Suspect Arrested in 1969 Cold Case Murder of Nebraska Teenager

Authorities in Wahoo, Nebraska, have arrested a 77-year-old man in connection with the 1969 murder of Mary Kay Heese. Joseph A. Ambroz was taken into custody in Oklahoma more than five decades after the teenager's body was found in a field.

The arrest marks a significant breakthrough in what is considered the state's oldest unsolved cold case. Heese was just 17 years old and a junior in high school when she was brutally stabbed to death in March 1969.

Her body was discovered in a roadside ditch outside of town, with investigators noting she had suffered more than a dozen stab wounds. A local farmer had found her schoolbooks scattered along a country road, which led searchers to her remains.

Ambroz had been a person of interest for decades, but investigators previously lacked the necessary evidence to file charges. He was living in Wahoo at the time of the killing and had a prior criminal record involving forgery and escape.

The case was revitalized after a grand jury in Saunders County returned an indictment for first-degree murder against the suspect. This legal action followed a renewed examination of the case files and the re-interviewing of key witnesses by determined investigators.

For over half a century, the community of Wahoo has lived under the dark shadow of the unsolved crime. The brutal nature of the murder and the lack of an arrest had left a lasting scar on the small Nebraska town.

Family members of the victim have waited 55 years for answers regarding the tragic loss of the spirited teenager. This arrest brings a sense of closure to a family that had long feared the killer would never face justice.

Ambroz is currently being held in the Kay County Detention Center in Oklahoma while he awaits extradition proceedings to return to Nebraska. Prosecutors have not yet disclosed the specific new evidence that finally tipped the scales toward an arrest.

The Saunders County Sheriff’s Office credited the relentless work of generations of law enforcement officers for keeping the investigation alive. As the legal process moves forward, the town of Wahoo prepares to revisit the painful memories of that spring night in 1969.