Family of Joyce Malecki hopeful for answers after FBI exhumes body

BALTIMORE -- Darryl Malecki once again said goodbye to his sister Joyce. 

Fifty-four years after she was buried, the FBI exhumed her body at Southwest Baltimore's Loudon Park Cemetery and brought her casket into the chapel there. 

"It's very emotional. I'm too old to cry," Darryl Malecki told WJZ Friday. "The first thing I said was 'Hi.' I'm sure she's in heaven. I hope she's talking to my parents."

His sister's murder remains unsolved, and Darryl Malecki believes the FBI was looking for DNA, although law enforcement has been tight-lipped.

"On our side, it's been 54 years, and we would love to have information. Maybe something will come out and we'll get some real answers to some real horrifying questions," Darryl Malecki said. "We'd just like to have some answers. The big question is what happened? Who did this?"

The Malecki family is receiving support from the Maryland Crime Victims' Resource Center and said they first received word the FBI was considering exhuming the body two years ago.

"The FBI would not be doing this if they did not have something specific in mind. They are simply not going to exhume someone after 54 years unless they have some dots they need to connect," the center's executive director, Kurt Wolfgang, said. 

Malecki disappeared on Nov. 1, 1969, after she left to go shopping at Glen Burnie's Harundale Mall. Her brother remembers the last time he saw her alive.

He was 17 at the time and working at a fast-food restaurant.

"She came up and she wanted to switch cars because she wanted to go to Glen Burnie," he said. "I was the last one in my family to talk to my sister when she was alive. Who would've thought?"

Another brother found her vehicle near Fort Meade. 

Her body was later discovered in a wooded area inside Fort Meade. Malecki had been strangled and her hands bound. She was stabbed multiple times, including in the throat. 

The FBI is investigating her murder because she was found on federal military property. 

It appeared that Malecki fought back.

Her brother said there was blood in the backseat of her vehicle. 

"When we went to identify her body, we were told she put up a fight. There were scrapings underneath her fingernails, which I'm glad to hear. They did a number on her. Him or them; I don't know," Darryl Malecki said. "I feel like this person, if he's alive, he should be in jail. If he's dead, we should know who he is. I mean, this is a heinous crime."

WJZ has investigated the disappearance of other young women around the same time, including Sister Cathy Cesnik.

Cesnik was also highlighted in Netflix's "The Keepers," along with the theory she was killed because many victims abused by a notorious Baltimore priest, Father Joseph Maskell, confided in her. 

Maskell's conduct was outlined in the landmark Maryland Attorney General's report into sexual abuse within the Baltimore Archdiocese.

While he was alive, Maskell denied any ties to Cesnik's killing. 

"There's a lot of similarities as far as where we lived and grew up. We were only three blocks from the church and the school at St. Clement [in Lansdowne] and Maskell was there. The rectory is only two blocks," Darryl Malecki said. 

He said he did not know of any direct link between Maskell and his sister.

Another woman, Pamela Lynn Conyers, disappeared at the same Glen Burnie mall one year after Malecki.

Earlier this year, police announced they had solved Conyers' case. Their suspect, Forrest Clyde Williams III, died in 2018. However, there has been no definitive link to Malecki. 

Joyce Malecki's family just wants answers.

"We're just hoping that we bring some closure and bring this person to justice," her brother said. "That would be the best thing we could hope for."

The family said they were told Malecki's FBI homicide file has more than 4,000 documents. They also told WJZ they were told some of the evidence in the case had been destroyed. 

The FBI said in a statement this week they remain committed to providing answers to the Malecki family but declined to comment beyond that because the investigation is still open.