The Mysterious Death of Katherine Korzilius, Daughter of Bon Jovi Tour Manager

Katherine Korzilius lived a comfortable life in Austin, TX, with her father, Paul, mother Nancy, and brother Chris. Paul worked as a tour manager for rocker Jon Bon Jovi.

On August 7, 1996, the Korzilius family's life changed forever. It was Paul’s birthday, and he worked in his office in New York City. Nancy and the kids spent the day running errands and buying gifts.

When the family returned home, Nancy stopped by the mailbox, located at the end of the driveway, less than a quarter-mile from their house. Katherine asked her mom if she could walk home from the mailbox. Nancy recognized this as Katherine’s way of ‘becoming a big girl.’ Since she had walked the driveway before, Nancy agreed.

While Nancy and Chris drove home, Katherine ran in the opposite direction to take a shortcut. Once home, Nancy and Chris unloaded the car but did not see Katherine. They assumed she had arrived before them and gone inside. After putting away the groceries, Chris began searching for his sister. Unable to find her in the house, he ran back to the mailbox looking for her and searched around the house again.

Nancy and Chris jumped in the car and drove to the neighbor’s house, hoping she had stopped by to say hello. When the neighbors said they had not seen Katherine, panic set in.

As they headed back home, Nancy spotted her daughter lying in the middle of the road.

“I could tell that she was unconscious, but she was breathing. I knew it was too hot to leave her on the pavement. I know it’s never a good idea to move someone if you don’t know their injuries, but I just couldn’t leave her there. Having driven to the emergency room before, I felt confident I could make that drive.”

Doctors placed Katherine on a ventilator to help her breathe, but they had already determined she was brain dead. She was pronounced dead at 11:30 p.m.

Paul arranged a charter aircraft home but sadly arrived after midnight, too late to say goodbye. Nancy and Paul, along with the police and townsfolk, assumed Katherine had become a victim of a hit-and-run driver. The police searched for a suspect while locals circulated theories.

Katherine was found less than ten minutes after she walked away from her mother’s care, on the opposite side of the circle, half a mile from home. The medical examiner's findings caused further speculation when he determined that a hit-and-run accident did not cause Katherine’s death.

R. Bavardo, the Travis County Medical Examiner, stated, “The injuries Katherine sustained could have resulted from either jumping from a moving vehicle, being thrown from a moving vehicle, or falling from a moving vehicle. The types of injuries we expect in these circumstances would have been the same.”

Taking the medical examiner’s information into account, police developed several theories about Katherine’s death. They suggested she might have jumped onto the back of Nancy’s vehicle without her knowledge and was thrown off as it sped down the driveway.

The Korzilius family found this idea appalling. They hired private investigator Barbara O’Brian to look into Katherine’s mysterious death. O’Brian criticized the police's explanation, citing the extreme heat that August day, which would have made the car very hot. Katherine had a broken thumb in a splint, making it difficult to hold onto the car handle—the only logical place she could have held on. O’Brian also believed Nancy would have seen her daughter in the rearview mirror.

As for the Korzilius family, they believe someone abducted and killed Katherine.

According to Barbara, “A few days after Katherine’s death, the investigators brought in the K-9 unit to search the area. They picked up her scent in a vacant lot, indicating she came from the mailboxes on the most direct route home. The scent was lost, which suggests this may have been the point where she was abducted or injured, and she was later moved to where her mother found her.”

Nancy believed someone placed Katherine in the street deliberately. “Her hair was smoothed down. Her shirt was straight. Her shorts were straight. Her toes were pointed straight. Her sandals were on. I know someone moved her, and I know someone laid her there for me to find,” she told Unsolved Mysteries.

More than 28 years have passed since Katherine died, and the circumstances surrounding her death remain a mystery.

Could the police's speculations be correct? Did someone strike Katherine as she walked home? Could Nancy be involved in her daughter’s disappearance? It seems unlikely that someone could execute all the scenarios Barbara suggested.