The unsolved murder of The College of New Jersey student Sigrid Stevenson, which occurred nearly 50 years ago, was featured in a recent episode of a television show on Netflix that highlights the case and its impact on the college.
The killing is the subject of Unsolved Mysteries Volume 4, Episode 4 “Murder Center Stage.” The episode revisits the perplexities of the case, speaking to those who investigated it in the 1970s as well as the detectives who picked it up decades later.
The case was recently reopened by the N.J. Attorney General’s Cold Case Network.
In 1977, Stevenson was a 25-year-old graduate student at Trenton State College, now The College of New Jersey, in Ewing. The student was studying music and education, as she held a strong passion for music and performing, specifically playing the piano.
“When she would play the piano, a completely different side of her would emerge that was just calm and powerful,” Carol Edson, a friend of the Stevenson family, told Unsolved Mysteries in the episode.
On Sept. 3, 1977, Stevenson was playing the piano on the main stage of Kendall Hall at the college.
Kendall Hall offers a complete range of theatrical spaces, including the 814-seat Main Stage Theater, the 150-seat Don Evans Black Box Theater, dressing rooms, green rooms, and facilities for scenic and costume design.
Stevenson had been hiking through Nova Scotia that summer, and when she arrived on campus her room was not accessible, because the people she was staying with were on vacation.
She decided to stay in Kendall Hall for a few days while she waited for her roommates to return. She was sleeping in the building’s green room when students performing in a play arrived and she then had to move; however, she stayed at the hall and attended the play.
Stevenson was last seen alive the evening of Sept. 3, when the students in the play reported that she was friendly and in good spirits, but that her mood changed later and that she reported having an argument with a man.
The play and her interactions with students suggest that she was killed sometime after the play ended and everyone else left, but she was not found for an additional 24 hours.
On the evening of Sept. 4, Campus Police Officer Thomas Kokotajlo noticed a bike chained up outside of Kendall Hall. Since classes had not begun yet, this was unusual because students at the time did not routinely chain their bicycles up outside school buildings, especially on a Sunday night.
Following his suspicions, the officer decided to go into Kendall Hall and investigate. When he walked into the auditorium, he was met with the gruesome sight of Stevenson’s naked body lying on the stage in a pool of blood.
She was handcuffed and, according to reports, gagged with her own blouse, as well as wrapped in the piano cover. It was believed that she was also sexually assaulted.
“The deputy medical examiner determined Sigrid was beaten repeatedly with a blunt object and suffered bruises and lacerations to the head and body.
She also had symmetrical ligature marks on her wrists, which could have been from handcuffs. Sigrid was found wrapped in a piano blanket; despite the amount of blood at the scene, police didn’t find any footprints or fingerprints,” according to the TV show.
There were no witnesses and no one came forward with any information, so it was nearly impossible for the police to figure out what had happened to her. At the time, the technology did not exist to do DNA testing and the case went cold, though it has not been forgotten.
When the murder first occurred, there were very few suspects. Ewing Police learned that Stevenson had illegally stayed in many buildings on campus while she was a student there and that police officers were constantly chasing her away from places she wasn’t supposed to be.
Additionally, she had been bound using handcuffs before her death. These two facts led Ewing Police to suspect she had been killed by a member of law enforcement, but were never able to conclusively identify a suspect.
Police also suspected a student named Chuck, who had been one of the people participating in the play at the College on Sept. 3.
Chuck had been playing a police officer in the play, meaning he would have had handcuffs on him as a prop, and Stevenson had a playbill in her possession with his name circled and a note saying he was “a nice guy who gave her a beer.” However, Chuck passed a polygraph exam, which at the time ruled him out as a suspect.
Unsolved Mysteries mentioned new suspects that had not been considered during the original investigation in 1977.
One suspect was a maintenance man who worked for the College at the time and had keys to the building. It was found that Stevenson had his phone number among her possessions.
Additionally, he was fired shortly after the murder for unknown reasons, resulting in having never been asked by police to take a polygraph. Similarly, an employee who was in charge of lighting at the theater would have had a set of keys and could have turned the lights out during or after Stevenson’s murder.
On Sept. 17, 2024, the state Attorney General’s Cold Case Network re-opened and placed Stevenson’s case under investigation. The case was submitted as a candidate to the cold case effort jointly by the Ewing and TCNJ police departments about two years ago.
Since the episode’s release, the College has paid tributes to Stevenson. A bouquet of flowers was placed on the steps of Kendall Hall in September with a note taped to the glass that read: For Sigrid Stevenson, the stage is forever your world. Rest in Peace. 01/24/1952–09/04/1977.
In addition, the College has dedicated a piano practice room in its music building to her. A plaque is being installed outside the building’s entrance as part of the tribute.
“Though her murder remains unsolved, she should not be unknown,” said TCNJ President Michael Bernstein on the TCNJ website. “Sigrid was an extraordinarily talented member of the college community, we are committed to ensuring she is always remembered as such.”
Kendall Hall at The College of New Jersey was the scene of the 1977 murder of student Sigrid Stevenson.,
