On a cold winter day in Chicago, the body of 44-year-old Margaret Gomez, a female victim of a suspected serial killer, was found in a desolate salvage yard. It was January 12, 2006, when police were called to the 4200 block of South Knox Avenue on the city’s Southwest Side. There, they discovered Ms. Gomez, who had been brutally strangled and was found partially clothed.
Her life had been taken, and her body left in a place far from the warmth and safety of a home.
Details about Margaret Gomez’s life are scarce. One account mentioned that she grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, but the public record holds little else about the woman she was. A comprehensive project by student journalists at Roosevelt University, which sought to tell the stories of dozens of women killed in a similar manner, was unable to connect with her family. What is known is that she was someone's daughter, and her life ended in a way that was violent, unjust, and remains unresolved. She is remembered as a human being who was loved and is deeply missed.
The investigation into Margaret’s murder soon revealed a terrifying pattern. Her death was not an isolated incident but one of a string of similar slayings that had been terrorizing the city for years. The method of killing—strangulation or asphyxiation—and the profile of the victims led investigators and researchers to believe a serial killer, or possibly multiple killers, was at large. This series of murders, which took place between 2001 and 2018, would come to be known as the work of the "Chicago Strangler."
The Murder Accountability Project, a nonprofit organization that analyzes homicide data, identified a cluster of at least 51 unsolved cases, including Margaret's, that bore striking resemblances. The victims were predominantly, though not exclusively, Black women, and their bodies were often discarded in alleys, abandoned buildings, garbage cans, and vacant lots, primarily on the city's South and West Sides. In total, as many as 75 murders from that period share the same grim characteristics.
Despite the clear pattern identified by outside experts and the pleas from community activists, the Chicago Police Department has historically been hesitant to officially link the cases or declare that a single serial killer was responsible. They have reviewed the cluster of 51 cases but have stated they found no definitive evidence connecting them all to one individual. This stance has been a source of frustration and pain for the families of the victims and the communities who fear a predator has been allowed to operate with impunity for nearly two decades.
To this day, Margaret Gomez's murder remains unsolved, another cold case file in a city with too many. There has been no justice for her and no answers for the loved ones she left behind. Her case, like the others, is a haunting reminder of the dozens of women whose lives were stolen in a similar, horrific fashion. While her story may be incomplete, her name is not forgotten, and she is counted among the many victims whose memories cry out for justice and a resolution that has yet to come.
