History and mysteries · Blackwood, Gloucester Township
Carol Reiff: the acquittal missing from older breakthrough headlines
Acquittal documented · Sources compared
A decade-old death investigation produced a DNA-based prosecution, but the man charged was acquitted in December 2024.
A disappearance near the wooded edge
Carol Reiff was reported missing in June 2013 after missing a planned family trip. Police found her car and keys at her apartment complex. Three days later, her body was located in woods behind a maintenance building.
In 2023, prosecutors charged Joseph Grisoff after retesting items from the apartment. Early coverage described the development as a breakthrough. Those reports describe the prosecution’s position at that time, not the result of a trial.
The later outcome belongs in the story
Grisoff was acquitted in December 2024. Patch’s January 2025 follow-up also reported the defense’s contention that laboratory contamination affected the samples. The laboratory records and trial transcript were not independently examined here, so that contention remains attributed.
A reader following only the original arrest headlines would miss the decisive change. The acquittal must remain explicit wherever the accusation is discussed; nothing in this entry asserts that Grisoff killed Reiff.
Sources and research limits
KYW, May 10, 2023, contemporary reporting on the disappearance and charges. June Bakan, Patch, January 8, 2025, acquittal follow-up. The later article contains an apparent 2023-for-2013 typo in its historical chronology; that typo is not repeated here.