GA GA - Carlene Tengelsen, 16, Macon, 21 June 1972

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I've spent much of this Sunday afternoon reading this thread and all the links that branched off of it. Backwoods and dog person , you guys have done an amazing job keeping this case going. I sure wish a good cold case investigator would do some work on her case.
 
crimson3 said:
I've spent much of this Sunday afternoon reading this thread and all the links that branched off of it. Backwoods and dog person , you guys have done an amazing job keeping this case going. I sure wish a good cold case investigator would do some work on her case.
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Thank you crimson3. I was sort of a latecomer -- dogperson is the one who has really kept things going here for Carlene. I have tried to pitch in and help, too. I would SO much like to see this case solved.

I was hoping that when the former Macon Police combined a year or so ago with the Bibb County Sheriff's Department (now the Macon-Bibb County Sheriff's Department) after the county/city merger that somehow that would make some extra cold-case resources/eyes/interest available for Carlene. Maybe it still will! I know that the transition time for the combination of those two entities has not been without hurdles, as is to be expected, I guess. I'd love to hear that Carlene's case is getting dusted off and looked over really well, too!
 
A sad side note to Carlene's story, her sister Arnell passed away in 2014.
 
That's so sad. She passed without ever knowing what happened to her sister. But I guess they are together again now.

I noted that in the obituary it neither mentions Carlene as predeceasing her or as being a survivor. So sad that the families of the missing live in a kind of limbo, never really being sure if their loved one is alive or passed on.
 
dogperson said:
That's so sad. She passed without ever knowing what happened to her sister. But I guess they are together again now.

I noted that in the obituary it neither mentions Carlene as predeceasing her or as being a survivor. So sad that the families of the missing live in a kind of limbo, never really being sure if their loved one is alive or passed on.
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Noticed that, too. Maybe the funeral home, assuming they wrote the obituary, did not know about Carlene. Or maybe with the stress of Arnelle's passing, the family could not deal with an added stress of figuring out how to include Carlene (dead, alive, vanished in 1972), so if they supplied the info to the funeral home, they skipped Carlene.

Arnelle's friends and coworkers wrote such loving messages in her online condolence book. I was moved to tears!
 
The article linked below really doesn't relate to Carlene's case at all, but the part I quoted just really made me think of "old days" at Westgate and so of Carlene:

Burlington to move from Westgate to Macon Mall

...This will be the last large retailer to leave Westgate which opened in 1961 as Georgia’s first enclosed mall. ...
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more at: http://www.macon.com/2015/02/26/3608145/burlington-to-move-from-westgate.html

I don't think any of the original structure that was the mall at Westgate still exists. As the shopping center transitioned to a different type, the old mall was done away with sort of piecemeal, I think, with parts of it incorporated into other stores for a while, but finally, I think, it was all demolished. At least that's how I'm recalling it. Basically, only the parking lot remains, and the newer structures.

I've said before that Westgate was a "big destination" in my young years. I've taken many a memory trip to those years, walking around Westgate and recalling the stores I used to spend time in, things I did, sights I saw -- as a result of following Carlene's thread. Trying to think what happened to her, though, has made it a bit of a "haunted", or haunting, place to me.

And then I think what a haunting place it must have become to Carlene's family! I remember, in one of the articles linked in this thread, Carlene's mother was quoted as saying something like, "Oh why did I let Carlene drive to Westgate!" That is so sad. Her mother didn't do anything wrong, she just let her daughter take an important step in growing up, taking what should have been an exciting, satisfying first solo drive to a familiar place, running a family errand. It never, ever should have ended as it did. It's just heartbreaking.
 
This should be posted in the other thread. This is not the right thread at all.
 
This long new article (about commercial growth and decline along Macon's Eisenhower Parkway) from The Telegraph/macon.com has nothing specifically related to Carlene, but there is a bit about Westgate and the first four photos in the photo gallery are from Westgate. (Remember, though, that all the original Westgate Shopping Center mall structure is gone -- there MAY have been some parts left at the time the 1986 archive photo was taken, but I'm not sure.)

I thought some of you who have followed Carlene's thread might like to see it -- and it is an opportunity to bump Carlene's case up to the top of the index, anyhow.

Eisenhower decline at center of commercial blight

...The opening of Westgate Shopping Center at the corner of Eisenhower Parkway and Pio Nono Avenue in 1961 arguably began the spiral of retail development away from downtown and toward the suburbs.

With the recent announcement that the Burlington department store will move into space in Macon Mall, Westgate will be all but empty. But at one time, Westgate was the premier shopping destination in Middle Georgia and was the first enclosed mall in Georgia.

“It was just like a little mini-mall up here at one time, and it was busy,” neighborhood resident Urickia Tobler said. “This was the place to be.”

That started to change in 1975, when Macon Mall opened, impressing shoppers with its modern lighting fixtures and hip anchor stores. ...
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more at: http://www.macon.com/2015/04/26/3715372/blight-problems.html
 
Bumping for Carlene. I apologize in advance if this post is too repetitive to other ideas that have been posted over the years. I haven't read through this thread in awhile.

I can't get this case out of my head. Although there was no evidence of foul play, if investigators had conducted more interviews back in '72 then maybe someone would have remembered something. Assuming she was murdered, the chances of solving her disappearance depends on if she knew her attacker. If she knew him, then there's a good chance that other people (friends, family, general residents) would also be familiar with her killer. Someone else would probably know and be able to provide information. For example, an individual may have been unaccounted for during that afternoon and evening. Maybe he was seen days later with scratches all over him. People are naturally nosy and they will put two & two together if something just feels too coincidental.

However, I do think this was a random abduction. I think the case of Kelsey Smith is probably an accurate comparison. Some random guy from a different town that was in the area looking for his next victim. Due to the lack of familiarity between the victim and the perpetrator, there's a very low chance this will be solved. Especially without a body.

Of course there's always a slight (less than 1% at this point I think) chance that Carlene did leave voluntarily. After 43 years, it's hard to imagine that to be true.
 
JusticeWillBeServed said:
Bumping for Carlene. I apologize in advance if this post is too repetitive to other ideas that have been posted over the years. I haven't read through this thread in awhile.

I can't get this case out of my head. Although there was no evidence of foul play, if investigators had conducted more interviews back in '72 then maybe someone would have remembered something. Assuming she was murdered, the chances of solving her disappearance depends on if she knew her attacker. If she knew him, then there's a good chance that other people (friends, family, general residents) would also be familiar with her killer. Someone else would probably know and be able to provide information. For example, an individual may have been unaccounted for during that afternoon and evening. Maybe he was seen days later with scratches all over him. People are naturally nosy and they will put two & two together if something just feels too coincidental.

However, I do think this was a random abduction. I think the case of Kelsey Smith is probably an accurate comparison. Some random guy from a different town that was in the area looking for his next victim. Due to the lack of familiarity between the victim and the perpetrator, there's a very low chance this will be solved. Especially without a body.

Of course there's always a slight (less than 1% at this point I think) chance that Carlene did leave voluntarily. After 43 years, it's hard to imagine that to be true.
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I share many of your thoughts. I just can't help feeling that this case just wasn't investigated as it should have been -- I could be wrong. Just feel as if SOMEONE almost had to see something that day that was important -- was that someone ever even questioned, I wonder. Did the case receive enough publicity at the time for any "someones" who might have been able to provide an important clue to even know to come forward?

I wasn't really familiar with the Kelsey Smith abduction and murder, so went and read a bit -- you're right, there are similarities. If only there had been cell phones and surveillance video in 1972! (Oh how I wish a witness had come forward to describe whoever left the car near the Krispy Kreme!) But there WAS fingerprinting (which, too, was important in the Smith case). Either it wasn't done properly for Carlene's case or the perp was unusually careful not to leave any fingerprints, I guess.
 
Yeah, you do get the vibe that the ball was dropped on this case big time.
 
It's getting really close to the anniversary date of Carlene's disappearance. Forty-three years.

Praying something will yet come to light.
 
I know that lots of you who follow Carlene's thread also follow, or are at least familiar with, the 1975 case of the young Lyon sisters, who went missing after a trip to a mall in Wheaton, MD. Linking their threads just below:


http://www.websleuths.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?97-Sheila-and-Katherine-Lyon

Hence, you likely know that a big investigation related to the Lyon girls has been going on in Virginia in recent months and press conferences are scheduled for tomorrow and the next day, in Maryland and in Virginia, to discuss developments.

A central figure in the investigation, Lloyd Welch, who is incarcerated and from whose account much of the recent investigation apparently sprung, was in his young days sometimes a carnival worker who traveled to several states on the job.

I don't really suspect that person in any way in Carlene's case -- I believe he would have been too young (before his carnival years, I think, and also I have not seen any record of him ever traveling to Georgia on that job) -- but all this does remind me of something that I have meant to mention a few times before on Carlene's thread, and that is that there were, from time to time back around the right time frame, small carnivals that would set up in the parking lot at Westgate. They were mostly kiddie rides, with maybe one or two "scarier" rides that would appeal more to older kids or teenagers -- and I think there were a few food booths, etc. Don't know if there was any carnival at Westgate at the time Carlene disappeared, but maybe I can find out. (Seems like it would have been a likely time, at the beginning of the summer, with kids out of school, etc.)

Anyhow -- a carnival worker or someone connected with a carnival: One more "possibility" that has crossed my mind at times.
 
I was told a couple years ago by someone who knows Carlene's sister Joanette that she was interested in reopening the case. I believe the mom did not want to drag it all back up again and had made her peace with it. I am unsure about the other surviving family members. The person who once was in touch with me through these threads has not spoken with me or even updated his Facebook page in over 2 years and I fear something happened to him as he spoke of health problems at the time. He was quite interested in seeing the case reopened and in working with Carlene's sister who still has a file on the case at her home.
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westgate_Mall_(Macon,_Georgia)

The "mall" that Carlene disappeared from was really a glorified strip mall, although it was considered the first enclosed mall in Georgia. The style at that time was similar to the style of Lenox Mall, where in 1965, Mary Shotwell Little disappeared. I don't think the cases are related, but the malls were set up similarly, with Colonial Stores as anchors. Lenox did (and still does) have big named anchors, however. About the time that Westgate was beginning to go bust, Lenox was transformed into Atlanta's more chic mall, with places like Neiman Marcus, Chanel and other very high end stores. This is just an FYI.
 
"As far as suspects go, I am now wondering about serial killer John Paul Knowles. He is suspected to have been the killer of Ima Jean Sanders from Warner Robins, GA in 1974. Her remains were found in the Macon, GA area in 1976 but not identified until 2011. He had confessed to picking up a girl in August 1974, taking her to the woods, raping and strangling her but he mistakenly thought her name was Alma. Sadly, Ima's fate was what I suspect was Carlene's fate. I really think she was carjacked, made to drive to a wooded location, then raped and most likely strangled. Unfortunately, Knowles was killed in a struggle while trying to escape from a police car and cannot be questioned, although he claimed to have killed 35 people, only 18 of whom are known victims. He would have been 26 the year Carlene was presumably abducted and killed, young enough and possibly attractive enough that he could have approached Carlene in the parking lot without her feeling threatened until it was too late. "

Knowles was a strange one in the line of serial killers. He seemed to kill across ages, genders etc. I wonder, too, if he was involved in Carlene's disappearance . I know he was incarcerated in Florida in early 1974, but I don't know for what or for how long. Most of his murders took place DURING 1974, AFTER Carlene disappeared. Not knowing when he went into the Florida prison system makes me unsure of where he was in 1972 when Carlene went missing.

My gut feeling is that Carlene met with foul play at the hands of someone she knew and felt somewhat comfortable with. She was, by all accounts, a conscientious girl, but with some time to waste waiting for her sister to get done with camp and driving for the first time, perhaps she was tempted to give an acquaintance a ride and something turned tragically wrong. My hunch would be to re interview the boys she saw that day and her boyfriend.
 
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