Casie Ellison, daughter of murder victim Melissa Ellison, speaks at a news conference Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026, about her mother's slaying 38 years ago. | First Coast Crime Stoppers
Published on January 15, 2026 at 1:38 pm
Free local news and info, in your inbox at 6 a.m. M-F. Sign up for the Jacksonville Today newsletter.
Melissa Ellison was clubbed to death 38 years ago with a charred log from the fireplace of her mobile home in West Jacksonville. The killer left her 13-month-old daughter untouched.
Now the grown daughter and sisters are pushing for more answers to a cold case that has remained unsolved since Ellison’s death on Dec. 28, 1987.
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
Family and police held a news conference Thursday with First Coast Crime Stoppers in a renewed push for answers from the public. For Casie Ellison, the murder of her mother, 20 years old at the time, is “not in the past” — someone knows what happened to her.
“She was unarmed; she was not engaged in criminal activity; she posed no threat to anyone,” Casie Ellison said, wearing a sweatshirt that read, “This is what depression looks like.”
“No one has been held accountable,” she said. “That means someone has lived for 38 years knowing exactly what happened while our family has lived for 38 years without the truth. Someone knows who did this. Someone knows why it happened.”
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
Glenda Banford, one of Melissa Ellison’s sisters, said the family continues to have unimaginable pain about that December night when someone came to her home “to deliberately hurt her.”
“It has eaten us alive,” Banford said. “My message today is not just for her killers, but all those involved in covering it up, all those involved in not speaking up. I want you to know that your actions have caused so much pain for my family, and so much grief. I wouldn’t wish this on any other family.”
Cold case details
Ellison, known by many as Missy Taylor, married out of high school, then had Casie. But just before Casie turned 13 months old, Ellison and her husband separated. Mother and child lived in the mobile home on Coljean Court off Normandy Boulevard, with two other roommates.
Just before 5 a.m. Dec. 28, someone broke out a window in the mobile home to get in, then hit Ellison with the log, police said at the time. Her roommates found her body in her bedroom, while the baby had been moved out of the room to a couch in the living room, alive and surrounded by pillows. The log was left at the front door, family members said.
Project: Cold Case, begun in 2015 to log and publicize Jacksonville’s unsolved murders, has a page of information on Ellison’s case and news stories seeking tips.
A Florida Times-Union story says someone called 911 the night after the murder referring to Ellison’s death and saying, “I’m sorry — I had to do it.”
But since the murder, the case has gone cold, said Travis Oliver Sr., a cold case detective with the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.
Oliver Sr. shared that there were roomates in the home when Ellison was murdered.
“We have witnesses that we know have information, and that information that they are withholding from us is hindering us getting justice for the family,” he said. “We will still be trying to reach out to those people, and see if we can reach out to you, talk to you, if you can come forward and give us the information that we need.”
Modern forensic tools, not available in 1987, also will be used to “work this case as if it was happening now,” Oliver said.
As with previous cold case murders, Crime Stoppers joined efforts by Project: Cold Case founder Ryan Backmann to push for more information.
“This case has not been forgotten,” Crime Stoppers Executive Director Chase Robinson said during the news conference. “Your attention and your willingness to listen helps keep the search for justice alive. … Our role is to stand beside the family and amplify their pain, their hope and their plea for answers, while providing the public with a safe and anonymous way to share information.”
Anyone with information about Ellison’s murder can call the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office at 904-630-0500. To remain anonymous and possibly be eligible for a $5,000 reward if the tip leads to arrest, call First Coast Crime Stoppers at 866-845-8477 (TIPS).
