Only on 10: Police reopen cold case from 1969

SOUTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. — One of Rhode Island's oldest unsolved murder cases was reopened on Tuesday.

The death of a Providence teenager has been unsolved since 1969.

All these years later, several persons of interest have been identified as possible suspects.

The badly-decomposed body of 16-year-old Louise McMillen was found off Broad Rock Road in South Kingstown on July 8, 1969.

She and her family lived on Providence's East Side and had a summer home at Bonnet Shores in Narragansett.

McMillen left the summer home June 17 that year to return some clothing she had purchased at Kenyon's Department Store in Wakefield. Earlier, her car -- a blue Buick Skylark -- had been found abandoned on Oak Dell Street in South Kingstown. Police found one suspicious and unidentified fingerprint on the steering wheel.

Due to the heinous nature of the crime, the case got attention from the top state investigators of the era.

"All physical evidence, including a knife found at the scene, has been forwarded to the Federal Bureau of Investigation," said then Rhode Island Attorney General Herbert Desimone. "And chemical tests and tissue analyses are underway at the time."

But the testing of the era did not lead to the apprehension of a suspect, and the case remained unsolved.

But about six years ago, the victim's younger brother asked police to reopen the case.

DNA testing, which was not available in 1969, was done on items found at the murder scene, including McMillen's clothing, purse and jewelry.

Earlier this year, two South Kingstown police officers viewed NBC 10 News footage from 1969, as they narrowed their investigation to multiple persons of interest based on new evidence they developed.

That led to an announcement Tuesday afternoon about reopening the case, in hopes of jogging the memories of people who may know something about the incident.

If you have any information, call South Kingstown police at 401-783-3321.