Paula Atkinson Cupit was 24 and working as a maid at The Abbey Resort in Fontana, Wisconsin, when she was killed in August 1974. A coworker became concerned after Cupit had not been seen for several hours and found her in Room 606 in the afternoon, partially unclothed and covered with two blankets. The attack was exceptionally violent: an autopsy found she had been sexually assaulted, stabbed in the heart, and strangled with enough force to break her neck. Investigators estimated the killing occurred roughly between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m., several hours before her body was discovered. Walworth County mounted an intensive investigation and the resort offered a $5,000 reward.

The case remained unsolved for over a year until attention focused on Richard Otto Macek of McHenry, Illinois, after similarities were noted between Cupit’s murder and another attack on a hotel maid in Wauwatosa. Macek was arrested in San Bernardino, California, on December 5, 1975; by mid-December he had been charged with first-degree murder in Cupit’s death. He later pleaded guilty on February 22, 1977, and was sentenced to life imprisonment, with related rape and mayhem charges dropped as part of the plea. Did anyone who worked at The Abbey Resort in 1974 or knew Paula recall anything unusual about that summer?