Woman arrested in 1975 cold case murder after DNA breakthrough

Nearly 51 years after human remains turned up at the Pima County Waste Transfer Station, Pima County detectives say they finally have a name, a family history and a murder arrest to attach to the case. Carol Ann Beall, 79, was arrested May 28, 2026, and charged in the 1975 killing of her stepfather, William Reginald Sipfle, a man who disappeared without ever being reported missing.

The case began in October 1975, when a man contacted deputies after discovering the remains. Investigators determined the victim was an adult male, but they could not identify him or build a strong enough lead to move the case forward. Prosecutors now allege the killing happened between October 9 and October 15, 1975, but for decades the file sat cold, with no missing-person report to anchor the inquiry and no obvious identity for the dead man.

That changed in 2025, when the sheriff’s department reopened the evidence and partnered with forensic genealogy specialists at Resolve Forensics and Intermountain Forensics. Detectives submitted material for advanced DNA testing and genealogical analysis, and the work identified the remains as Sipfle, who was 73 when he vanished. Investigators then followed the family line further and, through Sipfle’s granddaughter, learned that her grandfather had disappeared in 1975. That connection helped tie the unidentified remains back to the family and ultimately pointed detectives to Beall, Sipfle’s stepdaughter.

Authorities have not said exactly how Beall was linked to the crime, but the arrest marks a major shift in a case that spent nearly half a century without an identity for the victim, let alone a suspect. Beall was taken into custody in the 7800 block of North Starr Grass Drive and booked into the Pima County Jail. Tucson Sentinel reported her bond was set at $500,000 cash.

For Sipfle’s family, the DNA work did more than identify remains found near a transfer station in 1975. It turned a nameless set of bones into William Reginald Sipfle, and it turned an open question into a first-degree murder case that is still moving through the system.