Daughter Seeks Truth in Mom's 1993 Queens Murder

Dominique Harrow-Bredwood was 5 years old when her mother left Jamaica, West Indies to earn money as a beautician in New York City.

Dominique Harrow-Bredwood was five years old when her mother, a beautician in her mid-20's, was wooed away from Jamaica, West Indies with promises of a more affluent life in New York City. In the early 1990's, her mom, Dawn Higgins, married Emilio Cardoza--a former high school acquaintance--at Devon House in Kingston, Jamaica.

"I remember crying all day," Harrow-Bredwood recalled this week.

Dominique remained with her grandmother in Jamaica, while the newlyweds settled at 2095 Creston Avenue in the Bronx. Dominique learned her mother found success as a busy beautician. Dawn Higgins Cardoza, known as Peaches, often wired money home to Dominique's grandmother, so her little girl could attend private elementary school. This was a rare opportunity for a child living in a low-income, rural community.

The family of Dawn Higgins Cardoza said she was earning good money as a beautician in the Bronx, New York.

"She called me Shelly Ann," Dominique remembered. "I'm a nurse now."

And at the age of 39, Dominique Harrow-Bredwood is now trying to find the truth about her mother's murder thirty two years ago. On March 7, 1993, a passing motorist on the southbound Clearview Expressway in Queens discovered the partially-clothed body of Dawn Higgins Cardoza, 28, in a gully in the woods of Cunningham Park. The death certificate listed the cause of death as strangulation.

The death certificate for Dawn Higgins Cardoza indicates she was killed by strangulation.

About a year ago, an old Newsday story about Cardoza's murder turned up on the Reddit site devoted to the Long Island Serial Killer case. Web sleuths wondered if Cardoza could be a victim of the accused murderer Rex Heuermann, because Cardoza was found partly nude off the side of a highway in the woods. Dominique Harrow-Bredwood told me she stumbled upon this site just months ago and posted that she didn't think her mother was a LISK victim.

The partially-clothed body of Dawn Higgins Cardoza, 28, was found in a gully off the Clearview Exoressway in Queens on March 7, 1993.

Dominique said police told her family that Dawn's husband was questioned but never charged with a crime. Dominique said her efforts to talk to him on Facebook were rebuffed. The victim's daughter said she learned from an aunt her mother had moved out of the Bronx apartment in 1993 because of domestic issues.

So Dominique, who now lives in the United States, is pursuing justice on her own and appealing to authorities in Queens to take another look at her mother's case. Dawn Higgins Cardoza was killed during a year when 1,960 homicides were logged in New York City. The detective's squads in the five boroughs couldn't keep up with all of them.

Dominique Harrow-Bredwood, now 39, has begun digging for answers in her mother’s 1993 murder.

Dominique reached out to me in July on Facebook, asking for assistance to gain new attention for her mom's murder:

"Hello Mary, I am about 32 years late but I still struggle with the loss of my mother as if it was yesterday," Dominique wrote. "I was deterred for many years and I have been scared, too, but I am learning everyday that I need closure. Seeking your help."

Dominique has a 16 year old son and 9 year old daughter and revealed when she became a mother, she started to feel anger that she couldn't share the experience with her own mom.

5 year old Dominique stayed close to her mother on her mom’s wedding day to a former high school acquaintance in Jamaica.

Dominique said as a little girl, she used to wait every Friday for her mother's phone call from New York City.

"We had a landline at my grandmother's store," Dominique recalled.

On Friday, March 5, 1993, the call didn't come.

"Grandma was screaming. She had a vision her daughter had passed," Dominique said.

The wait for a call became excruciating.

"When Saturday passed, that's when everyone was like 'Something is definitely wrong," Dominique recalled.

A family friend found out that Dawn's body was found in the gully on Sunday morning, March 7, in Queens, New York and notified the victim's brother.

"My uncle was bawling," Dominique remembered. "Peaches is dead."

The daughter said she passed out upon learning the news.

Dawn Higgins Cardoza was wearing a gold ring showing the scales of justice, so police initially thought she might have been a law student, but they later discovered the ring represented the Zodiac sign, Libra.

Dawn Cardoza’s body was found in a gully between the Union Turnpike and Grand Central Parkway exits off the Clearview Expressway in Queens.

One of Dominique's uncles flew to New York to retrieve her mother's body and brought Dawn Higgins Cardoza back home to Jamaica for a burial in the community of Saint Catherine.

"At the funeral, my grandmother was a shell of herself," Dominique told me.

The still-grieving daughter said multiple people in her family were badly affected by Dawn's murder, especially her grandma.

"My grandmother passed away four years ago, and she died depressed," Dominique said.

Aside from childhood photos, one of the few mementos Dominique has of her mother is a 'photo banner' showing the smiling beautician with Dominique close by her side. There's an image of a chain with two lockets beneath the picture.

The banner's caption reads, "Prisoner of LOVE."

A ‘photo banner’ showing Dawn Higgins Cardoza with her daughter, Dominique, is one of the few mementoes Dominique has.

Anyone with information about the unsolved murder can e-mail the Cold Case Unit at the office of Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz.

The e-mail is: homicide@queensda.org.

The phone number for the homicide unit is: (718) 286-5896.