Cold case murder of Samuel Quentzel finally solved by 24-year-old cigarette and one tough cop

Nassau PD Det. Tom Goodwin worked the murder of Samuel Quentzel in 1986. The case went cold for 24 years, but was broken, using original evidence, by Nassau PD Det. James Hendry.















It took 24 years for this cold case to thaw.

It started on Sept. 4, 1986, when the stolen 1979 Econoline van tailed Samuel Quentzel's white Oldsmobile Cutlass from Quentzel Plumbing Supply on Throop Ave. in Bedford-Stuyvesant to the driveway of his home in Woodmere, L.I.

"When Sam Quentzel climbed out, two black males approached from either side," says Tom Goodwin, a retired Nassau County detective who's been haunted by this case for a quarter century.

"It was the height of the crack epidemic in New York. Sam was startled by the gunman on the driver's side who pointed a .380 automatic. There was a commotion. Sam hit the horn. The gunman shot him in the left side of the chest and he died instantly. Horrible. Senseless. Sam left behind a devastated wife and three kids."

Quentzel's wife, Ann, and an architect who was in the house discussing remodeling plans witnessed part of the shooting and saw two men run to the getaway van.

"The architect caught the first letters of the New Jersey plate," Goodwin says. "Fifty minutes later police in Brooklyn's 79th Precinct responded to a report of three black males fleeing from a smoking tan van on Monroe St. near the plumbing store. The perps tried to torch all the evidence."

Goodwin had the van hauled back to Nassau's crime scene unit, where they found Sam Quentzel's checkbook. "They also bagged four Newport cigarette butts," Goodwin says.

The fire destroyed all fingerprints and DNA technology was in its infancy in 1986, so Goodwin had the cigarette butts stored in hopes that one day the saliva could be linked to a suspect's blood type.

"My partner and I worked that case for nine solid months, mostly in Bed-Stuy," Goodwin says.

Quentzel's family offered a $50,000 reward, hoping it would bring information.

It didn't. And the case eventually went cold.

Goodwin later transferred to the robbery squad, but the Quentzel case followed him like a second shadow.

"I never stopped thinking about it," says Goodwin, who retired in 2000. "Whenever I had a case that took me into Brooklyn or Queens I always checked to see if there was a .380 handgun used, hoping to find a connection. I never got a hit."

In 2003, the four Newport cigarette butts underwent DNA testing. A genetic profile was established on one butt, but it didn't match any in a state DNA databank.

In 2006, the state Legislature expanded the DNA databank to retroactively include swabbing of felons doing time or on parole.

In 2007, Ann Quentzel and her son Andy implored newly elected Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice to take a fresh look at the case.