Miyaka Pollack

Miyaka Pollack, a 33-year-old Japanese-American woman and mother of two, was brutally murdered in her home at 145-22 14th Avenue in the Whitestone section of Flushing, Queens, New York, in May 1969. Although her death is frequently listed as May 8, 1969, a contemporary newspaper article published that day reported that her body had been discovered the previous day, May 7. Miyaka lived with her husband, Sam Pollack, and their two young children in a three-room apartment behind the family's air-conditioning business. The couple had been married for approximately ten years and had moved to Whitestone from Woodside, Queens, only three months before the tragedy. Their seemingly ordinary family life was shattered when Miyaka became the victim of a violent sexual assault and homicide inside the building where she lived.

On the morning of the murder, Miyaka's husband, Sam, who operated the Sam Pollack Air Conditioning Company, reportedly left their residence at approximately 9:30 a.m. to perform an air-conditioning job in Manhattan. Their two children, seven-year-old Dina and five-year-old Neil, were attending Public School 79, located approximately a block and a half from their home near 147th Street and 15th Avenue. Around noon, Dina returned home for lunch but could not locate her mother. An electrician named Joseph Goldstein, who had arrived at the apartment shortly after noon to perform work, reportedly helped the child search for Miyaka. During that search, Goldstein discovered her body in the basement near the family's washing machine. What began as an ordinary school day had become an unimaginable tragedy for the Pollack family.

Investigators found Miyaka lying face up on the basement floor, completely unclothed, with her hands bound behind her back. She had been sexually assaulted, stabbed six times, and strangled with a clothesline. The combination of injuries indicated an exceptionally violent attack. Police also discovered that her wallet was missing, raising the possibility that robbery had accompanied the sexual assault and murder. However, the available reports do not establish whether theft was the attacker's primary motivation or an additional crime committed during the assault. The circumstances suggested that Miyaka had been confronted inside the building while her husband was working and her children were away at school.

Detectives examined the layout of the residence and adjoining commercial property to reconstruct how the assailant might have entered and escaped. Police believed the murderer had entered either through the air-conditioning store at the front of the building or through an unlocked rear door. Investigators theorized that the attacker then descended an interior staircase into the basement, where Miyaka was surprised and overpowered. A separate basement entrance accessible from a communal driveway behind the row of single-story apartments and storefronts was reportedly locked. This detail was significant because it helped investigators narrow the possible routes the killer could have used to reach the basement. Nevertheless, the published information does not establish precisely how the attacker gained entry, whether Miyaka knew the individual, or whether the encounter was planned or opportunistic.

The murder attracted attention because of its brutality and the circumstances surrounding the discovery. Miyaka was described in contemporary reporting as a petite woman, approximately five feet one inch tall and weighing around 110 pounds. Her family lived in a largely residential neighborhood within walking distance of the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge. The commercial portion of the area was relatively limited, with a small stretch of businesses between Parsons Boulevard and 145th Place. The violent killing of a mother inside her own residence, during daylight hours and while her children were attending school nearby, underscored the vulnerability of a family that had only recently settled into the neighborhood.

Queens authorities investigated the homicide, and Assistant District Attorney Anthony Lombardino was identified in contemporary reporting as an official familiar with aspects of the family's background. Investigators had the crime scene, the victim's injuries, the missing wallet, and the building's possible entry points to examine. However, the publicly available accounts provide limited information about the subsequent investigation. No verified reports were located identifying a person formally charged with Miyaka's murder, an arrest directly connected to the killing, or any resulting criminal trial or conviction. Although the circumstances have been documented in historical cold-case records, there is no substantiated evidence in the available material establishing that a particular individual or known serial offender was responsible. Any proposed connection to other murders remains speculative without confirmation from investigators or reliable case records.

More than five decades after Miyaka Pollack's death, the publicly documented circumstances surrounding her murder continue to leave important questions unanswered. The identity of the person who entered the family's residence, sexually assaulted her, and took her life has not been established in the available reports. Her killing devastated a young family, leaving behind a husband and two children whose ordinary lives were permanently altered by the violence. The case remains a disturbing example of an apparently unsolved homicide in which the brutality of the crime and the circumstances of its discovery are known, but the identity and ultimate fate of the perpetrator remain uncertain.