BLOOMSBURG — State Police have reopened the investigation of a 42-year-old unsolved murder of a motorcycle gang member whose body was dumped along Byrnsville Road near Centralia June 7, 1974.

State Police at Bloomsburg ask anyone with information about the killing of Dennis Michael Schwartz, 22, of Mount Penn, near Reading in Berks County, contact them at 570-387-4261. 

State Police have not revealed what has sparked renewed interest in the case. 

An Ashland hospital worker heading to work that morning discovered Schwartz’s body along Byrnsville Road, which is now the Route 61 bypass between Centralia and Ashland. 

Investigators determined at the time that Schwartz was shot behind the right ear, possibly while seated inside a car.

And the condition of his body suggested he had been either thrown out of a vehicle or dragged on his face, according to news articles published in the Press Enterprise at the time.

Back in 1974, State Police said that Schwartz, who had long hair and a beard, was a former member of the Pottsville-based Charter Oaks Motorcycle Club. 

In announcing the reopening of the Schwartz investigation, State Police noted that the probe revealed that Schwartz “was prospecting for a motorcycle gang at the time of the homicide.”