Darleen (often spelled “Darlene”) May Boyd was born in North Dakota on March 29, 1931, to Robert W. and Frances Ronish Boyd, one of three children that included her brother Robert, Jr., born in 1930, and sister Ellen, born in 1933.
Darleen married Alanson “Lance” Malcolm Fitchett, Jr., and they had three children: Kathryn Eileen (1951), Alanson “Lanny” Robert, and Darleen Janette (goes by Janette, 1958).
The family resided at 608 Pleasant View Drive in Des Moines, Iowa, built in 1959.
On January 19, 1960, Darleen, 28, was ironing clothes in the home’s basement. Eight-year-old Kathryn heard her parents fighting there and her mother crying and calling out for help. Then, there was silence.
Kathryn attempted to leave her bedroom, but her father locked the door from the outside. Lance ordered her to go back to bed. A while later, Kathryn heard digging or sawing noises from the basement. (Good, 2019)
Around midnight, Lance told Kathryn and Lanny, 6, that their mother had left and gone to California. Janette was 18 months old then.
The following day, Lance traded in his dark green panel truck for a van and insisted to his children that their mother “just left.” However, Darleen left all of her belongings behind, including medication to treat her thyroid cancer and her prescription eyeglasses. However, some bedding and curtains from where Darleen had been sleeping disappeared along with her.
Lance never reported his wife missing; it was concerned friends and neighbors who filed a missing person report in February with the Des Moines Police Department.
It is believed that Lance stabbed his wife to death and initially buried her body in cement under their home.
Before her murder, Darleen and Lance had an open marriage. Darleen was seeing a sailor who was at sea when she vanished. He had visited Darleen’s house in 1959 with Lance’s blessing. (Good)
Meanwhile, Lance was involved with Colleen Seiberling, who resided at 717 Franklin Avenue in Des Moines.
Following Darleen’s disappearance, Colleen moved into the Fitchett home. In June 1960, she and Lance were preparing to relocate to California when Frances showed up demanding to know what happened to her daughter. Lance’s sister, Madalene Fitchett, told her Darleen had “left.”
Frances then spoke to her grandchildren, and Kathryn told Frances what she had heard the night her mother vanished.
Frances and the children drove to the hardware store where Lance worked. Darleen’s children waited in the car while Frances and Lance spoke in front of the vehicle. Lance gave Frances written permission to take the children to Dexter so that she and Bob could raise them. (Ewing, 2011)
It’s unclear whether Lance ever saw his children again. But he and Colleen never married. She had been married to Dale Seiberling, who died in 2019, but they divorced. She was also married Wellington Mark Radford, Jr. in 1959, but they later divorced, too. Colleen died in California in 2012.
According to his online memorial on Find A Grave, Lance married Lavonne Marie (Cary) Scott on May 28, 1963, in Los Angeles. Lavonne died in Hemet, Riverside, California, on March 16, 1999, “days after receiving in the mail a copy of an FBI report with statements from Kathryn that detailed what happened the night her father locked her in her bedroom shortly before her mother was murdered.” (Ewing, 2015)
Despite having the most obvious suspect in the world, police never charged Lance with a crime, and the investigation supposedly found nothing.
Lance died in Crestview, Okaloosa, Florida, in 2005 at age 77. Between July 1961 and October 2003, Lance lived in various places in California, South Dakota, and Washington State. He often used aliases such as Adam Fitchett, Malcolm Alason Fitchett, and Ahanson M Fitchett.
In 2013, Kathryn notified the Des Moines police that her father had killed her mother and buried Darleen under the basement of their home on Pleasant View Drive. P0lice used two ground-penetrating radar scans that showed a space under the basement’s concrete that did not belong there. (Zilbermints, 2014)
That space measured five-foot-by-two-foot, perfect for placing a small, petite body.
A few months later, in June 2014, investigators returned to the residence and excavated about three feet into the basement floor but did not find Darleen’s body. They called in a cadaver dog to assist, but it found nothing. Investigators continued drilling holes in the concrete around the basement. They tried the cadaver dogs again, but they found nothing, which means Lance moved her body to another location sometime before he left the area. Darleen’s body is believed to be encased in cement at Colleen’s former home, 717 Franklin Avenue, Des Moines, later converted into apartments.
Darleen’s sister, Ellen Montoya, spent decades trying to find her sister’s remains. Unfortunately, Ellen died in 2017. Their brother, Robert, died in 2014.
Darleen’s daughter, Kathryn died in 2022. It is unclear where her siblings are. However, Janette often responds to comments under Darleen’s Iowa Cold Cases entry.
ICC responded to another commenter with some interesting information.
Interestingly, Madalene Fitchett died in 2013 in Hemet, Riverside, California, the same town where Lavonne Fitchett died in 1999. That means the ever-loyal Madalene followed her brother to California and took his secret to her grave.
Sources
Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/144183736/alanson_malcolm-fitchett: accessed December 31, 2024), memorial page for Alanson Malcolm “Lance” Fitchett Jr. (24 Mar 1927–21 Mar 2005), Find a Grave Memorial ID 144183736; Burial Details Unknown; Maintained by Jody Ewing (contributor 47271115).
Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/150657619/colleen_marie-seiberling_padgett: accessed December 31, 2024), memorial page for Colleen Marie Hobbs Seiberling Padgett (5 Feb 1931–9 May 2012), Find a Grave Memorial ID 150657619, citing Sunset Memorial Gardens, Des Moines, Polk County, Iowa, USA; Maintained by Katie Lou (contributor 46950342).
Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/144007324/darleen_may-fitchett: accessed December 31, 2024), memorial page for Darleen May Boyd Fitchett (29 Mar 1931–19 Jan 1960), Find a Grave Memorial ID 144007324; Burial Details Unknown; Maintained by Jody Ewing (contributor 47271115).
Ewing, Jody. “Darleen Fitchett.” Iowa Cold Cases. April 2, 2011. https://iowacoldcases.org/case-summaries/darleen-fitchett/
Good, Meaghan. “Darleen May Fitchett.” The Charley Project. May 15, 2019. https://charleyproject.org/case/darleen-may-fitchett
Zilbermints, Regina. “Basement Dig Yields Nothing in ’60 Cold Case.” Des Moines Register. June 16, 2014. https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/2014/06/16/des-moines-disappearance-darlene-fitchett/10623265/
Other sources: FamilySearch.org