The Murder of Trellis “Tree” Sykes in Sunnyside

Gone Cold - Texas True Crime

Vincent Strange

True Crime, Society & Culture, News

4.6 • 1.8K Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2022

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Sunnyside, Houston, Texas was once a community of hope and prosperity. But by the 1990s, the community was riddled with dilapidated buildings and infrastructure, poverty, and crime. Track champion, basketball all-star, and honor student Trellis “Tree” Sykes was a light in the community. Everyone in Sunnyside was proud to have her as a local. In 1994, however, someone who can only be described as a monster accosted Tree and violently ended her incredibly special and promising life. Years later, when a neighborhood rapist was identified after the city of Houston finally prioritized ending their backlog of rape kits, the cops were sure the man was responsible for Tree’s slaying. Though the case remains unsolved to this day, Houston Homicide Division Cold Case Detective Darcus Shorten recently reopened the case.

If you have any information about the murder of Trellis Tree Sykes, please contact the Houston Police Department Homicide Division’s Cold Case Squad at (713)308-3618

If you are a survivor of sexual violence and need confidential help, please call the national sexual assault hotline at (800)656-HELP or (800)656-4673. You can also visit the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network at RAINN.org

Also, visit endthebacklog.org to find out how you can help get justice for victims and survivors and take dangerous sexual offenders off the street

Please donate to help get #JusticeForLeonLaureles at gofundme.com/f/leon-laureles-private-detective-and-memorial

To help the family of Brittany McGlone afford a billboard, go to gofundme.com/f/billboard-ad-for-the-unsolved-murder-of-my-sister

The Fort Worth Police Department still has nearly 1,000 unsolved cases dating back to 1959. You can help our diligent Cold Case Detectives by donating to the Fort Worth Cold Case Support Group at http://fwpdcoldcasesupport.org

If you’d like to donate to law enforcement investigations that need funding or upload your DNA into a database used only for law enforcement investigations, you can at DNAsolves.com. If you don’t have DNA data from a consumer testing site, you can get a kit at connect.DNAsolves.com

You can support gone cold and listen ad-free at patreon.com/gonecoldpodcast

Find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by using @gonecoldpodcast and on YouTube at: youtube.com/c/gonecoldpodcast

#JusticeForTree #JusticeForTrellisSykes #Houston #HoustonTX #SunnysideTX #HarrisCountyTX #Texas #TX #GoneCold #GoneColdPodcast #TexasTrueCrime #TrueCrime #TrueCrimePodcast #Podcast #ColdCase #UnsolvedMysteries #UnsolvedMurder #Murder #Homicide #EndtheBacklog

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Transcript

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0:00.0	On the day this episode releases, July 17th, 2022, Gone Cold is 5 years old.
0:09.4	I don't want to make a big deal about it, I couldn't care less about stuff like this,
0:14.2	but I did want to say thank you to everyone out there for listening.
0:18.9	Y'all mean the world to Erica and I and without you, it would be pointless to produce this
0:24.0	show.
0:25.7	I know a ton of you who have been with us since the beginning, and even if this is the
0:30.0	first episode of Gone Cold you've ever listened to, we appreciate it immensely.
0:35.6	So thank you.
0:38.6	I'd also like to add to Erica's usual discretion announcement.
0:43.9	This episode deals with the murder of a teenager and includes some descriptions of rape and
0:49.9	sexual violence that were pretty tough to write and record.
0:55.0	These descriptions are not gratuitous, but might be disturbing nonetheless, just a heads
1:00.7	up.
1:03.2	If you're a survivor of sexual violence and need confidential help, please call the
1:08.6	National Sexual Assault Hotline.
1:11.6	The number is 800-656-HELP or 800-656-4673.
1:20.6	We'll provide that number in the show notes, as well as a link to the rape, abuse, and
1:25.4	incest national network, or rain.org.
1:30.3	The Gone Cold Podcast may contain violent or graphic subject matter, listener discretion
1:35.2	is advised.
1:38.1	For decades following emancipation, former slaves from West Louisiana and Southeast Texas
1:45.0	trickled into Houston as words spread through black newspapers and by mouth that the
	...

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