Unsolved Mysteries is an American documentary TV series that explores cases that haven't been solved for a long time and have run cold, along with some of the unnatural paranormal events. It started as a few special shows with hosts Raymond Burr, Karl Malden, and Robert Stack on NBC in 1987. Later, it became a regular series in 1988, with Robert Stack as the host.
You might think a show called Unsolved Mysteries wouldn't actually solve many cases. But you'd be wrong. It's helped crack over 260 cases since it started in 1987 and ended in 2010. And with a brand new reboot on Netflix, it's been helping families uncover the truth about their loved ones for decades.
When Unsolved Mysteries first aired, it changed the way people watched TV. It allowed viewers to help solve the cases they saw on each episode. They could call in with any helpful information they had about a case, and that's how the show went on to produce over 600 episodes. Now that the show is on Netflix, viewers can go to the show's website to share their tips about any episode.
This article will look into 10 cases and how they were solved in Unsolved Mysteries.
Listing down 10 cases from the show Unsolved Mysteries that have been solved
The show Unsolved Mysteries has had a huge impact, thanks to its viewers. More than 100 families have been reunited with their loved ones who were wrongly accused of crimes. These people are now free and no longer face any charges.
1) Gabby and the skeleton
In 1986, a man named Gabby gave his friend Newell Sessions some of his belongings when he moved away. Among them was a trunk with a lock. Six years later, Newell finally opened the trunk and was shocked to find a skeleton inside. Even more disturbing, the skeleton had a bullet in its skull. Gabby told the authorities that he had bought the trunk at a garage sale without opening it. But as the investigation continued, Gabby took his own life.
It wasn't until 2017 that the case was finally solved in Unsolved Mysteries. The skeleton was identified as the remains of Joseph Mulvaney by his granddaughter. She told investigators that Gabby was her grandfather's brother-in-law, John David Morris. According to her, Gabby murdered Joseph and then hid him in the locker to avoid being caught. It is also believed that Gabby's wife, Joseph's sister, was involved in the crime.
2) The disappearance of Craig Williamson
Craig Williamson disappeared in 1993 while on a business trip to Colorado Springs, but his wife never believed that he was dead. Instead, she was certain that he was still alive somewhere and suffering from amnesia.
Then something surprising happened - Williamson saw an old episode of Unsolved Mysteries about his own disappearance in 1995. He realized it was him they were talking about. He remembered being beaten by two men, but that was it - he didn't even remember who his wife was. The two were reunited but later divorced, and they remained friends.
3) Murder of Kathy Freeman
In 1999, the Freeman family's life took a devastating turn when a fire destroyed their home. The only person to die in the fire was Kathy Freeman, the mother of the house. But the reality was not what it looked like from the outside; what made it even more shocking was that Kathy didn’t die in the fire but was shot and killed.
Her husband Danny went missing after the fire, but when he was found, it turned out he'd been shot, too. Her daughter Ashley and her friend were nowhere to be found. The case was only resolved in 2018 when Ronnie Dean Busick, a drug seller, was caught by the authorities and charged with multiple counts of murder, kidnapping, and arson.
4) Disappearance of Bonnie Haim
In 1992, a young mother named Bonnie Haim disappeared just days after Christmas in Florida. Police thought she was dead and suspected her husband, Michael Haim, of murder. While Bonnie's parents believed she had intentionally left Michael, some of his family members believed he had killed her.
The case was shown in Unsolved Mysteries. Years later, in 2019, a piece of a skull was found on Bonnie's old property, and Michael went on trial. He was found guilty of committing the crime and was sentenced to life imprisonment.
5) The Murder of Daphne Boyden and the mysterious disappearance of Le-Zhan
Daphne Boyden gave birth to a son named Le-Zhan at the age of 17. Tragically, just six weeks later, in 1996, she was brutally murdered, and her house was set on fire. Although her remains were found, Le-Zhan was nowhere to be seen. Fortunately, some neighbors reported seeing two girls fleeing the scene with a small bundle. Despite this clue, the case remained unsolved for six years.
In December 2002, police received an anonymous tip after a possible rebroadcast of the case on Unsolved Mysteries. This led them to investigate 22-year-old Latasha Brown, who was raising a 6-year-old boy on her own. It turned out that she had gotten help from a friend to kill Daphne and create a fake birth certificate for Le-Zhan.
6) Elizabeth Carmichael: The lady who remained hidden for years
In 1973, Elizabeth Carmichael moved her family from Los Angeles to Miami, Florida, after being accused of fraud by the police. But the police never left her out of their sight. They were constantly tailing her, and it turned out that Carmichael had a secret past: she had lived as Jerry Dean Michael and was wanted for crimes committed in the 1960s.
She got caught in 1980 but skipped a crucial court hearing and went missing for another eight years. Her anonymity ended when someone recognized her from an episode of Unsolved Mysteries. At that time, Carmichael was living in Texas as Kathryn Elizabeth Johnson. She was sentenced to almost three years in prison.
7) The Death of Jane Doe
One morning in 1987, a coroner named Cullen Ellingburgh got a call to help find out what happened to a young woman found at the bottom of a cliff in California. She was about 25 years old and had died hours earlier in the middle of the night. The last person to see her alive was a taxi driver. She had asked him to take her as far as her money would take her.
This case was a real mystery because the woman had no ID and was wearing used clothes, including men's underwear. It seemed like she didn't exist before that night. This case stuck with everyone involved, especially the coroner, for 26 years. But then they finally figured out who she was, and the case was shown in Unsolved Mysteries about 21-year-old Holly Jo Glynn, who sadly took her own life.
8) Who killed Joyce McLain?
On a summer evening in Maine (1980), teenager Joyce McLain went jogging and never returned. Two days later, her body was found in the woods behind the local high school. Although people saw her jogging toward the football field, no one could figure out what happened to her or who was responsible.
34 years passed before Philip Scott Fournier was arrested for Joyce's murder in 2016. At the time of Joyce's murder, Fournier was 19 years old, as shown in Unsolved Mysteries, and had also stolen and crashed an oil truck that same night. He was found guilty in 2018.
9) The elopement of Randy Mark Yager and Margie
Randy Mark Yager, a member of the Outlaws motorcycle gang in Indiana, was romantically involved with Margie Jelovic, a young bartender. He was later arrested on drug and murder charges, but the couple managed to flee to Las Vegas in the middle of the night in the year 1997 to avoid the FBI.
Margie resurfaced briefly but then disappeared again. Her family was convinced that Randy was holding her against her will somewhere in the US. The police finally tracked Randy down in Mexico in 2014, where they found Margie living with him. Randy was arrested, but in the chaos, Margie crashed her car while trying to escape and died.
10) The face on Mars
NASA sent Viking 1 into space on August 20, 1975. The goal was to see if there was life on Mars. Viking 1 took thousands of interesting photos of Mars, including dried-up rivers, old volcanoes, and ice caps. It also found a strange formation in the desert that looked like a face.
Some scientists thought the face was just a natural accident, while others thought it might be something more - something not from this world. When a new spacecraft visited Mars in the '90s, it found out that the "face" was just a hill that looked like a face from certain angles. The mystery was solved and broadcast on Unsolved Mysteries in 1996.
If you want to stream real mystery cases like the ones mentioned above, then Unsolved Mysteries is now available to stream on Netflix.
