January 4, 2024 • 29 mins
In this thought-provoking episode, we delve into the unsolved case of Sister Cathy Cesnik, a devoted nun who mysteriously vanished in 1969. Join us as we explore the intriguing details surrounding her background, her impactful teaching career, and her significant involvement in the Catholic Church.
We navigate through the web of suspicions surrounding two priests and the shocking emergence of sexual abuse allegations years later. Additionally, we delve into the noteworthy documentary series 'The Keepers' and the recent groundbreaking advancements in DNA testing.
Get ready for a captivating journey that culminates with a valuable teachable moment. Discover the importance of not hastily jumping to conclusions and the significance of allowing authorities to handle investigations. This episode will keep your podcast audience engaged from start to finish.
If you have any information on Cathy Cesnik’s case, please contact the Baltimore City Homicide Unit through Metro Crime Stoppers at 866-7-LOCKUP. That’s 866-756-2587. A $2K reward for information leading to an arrest is still active in this case.
Listen to new episodes every Thursday wherever you get your podcasts! You can find all of our socials @dying2bfound and more at https://linktr.ee/dying2bfound. If you like what you hear, please share and give a 5-star review! Consider supporting us by buying us a coffee at https://www.buymeacoffee.com/dyingtobefound.
Intro & Extro Music: Undersea World by Dragonov
Teachable Moments Music: Untold Story by Ballian De Moulle
REFERENCES:
The Murder of Sister Catherine Ann Cesnik; Maryland, 1969, Open Salon, August 11, 2014
Sister Catherine Ann Cesnik - Baltimore County
Sister Cathy Cesnik's Sister on Her Murder, The Keepers
Who Killed Sister Cathy? « Inside Baltimore
Women say ‘Keepers’ figure was unnamed rapist in Catholic abuse report - The Baltimore Banner
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hi everyone, this is Deb from Dying to be Found.
(00:03):
Before we get started, I just wanted to say that episodes contain disturbing discussions on harmful acts and crimes against animals and or humankind.
Recordings are not intended for young or sensitive audiences due to the content nature of this podcast.
Listener discretion is strongly advised.
(00:34):
Hi everyone, I'm Deb and I'm Shelby.
Welcome back to Dying to be Found where each week I get together with different family members.
Today, my daughter Shelby is here to listen to an unsolved crime that Shelby is going to go all the way back to the 1970s.
I know you had mentioned before we started recording that you had not heard of this.
(00:54):
First of all, I want to wish you a happy new year.
Can you believe it's already 2024?
No.
Oh my gosh.
This year has flown by.
Time flies when you're having fun.
I wouldn't call it fun.
Busy.
It's been busy.
Yeah, but I do want to say it was amazing.
To come up your way this holiday season.
(01:14):
I got to see the town where I began my teaching career.
I got to see your awesome new restaurant.
How's that going?
It's going wonderful.
We have been closed this week just to kind of give everybody a break after the holidays.
So starting Tuesday, we'll be back up and running.
Yep.
Oh, you're a good boss.
That's nice.
(01:35):
And interesting fact, the retail space that you have is where I used to get my hair done.
So I thought that was pretty cool.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah, it was a nightmare cleaning that place to turn it from a hair salon that had been a hair salon for,
I don't know, at least 15 years, I would say, maybe even longer and turning that into a restaurant.
Yeah, but you guys opened pretty quickly.
(01:58):
So good for you.
All right.
Remember how I have always told you that you will learn a lot about your mother on this podcast?
Yes.
Well, I have a little story for you before we get into our case.
Now, you know that I grew up Catholic.
So I still recall quite a bit about Catholicism.
Did you know that I attended Catholic school when I was young?
(02:20):
I did not.
I did.
It was a public Catholic school, but it was a Catholic school just the same.
And I'll tell you, there was one day that we all went on a field trip to the local All Girls Catholic High School.
And Shelby, I actually came home and I begged your grandmother to let me go there.
Oh, wow.
I know.
I love the building. It was so bright and cheery.
(02:42):
It was so clean.
I wanted to wear that uniform.
And having had enough religion classes, I was still interested in going to a Catholic school.
Are you surprised by that?
I am.
I never knew that.
I knew you were Catholic or grew up Catholic because when I was younger, we would go to Catholic Church, St. Oliver's, I think it was.
(03:03):
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Well, today we're going to talk about an unsolved case and this is a story of Sister Kathy Sesnik.
Just to backtrack a little bit, Kathy was born and raised in Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania, just across from Pittsburgh.
And she grew up in a very devout Catholic household.
(03:23):
Kathy attended Catholic school and eventually joined a convent where she would spend the next seven years serving as a postulant
or a candidate to become a nun.
You know, there are certain steps that you have to take to do that.
And I'm sure it hasn't changed much over the years.
But back in the 70s, Shelby, that was a time when nuns still wore their habits, the black and white gown that you see.
(03:50):
Oh, yes.
I love the movie, The Sister Act.
Oh, yes.
All right.
During this time as a postulant, you take classes to learn more about religious life.
You pray and participate in apostolic works.
By July 21st, 1967, Kathy made her vows to begin her life as a nun and she dedicated her life to the convent of the school Sisters of Notre Dame.
(04:16):
Kathy went on to teach at Archbishop Keogh High School, an all-girls school associated with the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
By 1969, Sister Kathy began experiencing fatigue.
There were a lot of changes coming from the Vatican.
Pope Paul VI at the time declared something called the Vatican II.
(04:39):
And I had to go look this up, Shelby, because I was not aware of these changes in the Catholic Church at the time.
But it's basically an awakening into modern times.
There were just a lot of changes going on.
Mass was now read in people's language instead of strictly in Latin.
And I will say when I was growing up in the Catholic Church,
(04:59):
it was in English, the readings increased and nuns were declared to be equal to Catholic parishioners.
So I kind of wanted to go back to when Kathy first began pursuing her life, dedicating her life to becoming a nun.
Nuns at that time, Shelby, were given a higher order, maybe a little bit.
(05:20):
I don't know. They were considered to be a little bit closer to God.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I can see that.
So with the Vatican II changes that the Pope had declared,
a lot of nuns were feeling set back a little bit because they were no longer at that stature.
So all that work and time and praying and religion classes and everything that they put in,
(05:45):
all that time that they dedicated for the years that it took to become a nun just basically got wiped away.
So this is where it didn't sit very well with the nuns because 90,000 of them left the church
feeling like they've lost that special place in the church.
Now, Kathy was not one of those nuns who left the archdiocese,
but she did start missing a lot of school.
(06:08):
And this was a time too, Shelby, where nuns were no longer required to wear the habits.
And she just wore regular dresses during those times and she could move off the convent property.
So she actually went out and got a small two bedroom apartment that she shared with another nun.
So she's just out in society just like you and me.
(06:28):
Wow.
On Friday, November 7th, 1969, Kathy had left to run errands around 7 p.m.
but never returned back to her apartment.
And by 11 o'clock that night, Kathy's roommate was worried that she had not returned home.
I believe Shelby, she was literally going out to get some dinner rolls and maybe pick a couple things up for dinner.
(06:50):
Her roommate got worried around 11 o'clock and she didn't call the police right away.
She contacted two priests, a Father Kube and Father McKeon, who lived in a nearby community.
So I think that that would be something that I would probably do first before calling the police,
just because, you know, you're going to be checking on people and just saying,
(07:12):
hey, have you seen Kathy or something like that?
I mean, that's a natural reaction to me, don't you think?
Right. Oh, yeah, I agree.
Well, the two priests arrived at Kathy's apartment around 1 a.m.
to speak to Kathy's roommate before calling the police and then set out by foot to begin scouring the neighborhood for her.
They found Kathy's car parked nearby the apartment where she lived,
(07:37):
but not on the premises of the apartment complex because nothing seems suspicious other than Kathy's car being parked at an odd angle.
OK, so the car is off the apartment complex property and it's parked at an odd angle.
So that's not suspicious.
Yeah, I would find that pretty suspicious.
(07:57):
Well, Shelby had just mentioned that I didn't think it was odd that you would start calling around calling friends first before you call the police.
But police found it rather odd that Kathy's roommate would call the priests before them.
Yeah, I would agree.
I mean, I don't know why they would find that odd.
It could have been their behavior.
(08:17):
Who knows? I didn't see anything in the writings, anything in the articles about that.
But you just never know because, you know, police are always on their guard anyway.
Mm hmm. Right.
On January 3rd, 1970, 26 year old Kathy was discovered by two hunters in Lansdowne, Maryland, just outside of Baltimore.
And Shelby, this is about five miles from her home.
(08:40):
Oh, I know.
She was covered with snow and lying on her back.
She was partially nude and on a hillside close to a garbage dump.
The interesting thing that I found here, Shelby, is that Kathy's purse and one shoe were within just feet from her body.
Wow.
Unfortunately, Kathy was too decomposed at this time to determine her exact cause of death because it had appeared that she had suffered from blunt force trauma to the head.
(09:10):
And to make matters worse, wild animals had found her before the hunters had.
So did the insects, so investigators could only discover her identity with the contents inside that purse that was lying nearby.
So interesting that her purse was still there.
Obviously.
Wow.
And it was only two months.
(09:32):
Exactly.
And it was in the colder weather too.
So to me, that's a little odd.
Yeah, same.
I mean, I thought that that would have been able to kind of preserve her at least a little longer.
I mean, animals, I guess.
That's a little more difficult.
Yeah, the animals are one thing, but the insects is what surprises me.
For sure.
Well, after Kathy's discovery, police began focusing on one of those two priests that I had mentioned.
(09:58):
And this was Father Koob, which police had learned that Kathy had written him a letter that was dated November 3rd, 1969.
So I'm going to read the little excerpt from here and you can kind of get a general idea what their relationship was.
Quote, my very dearest Jerry, if ever I should leave you is playing on the radio.
(10:19):
I'm all curled up in bed.
My period has finally started 10 days late.
So you may say I'm moody.
My heart aches for you.
I must wait on you, your time and your need even more than I had before.
I think I can begin to live with that more easily now than I did two months ago.
Just loving you within myself.
(10:40):
Unquote.
So I'm going to stop there.
Kathy went on to tell Father Koob that she wanted to have his children.
Ooh.
Okay.
First off, we're going to say that this was a little scandalous because priests and nuns don't have that kind of relationship in the Catholic Church.
Priests don't even get married, right?
(11:01):
No.
I don't think the other of them.
No, they do not get married.
So interesting that the police are going to show a little bit of interest in Father Koob here because priests at that
time were supposed to be celibate.
I don't think anything has changed over the years with that.
Father Koob did have an alibi on the night that Kathy disappeared.
(11:22):
He claimed that he and Father McKeon had pretty much hung out all night.
They went to dinner.
They caught a movie.
It was called Easy Rider.
And I think that was a pretty popular movie at the time, Shelbs.
This alibi seemed pretty legit.
And I wanted to mention too that the priests took not only one but two lie detector tests just for good measure.
(11:44):
They both passed with flying colors.
So I'm not really surprised because we know that priests are going to be honest.
Although sexual relationships between the priest and a nun is a no-no, they did to me just from what I read seem to be following an honest life.
I mean, they both passed two different lie detector tests, so that should be a pretty good indication that they didn't do anything.
(12:09):
Yes, absolutely.
Police went on to take an active role in the investigation and did come up with some pretty good leads all the way through 1977.
So they were on the case for a good seven years since Kathy's death.
But unfortunately, the evidence did seem to run out and Kathy's case went cold for another 15 years.
(12:33):
Did it say when she, oh, she left to run errands and they probably wouldn't have had video surveillance.
I was just wondering like maybe could they figure out kind of her track and where she was going and what she was doing before she went missing?
Yes, I think that she distinctly said she was headed for a specific store to pick up dinner rolls.
(12:54):
That's right. Okay.
So kind of like I'm going to run out to the grocery store.
I'll be right back sort of thing.
Okay.
So, Shelley, what do we know about crime and deceit?
They don't stay buried forever.
Do they know, you know, somebody's got to talk somebody might become suspicious by 1992.
Two women came forward and filed a lawsuit against the Baltimore Archdiocese claiming that they had been sexually abused by Father Anthony Joseph
(13:22):
Maskell when they attended Archbishop Keogh High School at the same time that Kathy Sesnick taught English there.
Now, here's the clincher.
One of the women testified in court that in November 1969, Father Maskell took her to the garbage dump near Lansdowne, Maryland and showed her Kathy's body.
(13:43):
Ooh, I know.
Father Maskell told her that she would be next if she did not keep her mouth shut.
So here we go with the scandal.
These two women also went on to testify in court that they knew of several other students at their high school that were also being sexually abused by Father Maskell.
And they went to Sister Kathy for help.
(14:05):
Oh, wow.
I know.
Okay.
So this woman, this woman of God is just given this information and ethically, morally, I'm pretty sure if I were in that situation.
I mean, I'm an educator and I am mandated to report things like that.
I don't know how the laws were back then, but besides being a mandated reporter, she's also a woman of God.
(14:29):
So she is definitely facing some moral issues.
Right.
Absolutely.
I wonder if she went to Father Maskell and said something and that's possibly why he did away with her.
You know what?
I kind of wonder the same thing.
None of the articles that I read said, of course, you know, he's going to deny, deny, deny.
(14:50):
So we will never know that answer.
But I have to in my mind think that she probably had a conversation with him or at least to say,
hey, there's a couple of students who came to me to tell me something that I just wanted to ask you about.
But ultimately, the courts ruled in Father Maskell's favor because the judge ruled that repressed memories don't count in extending the statute of limitations.
(15:17):
So too much time had gone on to prosecute Father Maskell.
This was 1992.
So this was 22 years after Kathy's body was found.
I wonder why it took them so long to come forward.
Did he pass away?
Does it? Did it say he had passed away?
I don't think so.
No, no, because this was taken to the prosecutors and the judge ruled in his favor.
(15:44):
I don't know.
We'll get back to that.
It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote this script.
So I don't believe that he had passed away at this time.
Shelbs.
All right.
To make a long story short here, there was never enough evidence to prosecute Father Maskell and Kathy's murder.
But there's a lot more to this story, which I will mention in just a little bit because Shelby,
(16:04):
I came across a Netflix documentary out there.
It was made in 2017 and it's called The Keepers.
Now, Kathy's case was mentioned in this docuseries.
I did not watch it simply because I think there is a ton more information that would take me down these rabbit holes.
And I really wanted to concentrate on Kathy's case here as opposed to looking at the docuseries that had all this scandal going on with the church.
(16:33):
So I wanted to stay away from that.
According to WMAR Channel 2 News out of Baltimore,
filmmakers were not trying to solve Kathy Sesnick's case in The Keepers,
although there was another case involved that they had mentioned and this would be Joyce Maleky.
She also was a murder victim, which The Keepers kind of mentioned in there along with Kathy.
(16:57):
Filmmakers of The Keepers were attempting to link Kathy's case to the bigger case of sexual abuse at the Archbishop Keogh's school,
where Kathy worked as an English teacher.
So let's talk about what Kathy probably knew a little bit too much of.
According to eyewitness accounts, girls would be pulled out of class at the high school to be sexually assaulted.
(17:22):
They were threatened never to speak of these ordeals or something bad might happen to them similar to what happened to Kathy Sesnick.
Now remember, one victim had come forward years later to say that she had seen Kathy's body.
Why wouldn't they tell their parents?
Well, let me put it to you this way, Shelbs.
(17:42):
This is the 1970s.
That era, you're taught to respect your elders.
And I think, Shelby, if I were in that situation and I were going to that school and I was threatened, I would take it seriously.
I mean, I would keep my mouth shut too, because if you're kind of threatened that you're next, wouldn't you keep your mouth shut?
(18:04):
Yeah, maybe.
But I mean, if it just kept happening to a bunch of different girls, I would think that there would have at least been one.
True.
I don't know. It's very odd.
It is odd, but remember, though, some girls did come to Kathy Sesnick and they told her because she was a trusted adult.
Yeah.
They probably trusted that she would go and look into it, which she probably did.
(18:29):
And this is why she disappeared, unfortunately.
It's just, you know, there's too much speculation.
I don't want to speculate here.
I'm not even an expert, but I'm thinking that had to have been the direction that Kathy was going was trying to get to the bottom of it.
Yeah.
Now, according to the Baltimore Banner, the Maryland's Office of the Attorney General released a massive report on sexual abuse in Baltimore's Catholic archdiocese.
(18:56):
More than 150 clergy and personnel were reportedly involved in covering up the abuse of nearly 40 children and teenagers, Shelby.
Sixteen of these victims attended the high school where Kathy Sesnick taught.
Wow.
So what do you think?
Do you think Kathy knew too much?
(19:17):
She planned to go to the police.
She went to the priest first to see if it was true.
I think it's fair to say that she was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time.
And when she left for errands, yeah, she was probably just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
I don't know if somebody was following her.
Did she plan to meet somebody?
(19:37):
I have no idea.
So many questions.
So many questions.
Well, I will say this one of the priests recently accused of taking part in the sexual abuse cases in the 1970s was Father Kube.
Remember that was the priest that Kathy had written that letter to.
Right.
So he had always maintained his innocence.
(19:59):
But my recommendation here is just go watch The Keepers.
I personally did not watch it.
I mean, I'll probably be interested.
I actually wanted to record this first before I go and watch that and make my own decisions because it's again, it's a completely different circumstance.
Yeah, I might have to watch that today.
Mm-hmm.
Now, I've also put the 2023 Baltimore Banner article in our show notes that has a very different account on Kube's personality and whereabouts of when Kathy went missing.
(20:30):
I didn't want to get too much into that as well.
But don't forget he did pass two lie detector tests.
So again, I'm going to let you I'm going to let our listeners kind of make your own decisions on the direction this is going to take.
But I did want to kind of jump forward a little bit because with the advancements of DNA profiling,
(20:51):
the FBI and local detectives began pursuing DNA analysis pretty heavily only back in 2017,
Shelby.
And this is the same year that The Keepers came out on Netflix.
So as we would have it back in the 1970s where crime scene investigators collected evidence,
they actually stored quite a bit of evidence from the location where Kathy was discovered.
(21:15):
They had her purse.
They had her shoes and then of course, whatever they may have found around her when they discovered her.
But on February 28th, 2017, the FBI obtained an order from the Baltimore County State Attorney,
allowing them to have Kathy Cisnik's body exhumed for DNA testing.
Good for them.
Oh, wow.
(21:35):
Her DNA samples were compared with Father Maskell.
But unfortunately, there was no match to the crime scene.
An additional half dozen other DNA samples were compared in this case.
Some that investigators believed were related to another crime activity.
That would be Joyce Maleky.
Now, I didn't really want to look her up either because I'm concentrating on Kathy's case here.
(21:59):
But that would be also quite interesting to take a look at.
I will say this just briefly.
Joyce Helen Maleky was a 20 year old girl that disappeared from the same district just four days after Kathy Cisnik.
She was on her way to a mall to do some Christmas shopping.
There was another girl who had disappeared and this was 16 year old Grace Elizabeth Montane.
(22:23):
She disappeared from another shopping center close by and her body was discovered September 29th, 1971.
All of these murders shall be occurred within a 30 minute distance of the Herondale Mall.
So if you're thinking about somebody out there doing this,
they're all in a crowded shopping area and they're all within 30 minutes of each other.
(22:49):
I can easily say that whoever the perpetrator is, that would definitely be their MO.
Yeah, so obviously we have a creeper who scouts crowded places and preys on young women.
Kathy was just 26 when she disappeared.
So she was a little bit older than the other victims.
But regardless, Shelby, you've got a creeper who is watching women out shopping alone
(23:14):
and is basically either following them or watching their movements and they could be showing up where they live.
Yeah, I think I've said it before on our podcast,
but I try to be very aware of my surroundings, especially in parking lots because that honestly tends to be,
I mean, when you hear somebody going missing, a lot of the time it is in a parking lot.
(23:37):
Yes, it is. And I've had some people just kind of come up on me as I'm either putting stuff in the car
or I'm just getting out of the car.
I literally have had people just coming straight up to where I just parked my vehicle and that's startling.
It is.
Well, ultimately DNA from Kathy and these other victims were entered into CODIS.
(23:58):
But even today, all cases have come to another screeching halt
because I told you Kathy's case went cold after about seven years,
but things kind of picked up when DNA samples were on the scene.
But no leads stemming from those DNA samples could be referenced in the CODIS system.
Baltimore police theorized that it was likely that Kathy was a victim of abduction.
(24:23):
Like you said, you know, when people just pop up on you,
when she was walking to her car to run errands in November 1969.
Now, I had mentioned that 2017 was a big year in Kathy's case.
There's a lot of publicity going on.
Kathy's sister was interviewed by People Magazine and believes that Kathy was indeed planning to go to the police to report Father Maskell,
(24:47):
but she just never made it.
And I'll put these articles in our show notes because Kathy's sister provides some very fond memories between the two of them growing up.
So I thought that was refreshing and nice to hear.
So I wanted to add that to our show notes today.
So that Shelby is the unsolved case of Kathy Sesnick.
(25:07):
And I do feel like authorities are close, yet they're still so far because there simply has got to be more to her murderer than what we see on the surface here.
Unfortunately, Shelby, this case is over 50 years old.
So the possibilities are pretty slim that it will ever be solved unless, of course, we have somebody who makes a deathbed confession.
(25:30):
I hope they figure it out.
I'm going to have to go watch the docu-series.
I'll have to see if I can start that today.
Yeah, let me know because I don't have Netflix right now.
So is it worth getting a subscription for that?
There you go.
All right. To our listeners, if you have any information on Kathy Sesnick's case,
please contact the Baltimore City Homicide Unit through Metro Crime Stoppers at 866-7-LOCKUP.
(25:57):
That's 866-756-2587.
There is a $2,000 reward for information leading to an arrest, which is still active in this case.
Kathy was last seen on November 7, 1969, at the Carriage House Apartments in Baltimore City.
Zip code, postal code is 21229.
(26:20):
She was on her way to the Edmondson Village Shopping Center,
and her body, unfortunately, was discovered at the Monumental Avenue in Halethorpe, postal code 21227.
So there you have it.
That's the case of Sister Kathy Sesnick.
Wow.
And I hope that we do get some answers for her.
(26:40):
I hate to have a cold case not get solved.
I do too.
Do you have a teachable moment for us today?
I do have a teachable moment, and this is a tough one, Shelbs,
because I think my teachable moment is to do your own research before raising judgments on people that you don't know.
I touched on a couple of accounts here that go all the way back to the late 1960s and early 70s,
(27:04):
which would still be considered scandalous today.
Again, Shelby, there's a handful of people being accused,
but until they reach a jury of their peers, they should be considered innocent, at least in this country.
But we've heard a lot of stories of abuse in the Catholic Church.
So when I began researching Kathy's case,
(27:26):
I was very surprised that her murder could somehow be related to that.
Even though I report from reputable sources,
there's still a lot of questions about Kathy's case that go unanswered.
And I've provided a documentary for you, some articles.
Any of our listeners can just tap into Beyond a 30-minute podcast here.
(27:48):
So my teachable moment is don't be quick to judge.
Sometimes innocent people get accused.
Sometimes guilty people don't.
It's not our place to say either way.
But we're human.
We all have an opinion.
Just be sure that your opinion is accurate and let authorities handle the rest.
And that's my teachable moment.
(28:08):
That was good. That was very good.
Thank you.
Well, another story in the books.
We would love to receive feedback from our listeners on this storyline or any of our other episodes.
And be sure to DM us on Instagram.
If you have a storyline that you would like to hear,
be sure to click on our Linktree account found in our show notes,
(28:28):
where you can also find our social media, website address, and a little bit more.
Until next time, talk to you soon.
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(28:51):
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(29:12):
With that, be sure to check us out every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.
We will talk to you all next week!
Hi everyone, this is Deb from Dying to be Found.
(00:03):
Before we get started, I just wanted to say that episodes contain disturbing discussions on harmful acts and crimes against animals and or humankind.
Recordings are not intended for young or sensitive audiences due to the content nature of this podcast.
Listener discretion is strongly advised.
(00:34):
Hi everyone, I'm Deb and I'm Shelby.
Welcome back to Dying to be Found where each week I get together with different family members.
Today, my daughter Shelby is here to listen to an unsolved crime that Shelby is going to go all the way back to the 1970s.
I know you had mentioned before we started recording that you had not heard of this.
(00:54):
First of all, I want to wish you a happy new year.
Can you believe it's already 2024?
No.
Oh my gosh.
This year has flown by.
Time flies when you're having fun.
I wouldn't call it fun.
Busy.
It's been busy.
Yeah, but I do want to say it was amazing.
To come up your way this holiday season.
(01:14):
I got to see the town where I began my teaching career.
I got to see your awesome new restaurant.
How's that going?
It's going wonderful.
We have been closed this week just to kind of give everybody a break after the holidays.
So starting Tuesday, we'll be back up and running.
Yep.
Oh, you're a good boss.
That's nice.
(01:35):
And interesting fact, the retail space that you have is where I used to get my hair done.
So I thought that was pretty cool.
Oh my gosh.
Yeah, it was a nightmare cleaning that place to turn it from a hair salon that had been a hair salon for,
I don't know, at least 15 years, I would say, maybe even longer and turning that into a restaurant.
Yeah, but you guys opened pretty quickly.
(01:58):
So good for you.
All right.
Remember how I have always told you that you will learn a lot about your mother on this podcast?
Yes.
Well, I have a little story for you before we get into our case.
Now, you know that I grew up Catholic.
So I still recall quite a bit about Catholicism.
Did you know that I attended Catholic school when I was young?
(02:20):
I did not.
I did.
It was a public Catholic school, but it was a Catholic school just the same.
And I'll tell you, there was one day that we all went on a field trip to the local All Girls Catholic High School.
And Shelby, I actually came home and I begged your grandmother to let me go there.
Oh, wow.
I know.
I love the building. It was so bright and cheery.
(02:42):
It was so clean.
I wanted to wear that uniform.
And having had enough religion classes, I was still interested in going to a Catholic school.
Are you surprised by that?
I am.
I never knew that.
I knew you were Catholic or grew up Catholic because when I was younger, we would go to Catholic Church, St. Oliver's, I think it was.
(03:03):
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Well, today we're going to talk about an unsolved case and this is a story of Sister Kathy Sesnik.
Just to backtrack a little bit, Kathy was born and raised in Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania, just across from Pittsburgh.
And she grew up in a very devout Catholic household.
(03:23):
Kathy attended Catholic school and eventually joined a convent where she would spend the next seven years serving as a postulant
or a candidate to become a nun.
You know, there are certain steps that you have to take to do that.
And I'm sure it hasn't changed much over the years.
But back in the 70s, Shelby, that was a time when nuns still wore their habits, the black and white gown that you see.
(03:50):
Oh, yes.
I love the movie, The Sister Act.
Oh, yes.
All right.
During this time as a postulant, you take classes to learn more about religious life.
You pray and participate in apostolic works.
By July 21st, 1967, Kathy made her vows to begin her life as a nun and she dedicated her life to the convent of the school Sisters of Notre Dame.
(04:16):
Kathy went on to teach at Archbishop Keogh High School, an all-girls school associated with the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
By 1969, Sister Kathy began experiencing fatigue.
There were a lot of changes coming from the Vatican.
Pope Paul VI at the time declared something called the Vatican II.
(04:39):
And I had to go look this up, Shelby, because I was not aware of these changes in the Catholic Church at the time.
But it's basically an awakening into modern times.
There were just a lot of changes going on.
Mass was now read in people's language instead of strictly in Latin.
And I will say when I was growing up in the Catholic Church,
(04:59):
it was in English, the readings increased and nuns were declared to be equal to Catholic parishioners.
So I kind of wanted to go back to when Kathy first began pursuing her life, dedicating her life to becoming a nun.
Nuns at that time, Shelby, were given a higher order, maybe a little bit.
(05:20):
I don't know. They were considered to be a little bit closer to God.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, I can see that.
So with the Vatican II changes that the Pope had declared,
a lot of nuns were feeling set back a little bit because they were no longer at that stature.
So all that work and time and praying and religion classes and everything that they put in,
(05:45):
all that time that they dedicated for the years that it took to become a nun just basically got wiped away.
So this is where it didn't sit very well with the nuns because 90,000 of them left the church
feeling like they've lost that special place in the church.
Now, Kathy was not one of those nuns who left the archdiocese,
but she did start missing a lot of school.
(06:08):
And this was a time too, Shelby, where nuns were no longer required to wear the habits.
And she just wore regular dresses during those times and she could move off the convent property.
So she actually went out and got a small two bedroom apartment that she shared with another nun.
So she's just out in society just like you and me.
(06:28):
Wow.
On Friday, November 7th, 1969, Kathy had left to run errands around 7 p.m.
but never returned back to her apartment.
And by 11 o'clock that night, Kathy's roommate was worried that she had not returned home.
I believe Shelby, she was literally going out to get some dinner rolls and maybe pick a couple things up for dinner.
(06:50):
Her roommate got worried around 11 o'clock and she didn't call the police right away.
She contacted two priests, a Father Kube and Father McKeon, who lived in a nearby community.
So I think that that would be something that I would probably do first before calling the police,
just because, you know, you're going to be checking on people and just saying,
(07:12):
hey, have you seen Kathy or something like that?
I mean, that's a natural reaction to me, don't you think?
Right. Oh, yeah, I agree.
Well, the two priests arrived at Kathy's apartment around 1 a.m.
to speak to Kathy's roommate before calling the police and then set out by foot to begin scouring the neighborhood for her.
They found Kathy's car parked nearby the apartment where she lived,
(07:37):
but not on the premises of the apartment complex because nothing seems suspicious other than Kathy's car being parked at an odd angle.
OK, so the car is off the apartment complex property and it's parked at an odd angle.
So that's not suspicious.
Yeah, I would find that pretty suspicious.
(07:57):
Well, Shelby had just mentioned that I didn't think it was odd that you would start calling around calling friends first before you call the police.
But police found it rather odd that Kathy's roommate would call the priests before them.
Yeah, I would agree.
I mean, I don't know why they would find that odd.
It could have been their behavior.
(08:17):
Who knows? I didn't see anything in the writings, anything in the articles about that.
But you just never know because, you know, police are always on their guard anyway.
Mm hmm. Right.
On January 3rd, 1970, 26 year old Kathy was discovered by two hunters in Lansdowne, Maryland, just outside of Baltimore.
And Shelby, this is about five miles from her home.
(08:40):
Oh, I know.
She was covered with snow and lying on her back.
She was partially nude and on a hillside close to a garbage dump.
The interesting thing that I found here, Shelby, is that Kathy's purse and one shoe were within just feet from her body.
Wow.
Unfortunately, Kathy was too decomposed at this time to determine her exact cause of death because it had appeared that she had suffered from blunt force trauma to the head.
(09:10):
And to make matters worse, wild animals had found her before the hunters had.
So did the insects, so investigators could only discover her identity with the contents inside that purse that was lying nearby.
So interesting that her purse was still there.
Obviously.
Wow.
And it was only two months.
(09:32):
Exactly.
And it was in the colder weather too.
So to me, that's a little odd.
Yeah, same.
I mean, I thought that that would have been able to kind of preserve her at least a little longer.
I mean, animals, I guess.
That's a little more difficult.
Yeah, the animals are one thing, but the insects is what surprises me.
For sure.
Well, after Kathy's discovery, police began focusing on one of those two priests that I had mentioned.
(09:58):
And this was Father Koob, which police had learned that Kathy had written him a letter that was dated November 3rd, 1969.
So I'm going to read the little excerpt from here and you can kind of get a general idea what their relationship was.
Quote, my very dearest Jerry, if ever I should leave you is playing on the radio.
(10:19):
I'm all curled up in bed.
My period has finally started 10 days late.
So you may say I'm moody.
My heart aches for you.
I must wait on you, your time and your need even more than I had before.
I think I can begin to live with that more easily now than I did two months ago.
Just loving you within myself.
(10:40):
Unquote.
So I'm going to stop there.
Kathy went on to tell Father Koob that she wanted to have his children.
Ooh.
Okay.
First off, we're going to say that this was a little scandalous because priests and nuns don't have that kind of relationship in the Catholic Church.
Priests don't even get married, right?
(11:01):
No.
I don't think the other of them.
No, they do not get married.
So interesting that the police are going to show a little bit of interest in Father Koob here because priests at that
time were supposed to be celibate.
I don't think anything has changed over the years with that.
Father Koob did have an alibi on the night that Kathy disappeared.
(11:22):
He claimed that he and Father McKeon had pretty much hung out all night.
They went to dinner.
They caught a movie.
It was called Easy Rider.
And I think that was a pretty popular movie at the time, Shelbs.
This alibi seemed pretty legit.
And I wanted to mention too that the priests took not only one but two lie detector tests just for good measure.
(11:44):
They both passed with flying colors.
So I'm not really surprised because we know that priests are going to be honest.
Although sexual relationships between the priest and a nun is a no-no, they did to me just from what I read seem to be following an honest life.
I mean, they both passed two different lie detector tests, so that should be a pretty good indication that they didn't do anything.
(12:09):
Yes, absolutely.
Police went on to take an active role in the investigation and did come up with some pretty good leads all the way through 1977.
So they were on the case for a good seven years since Kathy's death.
But unfortunately, the evidence did seem to run out and Kathy's case went cold for another 15 years.
(12:33):
Did it say when she, oh, she left to run errands and they probably wouldn't have had video surveillance.
I was just wondering like maybe could they figure out kind of her track and where she was going and what she was doing before she went missing?
Yes, I think that she distinctly said she was headed for a specific store to pick up dinner rolls.
(12:54):
That's right. Okay.
So kind of like I'm going to run out to the grocery store.
I'll be right back sort of thing.
Okay.
So, Shelley, what do we know about crime and deceit?
They don't stay buried forever.
Do they know, you know, somebody's got to talk somebody might become suspicious by 1992.
Two women came forward and filed a lawsuit against the Baltimore Archdiocese claiming that they had been sexually abused by Father Anthony Joseph
(13:22):
Maskell when they attended Archbishop Keogh High School at the same time that Kathy Sesnick taught English there.
Now, here's the clincher.
One of the women testified in court that in November 1969, Father Maskell took her to the garbage dump near Lansdowne, Maryland and showed her Kathy's body.
(13:43):
Ooh, I know.
Father Maskell told her that she would be next if she did not keep her mouth shut.
So here we go with the scandal.
These two women also went on to testify in court that they knew of several other students at their high school that were also being sexually abused by Father Maskell.
And they went to Sister Kathy for help.
(14:05):
Oh, wow.
I know.
Okay.
So this woman, this woman of God is just given this information and ethically, morally, I'm pretty sure if I were in that situation.
I mean, I'm an educator and I am mandated to report things like that.
I don't know how the laws were back then, but besides being a mandated reporter, she's also a woman of God.
(14:29):
So she is definitely facing some moral issues.
Right.
Absolutely.
I wonder if she went to Father Maskell and said something and that's possibly why he did away with her.
You know what?
I kind of wonder the same thing.
None of the articles that I read said, of course, you know, he's going to deny, deny, deny.
(14:50):
So we will never know that answer.
But I have to in my mind think that she probably had a conversation with him or at least to say,
hey, there's a couple of students who came to me to tell me something that I just wanted to ask you about.
But ultimately, the courts ruled in Father Maskell's favor because the judge ruled that repressed memories don't count in extending the statute of limitations.
(15:17):
So too much time had gone on to prosecute Father Maskell.
This was 1992.
So this was 22 years after Kathy's body was found.
I wonder why it took them so long to come forward.
Did he pass away?
Does it? Did it say he had passed away?
I don't think so.
No, no, because this was taken to the prosecutors and the judge ruled in his favor.
(15:44):
I don't know.
We'll get back to that.
It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote this script.
So I don't believe that he had passed away at this time.
Shelbs.
All right.
To make a long story short here, there was never enough evidence to prosecute Father Maskell and Kathy's murder.
But there's a lot more to this story, which I will mention in just a little bit because Shelby,
(16:04):
I came across a Netflix documentary out there.
It was made in 2017 and it's called The Keepers.
Now, Kathy's case was mentioned in this docuseries.
I did not watch it simply because I think there is a ton more information that would take me down these rabbit holes.
And I really wanted to concentrate on Kathy's case here as opposed to looking at the docuseries that had all this scandal going on with the church.
(16:33):
So I wanted to stay away from that.
According to WMAR Channel 2 News out of Baltimore,
filmmakers were not trying to solve Kathy Sesnick's case in The Keepers,
although there was another case involved that they had mentioned and this would be Joyce Maleky.
She also was a murder victim, which The Keepers kind of mentioned in there along with Kathy.
(16:57):
Filmmakers of The Keepers were attempting to link Kathy's case to the bigger case of sexual abuse at the Archbishop Keogh's school,
where Kathy worked as an English teacher.
So let's talk about what Kathy probably knew a little bit too much of.
According to eyewitness accounts, girls would be pulled out of class at the high school to be sexually assaulted.
(17:22):
They were threatened never to speak of these ordeals or something bad might happen to them similar to what happened to Kathy Sesnick.
Now remember, one victim had come forward years later to say that she had seen Kathy's body.
Why wouldn't they tell their parents?
Well, let me put it to you this way, Shelbs.
(17:42):
This is the 1970s.
That era, you're taught to respect your elders.
And I think, Shelby, if I were in that situation and I were going to that school and I was threatened, I would take it seriously.
I mean, I would keep my mouth shut too, because if you're kind of threatened that you're next, wouldn't you keep your mouth shut?
(18:04):
Yeah, maybe.
But I mean, if it just kept happening to a bunch of different girls, I would think that there would have at least been one.
True.
I don't know. It's very odd.
It is odd, but remember, though, some girls did come to Kathy Sesnick and they told her because she was a trusted adult.
Yeah.
They probably trusted that she would go and look into it, which she probably did.
(18:29):
And this is why she disappeared, unfortunately.
It's just, you know, there's too much speculation.
I don't want to speculate here.
I'm not even an expert, but I'm thinking that had to have been the direction that Kathy was going was trying to get to the bottom of it.
Yeah.
Now, according to the Baltimore Banner, the Maryland's Office of the Attorney General released a massive report on sexual abuse in Baltimore's Catholic archdiocese.
(18:56):
More than 150 clergy and personnel were reportedly involved in covering up the abuse of nearly 40 children and teenagers, Shelby.
Sixteen of these victims attended the high school where Kathy Sesnick taught.
Wow.
So what do you think?
Do you think Kathy knew too much?
(19:17):
She planned to go to the police.
She went to the priest first to see if it was true.
I think it's fair to say that she was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time.
And when she left for errands, yeah, she was probably just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
I don't know if somebody was following her.
Did she plan to meet somebody?
(19:37):
I have no idea.
So many questions.
So many questions.
Well, I will say this one of the priests recently accused of taking part in the sexual abuse cases in the 1970s was Father Kube.
Remember that was the priest that Kathy had written that letter to.
Right.
So he had always maintained his innocence.
(19:59):
But my recommendation here is just go watch The Keepers.
I personally did not watch it.
I mean, I'll probably be interested.
I actually wanted to record this first before I go and watch that and make my own decisions because it's again, it's a completely different circumstance.
Yeah, I might have to watch that today.
Mm-hmm.
Now, I've also put the 2023 Baltimore Banner article in our show notes that has a very different account on Kube's personality and whereabouts of when Kathy went missing.
(20:30):
I didn't want to get too much into that as well.
But don't forget he did pass two lie detector tests.
So again, I'm going to let you I'm going to let our listeners kind of make your own decisions on the direction this is going to take.
But I did want to kind of jump forward a little bit because with the advancements of DNA profiling,
(20:51):
the FBI and local detectives began pursuing DNA analysis pretty heavily only back in 2017,
Shelby.
And this is the same year that The Keepers came out on Netflix.
So as we would have it back in the 1970s where crime scene investigators collected evidence,
they actually stored quite a bit of evidence from the location where Kathy was discovered.
(21:15):
They had her purse.
They had her shoes and then of course, whatever they may have found around her when they discovered her.
But on February 28th, 2017, the FBI obtained an order from the Baltimore County State Attorney,
allowing them to have Kathy Cisnik's body exhumed for DNA testing.
Good for them.
Oh, wow.
(21:35):
Her DNA samples were compared with Father Maskell.
But unfortunately, there was no match to the crime scene.
An additional half dozen other DNA samples were compared in this case.
Some that investigators believed were related to another crime activity.
That would be Joyce Maleky.
Now, I didn't really want to look her up either because I'm concentrating on Kathy's case here.
(21:59):
But that would be also quite interesting to take a look at.
I will say this just briefly.
Joyce Helen Maleky was a 20 year old girl that disappeared from the same district just four days after Kathy Cisnik.
She was on her way to a mall to do some Christmas shopping.
There was another girl who had disappeared and this was 16 year old Grace Elizabeth Montane.
(22:23):
She disappeared from another shopping center close by and her body was discovered September 29th, 1971.
All of these murders shall be occurred within a 30 minute distance of the Herondale Mall.
So if you're thinking about somebody out there doing this,
they're all in a crowded shopping area and they're all within 30 minutes of each other.
(22:49):
I can easily say that whoever the perpetrator is, that would definitely be their MO.
Yeah, so obviously we have a creeper who scouts crowded places and preys on young women.
Kathy was just 26 when she disappeared.
So she was a little bit older than the other victims.
But regardless, Shelby, you've got a creeper who is watching women out shopping alone
(23:14):
and is basically either following them or watching their movements and they could be showing up where they live.
Yeah, I think I've said it before on our podcast,
but I try to be very aware of my surroundings, especially in parking lots because that honestly tends to be,
I mean, when you hear somebody going missing, a lot of the time it is in a parking lot.
(23:37):
Yes, it is. And I've had some people just kind of come up on me as I'm either putting stuff in the car
or I'm just getting out of the car.
I literally have had people just coming straight up to where I just parked my vehicle and that's startling.
It is.
Well, ultimately DNA from Kathy and these other victims were entered into CODIS.
(23:58):
But even today, all cases have come to another screeching halt
because I told you Kathy's case went cold after about seven years,
but things kind of picked up when DNA samples were on the scene.
But no leads stemming from those DNA samples could be referenced in the CODIS system.
Baltimore police theorized that it was likely that Kathy was a victim of abduction.
(24:23):
Like you said, you know, when people just pop up on you,
when she was walking to her car to run errands in November 1969.
Now, I had mentioned that 2017 was a big year in Kathy's case.
There's a lot of publicity going on.
Kathy's sister was interviewed by People Magazine and believes that Kathy was indeed planning to go to the police to report Father Maskell,
(24:47):
but she just never made it.
And I'll put these articles in our show notes because Kathy's sister provides some very fond memories between the two of them growing up.
So I thought that was refreshing and nice to hear.
So I wanted to add that to our show notes today.
So that Shelby is the unsolved case of Kathy Sesnick.
(25:07):
And I do feel like authorities are close, yet they're still so far because there simply has got to be more to her murderer than what we see on the surface here.
Unfortunately, Shelby, this case is over 50 years old.
So the possibilities are pretty slim that it will ever be solved unless, of course, we have somebody who makes a deathbed confession.
(25:30):
I hope they figure it out.
I'm going to have to go watch the docu-series.
I'll have to see if I can start that today.
Yeah, let me know because I don't have Netflix right now.
So is it worth getting a subscription for that?
There you go.
All right. To our listeners, if you have any information on Kathy Sesnick's case,
please contact the Baltimore City Homicide Unit through Metro Crime Stoppers at 866-7-LOCKUP.
(25:57):
That's 866-756-2587.
There is a $2,000 reward for information leading to an arrest, which is still active in this case.
Kathy was last seen on November 7, 1969, at the Carriage House Apartments in Baltimore City.
Zip code, postal code is 21229.
(26:20):
She was on her way to the Edmondson Village Shopping Center,
and her body, unfortunately, was discovered at the Monumental Avenue in Halethorpe, postal code 21227.
So there you have it.
That's the case of Sister Kathy Sesnick.
Wow.
And I hope that we do get some answers for her.
(26:40):
I hate to have a cold case not get solved.
I do too.
Do you have a teachable moment for us today?
I do have a teachable moment, and this is a tough one, Shelbs,
because I think my teachable moment is to do your own research before raising judgments on people that you don't know.
I touched on a couple of accounts here that go all the way back to the late 1960s and early 70s,
(27:04):
which would still be considered scandalous today.
Again, Shelby, there's a handful of people being accused,
but until they reach a jury of their peers, they should be considered innocent, at least in this country.
But we've heard a lot of stories of abuse in the Catholic Church.
So when I began researching Kathy's case,
(27:26):
I was very surprised that her murder could somehow be related to that.
Even though I report from reputable sources,
there's still a lot of questions about Kathy's case that go unanswered.
And I've provided a documentary for you, some articles.
Any of our listeners can just tap into Beyond a 30-minute podcast here.
(27:48):
So my teachable moment is don't be quick to judge.
Sometimes innocent people get accused.
Sometimes guilty people don't.
It's not our place to say either way.
But we're human.
We all have an opinion.
Just be sure that your opinion is accurate and let authorities handle the rest.
And that's my teachable moment.
(28:08):
That was good. That was very good.
Thank you.
Well, another story in the books.
We would love to receive feedback from our listeners on this storyline or any of our other episodes.
And be sure to DM us on Instagram.
If you have a storyline that you would like to hear,
be sure to click on our Linktree account found in our show notes,
(28:28):
where you can also find our social media, website address, and a little bit more.
Until next time, talk to you soon.
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year!
Thanks for listening to Dying to be Found.
Before we go, we would love for you to leave a review on your favorite podcast platform.
Be sure to follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest at Dying to be Found.
(28:51):
You can access our website, email, social media, and storyline request form
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(29:12):
With that, be sure to check us out every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.
We will talk to you all next week!
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