In 1991 there were scarcely more than 10,000 people living in Fountain Hills and residents were comfortable leaving their doors unlocked, as few people who came to town did not live here and were more than likely known.

Then, on the night of Aug. 8 or early morning Aug. 9, someone slipped into the home of Julie Patterson on Love Court and brutally murdered her.

After not hearing from her all day Friday, nor Saturday morning, friends went to her home early in the afternoon on Aug. 10 and found her lying on the sofa, bludgeoned with an unknown weapon. It is not known whether she even awoke to see her attacker. Her dog was also apparently unperturbed by the deadly visitor.

Now, 25 years later the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has arrested no one and would seem no closer to finding the killer.

A couple of years ago The Times was visited by a detective with MCSO’s Major Crimes Unit. He was reviewing information about the case and talked with Publisher Alan Cruikshank, a neighbor of Patterson’s, and his son Brent Cruikshank, a young teen at the time who sometimes looked after Patterson’s dog.

Patterson, 39, was a Michigan transplant who found Fountain Hills very much to her liking. She was considered bright and hardworking and had become involved in civic affairs about the time of the town’s incorporation.

She was a volunteer with the Chamber of Commerce and had taken on the challenge of organizing the Thanksgiving Day Parade. In 1991 the parade included a rider- less horse to honor Patterson.

One of the many other questions that persist over the decades is this: Did her killer get away because the resources of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office were overtaxed when her body was discovered?

On Aug. 9, 1991, there were nine Buddhist monks found slain at a temple in an unincorporated area west of Phoenix. Detectives were busy investigating that very high profile incident when Patterson’s body was discovered.

Detectives who worked the Patterson case at the time insisted that their investigation did not suffer because of the temple investigation.

Officials said they conducted more than 300 interviews in the Patterson investigation, many people over and over. They have accumulated a file more than six inches thick.

There were a number of items of evidence, including fingerprints and material fibers, collected at the Patterson murder scene that were sent to the Arizona Department of Public Safety crime lab for analysis.

These items failed to provide clues needed to catch the killer.

It seems probable that the same DPS lab was processing evidence from the Buddhist slayings at the same time.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio was still a year and a half from taking office at the time of the temple killings and the Patterson murder.

He has always insisted he would not second guess or criticize any of the work done by MCSO before he took office. However, he has acknowledged the magnitude of effort such an investigation as the temple murders would require.

As time goes on, memories fade. Even here at The Times we were reminded of the anniversary of the Patterson murder only this weekend when the Sheriff’s Office brought up the anniversary of the Buddhist Temple murders.

The case is still open and detectives will listen to anyone with a memory of something from that time that might be significant to the investigation and add to that six-inch file, or maybe open a previously closed door.