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Carla Maxwell's lifeless body, riddled in gunshots, laid in a pool of her own blood behind the 7-Eleven counter in Utah.

A deranged gunman had walked into the store in Layton just outside Salt Lake City, after 3.15am, while the 20 year old was working the night shift, and shot her six times.

Maxwell's murder has baffled police as they have been unable to find a motive for the April 25, 1986 killing.

Now in a chilling turn of events her slaying has been linked to the murders of two other women in the area, one just 17 days after Maxwell.

'Three homicides, the same gun was used,' Layton City Police Lieutenant Riley Richins told the Daily Mail.

Nearly a year before Maxwell was killed, 18-year-old Christine Gallegos was found stabbed 11 times and shot twice just 28 miles away in Salt Lake City.

Three weeks after the 7-Eleven clerk was gunned down, 25-year-old Lisa Strong was shot in the head while walking home from work, approximately 30 miles from where Maxwell was killed.

After years of ballistic analysis of the bullets, it was linked back to a particular firearm that is believed to be .38 caliber. 

Carla Maxwell, 20, was shot dead in Layton, Utah, on April 25, 1986. Her murder remains unsolved but a new person of interest has been named in the case who has chilling links to two other murders in the area

Last year Salt Lake police identified former airman Rickie Lee Stallworth (pictured) as the man responsible for Christine Gallegos' murder. He has now been named a person of interest in Maxwell's murder

'It wasn't until 2025, about a year ago, Salt Lake City police were able to use [genetic genealogy] and identified a suspect in one of those homicides,' Lt Richins added.

Investigators tested scrapings from Gallegos’ fingernails, and later identified the suspect as Ricky Lee Stallworth, a Layton-area resident who worked at Hiller Air Force Base. 

Unfortunately the results came too late, as they discovered Stallworth died in 2023, and now police are contacting relatives and friends to profile him.

According to Stallworth’s friends and ex-wives, he often spent nights with sex workers and owned multiple guns throughout his life.

'He lived in Layton City at the same time, or around that time frame,' Lt Richins told Daily Mail. 

'So it's highly probable that he would have been traveling past that 7-Eleven, as he would travel to Salt Lake City for different reasons.

'That's why he's a person of interest to us in our case at this point,' he added.

Maxwell had just graduated from Ogden High School in 1983, where she stood out as both a star student and athlete. She was a talented swimmer on the school team and served as an editor for the student newspaper. 

Police located this broken knife blade near where Christine Gallegos died

Christine Gallegos, 18 and  Lisa Strong, 25, they were both killed with the same gun that murdered Maxwell

Maxwell had hoped to attend the United States Military Academy at West Point. She had only been working the overnight shift at the 7-Eleven for a few weeks. 

When asked about a motive in Maxwell’s brutal killing, the lieutenant said there was no evidence of enemies or anyone who would have targeted her.

'She was young, she had her whole life in front of her, you know, and all that was just abruptly taken away from her,' Lt Richins said.

A year before the star student was gunned down, Gallegos was killed on May 16, 1985. Her body was discovered near 1300 South and Jefferson Street shortly before 4am.

She had been stabbed with such force that the knife’s blade snapped from the handle. 

Some of her jewelry was found away from her body, leading investigators to believe the killer had moved it in an attempt to conceal evidence.  

Investigators said Gallegos had been living a double life, telling her family and boyfriend she worked at a tavern in Salt Lake City while secretly working as a prostitute. 

The young woman lied about her bar job 'so she could get out of the house occasionally and get away from her mother and boyfriend,' investigators wrote in documents viewed by local outlet KSL-TV. 

Rickie Lee Stallworth (pictured) died before police named him as the likely suspect in Christine Gallegos' murder

Layton police now consider Stallworth (pictured) a person of interest in Maxwell's murder

Police have appealed to people to come forward with any information in Maxwell's murder

Gallegos was last seen at her friend's home at 10.30pm. The friend told police the 18-year-old had planned to hitchhike into Salt Lake City.

An hour later, shots were fired and Gallegos was dead. Later in the investigation, the FBI determined the ruthless killer had shown 'no remorse,' at the scene adding that the young woman was likely not his first victim. 

Three weeks after Maxwell’s murder came Strong’s. The 25-year-old art school graduate had moved to Salt Lake City with her husband to pursue a modeling career, but the couple separated soon after. 

Strong worked at Angel’s Answering Service in Sugar House and often made the mile-and-a-half walk home alone after late shifts. 

Just after midnight on May 12, 1986, while returning from an unusually late night at work, she was confronted and fatally shot in the head. 

Nearby residents reported hearing a woman scream 'no, no,' followed by four to five rapid gunshots. Some also said they saw a car speeding away from the scene with its headlights off. 

Bullets recovered from Strong’s case have now been compared with those from Maxwell and Gallegos, and all showed identical rifling characteristics, indicating they were fired from the same revolver. 

Stallworth's DNA has only been linked to Gallegos' murder. Another shooter, Forrest Lee Whittle, was convicted of Strong's murder and is serving a life sentence for it. Whittle is also considered a person of interest in Maxwell’s case. 

Forrest Lee Whittle was convicted of Lisa Strong's murder. He is also considered a person of interest in Maxwell’s case

Investigators are still exploring how the same firearm was used while pursuing different leads and possible suspects.

'We don't want to get just narrowly focused on one person. There's a lot of possibilities,' Lt Richins said.

'It could be one person used the same firearm in all three homicides. It also could be that the firearm traded hands.

'That's what we're trying to look into to build, try and figure out who these individuals were, type of people, the way they were, did they own firearms? Did they sell firearms? Did they trade firearms? There's a lot to go into that.

'Unfortunately, we don't have the definitive answer if this gun was used by one person or if it's traded hands,' he added.

Speaking at a press conference in May 2025 when cops identified Stallworth as the likely suspect in her daughter's murder, Leah Gallegos said: 'You never quit thinking about it. You never quit crying about it.

'I wonder about the kids that she would have…

'She was outgoing, she was sweet... they took so much away when they took her away.'

The mother of Christine Gallegos, Leah Gallegos, is pictured during a press conference in May 2025 when cops identified Rickie Lee Stallworth as the likely suspect in her daughter's murder

Ahead of the 40th anniversary of Maxwell's murder, police appealed for new information.

'With it being the 40-year anniversary, we thought, what a great time to get it back in the public eye and to try and get any further leads or tips that we might be able to follow up on,' Lt Richins said. 

'We're hoping that an individual or multiple people will come forward to provide that information for us so that we can bring some justice to Carla and her family,' he added.