A tip campaign -- dubbed "Hope for Holly -- underway in Brimfield seeks information on the 1993 abduction and murder of Holly Kristen Piirainen, a day after town police claimed "new information" related to the cold case has come to light.
This is part of an ongoing series from the MassLive Unsolved Case Files, a look at families of victims and the investigators who continue to dig for answers.
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A tip campaign -- dubbed "Hope for Holly -- underway in Brimfield seeks information on the 1993 abduction and murder of Holly Kristen Piirainen, a day after town police claimed "new information" related to the cold case has come to light.The 10-year-old Grafton youth disappeared from the Sturbridge cottage she and her family were vacationing at on Aug. 5, 1993. Hunters found her remains in a wooded area off of Five Bridge Road in Brimfield on Oct. 23, 1993.
Sarah Stein, a cold case consultant and co-founder of The Center for the Resolution of Unsolved Crime, held a press conference Friday morning at Infinite Granite -- 310 Sturbridge Rd. in Brimfield -- where the tip campaign will continue until 3 p.m.
Tipsters may visit the store or call Stein at 203-507-6352. An email box has also been established where anyone can leave a tip, anonymously or by name: hopeforholly080593@gmail.com.
"Let's give Holly and her family the justice they deserve," a Brimfield police press release on the campaign said. "All relevant information will be given to the Hampden County District Attorney's Office."
Anyone with information can also contact the Massachusetts State Police Detective Unit assigned to the Hampden District Attorney's Office at 413-505-5993. One can utilize text-a-tip by texting the word CRIMES (2-7-4-6-3-7) and type the word SOLVE into the body of the message followed by your tip.
In 2012, then Hampden District Attorney Mark G. Mastroianni linked a dead Springfield man who used to hunt and fish in the vicinity of where Piirainen's remains were found to the case, saying forensic evidence tied David E. Pouliot to the scene.
Authorities never identified Pouliot as a suspect, even after holding tip campaigns seeking information on his whereabouts and companions in August 1993 and in the weeks and months which followed.
"The nature of the (evidence) suggests either Mr. Pouliot or people associated with him were in the area at a time relevant to the disappearance of Holly and the discovery of her remains," Mastroianni said at the time.
Pouliot died of congestive heart failure in August 2003 at the age of 49.