AI Summary
5 min readA Promise to Helene
In January 1980, Helene Przezinski, a 21-year-old journalism intern from Massachusetts, stepped off a bus near her aunt and uncle's home in Douglas County, Colorado, after her shift at a radio station. She never made it inside. Her body was found the next day in a snowy field nine miles away. She had been stabbed nine times and raped. For 40 years, her murder went unsolved—but two women, one a high school friend and the other a detective who never met her, refused to let the case die.
The Friend Who Wouldn't Quit
Kimberly LaTourette met Helene in high school when they both sang in a group called Harmony. After Helene's murder, Kimberly made a promise to Helene's parents: "I would not stop for as long as I was living and doing everything in my power to find Helene's killer." She was 26 years old at the time and had no idea she was signing up for four decades of work.
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What you'll learn
- 1 (01:00) **The Cold Case and a 40-Year Promise** - Lester Holt introduces the mystery of Helene Pruszinski’s murder and the two women who dedicated decades to solving it: her friend Kimberly and cold-case detective Shannon.
- 2 (03:34) **Who Was Helene?** - A portrait of the victim as a bright, musical young woman from Massachusetts with a passion for journalism.
- 3 (05:49) **The Fatal Internship** - Helene moves to Denver for a journalism internship in January 1980, staying with relatives.
- 4 (07:15) **The Murder is Discovered** - The news of Helene’s murder reaches her family and friends in Massachusetts.
- 5 (08:29) **The Scene and the Initial Investigation** - Investigators in rural Douglas County, Colorado, grapple with a high-profile murder and a lack of modern technology.
- 6 (11:31) **The First Suspects and a Dead End** - Friends and family provide names, and a witness sketch is created, but leads go nowhere.
- 7 (16:38) **The Case Goes Cold and a Promise is Made** - By 1981, the investigation stalls, but Kimberly vows to never stop searching.
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Show Notes
When 21-year-old college student Helene Pruszynski is found murdered, the case remains cold for nearly forty years until a new detective uses an innovative method to catch Helene’s killer. Josh Mankiewicz reports.
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