally dumb founded. She could not think of any ideas or info to help me. This woman is very honest, intelligent and well respected. My gut says she really had no idea.

Suddenly, out of nowhere I remember this one guy who lived the next block over. He took up a friendship with my dad because he always walked past our house. Once or twice a summer he would stop and my dad offered him a beer on our patio. This guy used to talk about the airports all the time. Like the entire conversation was airports and airplanes. His job was a courier who would deliver lost airline luggage to people’s homes. That is probably why he and my dad got along. They had that delivery type of job in common. This guy walked past our house for many years. Then suddenly he didn’t walk by anymore. I remember asking my dad where that guy has been lately. And….

My dad told me that he moved to CHINA !!!!!!

I couldn’t remember his last name for the life of me. His first name was Albert. I asked my siblings. My sister remembered his last name. I had to google and see if I could find him online. He would probably be like 70 years old by now. Maybe older. I could not find him anywhere on social media or by a google search.

Look at me assuming I know that this really was an attempted abduction. This is such a strong assumption on my end. I am such a sucker for mysteries. So suspect #1 was Albert.

I kept plugging along….

I started really thinking about who could see inside our home without physically being inside.
Also, I asked myself how would this person eventually get in my house with an airline ticket?

Just for fun I started picturing in my mind where the airline ticket was found. I was picturing the layout of my old kitchen. I thought about the windows in our kitchen. The house directly next door was extremely close to ours. But I couldn’t think of anyone who I recalled living in that house who would be suspicious. Of course, I have no idea who lived there when I was 3 years old. I can only think of the people from when I actually had a memory of my childhood.

The houses are so close together that you could have a normal chat with someone from window to window. I recall back in the 90s my nephew met a friend who lived in the upstairs apartment of that house and they would have normal conversations from the kitchen window up to his friend’s bedroom window in the house next door.

I think it is also important to note that our family never locked our doors to our house. I remember when my mom passed away. We had to go through a jar of old keys and test them in the doors to see if any of them worked. (Was that just us ? Or was that common back in the day? )

I started doing research online. I assumed I would not have any luck finding any info from 1973. I did end up finding a website. (I had to pay money to access it)..I basically was able to find out the names of everyone who lived at that address for the house next door to me. It dates back to the 1960s.

The website gave me a name of a man who lived in that house from July of 1972 to December of 1973. His name was Leonard Walker. Leonard lived in the upstairs apartment. Apartment B.

After that, I did a normal google search for Leonard’s name and didn’t come up with anything at all.

So, then I spent more money. I paid for a newspaper website that has all archived copies of most newspapers in the United States.

All I had to do was search for the name on that website and BINGO !
I found something.

It was true !! My suspicion was right !! I strongly believe I was part of an attempted child abduction.
I found an article in the New York Times that had a story from January of 1974. Leonard was part of a child trafficking sting. Caught at Kennedy Airport. The article said that he was trying to take a young child onto an airplane and was stopped just in time by the FBI. The article was vaguely written and not a front page story. Which is shocking. But, I found it and couldn’t believe it !

So it was our next door neighbor – Leonard !
WOW !!!

My family totally freaked out when I told them about Leonard !

And poor, old Albert. He was trying to be a nice neighborhood drinking buddy and I suspected him. 🙂

It is also extremely disturbing to think that a stranger was lurking in our home and we never knew it !

This is a fictional story that was inspired by a TRUE story I had seen online. Click this link. https://www.tiktok.com/@k3llynb/video/6915915817003568390?lang=en