On This Day in History: December 20

Jonelle Matthews disappears

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On December 20, 1984, 12-year-old Jonelle Matthews disappeared from her home in Greeley, Colorado. Her remains were found 35 years later, and a Republican politician was indicted for her murder.

--On This Day in History, Shit Went Down: December 20, 1984--

Jonelle was a member of her middle school choir and was performing at a holiday concert in Denver. Her father was attending a basketball game for his other daughter, and her mother was out of town caring for Jonelle’s sick grandfather. She caught a ride from a friend, arriving home at 8:15 p.m.

Jonelle’s father arrived home at 9:30. The garage door was open, and his daughter’s shoes were still at home, but she wasn’t. Her father called police. Jonelle was adopted as a baby, and for a time Jonelle’s birth mother was a suspect. Her disappearance was national news. President Reagan mentioned her in a speech a few months later. She was declared legally dead in 1994. Continues below …

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Pipeline excavators discovered Jonelle’s body 15 miles from her home in July of 2019. Three weeks later Greeley detectives traveled to Twin Falls, Idaho to speak with Steven Pankey, but he refused to talk. A month later Pankey, who had lived a couple of miles from Jonelle’s house at the time of her disappearance, was named a person of interest in the murder. He was officially arrested and charged a year later.

Since moving to Idaho, Pankey had unsuccessfully run for that state’s governor as a Constitution Party candidate in 2014 and for the Republican primary in 2018. How did police so quickly ascertain Pankey as the prime suspect? Because he’d been fucking telling them he’d done it for years.

In 1977 he was charged with the rape of a woman who worked at the same church as him, but the charges were later dismissed. He also had numerous other brushes with the law. This goes to showing he’s a piece of shit, your honor. Being a piece of shit doesn’t mean he did it, but the criminal indictment shares a lot of details that reveal police almost certainly knew he was guilty by his not-so-subtle proclamations over the years, but without a body they couldn’t press charges.

Jonelle was killed by a gunshot wound to the head, and Pankey owned a gun in 1984. That’s circumstantial as all shit, but the rest isn’t. His now ex-wife testified that not only was Pankey abusive, but he acted odd as fuck around the time of the disappearance, showing tremendous interest in the case. More important is that he made numerous statements in legal proceedings over the years referencing Jonelle. He said the family should give up hope that she was alive. He offered to reveal the location of the body in exchange for immunity. He said the case would never be solved without a deal. His alibi was full of holes. And most damning is he admitted to knowing things about the crime scene that were never publicly revealed.

His 2021 trial was declared a mistrial. As of writing prosecutors are pursuing a new trial.

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