Some cases stay with you because of the mystery.

Others stay with you because of the people.

Allen Vance was 39 years old.

His daughter, Chastity Dollison, was only 20.

On a June night in 2012, father and daughter were together in San Francisco when something happened that would leave a family without two people they loved and investigators searching for answers more than a decade later.

This was not a case where two people simply disappeared.

There was a crime scene.

There was a surviving witness.

There were gunshots.

And yet, after all these years, the person or people responsible have never been held accountable.

The cases may be cold.

The questions are still burning.

THE NIGHT EVERYTHING CHANGED

It was approximately 10:20 p.m. on June 13, 2012, when Allen Vance, his 20 year old daughter Chastity Dollison, and a family friend were traveling in a white two door Lexus near Silver Avenue and Elmira Street in San Francisco’s Silver Terrace neighborhood.

Then something completely ordinary turned into something horrifying.

The Lexus ran out of gas.

The three people were sitting inside the vehicle waiting for someone to come and help them.

They had no reason to believe that they were about to become the targets of a deadly attack.

According to the San Francisco Police Department, an unknown person or people approached the vehicle on foot and opened fire.

Several shots were fired into the Lexus.

Chastity and Allen were sitting in the front of the vehicle.

Both were struck.

Both would die.

The family friend sitting in the backseat was also shot but survived.

And just like that, a father and daughter were gone.

WHO WERE ALLEN AND CHASTITY?

It can be easy when reading a cold case to reduce someone to a name, an age and a date.

But Allen was someone’s father.

Chastity was someone’s daughter.

She was 20 years old and, according to reporting from the Bay Area Reporter, had plans for her future. She had been taking GED classes and was working with the San Francisco Conservation Corps and at a halfway house in the Excelsior neighborhood. Her mother later described her as caring and said she had plans for her life that were suddenly taken away.

That detail is important to me.

Because Chastity wasn’t just a 20 year old homicide victim.

She was a young woman who was still figuring out what her life was going to become.

And Allen was right there with her.

Whatever happened that night did not simply take two lives.

It changed an entire family.

THE SHOOTING

When officers arrived, they found the aftermath of the shooting.

Contemporary reporting stated that Chastity was in the driver’s seat and had suffered multiple gunshot wounds. Allen was in the front passenger seat and had also been shot.

Chastity was pronounced dead at the scene.

Allen was transported to San Francisco General Hospital, where he died several hours later.

The surviving passenger was injured but lived.

That person would become extremely important to the investigation.

According to a 2015 Bay Area Reporter investigation, the surviving passenger told police that he had ducked when the shooting began and did not get a good look at the person or people responsible.

He also reportedly did not see or hear a vehicle associated with the attackers.

Investigators believed the shooter or shooters fled on foot.

And this is where the case becomes incredibly frustrating.

Because someone knows something.

Someone may remember something they saw that night.

Someone may have heard a conversation.

Someone may have recognized a person.

Someone may have been told something afterward.

And after more than a decade, those pieces have still not come together.

THE CASE GOES COLD

Years passed.

The names Allen Vance and Chastity Dollison remained connected to an unsolved homicide investigation.

In 2015, investigators were still looking for answers.

Inspector Daniel Cunningham told the Bay Area Reporter that investigators were seeking additional testing of evidence, including DNA, and hoped to reinterview the surviving passenger.

That is something I find particularly important.

Cold cases do not necessarily mean investigators stopped caring.

Sometimes it means investigators reached the limits of what they could prove with the technology, evidence and information available at the time.

But technology changes.

Investigative techniques change.

People’s memories change.

And sometimes someone who was afraid to talk years ago finally decides they cannot keep carrying the secret.

A $225,000 REWARD

In June 2025, more than 13 years after the killings, the San Francisco Police Department announced a new $225,000 reward for information leading to the identification, arrest and conviction of the person or people responsible for the murders.

That is significant.

It tells me investigators have not simply placed this case in a forgotten file cabinet.

The case is still being actively presented to the public.

And that reward could be the thing that finally convinces someone to come forward.

The San Francisco Police Department currently lists the case as Case Number 120466794.

MY CRIMINAL JUSTICE PERSPECTIVE

Now I want to make something very clear.

What follows is my opinion and my own theory as a Criminal Justice major.

These are not accusations.

I am not naming a suspect.

I am not saying that anyone mentioned in connection with this case committed a crime.

I am looking at the circumstances and asking the questions that I would want investigators to continue asking.

Theory One: Was Allen or Chastity the intended target?

This is one of the biggest questions I have.

Two people were killed while sitting inside a vehicle that had simply run out of gas.

That makes me wonder whether the shooting was random or whether someone knew exactly who was inside that Lexus.

If the shooter approached specifically because Allen or Chastity was inside, that changes the entire investigative picture.

I would want investigators to take another look at both victims’ relationships, conflicts, friendships, employment, financial issues and personal lives immediately before the shooting.

Not because any of those things prove anything.

But because motive matters.

Theory Two: Could this have been an ambush?

The circumstances make me wonder whether the shooter knew the victims were sitting there.

The vehicle was disabled.

The occupants were waiting for help.

That created a predictable situation.

If someone knew they would be stranded in that location, they would have had an opportunity to approach the vehicle when the occupants were vulnerable.

I would want investigators to reconstruct the timeline minute by minute.

Who knew the Lexus had run out of gas?

Who was expected to bring fuel?

Who knew where they were?

Who had communicated with Allen or Chastity that evening?

Those seemingly small questions could potentially become very important.

Theory Three: The surviving witness may hold information that was overlooked

The surviving passenger was injured and experienced something incredibly traumatic.

According to reporting at the time, the witness did not get a good look at the shooter.

That does not necessarily mean there is nothing more to learn.

Human memory is complicated, especially when someone is experiencing extreme fear.

I would want investigators to consider another detailed interview using modern investigative interviewing techniques.

Not an interrogation.

An interview.

There is a difference.

I would want investigators to carefully reconstruct what the witness heard, saw and experienced without leading them toward a particular answer.

Sounds.

Footsteps.

Voices.

Clothing.

Direction of travel.

The number of shots.

The amount of time between the vehicle stopping and the shooting.

Anything.

Sometimes information that seems insignificant during an initial interview becomes important when investigators can compare it with other evidence years later.

Theory Four: Revisit the physical evidence

This is probably the biggest investigative opportunity in a case that is more than a decade old.

Technology has changed dramatically since 2012.

If biological evidence was recovered and preserved, I would want investigators to determine whether additional forensic testing is possible.

That could include DNA testing or other forensic examination that may not have been available or practical when the evidence was originally collected.

I would also want investigators to revisit ballistic evidence, shell casings, bullet fragments and the trajectory of the shots if those items were preserved.

The goal would not be to simply repeat what was done in 2012.

The goal would be to ask:

What can we do with this evidence today that we could not do back then?

THE QUESTION THAT BOTHERS ME

There is one thing about this case that keeps coming back to me.

Allen and Chastity were sitting in a car that had run out of gas.

They were waiting for help.

Then someone approached them and opened fire.

That means there was a period of time when the shooter made a decision.

They approached the vehicle.

They had the opportunity to walk away.

Instead, they allegedly chose violence.

And whatever the reason was, it cost two people their lives.

Chastity never got to finish becoming the person she was meant to become.

Allen never got to grow older with his daughter.

A family lost two people in a matter of minutes.

And someone responsible has managed to remain unidentified for years.

SOMEONE KNOWS SOMETHING

This is where I always come back to the same question in cold cases.

What if the person who knows the answer is not the person who committed the crime?

What if they were a friend?

A relative?

Someone who heard a confession?

Someone who saw something and convinced themselves it was not important?

Someone who was afraid of what would happen if they talked?

Thirteen years can create a lot of distance between a crime and the people who witnessed it.

But it can also create regret.

People get older.

Relationships change.

People fall out with one another.

Secrets become harder to carry.

And sometimes the person who finally speaks up is not the person investigators expected.

JUSTICE FOR ALLEN AND CHASTITY

The San Francisco Police Department is currently offering a $225,000 reward for information that leads to the identification, arrest and conviction of the person or people responsible for the murders of Allen Vance and Chastity Dollison.

Anyone with information can contact the San Francisco Police Department Homicide Detail at 415 553 9515 or 415 734 3102.

Anonymous tips can also be provided through the SFPD Tip Line at 415 575 4444 or by texting TIP411 and beginning the message with SFPD.

And if you know something, even if you think it is too small to matter, please remember this:

You do not have to solve the case.

You just have to tell someone what you know.

Because somewhere in San Francisco, there may still be an answer to what happened to Allen Vance and Chastity Dollison.

They deserve more than being remembered as another unsolved case.

They deserve justice.

Until Every Case is Solved.