In the autumn of 1980, the life of a 15-year-old girl named Stephanie Ann Bauman came to a tragic and mysterious end in Arapahoe County, Colorado. A White female, Stephanie was a resident of a local group home, a place for troubled youths. Two weeks prior to her death, she made the decision to run away, seeking refuge with various acquaintances in the days that followed.
Her attempt to find a different path would ultimately lead her to a desolate end.
On the morning of October 28, 1980, a driver traveling along a rural road five miles south of U.S. 36 made a grisly discovery. In a ditch lay the nude and bruised body of a young woman, later identified as Stephanie. Investigators from the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office were called to the scene. While the immediate cause of her death was determined to be hypothermia from exposure to the cold, the circumstances strongly suggested a violent struggle had preceded it. Adding to the mystery, her clothes were found in a neat pile nearly a mile away from where her body was discovered.
The investigation into Stephanie's death has spanned decades, yet it remains an unsolved cold case. Law enforcement has collected DNA evidence, but it has not yet led to the identification of a suspect. The Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office continues to seek information from the public, holding out hope that someone may yet come forward with the key to unlocking this long-standing mystery. No arrests have ever been made in connection with her death, and the identity of the person or persons responsible for leaving a 15-year-old girl to die alone in a ditch remains unknown. Her case is sometimes mentioned in connection with other unsolved homicides in the Denver metro area from that time, raising the chilling possibility that her death may have been the work of a serial killer.
