The views and opinions expressed in Cold and Missing are exclusively those of the hosts. All parties mentioned are considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Cold and Missing also contains adult themes and languages. Listener discretion is advised. I'm your host, Ali McLaughlin-Sulkowski. And I'm your co-host, Eli Sulkowski. And this is Cold and Missing, where we cover cold cases and missing person cases. Hello everyone and welcome back to Cold and Missing.
I'm your host, Ali McLaughlin-Sulkowski. And my co-host, my wonderful husband, Eli Sulkowski, is again taking a break from the podcast right now. My mother-in-law, his mom, passed away recently, so he's just taking some time to grieve and to take care of himself. So thank you so much. If you have reached out, we've gotten lots of well wishes and condolences. So thank you so much. It really means the world to us. And it's so kind and so thoughtful. So thank you.
And also thank you to everyone who reached out. I know last week I talked a little bit about my mental health and how it was affecting me specifically in getting a new episode of the podcast out. And so many people reached out and said, it's totally okay. I understand where you're coming from. I suffer with that as well. I get it. So just thank you so much for those kind words and your understanding. It means so much to me.
And it helps me not feel as ashamed of my mental health or not feeling like I'm strong enough or good enough or I just can't muscle through it. I got to release a lot of that guilt that I was feeling just by your kind words. So thank you so much if you've reached out or even if you've just thought about us or prayed about us. It's so appreciative and we definitely feel it. I also just want to take a quick second at the top. We got a new review in our Apple podcast. So thank you so much.
It was so kind. Someone said that they're newer to podcasts and they're really enjoying ours. So thank you for being here. I hope you're still with us and enjoying the podcast. Actually if you leave us a review on Apple podcasts, I am 100% going to know about it and I'm going to glow about it all week. It just it means so much to me and it helps others find this podcast as well and give it a listen. So thank you if you've already done that.
And maybe if you have some time while you're listening to the new episode right now, you can just go ahead and leave us a quick review in Apple podcast or whatever platform you're on. It would be so helpful. It just helps this podcast get to more people and therefore these stories get to more people. So thank you for doing your part. Means the world to me. But otherwise, I think we should just go ahead and jump into the case. We are on a cold case this week.
So today we are talking about the cold case of Stella Bolton and James J.J. Moore. And this takes place in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in February of 1991. But first a little bit about Stella and J.J. Stella is 68 years old in 1991. She was born May 6, 1922. And James, who goes by J.J., is 73 years old and was born December 1, 1917. The two lived together as roommates. J.J. had known Stella's husband and when he passed away, Stella and J.J., who was also a widower, took care of each other.
Even though they lived together, they slept in separate bedrooms in their small rented bungalow in what was then known as Mariners Village. They were the best of friends. Mariners Village was a working class neighborhood where everyone looked out for each other. Stella was originally from Trinidad and acted as a grandmother to all of the children in the neighborhood. She always welcomed neighbors for a meal and would often pass cookies out to the neighborhood children.
Stella helped care for J.J., who had diabetes and gout in his later years. He was a veteran having served in three wars, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. J.J. was also known for his love of cars. Just about every year, he would buy a brand new Buick. Their neighbors had nothing but glowing remarks about them. Their neighbor Ray Harris said, quote, They were just people you would love to have for a neighbor.
They had a little front porch 10 feet from the street, so you couldn't go anywhere without seeing them. You had to know them. They loved company, and if you didn't sit and visit with them, you stood on the sidewalk and talked as you went by. End quote. Another neighbor, who also happened to be a city counselor, Linda Pannori, says, quote, They were the kind of people everybody loved.
It wasn't unusual to see an ice cream truck pull up and they would whip out some money and buy all the kids in the neighborhood some ice cream. That's the kind of people they were. Just loving and wonderful people. End quote. Now a timeline of events. On Saturday, February 16th, 1991, in the evening hours, Stella went out to play bingo, one of her favorite things to do, while JJ stayed at their shared home. It was rumored that Stella had been on a big winning streak at her bingo games recently.
We know that Stella did eventually return home to the house she shared with JJ. In the early morning hours of Sunday, February 17th, 1991, at around 1 30 a.m., a fire is reported at 74 Rockhill Avenue in the Mariners Village complex. This ends up being a two alarm fire, which means that the responding fire department had to call in additional assistance from other fire departments. The fire even spread to the house next door.
While fighting the fire, firefighters discovered the remains of two bodies. Officers on the scene assume that the two perished in the house fire. Police don't have a confirmed ID on the bodies, but the whole neighborhood knew. Neighbor Linda Pinores says, quote, There was such shock because it was so insane. And they had lived in the same place such a long time you couldn't even say maybe somebody got the wrong house. End quote. Fire investigators ruled the fire as arson.
The fire was started intentionally in the back left bedroom and spread throughout the home and to the home next door. On Monday, February 18th. So this is the next day after the fire. Medical examiners begin an autopsy to confirm the IDs of the two bodies found in the home. It is confirmed that the bodies that were found were Stella and JJ. However, the medical examiner also discovers that each of them had been stabbed multiple times and were murdered before the fire was set.
In the following days after the fire, rumors began to spread around the neighborhood about who would hurt these two beloved figures. Neighbor Ray Harris says, quote, Teenagers looking for money, a robbery gone bad. There were personal theories and police theories and criminology theories. She was playing bingo that night and he was home alone. And there's a theory that she came home and surprised a robber and he set the fire to cover up the evidence. End quote.
Police begin to comb through the neighborhood going door to door asking questions. Police begin to wonder if Stella and JJ's open and welcoming nature was used against them. As police are going through the burned out home, a young boy approaches police and tells them that he found a knife. The knife is about eight inches and police do believe that this is the murder weapon. On Thursday, February 21st, 1991, just four days after their murder, Stella and James are laid to rest.
Hundreds of people attend the funeral. Folks come from all over to pay respects to Stella and JJ, including Pennsylvania, New York and Trinidad. Stella and JJ are ultimately laid to rest together. Police are chasing leads, but they're not public about what they're looking for or who they're looking at. Police do tell the public that the rumor that Stella had won thousands playing bingo the night before she died was false.
But people in the neighborhood, along with police, will continue to talk about her bingo winnings as a potential motive over the years. In June of 1994, so this is three years since the murder of Stella and JJ, there is a grand jury held in regards to this case. Now police seem to have been working on this case in the background because I couldn't really find any media coverage outside of the initial shock of the crime.
But come June of 1994, they do hold a grand jury against a person of interest. However, police don't get an indictment against this person. Because grand juries are held in secrecy, we do not know who the person of interest in this case is or was, if they're still considered a person of interest at all. However, from these proceedings, police will go on to arrest William Schroeder, who is 30 years old, for tampering with a witness and hindering a police investigation.
Police believe that William has withheld information about the murder investigation to them the police and also when he was a witness for the grand jury. He also told another person to lie to the grand jury. This other person happened to be a police detective. Police hope that his arrest will generate more leads and tips in the case of Stella and JJ.
The chief of the Criminal Justice Bureau at the Attorney General's Office, Mike Ramsdale, says, quote, We certainly believe that he had knowledge about what went on on the night of the murder, and when he wasn't forthcoming, the charges were brought. End quote. Police don't say that they think William was involved in the murder, but they for sure believe that he has information about the murder.
No murder charges are ever brought against him, and ultimately, William will plead guilty to witness tampering in January of 1995, and he's sentenced to three and a half to seven years. And it doesn't seem like William ever provides any more information about what he may or may not know to police.
In May of 1996, so it has been five years since Stella and JJ were murdered, police connect with Dr. Henry Lee, hoping that he will take a look at the evidence to see if he could help find some suspects. Dr. Henry Lee, as some of our listeners may recognize, is a forensic scientist who has worked on some of the most famous cases. He's worked on the Jean-Béné Ramsey case, O.J. Simpson, Kathleen Peterson, and Kaylee Anthony.
Several items are sent to Dr. Lee, but the only DNA that he is able to develop matches the victim's, so there's no suspect DNA developed. The next year, in October of 1997, so now it's been six years since the murder, police offer a $10,000 reward for any information in this cold case. In the year 2000, they double it to $20,000, and this reward is still in place as of 2023 for information leading to an arrest in the murders of Stella and JJ.
In 2001, so it's been 10 years since Stella and JJ's murder, there's another double murder in New Hampshire, a husband and wife who were both professors at Dartmouth College, half and Suzanne Zantop. They were both stabbed to death like Stella and JJ. The major difference is that the case received a lot of media attention and resources from the state to get the case solved. This didn't sit well with the folks that knew Stella and JJ.
They believed that Stella and JJ deserved just as much media attention and resources from the police to get the case solved. Executive counselor Ruth Griffin, who was from Portsmouth, says, quote, they were black and poor. They lived in subsidized housing. It has bothered me. Isn't it the attorney generals who direct how the state prosecutes? End quote. Police counter that they continue to work this case and they have never forgotten about Stella and JJ.
Sergeant Michael Ranci says, quote, it is still an active investigation. We're still going through certain items of evidence collected from the scene, and these items are being retested due to progress made in forensic sciences. End quote. Police do continue to work behind the scenes on the case. However, it's another 10 years before Stella and JJ are back in the media in 2011, 20 years since their murder.
And they're back in the media because police firmly believe that other people know about what happened the night that they were murdered and have never come forward with this information. Detective Aaron Goodwin says, quote, we're not looking to charge anyone who just has information. If you were living in the community and you heard something, anything, come forward, let us know what it is. End quote. In 2011, police are confident that they are close to an arrest in this case.
As of 2023, so this is 33 years since Stella and JJ were murdered. The case is now with Detective Rachelle Jones. Detective Jones used to live near Stella and JJ as a child. And she says, quote, for me, just with JJ and Stella, I look at them and I have a personal knowledge of how great they were as people. And it makes me very angry. End quote. Detective Jones took over the case in 2021. And since then, she has developed multiple persons of interest.
She doesn't get specific, but she says that the person of interest used to live in the neighborhood and they were younger than Stella and JJ, who were in their 60s and 70s. So it's still very wide range for younger. Detective Jones has interviewed around 50 people, including the persons of interest. Police do believe that the motive for the murder was money.
Detective Jones says, quote, we really need the people that are probably still afraid and have that direct knowledge, just one little clue that could help us go forward. End quote. But that is really the last update we have on this case. Police have felt confident in the past 20 years that this case was going to be solved soon. But to date, there has never been anybody charged with the murder of Stella and JJ.
If you know anything about the murder of Stella Bolton and James JJ Moore in February of 1991, please contact Detective Rachelle Jones directly at 603-610-7503. And the sources for the timeline to date come from Journal Tribune, Sun Journal, Concord Monitor, Valley News, Morning Centennial, The Boston Globe, Seacoast Online, and WMUR. So that is the cold case of Stella and JJ.
My first reaction when I found this case and started researching it was just how sweet Stella and JJ are as people and as friends who were in their later years in life and were supporting each other and taking care of each other. But there wasn't that romantic aspect involved, which I think is so easy to just place on a man and a woman's friendship. But for them, they were best of friends and they took care of each other through their golden years.
And I just thought it was such a beautiful story and just a beautiful way to live your life. For that to be cut short when you're already at the end of your life, it just feels like so tragic that you've lived your whole life, you've done everything, and then at the end of it, somebody murders you. You don't even get to live out your final years the way that your maker intends. It just, obviously, at any time, I think a murder is bad.
But there's something about murder of the elderly that just seems so unfair in the same way that it feels so unfair for children to be murdered. I do have questions around this case, and I'm sure a big one that came up for a lot of you as well is, who is this person of interest? Who did they bring against the grand jury?
If I got to sit down with Detective Jones, who is covering the case today, and just ask and get all the answers I wanted, I would want to know, who is this person of interest that they took to a grand jury? They didn't get the indictment, so the grand jury didn't feel like there was enough evidence to support that murder charge, or I guess in this case, a double murder charge. But still, I have to just wonder who this person is.
And I know I've mentioned this before, but just being somebody who loves true crime and takes in a lot, I always have to wonder, is this person who they couldn't get the indictment on, are they really a good suspect, or is it somebody that the police just kind of tunnel visioned in on? That's something that I would like to know as well, but without really knowing who the person is and the evidence they have against him or her, I guess we really don't even know.
But without those details, all you can do is like wildly speculate, which is what I'm doing right now, so I'll stop. I also am curious, and I couldn't find any additional details on it, but the murder weapon was found by a young boy in the neighborhood. And from all reports, it seems like it was a child that found the knife. But I couldn't find an exact detail of where the knife was found. By all accounts, it just seems like it was found as somebody was fleeing the crime scene.
That was kind of how it was described. It was dropped or thrown while fleeing the crime scene. So I assume it was a little bit away from the home. But again, I don't know. So that would just be something that I would be curious about today. Where was that found in regards to where the home was, where Stella and JJ's home was? I also wonder who lived in that back left bedroom. From all reports, it does seem like the arson was started in the back left bedroom.
So I wonder, was that the target of this attack? Like whoever's bedroom that was, were they kind of the initial target? And then the other person was just the collateral damage of everything. Again, this is all very much speculation. But I just wonder. Or maybe that's just where they started, back left, and they just zipped around with some kind of accelerant and then started the fire. Maybe it means something, maybe it means nothing. But I couldn't find out whose room that was exactly.
And then police, during the initial investigation, they tell media that the rumors that Stella had won thousands at bingo the night before she died was untrue. But I wonder, did she win at all? Did it just get inflated to where she had won thousands of dollars when maybe in reality she had won a couple hundred bucks, you know, or maybe she had been winning throughout the week? It does seem like bingo is one of her favorite things to go and do. So had she had a winning streak recently?
Had she been talking about it? Did people just assume that maybe she had more money than she did? There's stories of her and JJ buying ice cream for everyone in the neighborhood or always giving food or cookies out to neighbors who needed it. So I wonder if someone mistook their kindness for a ton of wealth. From everything that the police report from the beginning until 2023, it does seem like money is a major motivator in this murder, which is so sad. Like money is the root of all evil.
Truly fully unstopped. I wish we could go back in time and just get rid of the need for money at all. Like it brings so much negative into this world. And it's the reason that Stella and JJ lost their lives. I mean, JJ was a 30 year vet who served in three wars. Like he's a national hero in my eyes. You serve in three wars? You're a hero. He deserved to live out his days exactly how he wanted to and not have them end abruptly.
And the same for Stella, who was a beautiful person from all accounts, she acted as a mother or grandmother to everyone in the neighborhood. If you needed anything, Stella would have given it to you. They were always chatting with neighbors and just a part of that community. I just really hope that Stella and JJ get justice. And police do seem to be close. You know, they keep begging for just that one piece of information, a little clue.
It seems like they just need a little bit more to like get everything to fall in place. And they really do seem convinced that people out there know people in this area, in this community know what happened to Stella and JJ. So if you know anything about the death of Stella and JJ in 1991, or if you're from that area and have heard rumors, please call those into police and police will do the work of sorting out who's right, who's wrong, what's true, what's not like that's their job.
But if you've ever heard anything, you never know what wild rumor might actually have like a little kernel of truth in it. So if you know anything at all, please call Detective Rochelle Jones directly at 603-610-7503. And again, I mentioned it at the top of our podcast, but if you could just give us a little review, it helps others find this podcast and it'll help others know Stella and JJ story. There's very little media coverage, very little podcasts on them.
So they deserve to have their case covered and heard. And just by sharing it, promoting it, rating it, you help their names get out to others out there and their stories get known and ultimately, hopefully close, we get their stories closed. So if you have a minute, please review us if you can, or maybe just share with somebody in your life that also enjoys true crime. That's also a win and gets more people knowing about these cases. We'll be posting pictures of Stella and JJ on our Instagram.
So if you're not following us, you can go ahead and follow us there at Cold and Missing. We're also on YouTube. We put all of the episodes up on YouTube and there's some lovely conversations happening in the comment sections, just about the cases in general. Maybe if you like to listen on YouTube, you can find us there too and subscribe. It's a great time. We also have our website, ColdandMissing.com. So all of our episodes are on there. The YouTube videos are on there.
And we also have transcripts. So if you or someone that you love is hard of hearing or deaf, you can also follow along with the podcast or read it at our website, ColdandMissing.com. But that's all I have for this week. Thank you so much for listening. I'm Allie McLaughlin-Sulkowski. This is Cold and Missing. Have a great week and stay safe, y'all.