Nearly 22 years after Molly Bish disappeared from her lifeguard post at Comins Pond in Warren, Massachusetts, the search for her killer has hit another roadblock.
Molly Bish's older sister Heather said in an interview with NBC10 Boston on Monday that the latest update in the case is disappointing for the family.
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"This has been a long journey," said Heather Bish, who revealed that she recently learned a DNA test involving the family member of a potential suspect did not match.
Molly Bish was just 16 years old when she disappeared on June 27, 2000. Her remains were found three years later in nearby Palmer, about five miles away in the woods of Whiskey Hill.
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Hope is hard to grasp right now for the Bish family, who has been waiting decades for justice -- and now they'll have to keep waiting.
It was in June 2021 that Worcester District Attorney Joseph Early Jr. first announced a breakthrough in the case, revealing that his office was investigating Francis "Frank" P. Sumner Sr. in connection with the teen's murder.
The district attorney said at the time that new information from an informant had led authorities to the convicted rapist and kidnapper who died in 2016. It was a promising update for the family, and Heather Bish said in a December 2021 interview with MassLive that she had hope her family may get their long-awaited closure after investigators traveled to an Ohio prison to collect a DNA sample from Sumner's son in order to analyze it in connection to Bish's case.
Francis Sumner Jr. is incarcerated at the London Correctional Institution in Ohio for aggravated robbery, according to records from the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
The district attorney’s office declined to address specific details about the case last year, citing the ongoing investigation, but Heather Bish was encouraged at the time, saying she felt like they were getting "very, very close" to solving the case.
She's feeling less encouraged now. Following the disappointing update that Sumner's son's DNA did not match, Heather Bish said Monday that frustrations are mounting for her family, and there's a lot they don't know about the investigation.
"I know they're still searching and conducting some further tests and still looking into Frank Sumner for more information," she said, adding authorities have received around 100 tips in the past year relating to Sumner.
Heather Bish has long hoped her sister's killer would eventually be identified so her family no longer has to keep trying to solve her case.
"My mom in the past has often compared these feelings that we have right now to being on a roller coaster. You always have hope. Hope is an eternal blessing that I hope I never run out of. But it's disappointing. This has been a long journey. There's been a lot of errors in Molly's case. The crime scene wasn't preserved. Our local police did not know how to look for a missing person. There was some tunnel vision with Molly's boyfriend initially. There have been lost samples in the past. And right up to learning about Mr. Sumner and his DNA not being in the coded system, there's been a lot of challenges in this case," she said.
"It's very difficult to navigate, and I'm disappointed in the Worcester County District Attorney and state police because it's hard for us to understand why they feel so strongly about this particular person without any further reasoning. I don't even get the privilege of knowing what kind of DNA tests are being done...Instead they tell me they can't tell me about DNA. And that's been really hard," she added. "Over this time, I've earned a doctorate degree. I just feel like there's nothing that I can do that's enough to get the information so that I can sleep at night. I've always been told by the investigators, well they sleep at night, but the problem remains is that I don't."
More on the Molly Bish Case
Authorities remain focused on Sumner, Heather Bish said, though the family does not know why.
"We've tried really hard to be supportive of the police and the district attorney, so I guess it's just really hard to not know," she shared.
"I've never been told there's a whole lot of DNA and we're going to be able to solve this case someday, in fact I've been told the opposite," Heather Bish said. "So for the district attorney to recently tell me they could spend 100 years conducting DNA testing on Molly's case, it feels sort of, I'm not clear on what that means because that's not what I've been previously told, so I don't understand."
The Worcester County District Attorney's Office confirmed Sumner remains a person of interest but declined to discuss the DNA evidence, noting this is a very active investigation. Anyone with information is urged to call the Molly Bish tip line at 508-453-7575.
Last year, ahead of the 21st anniversary of Molly's abduction, NBC10 Boston spent hours with the Massachusetts State Police detective on the Unresolved Case Unit who's still on the hunt for the teen's killer. Meet the detective here.
Meanwhile, Heather Bish and her family are celebrating their mother Magi's birthday -- but it's bittersweet because it's another year without Molly and without justice.
"Today is my mom's 71st birthday and it's her 23rd birthday without my sister, and it's really hard. These days are bittersweet. We miss Molly. We miss her exuberance, and her laughter, and she loved birthdays, we love birthdays. We like to open the presents first at a birthday party, and those are the things I miss most about my sister," she said.
"I hope today that anyone and everyone who loves Molly can remember her enthusiasm and love of life."
