{"id":337290,"date":"2026-07-11T23:18:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T23:18:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/337290\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T23:18:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T23:18:15","slug":"crime-stoppers-leader-says-innovative-digital-series-found-target-audience-helping-lead-to-1987-cold-case-arrest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/337290\/","title":{"rendered":"Crime Stoppers leader says \u2018innovative\u2019 digital series found \u2018target audience,\u2019 helping lead to 1987 cold case arrest"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 A renewed call for information earlier this year in the 1987 murder of a 20-year-old Jacksonville mother<\/a> reignited the cold case, eventually leading to information that helped the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office make an arrest, the executive director of First Coast Crime Stoppers said.<\/p>\n

Chase Robinson told News4JAX on The Morning Show that the idea behind the \u201cinnovative\u201d digital news conference series that highlighted Melissa Ellison\u2019s case in January is to give families like Ellison\u2019s a platform to share the human faces and feelings behind cold cases.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was because of this press conference that we reached the right target audience, and it allowed for information to come forward to allow JSO to make an arrest in the case,\u201d Robinson said. \u201cWe really felt that this had an impact in our community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ellison, also known as Missy Taylor to many, was an Ed White High graduate who was home with her 13-month-old daughter, Casie, three days after Christmas in 1987, when a man broke in and beat her to death with a charred log that came from inside her fireplace.<\/p>\n

Police say that man has now been identified as 70-year-old Gary Edward Glowacz. <\/p>\n

Gary Edward Glowacz was arrested in the murder of 20-year-old Melissa Ellison, who found beaten to death in 1987 (WXJT)<\/p>\n

After Thursday\u2019s long-awaited arrest announcement, Casie Ellison said she can now \u201csee the world differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI know that it\u2019s never going to bring my mom back, but it does have a ridiculous release of closure,\u201d said Casie, who was found unharmed in the home by her mother\u2019s roommate after the killing.<\/p>\n

According to his arrest report, Glowacz actually made a call himself<\/a> to Clay County Sheriff\u2019s Office dispatch on July 8 of this year, about six months after First Coast Crime Stoppers held the digital news conference on Ellison\u2019s case. Glowacz was later arrested.<\/p>\n

Casie Ellison shared emotional words during that January digital news conference. <\/p>\n

\u201cSilence does not change facts. And living a normal life does not undo taking someone else\u2019s. If you know something, say it. If you heard something, report it,\u201d Casie said. \u201cIf someone told you something years ago, submit it. Crime Stoppers exists for this exact reason.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robinson agreed, saying that bringing closure to families and safety to communities is why First Coast Crime Stoppers was created.<\/p>\n

But the real key to the success of Crime Stoppers, Robinson said, is the ability to provide complete anonymity to anyone who submits a tip, no matter how they provide it, because the nonprofit organization does not fall under the same public records laws as law enforcement agencies.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen someone contacts Crime Stoppers, they are anonymous, not (just) confidential. We don\u2019t have a database of names, addresses, IP addresses that could ever be leaked out to the public or made known,\u201d Robinson said, explaining that they simply do not collect that information. \u201cSo if Crime Stoppers doesn\u2019t know who you are, law enforcement won\u2019t know who you are, and therefore the community won\u2019t know who you are.\u201d<\/p>\n

In fact, those who submit tips are so anonymous that Crime Stoppers has no way to contact them to let them know if a tip led to an arrest.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you submit a tip, you\u2019re assigned a randomized tip number. That\u2019s the only thing that links you to the information that you provided,\u201d Robinson explained. \u201cThat\u2019s how you must reach out to Crime Stoppers to check the status of your tip, because we don\u2019t collect any identifiable information.\u201d<\/p>\n

To submit a tip to First Coast Crime Stoppers, you can call 1-866-845-TIPS or dial **TIPS on a mobile device.<\/p>\n

You can also share tips at FCCrimeStoppers.com<\/a> or by using the P3Tips mobile app<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 A renewed call for information earlier this year in the 1987 murder of a 20-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":337291,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2453,265,116,118,117,18394],"class_list":["post-337290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-cold-case","tag-crime","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-project-cold-case"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=337290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/337291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=337290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=337290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=337290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}