On Easter Sunday, April 22, 1984, 14-year-old Caucasian female April Brunais and her friend, Leslie Shelley, also 14, were walking home together in Griswold, Connecticut. The two girls were kidnapped by Michael Bruce Ross, who offered them a ride but then drove them past their intended destination. When April attempted to threaten him with a knife to make him stop, Ross disarmed her and continued driving into Rhode Island.
At Beach Pond in Rhode Island, Ross bound both girls' hands and
feet. He then untied April's feet and forced her to walk a short distance away from his car, where he sexually assaulted her and then strangled her. After killing April, Ross returned to his car and killed Leslie. He then placed both of their bodies in the trunk of his car and drove back to Connecticut, where he dumped them in a culvert near Preston.
The investigation into the disappearances of April and Leslie, along with other similar cases in the area, eventually led police to Michael Bruce Ross, who became known as "The Roadside Strangler". Witness descriptions of a car seen in the area of another victim's abduction helped authorities identify Ross. After his arrest, Ross confessed to the murders of April Brunais, Leslie Shelley, and six other young women in Connecticut and New York between 1981 and 1984. He led investigators to the locations where he had disposed of the bodies of several of his victims, including April and Leslie.
Michael Bruce Ross was convicted of multiple murders, including those of April Brunais and Leslie Shelley. He was sentenced to death and, after years of appeals, was executed by the state of Connecticut on May 13, 2005.
