On the night of January 15, 1971, 16-year-old James Jay Lorenzo Dial Jr. was walking home in the Green Valley neighborhood of Arlington, Virginia, after leaving his girlfriend’s house. A student at Wakefield High School, Dial was an athlete and musician, the only boy among six siblings. A car pulled up beside him; after a brief interaction with the occupants he began to walk away and someone inside the vehicle shot him in the back. Severely wounded, he staggered to a nearby house on South Kenmore Street and collapsed on the porch.

He was taken to a local hospital and pronounced dead on arrival. Fear and suspicion spread through the predominantly Black Green Valley community, and rumors quickly circulated that the Ku Klux Klan was responsible, with some seeing the killing as a violent message tied to efforts to honor Martin Luther King Jr. That year Arlington police arrested a suspect but released the person for lack of sufficient evidence. The case remains unsolved and is listed as a cold case by the Arlington Police Department.

If anyone knew James Jay Dial Jr., his routines, or saw something that night, can you help provide information?