ROSWELL, Ga. — Loved ones of a Roswell mother kidnapped and murdered 30 years ago are pressing investigators to take another look at the cold case.
Angela Matos was abducted from her home just before Christmas 1995. Her body was found two months later in Alpharetta.
“I think about her all the time,” said her cousin, Phil Summerour. “It gnaws at me because somebody out there did this and is getting away with it, and I want them to be caught.”
Matos was 30 years old, a Milton High School graduate and the mother of two small children.
“She was a beautiful, beautiful woman,” Summerour said. “Had a bubbly personality. Very loving and was a great mother.”
Matos was sharing a house with her mother on Hembree Road in Roswell when she disappeared. Her mother came home to find shattered glass, signs of a forced entry and her daughter missing.
Matos was going through a divorce at the time, and police said the husband was not cooperative in the search. In February 1996, a passerby found her body in a wooded area off Haynes Bridge Road in Alpharetta. Police said she had been strangled. Nobody was ever charged with her murder.
Channel 2’s Bryan Mims asked Summerour if he was confident that somebody will eventually be arrested.
“Yes,” he said. “Very confident.”
Family members believe the advancement of DNA testing and forensics over can help investigators identify a suspect. “The technology 30 years ago was not what it is today,” said Ricky Spencer, another cousin.
In a written statement, officer Tim Lupo said Roswell police never closed the case.
“It has remained among our short list of cold cases that are actively still worked and regularly reviewed by our Criminal Investigations Division,” he said.
Georgia passed a law in 2023 called the Coleman-Baker Act. It allows families to request a forensic review of cold-case murders by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, as long as they’re at least three years old. A sister of Matos, who declined to be interviewed, said she plans to pursue that action.
Loved ones say finding the killer will not only bring long-awaited justice but peace of mind.
“It means that we can go on with our lives,” Summerour said. “We’ll know who did it, and they can be serving prison time instead of being out there free.”
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