Though most of my entries center around New Mexico, El Paso is often jokingly regarded as part of New Mexico. “New Mexico can have it,” some Texans say. There are a few older El Paso homicides from the 1960s that have captured my interest. So, join me for a change in scenery and let’s review these El Paso cases that remain unsolved all these years later!
In the late 50s and early 60s, several unsolved murders occurred. One couple simply disappeared without a trace. Was a thief targeting these people? Or was it a deranged person, looking for some kind of Robin Hood class justice?
The murders appeared to start with Ruby Louise Stephens. But before the pregnant Air Force was brutally strangled in her home, there was an even weirder case…the disappearance of the Pattersons!
William and Margaret Patterson
William D. Patterson owned Patterson Photo Supply. His wife, Margaret, was known as shy and an alcoholic. Not much was known about the couple prior to their lives in El Paso, beyond the fact they hailed from Chicago. The two lived on the 3000 block of Piedmont Drive in El Paso when they vanished without a trace on March 6, 1957. A friend of theirs, Cecil Ward, reported them missing five months later. It took so long because they had apparently told associates that they were going on a long vacation in Florida, which was common for them, as William Patterson loved deep sea fishing in Mexico and Florida. But if they did go to Florida, they never came back.
In the 6 decades since, the vacuum of information in their case has spawned outlandish rumors and theories, ranging from UFO abductions to William Patterson being a Russian spy. A prevailing theory is that William Patterson was a conman and his wife was in on it. This theory was started by William Patterson’s own father. While there is some compelling evidence supporting several of these theories, I think something else happened, something far more worldly and sinister.
The last night the couple was seen alive, they were not in a happy place. A neighbor came by on the evening of the 5th with Girl Scouts cookies. She claimed the couple was behaving oddly and Margaret appeared to have been crying. Feeling weird and unwelcome, she excused herself. She was the last person confirmed to have seen the couple alive. She later said that Margaret always seemed tiny and frail, and William always seemed unfriendly and mean.
They were never seen again.
When the couple vanished, they left all of their stuff behind. The house had no indication of violence or a struggle of any kind. A telegram soon arrived from Dallas, instructing the employees how to handle the photo supply store while the Pattersons were gone. Employees often handled business while William was out of town, but this telegram didn’t add up. The middle initial on the telegram was incorrect. The telegram couldn’t be traced, as back then telegram companies didn’t require photo ID to send messages.
An inquest was eventually made into their disappearance but it uncovered no indications of their whereabouts. Luther Patterson, William’s 75-year-old father, visited El Paso from Chicago to testify in the inquiry. He made the statement, “I always knew Pat and Margaret would take off like this someday, but I figured it to be four or five years away. They’re not dead. My boy has done things like this before. He made his living doing sleight-of-hand tricks.” However, later, he admitted that he believed the couple was dead. It was not like his son to go this long without contacting him.
William Patterson had a mistress, Estefana Arroyo Morfin. Patterson would go visit her in Juarez. She told police that when he last visited, he told her he had lots to tell her and that “When they come for me, I’ll have to leave in a hurry.” But later, for some unknown reason, she recanted this statement and professed total innocence in the case.
While all this points to the couple leaving of their own accord, there are also signs of foul play in the case. One notable sign of foul play was the fact that Margaret Patterson didn’t take her beloved cat, Tommy. She always took Tommy with her when she went on vacation. If the couple had chosen to disappear, they would surely have taken Tommy. But Tommy was found in the home after the couple went missing.
Also, a few months after the couple vanished, a suspicious letter arrived, instructing for Patterson’s property to be distributed between Doyle Kirland, a business associate of the couple; Herb Roth, his business auditor; and Art Moreno, a family friend who was only 24 at the time. One of the signatures on the letter seemed suspicious. Furthermore, police questioned why William Patterson would leave his estate to these associates instead of his living relatives.
I mentioned the neighbor with the Girl Scout cookies. While she’s the last person known to see them alive, some say that Doyle Kirkland was actually the last person to enter the Patterson home and see them alive before they vanished. He also had possible motive to gain the business and money from killing the couple.
Over the years, sightings poured in, especially in Mexico, where Patterson had owned property. Sightings also came from Colorado. Police were never able to confirm any of the sightings were of the Pattersons. The couple never contacted family or friends again. Given the way they had told people they were going on an extended trip to Florida, it could be they meant to disappear. But why?
Rumors of the Pattersons being Russian spies in the Cold War began to surface. Even Leo Samaniego, sheriff in El Paso County, believes they were spies. Allegedly, William Patterson was very interested in Fort Bliss, and loved taking pictures of the military base and train shipments entering and exiting the base. Considering he owned a photo shop, I think it is quite plausible he was just doing what he loved, photography. But this fueled rumors that he worked for the USSR and he returned there when his work was finished, or else he was killed by Russians for blowing his cover.
However, as I mentioned before, I think the couple was murdered. A disturbing tip came through in the 1980s. Reynaldo Nangaray, a former employee of the Pattersons, claimed he had found blood and a bit of scalp hanging off the rudder of Patterson’s boat, which was kept parked in Patterson’s garage. He cleaned it up and never went to police for fear he would get deported. He was undocumented at the time. He died a few years after giving this tip, and nothing came of his lead.
The 3000 Piedmont house has long had a reputation as the “haunted house” of El Paso. Some think the Pattersons were killed there; some even think they were buried on the property, though their remains have never been found despite extensive searches of the property. A psychic did a paranormal investigation in the home and recorded the spirit of a woman screaming. She said she could not confirm if this woman was Margaret Patterson. While I don’t put much stock in that stuff, it does support the theory that something bad happened to the couple. Or maybe just to Margaret – maybe William killed her and fled.
Viewing William Patterson’s photo unsettles me. He seems creepy. His father said he was a shyster; the neighbor said he was mean and unfriendly. He cheated on Margaret and she drank due to unhappiness. They were fighting on the 5th. I think he killed her, possibly by accident and probably in the garage. I think he shoved her and she hit her head on the rudder, hence why Reynaldo Nangaray found the scalp and blood there. William Patterson then hid her body somewhere really well in the desert and vanished, as his father said he had in the past. He may also have been planning this murder, hence why he told Estefana Morfin that he would have to leave in a hurry. She did recant that statement, but c’mon, why would you lie about that initially? He also sent the suspicious letter and telegram himself to make the disappearance look like foul play.
Another viable option is murder by Doyle Kirkland. Business associates have been known to murder their partners in the past. He was able to gain control of the business from this, giving him motive. Who knows where he hid both bodies, but there are vast expanses of desert around El Paso, where disappearing a body isn’t too hard. He also knew the house and knew the couple, making it easy to access their home and kill them.
Ruby Louis Stephens
Ruby Louis Stephens was pregnant and recently wed to an Air Force sergeant, James Stephens. Her husband returned home from work on August 31, 1966, to find her on her back on the floor, a telephone cord wrapped so tightly around her neck that the firefighters had extreme difficulty cutting it off.
James Stephens had worked the overnight shift overseeing quarters on Fort Bliss Army Base. He spoke to Ruby on the phone around 8:20 pm and all seemed well. Three soldiers who were friends of his also stopped by that evening and spoke to Ruby. When James Stephens came home at 6:30 am, he was puzzled to find the front door unlocked. He entered the home and found his wife dead. She was wearing only the top part of a negligee, with the bottoms missing.
It is thought she may have been killed around 1 am. That’s when a neighbor reported hearing a woman screaming, “Please stop! What do you want?” Then there was an eerie silence and about 20 minutes later, a car door slammed and the car sped off into the night.
No one knows why this was done to poor Ruby. She was eighteen and pregnant. She didn’t have any known enemies. Originally from Cloudcroft, there was nothing about her life or her acquaintances that indicated why she was murdered.
At first, this seems like a robbery gone wrong. A person may have been casing the place for a while and may have known that Ruby was home alone at night. The use of the phone cord suggests this was not a premeditated murder, but rather he was interrupted in the act. According to the El Paso Times, though, robbery was ruled out. Nothing was missing from the home and the couple was far from rich.
Sexual assault also seems like a likely motive since her bottoms were missing. But the newspaper claims that she had not been raped. I’m no expert but I have heard of cases where rape was missed. Especially back then with less advanced technology, it could be she actually was raped and it was overlooked.
One thing cops noticed was that a kitchen window screen was missing, suggesting that was the entry way for the intruder. However, there was a sink full of dishes directly beneath the window and they were undisturbed. A tip came in from a neighbor, claiming she saw a man removing the window screen at some unspecified time, not that night. This and the unlocked door indicate that Ruby may have known the killer and willingly let him in.
The way she screamed, “Please stop! What do you want?” does not sound to me like she interrupted a robbery in progress. If I interrupted someone robbing me, I would probably just start screaming, “Help!” or “Get out!”. Instead, it sounds like she was with someone who started to do something she didn’t like. The way her negligee bottoms were missing suggest this may have been a consensual tryst with a lover that turned ugly. Or the person came by to talk and started puting the moves on her, upsetting her.
Cops questioned the three soldiers who visited her earlier and cleared them. But I think those men deserve another look. It could be one or all of them returned later in the night, knowing Ruby was alone and vulnerable.
El Paso Cold Case Unit Detective, Michael Aman, says that there is a lot of evidence in the case which has been remarkably well-preserved. So it could still be solved. DNA comparisons to the three soldiers, or their surviving family members if they are now deceased, might just close this case. Forensic genealogy might also be able to pinpoint the perpetrator based on his family tree.
But as of now, Ruby’s case lays cold in a series of files and evidence boxes. Her husband has since died, never finding out who killed his wife and unborn child. This death was particularly troubling for police as leads never led anywhere. Furthermore, they were inundated with work because five other gruesome homicides occurred that very week. One was the gruesome quadruple homicide, committed by Leopoldo Morales. Morales killed his landlord and landlady Mr. and Mrs. Mearse, and his neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Artz. He then set fire to the apartment complex where they lived to hide evidence. He was found unconscious from smoke inhalation on the apartment steps and a tenant of the complex named him as the suspect. That case was open and shut and Morales got the death sentence.
The other was the weird murder of Ruth Gatis Holland.
Ruth Gatis Holland
On September 7, 1966, a maid came to her shift at Ruth Gatis Holland’s home. She was alarmed to find the house in complete disarray. An electric clock had been ripped from the wall. Drawers from Holland’s dresser had been pulled out and dumped out on the floor. Most worrying of all, there was no sign of Holland or her car, but there were bloodstains on the hall floor and a strange Mustang in the driveway.
The maid promptly reported her employer missing.
When cops visited her home, they found bloodstains in the bedroom and hallway. They also found that the clock that had been ripped from the wall was stopped at 3:45. The Mustang in the driveway had been reported stolen by a local dealership. Neighbors said it had been there since the previous afternoon, when it arrived around 4 pm (more likely 3 or shortly thereafter, since that’s when the electric clock stopped). It is unclear when Holland’s car went missing.
Investigators promptly went on a hunt for Ruth Holland’s gold Cadillac sedan. They found the car at the El Paso International Airport at 3:15 pm, and learned it had been there since about 10 am that morning. The engine was off but the air conditioner was left running, likely to delay decomposition and odor. Investigators opened the trunk and there lay the body of Ruth Gatis Holland. The woman had been bound with the electric clock cord and heavy string, and gagged with a towel. She had been severely beaten with a fist and her lip was split open, her eyes were blacked out, and blood streamed from her nose and mouth. She was wearing red slacks and a flower print blouse, with no evidence of sexual assault. Her body was wrapped in a blanket and stuffed around the spare tire.
A nearby dealership reported the Mustang missing when the traveling businessman who picked it up for a test drive didn’t return it. They described the man as Italian, six feet tall, neatly dressed, with dark curly hair and a dark heavy beard. He said he worked for NASA and was currently working at White Sands Missile Range. He didn’t provide ID, but he gave a name. This all turned out to be fake information.
Holland was a wealthy matriarch from a prominent Lower Valley family. She was also the widow of Park Holland and lived alone. She was known to keep both cash and jewelry in her bedroom. Since the cash and jewelry were both missing from the home, it appeared that the motive for this was robbery. While that is a pretty common motive for murder, the way this man stole the car for a test drive is odd. I think it offers a clue about how premeditated this was. Even if he didn’t specifically target Ruth Holland, he stole the car in order to remain unidentified as he scouted wealthy, vulnerable houses. I personally think he targeted Ruth Hollan specifically because he probably knew her in some capacity. At the very least, he knew that she lived alone and had lots of cash and jewelry in her bedroom.
The other odd thing about the case is how the man felt the need to put her body in her car trunk and dump it at the airport. Why didn’t he just leave her in her house? That’s what happens in most robberies gone wrong. It appears that he needed her car to get to the airport to get away. He knew the Mustang was now hot and the Cadillac wasn’t. It could be that he caught a flight at the airport from there, vanishing into the ether. But why didn’t he just leave her body at the home and steal the car?
Could it be that he had other intentions? Maybe he wanted her alive and he was taking somewhere to torture her or he was bringing her to someone. He didn’t count on her dying beforehand. The way he wrapped her in a blanket challenges that theory, though. The other likely possibility is that he wanted to delay the discovery of her body as long as possible to allow him to get away.
Since her car didn’t show up at the airport until 10 am the 7th but it wasn’t there when the maid arrived to work that morning, that suggests this man drove around for a while with her body in the trunk. The car was brand new but already had 2500 miles on the speedometer. How much of that was from him driving around?
Or it could be that he spent the night in Holland’s house with her body before deciding to load it in the trunk and take off in the morning before the maid arrived. Both scenarios are pretty ballsy, with a significant risk of getting caught. This man also didn’t mind showing his face at the dealership and leaving the stolen Mustang at the scene of the crime so it could be linked to him. This all suggests he was confident he was going to get away and never be seen again.
I highly doubt he was local. Not only was he not afraid of being recognized, but there also is not a large Italian population in the area. It seems he was able to vanish, probably on a flight, and never returned that we know of.
It honestly seems personal. Like he knew her and decided to kill her and staged a robbery. The paper speculates that she likely knew him. This is because they think the clock may have stopped at 3:45 am, not 3:45 pm, but his car was there since 4 pm. So he came to her home, she let him in, and they spent hours together before she met with violence. The way he dumped her body was also more personal than just a robbery gone wrong. Like he had some reason to put her in her trunk and take her elsewhere.
I noted that Holland’s son-in-law was the executive of the Sunland Park Race Track. Sketchy things go on at racetracks. Was this man a member of the Italian mob? Did he have dealings with the racetrack, and thus the family, that maybe veered into dark territory?
Cops did get latent fingerprints from the car. I wonder if these could be compared to the database again?
Stacy and Evelyn Brookins
Now we jump to 1968. This is when an affluent couple, the Brookins, were shot and killed in their home. IT is thought they were targeted by a burglar and interrupted him in the act. Stacy L. Brookins was found dead on June 23, 1968. His wife, Evelyn, lay nearby, still alive, but she passed on a few hours later at Providence Hospital.
The couple were lounge owners and their daughter-in-law became concerned when they didn’t open the Jade Lounge on Monday the 24. She visited the home, only to find the Monday paper still on the lawn and their car still in the driveway. She went around back and found panes missing from the kitchen window and the French doors leading to her father-in-law’s office off the patio. The back door was wide open. She ran to a neighbor’s and called family members and police instead of entering the home alone.
Police entered and found the couple shot. There were signs of a significant struggle, including lamps upended and smashed and Stacy Brookins’s glasses lying broken on the red carpet near him. The couple had fought for their lives before being shot.
There were a few other odd clues at the scene. The intruder had stuck tape to the kitchen window to prevent the sound of falling glass as they broke in, yet they didn’t bother to do this on the French door panes. Footprints indicate they had approached the back gate at a leisurely pace and entered through the unlocked gate, yet then they jumped over the gate and fled at a fast pace, breaking several plants in the process. Tire tracks in the alley behind the home showed the murderer entered a waiting vehicle and took off quickly. Neighbors reported a car had been parked in the alley that evening. A neighbor also said her dog had been upset at midnight, suggesting that is when this happened.
The Brookins had been burglarized a year prior. The thief took cash and small appliances. Maybe they came back for more? Then the couple interrupted them and they opened fire and fled. It doesn’t appear premeditated – more like a robbery gone wrong. This case has never been solved.
Pattersons: