{"id":900,"date":"2026-08-15T00:25:40","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T00:25:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/2026\/08\/15\/23-year-old-rising-star-was-found-strangled-in-her-apartment-more-than-60-years-later-the-case-remains-unsolved\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T00:25:40","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T00:25:40","slug":"23-year-old-rising-star-was-found-strangled-in-her-apartment-more-than-60-years-later-the-case-remains-unsolved","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/2026\/08\/15\/23-year-old-rising-star-was-found-strangled-in-her-apartment-more-than-60-years-later-the-case-remains-unsolved\/","title":{"rendered":"23-Year-Old Rising Star Was Found Strangled in Her Apartment. More Than 60 Years Later, the Case Remains Unsolved"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Karyn Kupcinet\u2019s remains a mystery, decades later<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/people.com\/thmb\/TSHUX1QwJp9gqqOzX8qeNhSOxdw=\/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(jpeg)\/Karyn-Kupcinet-1-081426-40989a4d377a4753b743d3f68c72cfcc.jpg\" alt=\"Karyn KupcinetCredit: CBS via Getty\" title=\"Karyn Kupcinet\" \/><figcaption><i>Karyn Kupcinet<br \/>Credit: CBS via Getty<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h3>NEED TO KNOW<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Karyn Kupcinet\u2019s death in 1963 was ruled an unresolved homicide and remains a mystery 63 years later<\/li>\n<li>Police believed Karyn likely knew her killer but could not establish a motive or identify a suspect<\/li>\n<li>Karyn\u2019s father, Irv Kupcinet, kept hope for answers, even consulting mystics in his search for closure<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Karyn Kupcinet was just 23 years old when she began making a name for herself in the world of film and television.<\/p>\n<p>The daughter of Chicago newspaper columnist and television personality Irv Kupcinet and the sister of television director and producer Jerry Kupcinet, Karyn seemed destined for the spotlight \u2014 until her dream was cut short when the ingenue was found dead in her West Hollywood, Calif., home.<\/p>\n<p>It was 1963 when Karyn\u2019s death was ruled an unresolved homicide; 63 years later, the mystery remains.<\/p>\n<p>Never miss a story \u2014 sign up for <a href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/people-news-daily-newsletter-sign-up-8692701\">PEOPLE\u2019s free daily newsletter<\/a> to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/people.com\/thmb\/ILH0UxQK0J6Vwg9EdSxouGZUHzc=\/fit-in\/1280x960\/Karyn-Kupcinet-2-081426-0657ea381a5c4f9ebcb19557b6f7c34c.jpg\" alt=\"Karyn KupcinetCredit: CBS via Getty\" title=\"Karyn Kupcinet\" \/><figcaption><i>Karyn Kupcinet<br \/>Credit: CBS via Getty<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The police investigation was hampered by the fact that Karyn\u2019s nude body lay in her apartment three days before she was discovered. And while police said they believed that Karyn likely knew her murderer, they never established a motive.<\/p>\n<p>Karyn had been bright and well-liked, pursuing her dream of dropping out of junior college and moving to Los Angeles after a family friend \u2014 comedian <a class=\"null\" href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/tag\/jerry-lewis\/\" data-component=\"link\" data-source=\"inlineLink\" data-type=\"internalLink\" data-ordinal=\"1\" rel=\"null\">Jerry Lewis<\/a> \u2014 offered her a role in his 1961 film, <em>The Ladies Man<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>She would go on to land bit parts in films like <em>Surfside 6<\/em>, <em>Hawaiian Eye<\/em> and <em>Perry Mason<\/em>, but her career slowed.<\/p>\n<p>Per PEOPLE\u2019s early reporting, Karyn faced issues in her personal life and was convicted of shoplifting in 1962 for taking two books, a sweater and a pair of slacks. Months later, she broke into the home of her ex-boyfriend, actor Andrew Prine, and hid in his attic when he arrived home with a date.<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/people.com\/thmb\/M3B4s600s2nl1zEfCRF20cnTbBQ=\/fit-in\/1280x960\/Karyn-Kupcinet-3-081426-709ba64009ff4dd880549ca06d19e3d4.jpg\" alt=\"Karyn KupcinetCredit: CBS via Getty\" title=\"Karyn Kupcinet\" \/><figcaption><i>Karyn Kupcinet<br \/>Credit: CBS via Getty<\/i><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The night she was killed, PEOPLE noted, Karyn had been dining out with actor Mark Goddard and his wife before returning to her apartment with friends.<\/p>\n<p>Following the discovery of her body, police gave lie detector tests to Karyn\u2019s ex, Prine, and three other friends, but \u201cthe results for all four were inconclusive,\u201d PEOPLE reported.<\/p>\n<p>From PEOPLE in 1976: \u201cThe most promising lead fizzled when police examined a packet of threatening letters that Karyn and Prine had received. The threats were spelled out in words clipped from magazines and pasted on sheets of paper. Removing the words, a detective found Karyn\u2019s fingerprints underneath, indicating that she had sent the letters herself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/people.com\/people-puzzler-8620185\" data-type=\"\" data-component=\"link\" data-source=\"inlineLink\" data-ordinal=\"1\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>The PEOPLE Puzzler crossword is here! How quickly can you solve it? Play now!<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>As PEOPLE reported in a 1976 retrospective of the case, Karyn\u2019s father still kept a leather-bound album inscribed simply \u201cKaryn\u201d in the living room of his Chicago lakefront apartment, some 13 years later.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have a good idea who did it,\u201d Irv told PEOPLE at the time, \u201cbut nothing we could ever prove. We still hope the Los Angeles sheriff\u2019s police won\u2019t give up on the case, but the longer it goes on with no real answers, the harder it is to have any hope.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At the time, Irv said he had not heard from police in more than three years, admitting that the family had offered to hire a private detective and had taken other measures in an attempt to find out what happened to Karyn.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe even tried mystics. When you\u2019re desperate, and your own daughter is involved, you\u2019ll do anything,\u201d Irv said.<\/p>\n<p>The case remains officially unsolved.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Karyn Kupcinet\u2019s remains a mystery, decades later Karyn KupcinetCredit: CBS via Getty NEED TO KNOW Karyn Kupcinet\u2019s death in 1963 was ruled an unresolved homicide and remains a mystery 63 years later Police believed Karyn likely knew her killer but could not establish a motive or identify a suspect Karyn\u2019s father, Irv Kupcinet, kept hope [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-everything-else"],"wpmagazine_modules_lite_featured_media_urls":{"thumbnail":"","cvmm-medium":"","cvmm-medium-plus":"","cvmm-portrait":"","cvmm-medium-square":"","cvmm-large":"","cvmm-small":"","full":""},"categories_names":{"1":{"name":"Everything Else","link":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/category\/everything-else\/"}},"tags_names":[],"comments_number":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adsandthings.com\/winews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}