BALTIMORE COUNTY — On a Sunday evening in August 1981, Anne Allen and her parents were in their kitchen of their Liberty Road home when a man broke in carrying a revolver, surgical gloves and a cloth bag, demanding money.
When Allen's father, Samuel Allen, 59, walked into the room, the intruder shot him twice, according to police.
Samuel Allen was a World War II veteran whom his daughter admired for his helpfulness and life lessons. For over 40 years, Anne lived not only with that night's trauma, but without answers as the case went cold.
Detectives at the time processed the scene, recovering a bag and shirt as evidence.
"We didn't know this man, we never seen him, we never heard from him before. Why would somebody do something like this?" Allen wondered.
In 2023, Allen reached back out to investigators in Baltimore County. After re-examining her father's case, cold case detectives sent evidence from the scene for DNA testing and found a breakthrough.
DNA testing matched that of 75-year-old Alan Bass, a man currently incarcerated in Delaware serving five life sentences on rape charges.
There's an open warrant for Bass, but because of his health, he won't be taken back to Maryland. If his Delaware sentence ever changes, Baltimore County police are ready to formally charge him with Samuel Allen's murder.
Anne Allen joined police and county leaders on Friday morning at police headquarters in Towson for the announcement that Bass had been identified as a suspect.
Allen is donating $30,000 to police so they can have DNA analyzed in other cold cases.
"For heavenly day's sake, if this can give somebody else the closure that I got, it's going to be worth every penny of it," Allen said.
The cold case team in Baltimore County still has dozens more cases they want to see solved. Anyone with information that can help detectives is asked to call 410-887-3943.
