Darlene Hulse

Case background and investigation

Darlene Hulse, 28, was at home with her three daughters on the morning of Friday, August 17, 1984. The family lived on a rural road off Old U.S. 31 near Argos, in Marshall County, Indiana, and her husband was at work. According to WNDU's 2023 report on the case, a man knocked on the door at about 9:30 a.m., forced his way in and tried to bind her with tape.

Two of the girls saw the attack begin. WNDU reported that one of them tried to telephone for help before the intruder pulled the phone away, and that the two then ran to their grandmother's house nearby. The youngest child, aged one, was left in the house. According to the investigative podcast The Deck Investigates, which interviewed all three daughters, the man struck Hulse with a poker from the family's wood stove. When police arrived she was gone, and a trail of blood led from the living room to the driveway where a vehicle had been parked.

Her body was found the following day in woods about six miles from the house. WNDU reported that the cause of death was blunt force trauma and that a fireplace poker was missing from the home.

The children and other witnesses gave descriptions of the man and his car. As reported by WNDU, he was thought to be in his early twenties, clean-shaven, with neatly combed blond hair and a long face, and was wearing corduroys and a striped T-shirt. The car was described as an older, rusted four-door sedan from the 1970s, green or bluish-green in colour; it was never found. WNDU reported that several men were looked at in 1984, including people in Texas and Alabama as well as local residents, and that all were ruled out. The investigation slowed after the first year.

Indiana State Police hold the evidence in the case, more than four dozen items according to WNDU, including clothing from which a partial male DNA profile has been recovered. In the 2023 report, Marshall County Prosecutor Nelson Chipman said those still working on the case remained confident that a breakthrough was close. The Deck Investigates devoted its first season to the case in 2023, and in October 2023 it reported that Hulse's family had started a petition asking for further DNA testing and comparison. No arrest has been announced and no one has been charged.