EastPark John Doe, missing persons events, and other stories

Colorado: There will be two events to honor the May 10, 2020 disappearance of Suzanne Morphew from Chaffee County. (I haven’t added her yet cause it hasn’t yet been a year.) The first will be held at the Poncha Springs Visitor Center at 7010 U.S. Highway 285 in Poncha Springs, Colorado at 7:00 p.m. on April 30. This day would be/have been Suzanne’s fiftieth birthday. The second event is scheduled for 4:00 p.m. on May 2, at the Community Garden at 202 East Church Street in Alexandria, Indiana; Suzanne grew up there and many family and friends still live there. I might attend that event as it’s only an hour and ten minutes from where I live.

Kentucky: In EastPark, on the edge of Boyd County, last July, hunters found the badly decomposed remains of a murdered man partially buried. He had been dead for between approximately two weeks and a month. The man was wearing only boxer shorts and there were no personal effects. The man was between 20 and 40 years old and about 5’8 and 140 to 160 pounds, with brown hair between earlobe length and shoulder length. He had been shot, but also had drugs in his system when he died. The place where he was buried, although somewhat secluded, had easy access to the interstate; the dead man “literally could have come from anywhere.” The man has yet to be identified.

Also in Kentucky: Skeletal remains found in Hardyville in February 2020 have been identified as Jacob Lewis Tipton, a 24-year-old man who disappeared from Berea on April 23, 2016. Unfortunately there wasn’t much left of him and they couldn’t establish a cause of death.

Also in Kentucky: They’re still looking for Andrea Michelle Knabel, a 37-year-old woman who disappeared from Louisville on August 13, 2019. A retired homicide detective has taken an interest in the case and believes he’s found a three-hour discrepancy in the timeline of the night of Andrea’s disappearance.

Mississippi: They’re still trying to identify a Jane Doe who were found under a bridge over the Pearl River in Rankin County in 1978. She was nude and wrapped in an old blanket. She had died of multiple blows to the head and may have been killed by serial killer Samuel Little, who died late last year. They’re looking into the possibility that the Jane Doe may be Wendy Susan Byron, a 24-year-old woman who disappeared from Glendora, California just two days before Jane Doe was found in Mississippi.

New York: They’re still looking for Flossie A. Wilbur, a 75-year-old woman who disappeared from Angelica on August 24, 1985. David Sherk, one of her then-neighbors, confessed to her murder in 2020 and told authorities he had buried her body near the Almond Dam, but the body has never been found. Doesn’t mean the man was lying; the dam has flooded multiple times since 1985. Sherk had terminal brain cancer when he made his confession and I’m not sure he’s still alive now, but he was never charged.

South Dakota: In Rapid City, groups and leaders both from town and from Native American reservations across the state united yesterday to raise awareness for missing and murdered indigenous people. Here are some photos of the event.

Virginia: It’s been ten years now since Robert Lee Hourihan disappeared, leaving behind a wife and six-year-old daughter her adored. Foul play is suspected in his case. His wife has never remarried and still hopes every day that he will be found.

Also Virginia: Human remains found in the woods on the campus of Hollins University back in February have been identified as Jessica Darling Dickson, a 30-year-old woman who disappeared from Roanoke on June 1, 2019. Jessica’s death is under investigation, but the police said there doesn’t seem to be any connection to the university and they don’t think the students (it’s a women’s college) are in danger.

Toronto, Ontario, Canada: There’s an interesting article/podcast episode on the systemic failures of Toronto Police and missing persons cases.

New Waterford, Nova Scotia, Canada: They’re still looking for Debbie Hutchinson, 59-year-old woman who disappeared on April 15, 2017 and wasn’t reported missing for twelve days. Her niece found groceries lying on the floor of Debbie’s home, and her car later turned up abandoned and burned.

Interesting article with a lot more info on Jody Ledkins case

Hi all. This article came out a few days ago that has a lot more info on the 1985 disappearance of Jody Lee Ledkins. It’s very interesting and it’s hard to decide whether or not she ran away, though I don’t think she’s alive now.

The article puzzles me though. It’s mentioned that Jody’s probation officer got a letter, supposedly from her, after her disappearance, and that Jody’s mom compared the writing to a previous letter Jody wrote to her PO before she went missing. The article includes photos of both letters.

But, um, the post-disappearance letter is addressed to “Mom” and includes the phrase “I am writing to tell you I love you” which doesn’t sound like the kind of thing you’d write to your PO. I wonder if the reporter mis-wrote and she meant to say Jody’s mom got the letter. I do think it’s odd that the letter references Jody’s sister just as “sister” rather than by her name.

I can’t really say whether the handwriting looks the same to me; the pre-disappearance letter is printed (sort of) and the post-disappearance one is in cursive, which doesn’t really help comparison.

There’s also part of a transcript from a threatening call Jody’s mom got. The caller said if her mom didn’t pay them money, “your daughter will be sent to you in pieces.” The caller also asks about someone named “Lori”; maybe that’s Jody’s sister? I dunno.

Missing persons news that happened while my computer was broken

Yeah, so this has been in the news:

• They’re going to try to identify two bodies, victims of a terrible fire at a Connecticut circus in 1944. 168 people were killed and of those, five are still unidentified. Per the article: “State Chief Medical Examiner James Gill wants to compare the unknown victims’ DNA to that of Sandra Sumrow, the granddaughter of 47-year-old Grace Fifield, a Newport, Vermont woman who was at the circus the day of the fire but was never seen again.”
• Hazel Rose Hess‘s daughter has gone on the news asking for information that could solve her mother’s 25-year-old disappearance. There isn’t much in the way of anything new in the article, however. I just found a few new pictures.
• There’s been some news about the 1985 disappearances of Janet Shuglie and her ten-year-old daughter Marisa. It turns out someone found her class ring. They found it over 20 years ago, but it wasn’t until recently that they realized the ring belonged to a missing person and turned it over to the police.
  The police seem to think the find is significant, and they have not disclosed where the ring was found. There were several articles about this: here, here, here and here. There is a picture of the ring (is it just me or is the stone missing?) but alas, no photos of Marisa. I don’t have a photo of her either, so only Janet has a casefile on Charley.
• They’ve found the bodies of Danielle Marie Steiner and her five-year-old son, Aubrey Hall, who disappeared from Lansing, Michigan a year ago. The bodies were discovered by a clean-up crew in a vacant house in the 800 block of Loa Street. The article notes that “At various times, Steiner and Aubrey had lived in the 700 and 800 block of Loa Street.”
  No other details have been released, except that the deaths are being treated as homicides. I’m sure their families are devastated.
• This month is the 13th anniversary of the disappearance of Melanie Metheny from Belle, West Virginia. She went missing on July 19, 2006. There’s this article about it.
• Doreen Jane Vincent‘s 1988 disappearance has been covered in the second season of the podcast “Faded Out.” I grabbed a bunch of photos off this article, and the podcast sounds absolutely fascinating, but I don’t know if I’ll have time to listen to it. There’s 21 episodes in the season so far, ranging in length from 27 minutes to an hour and 17 minutes, during which time I’d have to be paying very close attention, stopping the play to take notes, etc. All for one case. I wish I had the time for this kind of thing; it would benefit the Charley Project greatly. But I just don’t.
• A suspect, Bryan Lee O’Daniels, has been charged with murder in the 1995 disappearance of Timothy Jason Smart. Apparently there were many witnesses who knew the truth, but none of them spoke up out of fear of O’Daniels. The case broke after the police got an anonymous tip last year that led to a motherlode of information.

Asian Pacific American Heritage Month: Rhonda Yocom

In honor of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I am profiling one Asian or Pacific Islander MP for every day of the month of May. Today’s case is Rhonda Lynn Yocom, a 19-year-old woman of Filipino descent who disappeared from Oroville, California in February 1985.

Rhonda left Oroville on February 7 with a man, Odis Garrett, who said he was going to drive her to Oregon so she wouldn’t have to make a court appearance. It’s possible he took her to Vallejo, California instead. She called her boyfriend on February 11, but no one has seen or heard from her since then.

Both Rhonda’s boyfriend and Garrett she was last seen with were Hells Angels, and Garrett’s doing multiple life sentences right now for crimes unrelated to her disappearance.

Curiously, although Rhonda’s boyfriend isn’t a suspect in her disappearance, another woman he dated, 29-year-old Paget Renee Barr, disappeared from Oroville a year later and was never found, and he was the last person seen with her.

Asian Pacific American Heritage Month: Nhi Nguyen

In honor of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I am profiling one Asian or Pacific Islander MP for every day of the month of May. Today’s case is Nhi T. Nguyen, a Vietnamese-American woman who disappeared from Port Angeles, Washington on May 1, 1985

She was living there with her two children and her husband was working in Alaska. She knew very few people in the U.S. For that reason, and probably some others, authorities think she was taken against her will. But I don’t have much on her case.

If still alive, Nhi Nguyen would be 67 next month.

Asian Pacific American Heritage Month: Vijaykumar Patel

In honor of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, I am profiling one Asian or Pacific Islander MP for every day of the month of May. Today’s case is Vijaykumar Parbhubhai Patel, an eighteen-year-old who disappeared from Aurora, Missouri on March 1, 1985. He used the nickname Vijay, or the Anglicized name Victor.

Patel’s family owned and operated the Sands Motel in Aurora, and he worked at the restaurant next door. He was last seen on his way to work his twelve-to-seven shift. He never arrived, and his car has never been located either.

Not much is known about his case, which only made it onto the internet relatively recently. If anyone in his family or circle of friends wants to reach out, they can email me or post in the comments below.

MP of the week: Martha Lambert

This week’s featured missing person is Martha Jean Lambert, a twelve-year-old girl who disappeared from Elkton, Florida on November 27, 1985.

In 2009, Martha’s brother, David, confessed to the police that she had died in an accident the day of her disappearance and he had buried her body. David would have been fourteen at the time. Although the police never found Martha’s body and David later retracted his statement, investigators believed his story.

Martha’s mother believes her daughter was abducted by someone outside the family and hopes she is still alive. A friend of mine also believes David is innocent, and put up a Facebook page to draw attention to Martha’s case.

Black History Month: Olynthia Harper

In honor of Black History Month I’m profiling one African-American MP every day on this blog for the month of February. Today’s case is Olynthia Ann Harper, a 25-year-old woman who disappeared from Syracuse, New York on September 20, 1985.

That evening, she left her two kids with a babysitter. I’m assuming the kids were supposed to spend the night there, since it was eleven p.m. when she dropped them off. She never returned for them and there’s been no indication of her whereabouts since.

I haven’t been able to find any articles on the case and don’t know much about it, alas.

MP of the week: Mohan Vellanki

The first missing person of the week in 2019 is Mohan Chandra Vellanki, a 23-year-old who disappeared from Kent, Ohio on May 18, 1985. Unfortunately I can’t find doodly squat on his case; it’s a “few details are available” one.

Happy New Year to everyone! For me, in spite of my brother’s death in February, 2018 was a pretty good year.

National Hispanic Heritage Month: Patrick DiFrancesco and James Johnson

In honor of National Hispanic Heritage Month I’m featuring a Hispanic missing person every day from September 15 to October 15. Today’s case is the disappearance of Patrick Joseph DiFrancesco (Hispanic) and James Woodford Johnson (white) who disappeared together from Fort Pierce, Florida on August 26, 1985.

Johnson was 61 at the time; DiFrancesco was 24. For some reason, neither of the men are listed as missing persons on the Florida Department of Law Enforcement database. Johnson was a certified pilot and DiFrancesco had a student pilot’s license.

DiFrancesco, the father of two, supplemented the income from his construction job by flying cocaine into Florida for a guy named Jay Crouch. I’m not sure where Johnson comes into all of this, but the two men supposedly flew out of Fort Pierce in a plane owned by Crouch, planning pick up some marijuana in either the Bahamas or in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. They never returned, although there was an unverified rumor that DiFrancesco was jailed in Jamaica.

DiFrancesco’s brother believes his missing brother never left Fort Pierce at all, and that he and Johnson were murdered and buried locally.