More than five months since Foster City police of 71-year-old Klaus Gachter in his lagoon front home, few details have emerged in a case that's shattered the upper-middle class Peninsula suburb's sense of imperviousness to violent crime.
No suspects or persons of interests have yet been named, and police won't say whether they have any video, eyewitnesses, or forensic evidence. Releasing critical details of the investigation would compromise the probe, police Capt. Jon Froomin told Patch.
Police are adamant, however, that solving Foster City's first reported homicide in nearly six years remains their top priority.
Gachter’s body was found in his home on the 600 block of Waterbury Lane on Dec. 16 according to a neighbor’s account. Police say Gachter, an adventurer and philanthropist, was likely targeted.
Froomin deflected the notion that the case does not appear to be going well.
"We're absolutely not calling it a cold case, " he said.
"We're working with the evidence that we have and the information that we have. It is still an active investigation."
Froomin said the department has one Sergeant and two detectives assigned to an investigation that's already involved interviews with well over 40 people. Additional resources from within and outside the department have been summoned to augment their work and will continue to do so.
The tiny department of 36 sworn officers had as many as five officers assigned to the case fulltime until early February.
The Gachter killing is Foster City's first reported homicide since January of 2006, when according to published reports, a 50-year-old wheelchair-bound man was stabbed to death by a 41-year-old Redwood City man he refused to sell drugs to.
Police say Timothy Singler shot himself to death shortly after killing Brandon Hepponstall.
The last reported Foster City homicide before that was in 1996.
Anyone with information about the Gachter case is asked to call the Foster City Police Department Detective Bureau at (650) 286-3300 or the police tip line at (650) 286-3323.
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