In 1979, police believe men killed a man in a wheelchair then dressed as women and fled. Now, Utah police want to find them.

South Salt Lake • Jack Richardson took his family fishing and hunting, sledding and tubing.

If he couldn’t participate in the activity — and he usually could — he would film his children playing. He didn’t let his wheelchair get in the way of family fun.

“He was in a wheelchair,” said daughter Karin Johnstone, “but he wasn’t handicapped.”

Then, on Jan. 5, 1979, detectives from the Unified Police Department believe, two men looking for someone to rob chose Richardson, 54, because of his wheelchair. They got Richardson to open the door of his Holladay home, where they allegedly shot and killed the man before fleeing.

On Friday, the Salt Lake County district attorney charged the pair, Hector Brito and Pascual Alfonseca, with first-degree murder. They also were charged with counts of robbery and obstruction of justice.

But no one seems to know where Brito and Alfonseca are. Not long after the killing, detectives believe, Brito and Alfonseca dressed as women, boarded a bus and left Utah. Police haven’t had a sighting of them since.

Friday’s news conference with law enforcement and Richardson’s family was a chance to both announce the charges and ask for help finding the suspects.

Brito and Alfonseca, who are now believed to both be 60 years old, immigrated from the Dominican Republican, UPD Detective Ben Pender said Friday. They came to Utah to attend a Jobs Corps program but got into trouble when they arrived in the state. UPD on Friday displayed old mug shots from arrests that happened before the Richardson killing.

Pender said Brito and Alfonseca may be in the United States, the Dominican or somewhere else. Pender, who investigates cold case homicides for UPD, said he has spoken to their families and they report they have not heard from the men since the late 1970s.

According to a witness who spoke to detectives a week after the shooting, Brito and Alfonseca wanted to steal guns in Richardson’s home. They loaded a .45-caliber Colt revolver.

They knocked or rang Richardson’s doorbell, the witness said, and then rushed in when Richardson opened the door.

Brito told Richardson it was a holdup and pointed the gun, the witness told police. Richardson raised his hands but was shot anyway.

The witness said he was told the shooting was an accident.

A second witness told police Brito gave him the gun, according to court documents. The witness said he tossed the remaining bullets in Butterfield Canyon and hid the gun under a rock there. Detectives found the revolver in the canyon 10 days after the killing.

Brito and Alfonseca, apparently knowing detectives were looking for them, disguised themselves as women for the bus ride out of Utah.

“That’s kind of the twist,” Pender said. He did not offer a more precise description of the disguises.

As was the procedure in 1979, detectives from the Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Office obtained an arrest warrant for Brito and Alfonseca. Formal charges would have been filed after the arrest.

But detectives couldn’t find the suspects, and charges were never filed. The court that issued the warrant canceled it in 1991 in what appears to have been a routine purging of old warrants, Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill explained at Friday’s news conference.

Pender recently began re-examining the case, which led prosecutors to announce Friday that charges would be filed.

Richardson’s family, including his 88-year-old widow, Rayola Richardson, who came home and found her husband’s body after he was shot in the face, were at the news conference Friday to discuss the victim. Family photos were displayed on a table next to crime scene photos and Brito and Alfonseca’s mug shots.

Cindy Greer, another of Richardson’s daughters, said she was hurt to know the suspects targeted her father because he used a wheelchair.

“They could have done anything” to him, Greer said, “but they didn’t have to shoot him.”