Sarah Kashka: The Dallas/Fort Worth ‘80s Murders Part 1

In December of 1984, fifteen-year-old Sarah Kashka travelled to Fort Worth from Denton to visit her best friend and hit a party. The party didn’t happen, and Sarah and her friend parted ways, each with their boyfriends. When Sarah’s boyfriend decided he needed to go home early, he says, he left her outside of an apartment complex where friends lived. Those friends turned out not to be home, and Sarah Kashka was never seen alive again.

If you have any information about the murder of Sarah Anne Elizabeth Kashka, please call the Dallas Police Cold Case Squad at [phone] or the Fort Worth Police Cold Case Unit at [phone].

You can support Gone Cold – Texas True Crime and listen to the show ad-free at patreon.com/gonecoldpodcast

Find us at https://www.gonecold.com

Follow gone cold on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, TikTok, YouTube, and X. Search @gonecoldpodcast at all or just click linknbio.com/gonecoldpodcast

Sources: The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, The Dallas Morning News, The Austin American Statesman, digital.library.unt.edu, and texashistory.unt.edu 

#JusticeForSarahKashka #FortWorth #FWT #Texas #TX #TrueCrime #TexasTrueCrime #TrueCrimePodcast #Podcast #Unsolved #GoneCold #GoneColdPodcast #UnsolvedMysteries #TrueCrime #Homicide #UnsolvedMurder #ColdCase #CrimeStories #PodcastRecommendations #SerialKiller #TrueCrimeCommunity #CrimeJunkie #MysteryPodcast #TrueCrimeObsessed #CrimeDocs #InvestigationDiscovery #PodcastAddict #TrueCrimeFan #CriminalJustice #ForensicFiles #TrueCrimeAddict #TrueCrimeLovers #CrimeScene #PodcastLife


Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/gone-cold-texas-true-crime--3203003/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
If you haven't already, please listen and subscribe to our
other project, Silkwood wherever you're listening now. Silkwood is the
story of twenty eight year old whistleblower Karen Silkwood, her
relentless fight for the truth, and the chilling events that
followed her attempt to blow the whistle on the billion
dollar nuclear corporation she worked for. Instead, she died in

(00:24):
a concrete colvert on a dark, desolate stretch of highway
just outside of Crescent, Oklahoma. Was it an accident or
something far more sinister? Episode one is out now and
two will be released later this week. Erica has worked
as hard on this project as I've ever seen anyone work.

(00:45):
I'm proud of how the limited series is shaping up again.
Please listen and subscribe to our other project, Silkwood wherever
you're listening now. Thanks y'all. The Gone Cold podcast may
contain violent or graphics subject matter. Listener discretion is advised.

(01:06):
As the year nineteen eighty four reached its end, the
Fort Worth Police had four relatively high profile missing persons
cases on their hands, and none of the investigations were
going anywhere. In the early morning hours of Sunday, September thirtieth,
twenty three year old Catherine Davis was last seen leaving

(01:26):
her above garage apartment at thirty four oh four Park
Ridge Boulevard, near the campus of Texas Christian University. Katherine
and her car subsequently disappeared without so much as a
trace left behind. A week later, the vehicle was found
about a mile west of her apartment outside the Westcliff

(01:48):
Manor apartments, but there was still no sign of Catherine.
Less than a month later, late on the night of Monday,
October twenty second, nineteen eighty four, Cindy Heller, also twenty
three years old, vanished after attempting to help a stranded
motorist on Fort Worth's southwest side. The following day, her

(02:11):
vehicle was discovered at the Hunter's Ridge apartment complex, though
like the case of Catherine Davis, there were no clues
that pointed to her whereabouts. About a month and a
half later, on Tuesday, December eleventh, twenty one year old
Angela Ewart's father reported her missing. She was last seen

(02:32):
the night before at the home of her fiance on
the sixty two hundred block of Whitman Avenue in the
Wedgewood neighborhood of Fort Worth. Later on the morning she
was reported missing, Angela's car was found abandoned on southeast
Interstate Loop eight twenty, about seven and a half miles
from her fiance's house. While police and Fort Worth struggled

(02:55):
to make sense of these three women's disappearances, law enforcement
and other jarjurisdictions were taking note. The cases were highly publicised,
and with that came dire warnings from police all over
Terrant County. Being twenty something female and a good samaritan
for starters became something the cops adamantly opposed, and fort

(03:19):
Worth and the surrounding cities began ordering their patrol officers
stop at the scenes of stranded motorists. They weren't triple
a Arlington spokesperson Jim Willett suggested, but they could stick
around while help arrived. As the continued lack of progress
and the disappearances compounded the fear Fort Worth residents felt,

(03:42):
especially the city's young women, It also brought forth intense criticism.
The public wanted these young ladies found, and they wanted
it now. But before the Fort Worth police could, a
fourth missing person was added to their list. Fifteen year
old Sarah Koshka. Sarah Ann Elizabeth Koshka was born on

(04:29):
November seventh, nineteen sixty nine, in Kansas City, Kansas, to
parents Mazie and Leroy Koshka. In June of nineteen eighty three,
Sarah and her mother moved to Texas from Prairie Village, Kansas,
first to a duplex in the Wedgwood neighborhood of Fort Worth,
and then to Denton. Mazie picked up a job at

(04:53):
Texas Women's University while she worked toward her doctorate in nursing. There.
As she had in Sarah made friends quickly and easily
at Strickland Junior High School in Denton, and in fact
gained almost instant popularity among the students. The teenager has
been described by friends as intelligent, friendly, outgoing, and mature

(05:18):
beyond her years. It didn't hurt that Sarah lived on
Bell Avenue, about a block away from Strickland Junior High,
making her house a popular after school hangout for her friends.
On Saturday, December twenty ninth, nineteen eighty four, Sarah traveled
from Denton to Fort Worth to spend the weekend at

(05:40):
her best friend's house. The evening of the following day, Sunday,
December thirtieth, the two made plans to hit a party
with a couple boys they were into. For some reason,
plans to go to the party were nixed. It's been
reported both that they went to the address it was
to take place, but it was no longer happening, and

(06:03):
that the four teenagers simply decided not to go. Whatever
the case, Sarah and her best friend parted ways, each
going with their respective dates, but made plans to meet
up again later on. At around eleven that night, according
to her date, he decided he needed to go home.

(06:24):
Because she knew her friend wouldn't be back for several
more hours, Sarah decided she'd visit some friends who live
in an apartment complex not far away. Her date dropped
her off at Wedgewood Terrace apartments and drove off before
she reached the door. This put Sarah in a bind
when it turned out her friends were not home. Still,

(06:47):
as far as she was concerned, likely it wasn't that
big of a deal. When they'd first moved to Texas,
Sarah and her mom had lived just a few blocks
down the road, and she knew the area. The familiarity
probably held back the panic she might have felt if
she were somewhere foreign to her. She just had to

(07:08):
kill some time, Sarah likely thought. Later witnesses would report
that Sarah headed in the direction of a dairy Queen,
which could be seen from the apartment complex beside Mamma's
Pizza and across the street from the Wedgewood Bowling Alley.
Those witnesses were the last people to see fifteen year

(07:28):
old Sarah Kashka alive. When Sarah didn't return to the
house by the following day, Monday, December thirty first, nineteen
eighty four, Sarah's friend called her mother, Maisie Kashka and Denton,
who called the Fort Worth Police Department. Likely because they
already had three women missing from the area, law enforcement

(07:52):
began speaking with Sarah's friends right away. Lieutenant Vernon Ferris
told a reporter for the Fort Worth Star Telegram that
they were treating the case as a legitimate disappearance, but
offered that it was too early to theorize whether foul
play was involved. They knew Sarah had no history of
running away from home, and what the cops weren't letting

(08:15):
anyone onto was that they feared. The four disappearances were connected,
at least in the beginning. Like missing twenty three year
old Cindy Heller, Sarah was small, at five feet four
inches tall and barely one hundred pounds. Cindy had brown hair,
as did Catherine Davis, another missing twenty three year old,

(08:38):
though Catherine stood tall and thin at five feet ten
inches and weighed about one hundred and thirty pounds. Missing
twenty one year old Angela Ewart was also tall at
five feet nine inches. Her hair, like Sarah Kashka's, was
blonde and wavy. The similarities between the women and teenage

(09:00):
were mixed and not necessarily striking. Their last known sightings,
three of which involved their vehicles, didn't seem to provide
any evidence of a connection other than the fact the
cars were all found abandoned later, but one particular detail
seemed potentially relevant. Just before Angela Ewert vanished three weeks before,

(09:25):
she bought gas at a seven to eleven convenience store
just a block away from where Sarah Kashka was last seen.
As was the case with other disappearances, the Fort Worth
Police neglected to utilize the media immediately. Sarah's description wasn't
released in the newspapers and on television until more than

(09:46):
forty eight hours had passed before it even ran. A
shocking discovery was made twenty four miles east of where
Sarah Kashka was last seen. As I'm sure you've noticed,

(10:07):
the holiday season is here. Just some unsolicited advice. It's
probably a good idea to hit the festive gatherings while
not looking like a caveman. Manscaped's latest masterpiece. The Chairman
Pro package can have you looking extra sharp while minimizing
the razorburn and irritation. The Chairman Pro has flex adjust

(10:29):
technology fancy talk for the pivoting head, adjusting to every
curve of your face. The skin Safe four blade foil
will give you that old school clean close shave smooth,
while the skin Safe Stuble trimmer lets you clean up
while keeping that mysterious five o'clock shadow. I've been using
the Chairman Pro on my neck daily, but this thing

(10:52):
is powerful enough to take on a five day growth
all over your whole face. It lasts up to seventy
five minutes too, so you've got plenty of shaves before
it's time to charge. Oh and the LED spotlight helps
you see every detail as you go. The Chairman Propackage
also includes power shave jail for that wet shave experience,

(11:13):
and face shaved soother to finish you off. Get the
Chairman Propackage today and experience a shave that is as
smooth as you deserve. Get twenty percent off plus free
shipping with the code gone Cold at manscaped dot com.
That's twenty percent off plus free shipping with the code
gone Cold at manscaped dot com. On the afternoon of Tuesday,

(11:40):
January first, nineteen eighty four, children shooting targets with appellet
gun and far southwest Dallas discovered a body floating face
down in the water in a small stream that feeds
into Mountain Creek, which itself feeds into Mountain Creek Lake.
The body, a female, as nimated by officers at the

(12:01):
scene to be in her late twenties, was fully clothed.
The area near the small stream, just off FM thirteen
eighty two and East Camp Wisdom Road, was marshy fields
of high brush that was sporadically wooded in between, especially
near the water, and sparsely populated. Whoever dumped the body there,

(12:25):
it seemed must have been familiar with the area. The
Dallas Police tried matching up one of their missing persons
to the body, but couldn't. When detectives in Fort Worth
got word, they quickly sent over their missing person's dental
records to Dallas County medical investigator Richard George. One was

(12:46):
a match Sarah Kashka. The fifteen year old had been
stabbed repeatedly in her chest and neck. For detectives further
along in their careers, the discovery of Sarah's body brought
back memories they'd just as well assumed keep buried in
the far recesses of their minds seven and a half

(13:10):
years before. On June eleventh, nineteen seventy seven, and just
a couple miles north, two fishermen discovered the skeletonized remains
of seven year old Ladina and McCoy in the bed
of a dry runoff creek. The girl had been missing
since February eleventh, four months to the day before her

(13:30):
body's discovery. She was abducted while walking to school, excited
to hand out Valentine's Day cards to all her classmates.
Ladina had been dumped in water, either after death or before.
Investigators couldn't be certain, but first she'd been shot in
the chest. Eight days after Ladina's remains were discovered, on

(13:55):
June nineteenth, nineteen seventy seven, a man walked into the
Dallas Policeolice Department with a rusted up pistol he'd found
a short distance north of where the body of Ladina
McCoy was discovered. The firearm was in a markedly unique holster.
The leather holster was stamped OH Ball, the signature that

(14:16):
Fort Worth homicide detective Oliver Ball stamped on all the
hundreds of holsters he hand crafted, usually to give police
academy graduates, but he also sometimes sold them to officers
and detectives who didn't graduate at Fort Worth and came
on to the department later. Ladina's body could have washed

(14:37):
down from where the pistol was found. Ball was retired
at the time of the discovery, but worked with police
to try to identify who the holster was made for,
but the ex homicide detective had made so many at
that point he told the Fort Worth Star Telegram he'd
be able to Whether he ever did or not was

(14:58):
never reported on, and it's unknown if any then, current
or former Fort Worth police officer ever came forward to
claim it. If the one of a kind Holster is
in any way connected to Ladina McCoy's slang, it's still unknown,
as the case remains unsolved to this day. Presumably the

(15:20):
Dallas police detectives who remembered working Ladina's murder couldn't help
but wonder if there was a connection between her and
Sara Kashka's cases. Detectives in fort Worth, however, were busy
trying to prove or eliminate a connection between the teenager's
case and the three still missing women in their city.

(15:43):
It was vital, of course, for authorities to comb the
proximity around where a body is found to find evidence.
Because the fort Worth police had no solid leads in
the cases of Angela Ewart, Cindy Heller, and Catherine Davis,
they also believed searching the area might turn up more bodies.

(16:04):
Police weren't convinced the cases were related. They had no
evidence of a connection, but they also had nothing to
lose and were desperate for leads. Both Dallas and fort
Worth police helicopters could be seen hovering around the scene
while officers from both departments performed ground searches. Technically, since

(16:26):
Sarah was found in their jurisdiction, the case now belonged
to Dallas. It was theorized the victim was taken across
county lines to purposefully confuse the investigation by pitting two
rival police agencies against one another. Even if that wasn't
the case, the split jurisdiction certainly threw in a wrench. Still,

(16:49):
the departments vowed to work together for whatever reason. The
press continually spoke of Catherine Davis, Cindy Heller, and Angela
Ewerts cars being found within two miles of one another,
but that simply was not true. While two of the
women's cars being found outside apartment complexes was an interesting

(17:11):
clue worth keeping in mind. Those two vehicles, Catherine and
Cindy's were found four miles apart, while Angela's was found
more than seven miles from both. And now their missing
teenager was found dead twenty four miles from where she
was last seen. Fort Worth Police Lieutenant Tommy Swan tried

(17:34):
to play down the connection angle, but the media had
already made up their mind after their searches of the brushy,
swampy fields and thick woods surrounding where the body of
Sara Kashka was found fort Worth Police Captain of Detectives
Ben Dumas announced they'd found evidence that she was killed

(17:55):
at that spot near the creek in which she was
found floating. Searches had located Sarah's black spike heeled boots,
apparently the only thing missing from her body, as she
was described as fully clothed. Other evidence, police said suggested
Sarah and whoever killed her were at the spot for

(18:16):
a significant amount of time. A small pullover on the
shoulder near the intersection of FM thirteen eighty two and
Camp Wisdom Road was likely where the killer parked their vehicle.
Both roads were well traveled, and Captain Dumas said he
hoped to find someone who saw one there that night,

(18:37):
Although he declined to elaborate further as to not hinder
the investigation. The Luman called the evidence gathered at the
scene substantial. There was a considerable difference in the murder
of fifteen year old Sarah when compared to the three
missing women, he added, but it was one they weren't
ready to talk about publicly. This one, Dumas said, was Separate.

(19:03):
Funeral services for Sarah and Elizabeth Koshka were held both
in Denton on January fourth, nineteen eighty five, and where
she'd grown up Prairie Village, Kansas. The following day, she
was buried at Pilgrim Home Cemetery in Hope, Kansas. On
that same day, January fifth, two other major events unfolded. First,

(19:28):
the Fort Worth Police established a task force to investigate
Sarah's brutal murder, the disappearances of the three missing young women,
and the murders of several other women that were also
unsolved at the time. More than twenty detectives from various
police agencies in the region were expected to join, with

(19:49):
Fort Worth Police Captain C. E. Hoague heading it up.
The second event lessened the number of missing women. The
body of missing twenty five three year old Cindy Heller
was found in a creek on the campus of Texas
Christian University. The remains were badly decomposed, though the cold

(20:10):
weather and water had slowed the process considerably. The discovery,
though expected at some point, was a shock. News about
the Sara Kashka case continued to run in the local, state,
and even national newspapers, though there was nothing new to report,
nothing more than a repeated brief synopsis, that is, until

(20:35):
the arrest of a local man for the rapes of
several area women. Several investigative avenues police pursued in Sara

(20:55):
Kashka's murder apparently went nowhere. A car was reported stolen
about a block from where she was last seen, and
it would have been stolen around that same time. It
was a long shot, but detectives checked it out, presumably
with no luck tying it to the slang. When interviewed

(21:16):
by a local reporter, a Wedgewood neighborhood liquor store owner
shared his doubts that four different perpetrators were responsible for
Sarah and Cindy Heller's deaths and the disappearances of Catherine
Davis and Angela Ewart. More than one madman on the
loose was, perhaps to frightening a concept to grasp. On Wednesday,

(21:40):
January tenth, nineteen eighty five, another heinous crime was added
to the task force's list when the body of twenty
year old Lisa Griffin was found near railroad tracks that
ran alongside Alito Road in far southwest Fort Worth. Lisa
was shot once in the head with the In a

(22:00):
couple days, police charged a twenty five year old man
named Timothy Paul Volkmar for the crime. Volkmar, who was
diagnosed with schizophrenia and had a nineteen eighty aggravated assault
with a deadly weapon conviction, was arrested when police heard
he was dating a woman named Lisa. The conviction he

(22:22):
had was for an assault against his father. Coworkers and
acquaintances had also vouched for his whereabouts the entire day
Lisa Griffin was killed, and the young woman's mother said
she was certain her daughter didn't know Volkmar. Still, an
officer with the Arrant County Sheriff's Office told the press

(22:43):
that a fingerprint found on the trunk of Lisa's car
matched his, but they didn't suspect he was responsible for
any of their other victims and missing persons. Fingerprint experts
exonerated Timothy Paul Volkmar within days, anyway, and the whole
debacle eventually led to a lawsuit against the department, though

(23:06):
the cases would ultimately prove not to be linked with certainty.
It turned out Lisa Griffin worked with missing twenty three
year old Catherine Davis at Mama's Pizza during the summer
of nineteen eighty three. It was hardly where the connections ended.
On Wednesday, January twenty third, nineteen eighty five, Catherine's skeletal

(23:29):
remains were found in thick brush and far south Fort
Worth by land surveyors. The next day, Thursday the twenty fourth,
the Fort Worth Police discovered a unit at the Wedgewood
Terrace apartments in which the walls had been vandalized using
spray paint. Some of the graffiti was described as cryptic

(23:50):
drawings and rhymes, but two things were of interest, if
only passing interest. One was that the apartment complex was
the last place Sarah Kashka was seen alive, and the
other was the fact that Sarah's name was among three
others painted on the wall. Lieutenant Tommy Swan brushed off

(24:11):
the discovery's significance, calling it just a bunch of graffiti
and that investigators truthfully did not see any connection with
her murder. That same day, the Fort Worth Police took
forty four year old freelance photographer Remsen Newbold Wolf into
custody in an out of the ordinary circumstance. Judge Dan

(24:34):
Hollifield arraigned Wolf at his apartment as police executed a
search warrant and interviewed the man. The Village Apartments in
southwest fort Worth where Wolf lived was the same complex
where eighteen year old Ginger Hayden was found slain stabbed
more than fifty times in her apartment on September fifth,

(24:56):
nineteen eighty four. Though police would go on to label
Ginger's murder as the first in this series of crimes,
the truth was the horror had started long before. Wolf
was already under investigation for indecency with a child, so
when a rape survivor picked him out of a photo lineup,

(25:17):
the cops pounced. He was also suspected of raping six
other women, all of whom were photographed by their attacker,
and of the murder of Ginger Hayden, who lived just
several apartment units away from his. Ginger's case was solved
decades later, and it wasn't Wolf who killed her, but

(25:39):
her slang remained on the list that would become known
as the eighties murders colloquially in fort Worth in the duration.
But that's certainly not where it ends, as police had
other reasons to suspect the man, and at least a
couple of the other cases, including Sarah Kashka's Remsen Newbold

(26:01):
Wolf owned a blue pickup truck. A witness came forward
saying they saw a blue truck near the abandoned car
of missing twenty year old Angela Ewart, and at least
one witness in Sarah's case came forward saying they saw
a blue truck near the creek in southwest Dallas where
her body was found. According to KDFW television reporter Ed Dalheim,

(26:27):
a source told him that Remsen admitted to the murder
of a teenager named Tara. Tara was believed to be
Sarah Kashka based on Dalheim's conversation with the source, who
he described as someone who holds a responsible social and
professional standing in the community. However, the case against Wolf

(26:49):
fell apart in no time. Police found no photos of
any of the murder and rape victims among the freelance
photographer's large collection. Wolfe's blood type differed from the rapist.
A few days after he was arrested, all charges against
Remsen Newbold Wolf were dropped. The chief of police told

(27:12):
reporters he was no longer a suspect in any of
the crimes. Mid month January stumped and desperate for fresh eyes,
the fort Worth Police brought in both FBI agents and
Texas rangers to work alongside the task force they'd already established,
manpower now numbered in the forties. New leads were being

(27:36):
created daily, not because of new evidence they'd uncovered, but
instead because of the seemingly unstoppable flow of violent crime
that was occurring in the city and other cities nearby.
On Saturday, July twentieth, nineteen eighty five, at about eleven
fifteen pm, twenty eight year old Rebecca K. Smidty left

(28:00):
home in Pleasant Grove, a neighborhood in East Dallas. Rebecca
should have only been gone a few minutes. She was
only heading down to a nearby convenience store for cigarettes,
a coke, and to get the car washed. But she
never made it home, and although her vehicle was found
at the car wash, subsequent searches failed to locate her.

(28:23):
Almost four days later, at eleven am on Wednesday the
twenty fourth, a fisherman discovered Rebecca Smitty hidden in the
tall grass in a swamp at the southeastern edge of
Mountain Creek Lake in far southwest Dallas. It was just
a couple miles up the road from where the body
of teenager Sarah Kashka was found. Like Sarah, Rebecca was

(28:48):
found around twenty five miles from where she was last seen,
only to the west instead of east. Rebecca had been
shot in her head. In January of nineteen eighty six,
thirty three year old Ronald Glenn Corley was arrested after
stalking a woman from a fort Worth nightclub, accosting her

(29:11):
and beating her. The attack, which was no doubt an
attempted rape, was thwarted when the brave twenty six year
old woman kicked Corley in the groin and fled. Later,
it was discovered that the woman had been friends with
murder victim Ginger Hayden. Because the attack occurred in the
parking lot of an apartment complex that was less than

(29:34):
a half a mile from the apartment complex Sarah Kashka
was last seen, detectives grilled the man about her and
other victims' cases. Turns out, however, Corley was just released
from prison in May of nineteen eighty five, making it
impossible for him to have committed the crimes for which

(29:54):
they suspected him. Throughout the initial coverage of Sarahra's case,
it was repeatedly reported that police were awaiting test results
to determine if she'd been sexually assaulted. In two thousand
and five, the fort Worth Star Telegram reported she had
been raped. Several known serial killers have been looked at

(30:18):
for the murder of fifteen year old Sarah Kashka, including
Ricky Lee Greene, Curtis Don Brown, and Ferrian Edward Wardrobe,
all of whom will be discussed in the next few
episodes of Gone Cold, Texas true crime, as will several
victims the press and the police seemingly left behind. If

(30:42):
you have any information about the murder of Sarah Ann
Elizabeth Koshka, please contact the Dallas Police Cold Case Squad
at two one four six seven one three six six
' one or the fort Worth Police Cold Case Unit
at eight one seven three nine two four three zero seven.

(31:04):
If you'd like to join Gone Cold's mission to renew
the public's interest in unsolved homicides, missing persons cases, and
other perplexing mysteries, you can support the show and listen
at free at patreon dot com forward Slash Gone Cold Podcast.
You'll also find episodes exclusive to Patreon there with more

(31:25):
to come in the near future. Words cannot express how
much we appreciate our patrons. Thank you so much for
your support. You can also support Gone Cold by leaving
a five star rating and written review on iTunes and
Apple podcasts, which will help the show reach more ears,
bettering the chance someone with information about a case will

(31:48):
hear it and come forward. A rating and written review
wherever you listen is much appreciated. Thanks for listening, y'all.