'Justice needs to be served,' victim's sister says

WOODS CROSS — Coco Saltzgiver used to call the police and pester detectives for any new information in her sister's murder.

"When you lose somebody you love so much, it leaves a hole in your heart," she said Tuesday.

Saltzgiver was thrilled to learn that Woods Cross police have now reopened the case into Karin Strom's murder nearly 27 years after she was strangled inside her home.

"Justice needs to be served for Karin," Saltzgiver said, tearing up at a news conference Tuesday at the Woods Cross Police Department. Investigators are breathing life into the cold case, hoping that advances in technology and fresh eyes among detectives will help catch the killer.

"We have DNA evidence that couldn't be analyzed then that can be analyzed now," said Woods Cross Police Sgt. Brad Benson.

At the time of the crime in June 1980, police saved fingernail clippings and hair samples. Those samples have now been sent off to a lab for testing, with results due back in 45 to 60 days.

Saltzgiver also put out a plea for any witnesses from that time to come forward to police again.

"You don't heal over time. You just learn to live with it," she said. "I just want, for Karin, justice to be done."

Witnesses have already started to come forward. Woods Cross police confirmed that a man stepped forward with information after reading in Tuesday's edition of the Deseret Morning News about the case being reopened.

Police said they have several people they are now looking at in connection with the murder. That includes Strom's then-husband, Stephen Strom.

Family members said he and Karin were high-school sweethearts, but police confirmed she had filed for divorce before she died.

"He is considered a person of interest," Benson said Tuesday. "We have other suspects."

In 1980, police arrested Stephen Strom, and he was charged with second-degree criminal homicide. However, the case was dropped nearly a year later when hearsay evidence was tossed by a judge. Strom told the Deseret Morning News in 1981 that he would not be satisfied until his wife's real killer was brought to justice. He moved out of state a short time later, police said.

"I have not seen Steve since my sister's murder," Saltzgiver said.