Three years before Theresa Jimmie Cross was arrested and charged in the California slayings of two of her daughters, Utah investigators provided details on the crimes to Sacramento police, authorities say.
Woods Cross Police Chief Paul Howard said Thursday that on Sept. 5, 1990, he sent a letter to Sacramento police detailing an interview his detectives had with a Utah woman who claimed to have witnessed the killings.The witness, identified as Theresa Knorr Groves of Sandy, said her mother and brothers killed a sister and half-sister nearly a decade ago in the Sacramento area. Groves has said she told police and an attorney about the slayings over the years, without result.
But information she provided recently to Placer County, Calif., lawmen finally resulted in charges and the solution to a pair of grisly "Jane Doe" homicides that have long baffled investigators.
Placer County is just east of Sacramento County.
Howard said that along with his certified letter, he also sent a partial tape recording of Groves' interview to Sacramento.
"They didn't send us a written response, but they did call us and tell us they couldn't locate any bodies that matched (the allegations)," Howard said.
"I feel we did everything that we could. It was quite a bizarre story, but we followed through and provided the California authorities with all the details," he added.
Lt. Joe Enloe, head of Sacramento's homicide division, said he had no knowledge of the letter, but confirmed an effort was under way to determine its fate.
Johnnie Smith, an investigator with the Placer County Sheriff's Department, said he was sure the letter had been received by Sacramento police.
"We are working with the authorities there trying to find out what happened to the letter," Smith said.
Cross, 47, was taken into custody at a Salt Lake home Nov. 10, by Smith and another Placer County detective. She had been living in Utah since 1987 or 1988, and worked caring for the elderly and disabled. She is fighting extradition.
Cross and her two sons, arrested earlier, were accused in the burning death of 17-year-old Suesan Knorr in July 1984 and the slaying a year later of her half-sister, Sheila Gay Sanders, 20, who was beaten and locked in a tiny closet until she starved.