Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

The following New Year's Eve disappearance was covered in the "South Bend Tribune," February 9, 2008.  It appears to be one of those crimes where the police "knew" who did it, but were unable to find enough evidence to make an arrest.  To date, the case is still unsolved, and Pullen has never been found.

What happened to Shirley Pullen, a 70-year-old Niles Township woman who was last seen on New Year’s Eve 1986, is still a mystery. 

But police said they believe answers are out there and are turning to the public for help. 

Authorities consider the former Windward Village Mobile Home Park resident’s disappearance suspicious and said they believe Pullen was possibly a victim of foul play.  However, they have come up short in their attempts to find her body or the person responsible for her disappearance. 

On Friday, the Michigan State Police post in Niles announced that it will reopen the investigation. 

Pullen was last seen by her hairdresser at the Save Mart store near her mobile home park Dec.31, 1986. That night she was reportedly planning to attend a New Year’s Eve party. 

Twelve days later her mobile home park manager reported her missing after Pullen, who always paid her rent on time, failed to do so.

Inside her residence police found indications that Pullen likely left abruptly. Her television was still on, a plate of food was out and a cigarette butt had burned down to the filter, said MSP Detective Sgt. Fabian Suarez, who is heading up the inquiry.  Her vehicle was still at the home. 

“Preliminary indications don’t show she left willingly,” he said. 

Suarez is no stranger to cold cases.  In 2006, he and another trooper turned up new witnesses and evidence that led to a conviction in a 16-year-old Cass County murder case. 

Suarez began reviewing the Pullen case in October 2005.  Four investigators from the Michigan State Police and Berrien County Sheriff’s Department will be interviewing about 50 people over the next few months, and Suarez is hopeful their inquiries will turn up some new leads. 

“By next week we hope to start knocking on doors,” he said. 

Noting that names, addresses and phone numbers have likely changed, Suarez is asking that anyone who was interviewed during the original investigation contact police rather than wait for authorities to track them down. Investigators also are looking for names of people who should have been interviewed originally. 

“Time changes a lot of things,” Suarez said. 

Information from the public could very well provide the answers police are looking for.  Back in 2000, a tipster called after the case was featured on Crime Stoppers and indicated Pullen was dead and that he knew where her body might be.  But the caller,who was instructed to contact the now-defunct Niles Township Police Department, was never heard from again. 

At the time she vanished, Pullen owned two mobile homes in the park, one of which she rented out. 

“She had been having trouble with those tenants,” Suarez said. 

Years after Pullen disappeared, a neighbor came forward and told police she heard “yelling” outside the missing woman’s residence that New Year’s Eve, former Niles Township Police Chief John Street said in a 2000 Tribune interview. 

The neighbor apparently saw Pullen talking with two men, one of whom was the tenant living in Pullen’s other mobile home.  After several minutes of arguing, Pullen went into her residence and the two men drove away. 

The renter, according to Street, denied seeing Pullen that day but told police she had given him several checks after he did some work for her.

Her last check to him,made out for $500, was dated Dec. 30, 1986, and the man claimed it was a Christmas gift for his family. 

Street also said the man indicated that Pullen had granted him use of her Discover credit card to buy more than $1,000 in household items. The card was used twice, on Jan. 11 and 16, 1987, at the former Highland Appliance store in Mishawaka.