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JUANITA BOYD 👤 Her Car Was Found Six Days After She Disappeared. Her Killer Wasn’t Identified for 45 Years. On February 22, 1981, 31-year-old Juanita Boyd failed to return home. She was a mother to a nine-year-old boy, worked at the LaPorte County Courthouse in Indiana, and was known to be devoted to her son. The disappearance was completely out of character. Juanita had last been seen at a bar on Lincolnway in LaPorte. Her family waited. Days passed, and nobody could explain where she had gone. Then, six days later, investigators found her green Pontiac stuck in the mud near Forester Road in Coolspring Township. What they discovered inside the vehicle turned the missing-person investigation into a murder case. Juanita’s body was in the trunk. She had been strangled and stabbed. The investigation began, but the technology needed to identify her killer did not yet exist. Evidence was collected and preserved, including biological material on her clothing. Years passed. Investigators changed. The case grew older, but the evidence remained. In 2013, detectives reopened the investigation. As forensic technology improved, they returned to the evidence, hoping it might finally reveal something the original investigators could not see. Then came the breakthrough. In July 2026, investigators obtained a DNA sample from a close relative of a potential suspect. They used forensic genetic genealogy to build a family connection and narrow down the possibilities. By October, the comparison had produced an answer. The DNA recovered from Juanita’s clothing matched Carl David Phillips, a man who had lived in the LaPorte area when she was murdered. Investigators said the DNA comparison produced a probability of 38 trillion to one in support of the match. Phillips had a criminal history, including armed robberies and a burglary conviction. But he had never been charged with Juanita’s murder. There was one final obstacle. He had died in 2017. On November 10, 2026, the LaPorte County Sheriff’s Office publicly announced that investigators had identified Phillips as the man responsible for Juanita’s killing. Authorities said there was no known relationship between the two. That leaves a question investigators may never be able to answer: why Juanita? Her nine-year-old son grew up without his mother. Her family spent decades without knowing who had taken her life. The discovery cannot bring Juanita back, and the man identified by investigators will never face a courtroom for this crime. But after 45 years, her case finally has an answer. Juanita Boyd was not forgotten. And the evidence she left behind outlived the man investigators say killed her. 🕯️