Charles Rupert, 27, and his wife, Leslie Rupert, 22.
For newlyweds Charles and Leslie Rupert, one of their marriage vows, "until death do us part," came sooner than they could have anticipated.
The young husband and wife, graduate students at the University of Arizona, were shot execution-style in February 1975, their bodies left in a drainage ditch along Interstate 10.
On the night of Feb. 1, 1975, the Ruperts were driving home from the Fort Grant Training Center near Safford, where they had attended a banquet for the Seventh Step Foundation, an organization that helped ex-convicts. Charles, 27, met his wife, 22, while both were students in the school's public administration graduate program. They shared an interest in prisoner rehabilitation.
The couple left the banquet at 10:45 p.m. A passing motorist found their bodies along the interstate near Vail Road 24 hours later. Charles had been shot once in the side of the head and twice in the back with a .38-caliber revolver. Leslie was shot once behind the ear. Their car was found hours later at the junction of I-10 and Interstate 8 south of Casa Grande. The car had been wiped clean of fingerprints except for what appeared to be the letter "p" written on the rear window.
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Police at the time could not determine the location where the couple had been shot. The back seat of the car was stained with "a considerable amount of blood," but there was no blood trail leading from the roadway to the drainage ditch where the bodies were found.
Robbery, apparently, was not a motive for the killing, since money was found with the bodies.
Investigators, at the time, estimated the Ruperts were shot between midnight and 2 a.m. Feb. 2. A gas-station attendant near where their sedan was found said he saw a stocky, brown-haired man in his mid- to late 20s pull the car into his station between 1:30 and 5 a.m.
