Boys fishing found 10-year-old girl dead in 1966. Now an arrest is made, officials say
A group of boys were fishing in the river when they found the body of a missing 10-year-old girl. She had been badly beaten and was covered in mud.
It was Memorial Day, 1966.
Betty Lou Zukowski’s body was spotted off shore four days after her parents reported her missing when she didn’t come home one evening, according to the Hampden County District Attorney’s Office.
It was determined Betty Lou was murdered, and that she may have known her killer, the office says. After her body was found near the Westfield River in West Springfield, a search for a suspect ensued before the “case went cold.”
Now, more than 56 years later, a man has been arrested in connection with her killing, the office announced in a Nov. 3 news release.
Donald Raymond Mars, 73, of Bedford, faces a first-degree murder charge, according to the office. He appeared in court for an arraignment on Nov. 3 after his arrest on Nov. 2.
“Sadly, Betty Lou’s parents are deceased and will not see Donald Mars answer for what we allege he did to their daughter,” Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni said in a statement. “My office has been in contact with Betty Lou’s extended family members, one of whom was a pallbearer at her funeral in 1966.”
Attorney information for Mars was not immediately available.
“While this investigation will not bring Betty Lou back to her family, or grant her the opportunity to grow into a healthy adult that she and every child deserves, it is for them and for Betty Lou that we embark upon this journey of seeking justice,” Gulluni said.
Mars is a level 3 registered sex offender in Massachusetts, according to the Sex Offender Registry Board. He would have been age 17 at the time of Betty Lou’s murder.
The case of Betty Lou’s murder was revisited after the district attorney’s office established its Unresolved Cases Unit, the release says. In 1997, investigators received several tips linking Mars to the murder, but an arrest was not made, prosecutors say.
However, “over the last year, Betty Lou’s murder became a more intense focus,” according to the release. A case was built against Mars in recent months, but the office didn’t specify what exactly linked him to Betty Lou’s killing.
Betty Lou goes missing
On May 26, 1966, Betty Lou left home after telling her mother she received a phone call from a friend, according to the district attorney’s office.
Her family never saw her again.
“Investigators believed Betty Lou knew the person who killed her, otherwise she would not have left her home after receiving the phone call on Thursday night,” the release says.
It was believed that Betty Lou met up with her killer, before she was beaten and discarded near the Westfield River, according to the release.
She died from several blunt force injuries to her head, a skull fracture and drowning, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner discovered, the release says.
Betty Lou’s funeral was held on her 11th birthday on June 2, 1966. Students from her fifth grade class at Valentine School in Chicopee were in attendance, according to the district attorney’s office.
“I cannot promise that we can solve every case, but I can and do promise that we will make every possible effort, and never forget,” Gulluni said.
West Springfield, where Betty Lou’s body was found, is about 90 miles west of Boston.
This story was originally published November 3, 2022 at 4:40 PM with the headline "Boys fishing found 10-year-old girl dead in 1966. Now an arrest is made, officials say."
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