TEXAS/ARIZONA
Arizona Republic
Christopher Silavong, The Republic | azcentral.com
February 24, 2016
An extradition hearing will be held Wednesday for an 83-year-old Scottsdale man accused of murdering a Texas beauty queen when he was a young priest in 1960.
Prosecutors want John Feit to be returned to Hidalgo County, Texas, to be tried for the first-degree murder of Irene Garza, a 25-year-old school teacher. She went to Feit’s parish on April 16, 1960, and never returned home.
Since nearly a lifetime ago, Feit had been the sole occupant on detectives’ list of suspects in the murder, although he never had been arrested or charged.
His name is absent from the earliest police records generated in the missing-person-turned-murder case. The Republic obtained copies of those records with help from the McAllen Monitor.
The following is an account of the very first days of the case, from when Irene Garza’s father reported her missing to the McAllen Police Department through the forensic examination of her body that would occur five days later.
The beginning
Irene Garza hadn’t called her mother, something she did whenever she was going to be late.
She left home at about 6:30 p.m. for Sacred Heart Catholic Church. It was the night before Easter 1960.
The missing person report gives no indication about when her family expected her home, just that eight hours had passed without word.
Her parents, Josefina and Nicolas Garza, were worried something happened. Nicolas went driving and found her car parked just south of the church. His next stop was the McAllen Police Department to report Irene missing, a report taken at 3:10 a.m. April 17.
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