New Hope in Solving 30-year-old Corcoran Murder Mystery

By Joe Ybarra, KSEE News

January 1, 2013 Updated Jan 1, 2013 at 12:47 PM PDT

Denice Holm has trouble sharing 30 years of pain. It's too difficult for her to do on camera but you can hear it in her voice, "This is not the memories that we should have, these are not the memories that I wanted," she said while sifting through news clippings.

The news clippings are all she has left of her sister Carol Bella, 21 and her 3-year-old nephew Bobby. They were stabbed to death in November of 1982, in a small Corcoran home.

Denice asked, "Why did it have to happen? What was the reasoning behind it?"

Police have been trying to answer those questions. The Former Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger also tried to help in 2006, offering a $50,000 reward.

It wasn't enough to capture the killer but there is new hope now. According to a local paper, the Kings County Board of Supervisors has allocated $50,000 in state funding to help solve the case.

Bobby Bella, Carol's husband at the time and the younger Bobby's dad calls it a roller coaster of emotion, "It's driving everybody nuts, me my mom...Denice, the whole clan, everybody...something needs to be done...it's been too long."

In 2006, Police also named a person of interest but couldn't link him to the scene. That's where the state funding comes in. It could be used to finish analyzing old evidence, trace for DNA and maybe lead to an arrest.

Holm said, "We hope for that every day, that somebody is going to finally pay for what they've done."

She's waiting, hoping for closure and a chance to heal from three decades of pain.

Officials say forensic testing could take anywhere from six months to a year. If you have any information about this case, you should call Corcoran Police.

This murder is Corcoran's only unsolved murder.

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