Cold case murder solved 40 years after Utah teenager killed after hitchhiking to work: Police

Police in Salt Lake City announced Thursday they have solved the cold case murder of Christine Gallegos, 40 years after the 18-year-old was found dead after trying to hitchhike to work.

Gallegos was found dead on May 16, 1985, according to the Salt Lake City Police Department. She had been severely beaten, stabbed and shot twice in the head. Police believe that the person who picked her up the night before drove her to a remote area and sexually assaulted her, killing her after she tried to fight back.

The case remained unsolved for decades. In 2023, the case was re-examined in an attempt to identify an unknown male DNA profile collected in the case. Detectives sent the evidence to Texas-based Othram Labs for advanced DNA analysis using investigative genetic genealogy, police said.

That analysis identified a likely suspect, who was confirmed through a voluntary DNA sample from a family member to be Ricky Lee Stallworth, police said.

Stallworth was a 27-year-old U.S. Air Force airman stationed at Hill Air Force Base in Layton, Utah, at the time of Gallegos’ murder, police said.

Police spoke with three of his four ex-wives and a friend before making contact with a child of his who provided a voluntary DNA sample that confirmed the match, according to retired Detective Cordon Parks.

There is no indication that he and Gallegos knew each other, and Stallworth’s name had never come up during the investigation, Parks said.

Detectives were unable to interview Stallworth, who died from natural causes in July 2023, months before he was identified as a possible suspect, police said.

“I wish we could have got to him before he died,” Parks said during a press briefing on Thursday announcing the closure of the cold case.

“Today, we can say with certainty that he was responsible for the death of Christine Gallegos,” Parks continued.

Stallworth was known to go out overnight and return in the morning “without explanation,” Parks said. In the last two years of his life, police reports showed that he had been associated with prostitutes, Parks said.

One of his ex-wives was “not surprised that we would be collecting his DNA” in a murder investigation, Parks said.

Gallegos’ mother, Leah Gallegos, remembered her daughter as “outgoing” and “sweet.”

“She was in love with her fiancé, Troy,” Leah Gallegos said during the press briefing. “They had a family planned.”

“I just know that I sure miss this girl every day. I wonder about the kids that she would have, and I watch other people with their daughters, their grandkids,” she said. “They took so much away when they took her away.”

Salt Lake City Police Chief Brian Redd credited the “determination of our homicide detectives” and the advances in forensic technology in allowing them to solve the case.

“I just want to reiterate our commitment to solving cold cases,” he said during the briefing.