The Ramsey case coming to the forefront of the headlines again after so many years has led me to look again at another long unsolved case involving the murder of Kaitlyn Arquette, the daughter of author Lois Duncan. I first bought Lois Duncan’s book Who Killed My Daughter? back in 1992 not long after its release although I wouldn’t get around to reading it for another few years. When I did read it the story of a family’s grief brought me to tears after the first couple of chapters. I was drawn into the investigation on the mother’s part, and when the book drew to an end I was left to wonder if it had been resolved. An online search led to my answer. Kaitlyn’s murder is still unsolved.
Kaitlyn Arquette, 18, was murdered in Albuquerque on July 16, 1989. Albuquerque police dubbed the shooting a “random drive-by” and refused to investigate any other possibility. The case has never been solved.
Kait’s family believes she was killed because she was a potential Whistle Blower. In the months directly preceding her murder, Kait was in a position to have gained information about a number of illegal activities involving dangerous and corrupt individuals. Among those activities were the following:
Asian Crime in New Mexico and California
Drug Smuggling
Drug Activities Involving New Mexico VIPs
Police Corruption
Lois Duncan writes:
Our daughter, Kaitlyn Arquette, 18, was murdered in Albuquerque on July 16, 1989. The Albuquerque Police Department dubbed the murder a “random drive-by shooting” and refused to investigate any other possibility, despite strong evidence that Kait was deliberately murdered because she was preparing to blow the whistle on organized crime that appears to be protected by certain police officers.
On the night she was killed, Kait came by our home to tell us that she was breaking up with her live-in Vietnamese boyfriend, Dung Nguyen. She said she was going to visit a friend and if Dung called trying to find her not to say where she was. When she left her friend’s house at 10:30 p.m., driving in the direction of our house, she was shot to death in her car.
While we were at the hospital waiting for Kait to die, a friend of Kait’s told us that Dung Nguyen and his friends were involved in an interstate insurance fraud ring that Kait had threatened to expose. The following night we called police to our home and gave this information to the case detective. The report of that meeting, (the only one APD ever had with our family), was withheld from Kait’s case file.
With the help of private investigators and insurance claims investigators, we uncovered extensive information about this crime ring. An Quoc Le, the Albuquerque control man for the insurance scam, was Dung’s alibi for the night of the shooting. The capper in Orange County, CA, has been identified as Bao N. Tran, housemate of convicted arsonist, Hong Phuc Duy Van. An Quoc Le would hire people from Albuquerque to fly to California, rent or steal cars, and then stage wrecks, claiming fake injuries. Bao Tran would pay the participants $1,500, while he and the crooked doctors and lawyers would rake in the Big Money. At our insistence, the case detective interviewed Dung, who confessed to personal involvement in two staged wrecks, one of which Kait witnessed. Dung subsequently told Deputy D.A. Susan Riedel that he knew of up to 20 other people in Albuquerque who were also involved. APD did not question these people and did not share the information with law enforcement authorities in California. Several members of this crime ring have since been identified as car thieves, interstate drug dealers and participants in a racket to steal and sell computer chips. APD has never taken statements from any of those subjects.
Examples of other information that APD has refused to follow up on:
An affidavit from a witness stating that Dung phoned her before midnight to tell her Kait was dead. This was three hours before police informed Dung of the shooting.
An affectionate note Dung told police Kait left for him that police consider evidence that Kait wasn’t breaking up with him. A handwriting expert has verified that the note is not in Kait’s handwriting.
Phone calls made by An Quoc Le from Kait’s apartment as soon as Kait died to inform Bao Tran, the insurance fraud capper in California.
Information in Kait’s apartment file that she was terrified of Dung’s friends and shortly before her murder had her locks changed to keep them out, but they broke in anyway, and she fled to the manager’s apartment for fear of physical assault.
The fact that within days after Kait’s murder, five people closely linked to her case suffered mysterious slashings and stabbings, apparent attempts to intimidate witnesses.
A statement from Kait’s neighbor that he saw her followed from her apartment on the night of her death by a VW bug. Witnesses saw a VW bug leave the crime scene immediately after hearing shots. (An Quoc Le owned a VW bug.)
The presence at the crime scene of Paul Apodaca, a man who is linked to An Quoc Le and is also linked to APD through his alleged drug dealer, Lee, who is the brother of an APD undercover narcotics agent. Police allowed Apodaca to leave the scene, and never questioned him as either a suspect or witness, despite the fact that Apodaca had a long court record of violent assaults upon women.
Private investigation has revealed that Dung Nguyen’s criminal group was linked to a small group of rogue cops, several of whom have since been convicted of such felonies as burglary, bank robbery and murder of a witness. Those cops held late night parties at an auto body shop one half block north of the crime scene. That establishment has since been raided by the F.B.I.; Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms; APD; and the Department of Public Safety; guns were confiscated, and the owner’s son was arrested for drug dealing. Vietnamese in expensive cars frequented that body shop, which was also reportedly a chop shop for stolen vehicles. When the VW bug fled the crime scene, it went directly to that body shop.
A police cover-up appears to have started at the crime scene when the first officer at the scene, APD Violent Crimes Detective Ronald Merriman, ignoring the bullet holes in Kait’s car and a blood drenched girl sprawled across the front seat with her brains blown out, called in a report of an accident with no injuries. Statements from Merriman and the second officer at the scene are a tangle of contradictions, and both officers allowed Paul Apodaca to leave the scene without getting his identifiers. Most bewildering of all, both officers then left the scene themselves. The medics who transported Kait to the hospital have stated in an affidavit that they almost missed the scene because there was no one there to wave them over. There were no cops or police cars — just Kait all alone in her car on an empty street with two bullets in her head. The ambulance driver said, “It was so quiet it was eerie!”
Six months after the shooting, as the result of a Crime Stoppers tip, police arrested three Hispanic men for Kait’s murder. Those men were apparently set up, as APD’s “eyewitness” was in jail on the night of the shooting. The district attorney dropped all charges against the Hispanics and directed the police to investigate the Vietnamese. Instead, APD terminated their investigation stating that they would never make further arrests.
In 1992, when police dropped off Kait’s unsolved case, her mother, Lois Duncan, wrote a book, WHO KILLED MY DAUGHTER?, to motivate informants. That book elicited a flood of new information that convinced our family that the criminal activities Kait was planning to expose were not confined to the Vietnamese community. We were told by several unrelated sources that Kait was playing a dangerous game of Nancy Drew. Certain members of her boyfriend’s group allegedly leaked information about political VIPS involved in the New Mexico drug scene, and Kait was attempting to confirm their identities.
In 1999, our private investigator attempted to turn over all the new information from our extensive personal investigation to the APD Cold Case Squad, but they refused to review it. They said Kait’s case has been closed as a random drive-by shooting and they will not follow up on any information that indicates otherwise.
Update, July 2004:
The Arquette family has long believed that Kait was killed because she had learned too much about influential people involved in the New Mexico drug trade. It now appears their suspicions might be justified. In May 2004, Chief Judge John Brennan of Albuquerque was arrested on narcotics charges. That opened a can of worms that may affect a number of cases on this web site.
In June 2004, KRQE TV aired information from a confidential narcotics report about drug activities involving, not only Judge Brennan, but numerous other prominent NM judges, attorneys and members of the state legislature dating back to before Kait was murdered. “It draws on a variety of sources and reads like a Who’s Who of the New Mexico drug underworld,” the reporter said. “Judges, lawyers, politicians, sports celebrities and prominent businessmen appear in the report right along side the State’s narcotics kingpins.” David Iglesias, US Attorney for New Mexico, called the detailed document about drug smuggling and money laundering in New Mexico “a page-turner I couldn’t put down.”
The Arquettes and other NM families who believe their loved ones were killed because they “knew too much,” (Peter Klunck, Ramona Duran, Stephen Haar, etc.), are eager to learn the identities of the VIP drug traders whose names are contained in that report. But they have been told that those names cannot be released, because the VIPs have not been arrested.
http://www.realcrimes.com/Arquette/Kaitlyn_Arquette.htm
At 6 p.m. on Sunday, July 16, 1989, Kaitlyn Arquette, 18, of Albuquerque, NM, who had recently graduated from high school and gotten her own apartment, stopped by her parents’ home en route to visit a new girlfriend, Sharon Smith. Kait told her parents that Sharon had invited her for dinner and had given her written directions to show the route to take to her house in Old Town.
Kait also said that she was breaking up with her live-in Vietnamese boyfriend, Dung Ngoc Nguyen, and if he called trying to find her, not to say where she was. When Kait left Sharon’s home at 10:45 p.m., driving east on Lomas Blvd. in the direction of her parents’ house, she was shot twice in the head. Her car jumped the median and came to rest against a pole at the intersection of Lomas and Arno Streets. Kait survived 20 hours in a coma and died the next evening.
The first officer at the scene, violent crimes detective Ronald Merriman, (not in uniform–just passing by) observed two vehicles parked on the sidewalk, Kait’s red Ford Tempo and a second vehicle (later determined to be a VW Bug). He also saw a man (later determined to be Paul Apodaca), standing next to Kait’s car. Merriman drove past the vehicles while he radioed in to ask about an accident (none reported). He called in a report of an accident with no injuries and returned to the scene to investigate.
It was then that he discovered an unconscious, blood drenched girl, lying across both front seats of the Ford.
The first officer dispatched to the scene, Mary Ann Wallace, arrived within 40 seconds. Wallace observed only one vehicle on the sidewalk — Kait’s Ford Tempo, with Merriman standing behind it, chatting with Apodoca. Merriman told her the driver of the Ford had been injured in a traffic accident and he had called for an ambulance. (No record has been found of such a call.) Wallace took one look at the bullet-shattered driver’s window, recognized that this was a crime scene, and radioed the station for back-up. Neither Wallace nor Merriman took any information from Apodaca other than his name and an incorrect phone number. To this day, no police officer has ever interviewed Apodaca. Nor have police questioned the disappearance of his VW Bug between the time Merriman saw it parked next to Kait’s car and the time Wallace arrived. (See “Possible Suspect – Paul Apodaca.”)
Merriman and Wallace have stated that, accompanied by Apodaca, they opened the passenger’s door of Kait’s vehicle and observed a girl sprawled across the two seats, bleeding profusely from the head. Wallace noted that the victim was “moaning and crying.”
Merriman, Wallace, and Apodaca, then, left the scene. The medics with Albuquerque Ambulance, who transported Kait to the hospital, have stated in individual affidavits that they responded to a routine 10-44 call to find no cops, no police cars, no bystanders, just Kait alone in her car, unconscious and bleeding from two head wounds.
Reports by Merriman and Wallace indicate that they were there when rescue arrived. Merriman has specifically stated that he couldn’t interview Paul Apodaca, because he “had to stay with the victim.” Yet, according to the rescue team, he did NOT “stay with the victim.” Officer Wallace has stated that Merriman told her not to interview Apodaca, because he had already done so, and she busied herself “directing traffic.” Yet, according to the rescue team, she was NOT directing traffic. The medical team has stated that they almost missed the scene, because there were no police cars and there was nobody there to wave them over.
Police maintain that Kait was chased down on Lomas and shot twice in the head at a stop light at the corner of Lomas and John streets. Her car then proceeded to travel 719 feet, cross two traffic lanes, bump over the median, cross three more lanes, go up onto the sidewalk past the Arno intersection, and crash into a light pole. They say the location of the shooting was defined by a large pile of broken glass at Lomas and John. However, there is nothing to document the existence of that glass. It was not gathered up as evidence, nor was it photographed.
The Arquette family and their investigators speculate that the crime scene may have been altered before investigators got there. APD criminalistics arrived late, because they had been at a police shooting. According to their report, they were met at the scene by Sgt. John B. Gallegos. Much of the content of the criminalistic report apparently was based upon information from Gallegos rather than personal observations. Sgt. Gallegos was reportedly one of the rogue cops who partied at the chop shop on Arno one half block north of the crime scene. He has since been fired from APD for burglarizing a liquor store while on duty.
Since bullets and casings were never found, there is no way to determine if the small caliber bullets that shattered in Kait’s head were of the same caliber as the bullet that struck the door frame of her car. The size of the hole in the door frame seems to suggest otherwise.
In 2003, after reviewing copies of APD reports, forensic reports, scene photos, etc. a member of the Bernallilo County Cold Case Squad, (not to be confused with the APD Cold Case Squad who have no interest in the case), came up with the following interpretation of the crime scene:
On the basis of review of available material in the matter of the death of Kaitlyn Arquette, the following observations are made:
1) This was not a random drive-by shooting
2) The shooting occurred after Kaitlyn’s vehicle had struck the utility pole
3) The accuracy of the shots suggests they were fired at a very close range, at a non-moving target.
4) Had the shooting taken place while victim’s car was in motion, it would have veered to the right of the roadway due to the left-to-right camber of the pavement. Also, the victim’s falling to the right would have turned the steering wheel in that direction if she was grasping the steering wheel at the time of shooting.
5) Damage to the left end of the rear bumper suggests the rear of her vehicle was struck and pushed to the right by a second vehicle which veered her car across the median and into the utility pole.
6) This shooting was intentional and Ms. Arquette was the specific target.
A number of people linked to Kait and/or Dung Nguyen suffered suspicious injuries following her murder. Is this just coincidence, or could these have been attempts to intimidate potential informants?
July 21, 1989 (the day of Kait’s funeral) Sharon Smith, the last person to see Kait before the shooting, missed the funeral because she was in the emergency room with a severely wounded arm. (Allegedly bitten by her own dog, although the scar suggests otherwise, and Sharon will not sign a permit to allow the release of the emergency room report.)
July 21, 1989 (the evening of the day of Kait’s funeral), Dung Nguyen was stabbed in the abdomen in the room of one of the men who were his alibis for the night of the shooting. (Alleged suicide attempt, although circumstances indicate otherwise.)
August 2, 1989 (two weeks after Kait’s murder), Ray Padilla, Dung’s close friend and drug supplier, had his wrist slashed. (Alleged suicide attempt).
August 2, 1989 Ray Padilla’s friends, Elena Chavez and Kathy Sanchez, who were with him when his wrist was slashed, had their own arms and wrists slashed. (Allegedly suicide attempts to keep Ray Padilla company.)
February 11, 1990 (3 wks. after his arrest with Miguel Garcia and Juve Escobedo), Dennis “Marty” Martinez was found lying in the doorway of his home with his wrist slashed. (Alleged suicide attempt.) He survived.
February 4, 1992 (shortly after charges were dropped and he was released from prison), Miguel Garcia was shot in the lower portion of the right abdomen. The bullet came out his back. It was so close to the spine that doctors thought he was going to be paralyzed. He survived. (Alleged suicide attempt.)
September 24, 2003 Robert Garcia, APD’s alleged eye-witness to Miguel Garcia shooting Kait, (who later turned out to have been in prison at the time of the shooting), was found dead of a drug overdose. Someone had dragged his body into an alley and left it there.
When I read the emotional turmoil of a grieving mother and how Kaitlyn was left to die I am overcome by a flood of emotions myself. The whole story has complex twists and turns that would take far more than a single blog entry to cover, but it speaks of Asian gangs, organized crime, corrupt police, and drug smuggling. The story is ongoing and hasn’t received as much attention as the Ramsey case…but just the same…it needs to be solved.
(There is enough information at the website to fill a book)
http://kaitarquette.arquettes.com/index.htm
Posted by jpfarris9 