Who Killed Patricia Shea? An Investigation

On the night of July 25, 1982, Patricia "Pat" Shea — a beloved physician's assistant from Rockaway Beach, Queens — crossed the street to check on an elderly neighbor. She was found strangled eleven miles away in Brooklyn's Prospect Park the next day. More than four decades later, no one has ever been charged.

In this episode, we speak exclusively with Kevin Shea, Pat's nephew, who has spent decades pushing for answers — filing FOIA requests, tracking missing evidence, and keeping his aunt's memory alive. He shares new details never before reported: a forensic finding that reframes where the crime may have occurred, a revelation about three men on the floor that night and a polygraph that was never given, and the truth about what police actually found when they investigated the mysterious anonymous letter that arrived at a local newsroom in 2021.

For the full investigative report — including a complete case file, crime timeline, and tip line information — visit TheColdCases.com.

If you have any information about the murder of Patricia Shea, contact the NYPD Cold Case Homicide Squad at 212-239-2256.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

We have Kevin Shea, who is the nephew of Pat of Pat Shea, who was killed, who was strangled in the summer of 1982, and we're talking to him about her cold case. So uh Kevin, what was Pat Shea like?

SPEAKER_01 0:21

So Pat Shea, last name is Pan Shea. Um she was uh the nicest person I remember. Um also uh tough, she grew up in Rockaway um with my father. Uh their children, uh siblings together, and they grew up um in in Rockaway Beach. Um both born in Massachusetts, but shortly after that their father had a stroke, so they grew up there. So she was a very kind person uh and very engaged in the community of Rockaway Beach.

SPEAKER_00 0:57

Can you set the the can you tell me how this case came about? Like tell i if you don't mind. I I know the details, but I just want to hear from you how you think this came about, you know, the the timeline and all that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Do you want me to go through the timeline?

SPEAKER_00 1:17

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Sure. So um she was upstate on she left Friday night with a friend, and he's referred to as the boyfriend, but they were just friends, and that's confirmed, um to go to a reunion. Uh I believe it was his union, but um I'm not sure if it was she was going to her reunion or not. I'm we're not really sure about that, but she came back that Sunday with him. Um she had stayed at his sister's place that well that weekend, and then when they came back on Sunday, uh it was between 10:30 and 11 o'clock. Um, and he uh my my aunt worked for the doctor in the building, the same building, Dr. Boggiano. Um, and uh due to that she was very aware of you know uh what it may look like uh if uh she was seen with a man. So he asked she asked him to drop her off at the side door, uh, which she did. She went in that side door of the building of 10710 uh Shrofront Parkway, and uh he went to park his car on the other side of a street in a lot because there weren't any spots in the front. Um she went up to her apartment, left the door open, came back down, um, unlocked, came back down and was going across the street to go care for um Agnes Aggie um across the street at 10620. Uh that's their two buildings, very identical, uh, within a hundred yards of each other. Um she she met the friend as she was coming out of her building and heading towards the other building. She told him that's what she was doing. So this is now around 11 o'clock, 1110. Um she enters the building. She is seen entering the building at that time by herself and heading toward the stairwell um at that time. So it's confirmed that that is the last time she is seen by anybody who was interviewed.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

And you you don't believe that she even made uh I think you said you don't believe she even made it to Agnes' house. Um is that right?

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Yeah, I mean these these are this there's a lot of apartments in these buildings, uh in these buildings. I don't she either was there very briefly or not at all. And the reason why I can say that is that Agnes's apartment was not considered a crime scene. In other words, there was no evidence of anything broken, any blood of any type, anything like that. Agnes had a disability from having a severe stroke.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Yeah, and she uh she apparently had dementia, it seems like.

SPEAKER_01 4:19

Yeah, yeah, they think it was mainly from the stroke, but she had multiple things going on that kept her from being able to communicate, uh, kept her from being able to, you know, be cognitive, uh, be aware cognitively.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

And she's mentioned a lot in other articles as though she's seen a blond man or something like that. And we really can't even take into account, you know, what she says because she was messed up basically. She had a disability.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

Yeah, and also when she was, you know, she she didn't come out with that information the first time she was approached. They had put detectives in her room for multiple days at a time to see if she would speak on the to on the subject. Um she would just blur things out once in a while on different occasions. So it's difficult to put her words to anything specific.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Yeah, and uh some weird things have happened in your case, like the the um, and you don't have to talk about this if you don't want to, but you know, the the evidence going missing and and the the letter from somebody that said, you know, uh a letter in 2021 that said, oh, we know who did it, it was a cop or something like that. Uh I could talk to both.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

Um the evidence going missing, so I have I have a FOIL request out for that. I I published it on the uh on my Facebook page. The the FOIL request is public um to find the clothing and other objects she was wearing at the time. There's also a man's shirt found at the scene. That was also amongst the things that were um there. Um that evidence, um there have been various stories that we call them about what happened to the evidence. There have been things that have happened to evidence locations like flooding and things like that, but in this particular case, right now, the last word is it just can't be found. There is no evidence necessarily saying that the evidence has been destroyed by a flood. So I am still pursuing that. I'm also pursuing the record handling, um, the sequence of record handling, uh, the chain of custody on the evidence to follow the last people that that moved the evidence. Uh, regarding the letter, the letter was disproven. Um, the person who wrote the letter was approached by police as well, and uh it was not credible whatsoever. The person who was accused was interviewed. Uh he's an ex-police detective, and um he did not do this. This is a a family person or an ex-friend of the family who had a grudge up against him.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

And and another thing is they said they interviewed somebody who, quote, had blonde hair as a suspect. I I don't know when, but but that was based on Agnes' testimony. Um, I don't know, is that suspect even really considered or or like what happened with that guy?

SPEAKER_01 7:33

I can say that there were three people on the floor at the time that were interviewed. Um I can also say that two of those people were polygraphed and passed and one person was not polygraphed.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

Okay, did he refuse?

SPEAKER_01 7:58

Not that I know of.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

Okay. And uh what do you well another question I have is there were let me see here, there were three or four people strangled and three or four people, women, strangled in the summer of nineteen eighty-two. Do you think they have any connection?

SPEAKER_01 8:17

I don't believe so. Um there was no there's no evidence pointing to a connection. There were unfortunately back in 1982, between you know, the early eighties, there were a substantial number of murders relative to what there are today. So um to put things to perspective, there were I think there were twenty five hundred and three thousand murders in New York City that year.

SPEAKER_00 8:41

So Okay.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Where what do you think?