FOUR cold case murders are solved after 40 years as cops link victims to notorious American serial killer
Decades after four Canadian women were mysteriously murdered, officials have linked their deaths to a notorious American serial killer and sex offender.
Gary Allen Srery, a convicted rapist, has been identified as the killer of Alberta’s Eva Dvorak, 14, Patricia McQueen, 14, Melissa Rehorek, 20, and Barbara MacLean, 19, in the 1970s.
The American fugitive who hid in Canada from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s died in 2011 after being sentenced to life in a state prison in Idaho.
Srery was identified as the killer through sophisticated DNA analysis of semen found at the scene and criminal databases – which ultimately linked all four victims to him.
Gary Allen Srery, a notorious American serial killer and convicted rapist, has been linked to the deaths of four women
Clockwise from top left: Eva Dvorak, 14, Patricia McQueen, 14, Barbara MacLean, 19, and Melissa Rehorek, 20, were all killed by Srery
Alberta RCMP historical murder investigators announced they had “conclusively” determined Srery was responsible for the murders.
“Between February 1976 and February 1977, four young women were found deceased outside of Calgary, Alberta. Their murders remained unsolved for fifty years.
‘As of 2024, all four murders have been linked to one serial killer,’ RCMP officials say said Today.
Authorities believe all the killings were sexually motivated and there may be more victims.
Authorities believe all the killings were sexually motivated and there may be more victims
Staff Sergeant Travis McKenzie, head of the RCMP’s Historic Homicide Unit in Alberta said at a press conference: ‘He has a consistent pattern of regularly committing sex crimes (in the US), getting charged and convicted.
“And then when he comes to Canada, it’s almost like he disappears. So our biggest concern is that there are more victims out there that we don’t know about.
‘It hurts us that he is dead. I would like nothing more than to stand here in front of you and tell you that we have put handcuffs on this man.
“But unfortunately that’s not the way this one ends.”
According to Alberta RCMP Inspector Breanne Brown, Srery used nine different aliases during his lifetime and frequently changed his appearance, residence and vehicles through illegal identification.
The bodies of Dvorak and McQueen, both ninth-graders at Ian Bazalgette Junior High School in Calgary, were found in February 1976 under the Happy Valley Viaduct, about a mile outside the city.
Investigators were unable to determine the cause cause of death for both teens.
Rehorek’s fully clothed body was found in a ditch along a dirt road about 20 kilometers west of Calgary on September 16, 1976. The police determined that she had been strangled.
MacLean was also found fully clothed and strangled next to a dirt road near 80th Avenue and 6th Street in Calgary on February 26, 1977.
According to Alberta RCMP Inspector Breanne Brown, Srery used nine different aliases during his lifetime and frequently changed his appearance, residence and vehicles through illegal identification.