New Kansas City, Kansas, police chief hopes to create cold case unit in 2022

Luke Nozicka
·2 min read

Karl Oakman, recently sworn in as police chief in Kansas City, Kansas, said Tuesday he hopes to create a cold case unit next year.

In a statement, Oakman said he proposed the idea in May when he was interviewing to become the next chief of the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department. He was sworn in earlier this month.

“I am currently evaluating staffing and am working towards a plan for a cold case unit sometime in 2022, once staffing allows,” said Oakman, who previously served as a deputy chief across the state line in the Kansas City Police Department.

Oakman’s statement came after Justice for Wyandotte, a social justice group, on Tuesday called for the creation of such a unit during a rally at One McDowell Plaza across the street from the Wyandotte County courthouse.

Some of the about 20 supporters gathered there held signs with the names of victims whose homicides have remained unsolved for years, including 39-year-old Rose Calvin, who was killed in 1996.

As of Tuesday afternoon, nearly 120 people had signed Justice for Wyandotte’s online petition demanding that the police department create a unit to look at cold cases. The group has also before called for an independent task force to investigate the large number of cases of mostly Black women in Kansas City, Kansas, whose homicides have never been solved.

“I knew these women personally,” Niko Quinn, whose sister, Stacy Quinn, was murdered in 2000, said at Tuesday’s rally, according to a FOX4 livestream of the event. “We need accountability.”

In March, the FBI offered a reward of $50,000 for information in one such killing: the 1998 murder of 33-year-old Rhonda Tribue. She had been living in Kansas City, Kansas, and was found dead in the 500 block of South 94th Street near Edwardsville.

Nancy Chartrand, a police spokesman, said to put things in perspective, about 10% of U.S. police departments have a dedicated cold case unit, so it is not “unusual” for Kansas City, Kansas, to not have one today.

Community activists said such a unit is needed in Wyandotte County’s largest police force.

“These people are people,” Quinn said of the victims. “They are human. They have loved ones.”