Ashley Flowers

And, you know, it's always hard to solve a stranger attack like that.

But maybe one day the prince on her car would turn up a match.

Or maybe they would find her missing purse.

The truth was, both things would end up happening.

But when they did, it didn't confirm their theories.

It actually completely threw them on their head and introduced possibilities of conspiracy and cover-up.

For decades, some cold cases have been reduced to files in a cabinet, but not anymore.

I'm Ashley Flowers, and me and my team on the deck have been traveling across the country to report on these forgotten cases.

And in some instances, it's resulted in these cases being solved after decades.

Join me every Wednesday as we revive these stories one card at a time.

Listen to The Deck now, wherever you get your podcasts.

Three years passed after Alberta's murder without an arrest or really any new updates.

But then, on July 16, 1968, a group of boys playing on the lower level of the Sherman-Minton Bridge found something that changed this entire case.

When they leaned over the ledge, they saw this black leather purse tucked into this, like, hole on one of the steel braces.

And it wasn't even hard to get to or to grab, so they did.

And inside was a check, key rings, lipstick, a lower dental plate, and the ID for Alberta O. Jones.

I don't know how well they did or didn't search the bridge, but I don't think that matters because I actually don't think the purse had been there for three years.

But where it was, it's not like in this enclosed area or anything.

It's like right out there in the open, exposed to rain, to snow, every other flavor of unpredictable Midwest weather that you can think of.

And this thing, the contents in it, like it did not seem weather-worn, which makes me think someone put it there.