Kudos to Los Angeles’s cold case unit and Detective Mitzi Roberts and forensic artist Marilyn Droz for trying to help a family find this missing loved one.
But what took so long? This young woman’s body was found in 1994!
40,000 unidentified bodies in the U.S. and 105,000 missing persons cases. A whole lot of potential matches that aren’t being made. Why wait so long on any unidentified to do all you can to help their families find their answers as quickly as possible? A mom or dad could have passed away never knowing what happened to her.
I hope her DNA, her dentals, and prints are in the national databases. I do not believe that California has yet enacted Project Jason’s Campaign for the Missing, which has been enacted in 11 states. That would be a good move for a state where SO many people vanish.
(Mitzi, contact us to get that going!)
Still, I’m glad the detective made something happen here. Let’s hope it leads to answers for her family.
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/local/los_angeles&id=7254240
With the help of forensic artists, investigators are using photographs taken at a crime scene to try and recreate the way one young woman might have looked at the time of her murder.
The detectives are also using other items like jewelry and clothes, but it all still provides an incomplete portrait of a murder victim.
On a stretch of road in the Angeles National Forest, beyond a yellow guard rail is a patch of dirt where more than 15 years ago a young woman’s body was set on fire and left to burn like a pile of trash.
“The fire was actually an attempt to hide the victim’s identity,” said Los Angeles Police Detective Mitzi Roberts.
Roberts works on the LAPD’s Cold Case Unit. And she’s talking about a woman known only as “Jane Doe,” a woman probably 18 to 22 years old, who was strangled in August 1994.
“Some passersby observed what appeared to be burning trash off the side of the freeway, and they stopped to take a look at it, kicked some dirt on it, and realized that it was actually a body that was burning,” said Roberts.
Because of the fire, authorities weren’t able to identify the victim at the time of the murder, and to this day, her identity remains a mystery.
“Memories fade and things like that, so we’re at a severe loss because of the loss of time and how long it’s been,” said Roberts.
But at the very least, Roberts is hoping to learn who this woman was. And she’s working with the very little evidence that was recovered at the crime scene.
Specifically, gold rings and a gold chain. The jewelry made it through the fire set by the killer. There’s also a medallion of Jesus Christ.
And then there’s what was left of the woman’s dress, with a floral print. They help provide an incomplete portrait of a murder victim.
“I have to believe that somewhere out there there’s a family member, a mother, a father, grandfather, grandmother, sibling that’s missing this child,” said Roberts.
The Cold Case Unit is also trying to reconstruct how the victim looked, so they turned to Marilyn Droz, a forensic artist with more than 30 years’ experience.
“My impression, from the pictures that I had to work with, was that she was a young Latina woman, an attractive girl,” said Droz. “What was significant that I wanted to bring out in the picture, was the gap between her two front teeth and some small moles on her forehead.”
It’s likely the young victim was Hispanic or Filipina, and probably Catholic.
Roberts is hoping some of these details will trigger something in someone’s memory. Otherwise, this cold case may never be closed.
“This family probably is hoping that she’s still missing, not dead, but hopefully or maybe the family just needs closure, and I would just have to tell them the truth and offer to bring that healing process somehow,” said Roberts.
If you have information related to this case, you are asked to call the Los Angeles Police Department at (877) 527-3247 (LAPD-24-7).
Kudos to Los Angeles’s cold case unit and Detective Mitzi Roberts and forensic artist Marilyn Droz for trying to help a family find this missing loved one.
But what took so long? This young woman’s body was found in 1994!
40,000 unidentified bodies in the U.S. and 105,000 missing persons cases. A whole lot of potential matches that aren’t being made. Why wait so long on any unidentified to do all you can to help their families find their answers as quickly as possible? A mom or dad could have passed away never knowing what happened to her.
I hope her DNA, her dentals, and prints are in the national databases. I do not believe that California has yet enacted Project Jason’s Campaign for the Missing. That would be a good move for a state where SO many people vanish.
Still, I’m glad the detective made something happen here. Let’s hope it leads to answers for her family.
Here is the article. Video included.
0 comments Denise Harrison (Second Life nickname: Ronnie Rhode) | Behind the Headlines |
A new display featuring hundreds of missing persons posters is now available for anyone to place on their land. The display lets people click on any missing person’s poster and receive a notecard that gives a URL to learn more about that person and their families. The notecards also have small gifts in them. This is free for anyone to use and place.
Home for the Holidays: Special Series
I approached a CNN reporter about the possibility of doing a story about Jason Jolkowski and his parents, Kelly and Jim, the founders of Project Jason. The reporter said yes, and the story was not only published, it held a spot on the home page of CNN.com for a few hours that day! (The CNN story about The Garden for the Missing was also featured on the CNN home page, as some of you who follow this may recall.)
Project Jason announced a new fundraiser that kicked off on the nonprofit’s sixth anniversary October 6, 2009. “No Family Left Behind” asks the public to help fund the next Project Jason Keys to Healing Retreat, to be held in August 2010. The first retreat was such a miracle, we want to repeat it, but we want to make it free for all attendees. Be sure to 
This isn’t just a sad story. this was reality for numerous families who wanted, no, needed to come to our 2009 retreat but could not afford it.
