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Is it possible to get any DNA from Lisa's fetus? If we find the father then we might find out who killed her.
I am only a bit older than Lisa, and recall a few school peers that got pregnant with few resources. Most had to drop out, grow up fast, work. They didn't have programs or much education for teens/young single mothers, other than Planned Parenthood (with protesters outside screaming) or a few other abortion venues. Most medical providers would also involve an under 18's parent which was not always a good thing. Sad all around.I'm hoping that they can test the DNA of the fetus, cross-check it against the DNA of her living son, and see if there's a match. If the same dude is father of both, I'd do some heavy investigating. A lot of times, women who get pregnant multiple times under 18, it's usually by the same dude. She was pregnant at 14, more than likely by somebody older. She kept that child, and was going to keep this one. Baby daddy probably didn't like this. I get her attire was "adult-like" but its possible judging by the shoes they weren't even her's. Plus what kid is dressing sexy while 6 mos pregnant?
On a sad note, somebody really let this child down. 2 year old at 17, means pregnant at possible 14. Dropping out of school and pregnant again 2 years later. A number of people failed this child.
In 2020, Bensalem PD partnered with Bode Technology to explore advanced DNA testing methods. Bode Technology had to leverage propriety DNA extraction methods to work with the highly degraded skeletal evidence. The DNA extract developed at Bode Technology was then sent to Othram Inc. for further analysis. Othram used human enrichment paired with Forensic-Grade Genomic Sequencing to produce a genealogical profile. While the DNA evidence was severely degraded due to the age of the case and the condition in which the remains were found, the Bode-Othram partnership produced a genealogical profile that enabled genealogy search. Genealogical research performed by Bensalem PD produced the leads necessary to confirm Todd’s identity.
High-tech DNA Extraction Method Helps Identify Pregnant Jane Doe Found in 1988
If Lisa was 17 in the late 80's, she was a few years older than me, since I didn't turn 17 till '91. I also knew kids who got pregnant young, and the resources didn't get better to the mid-90's where HS's actually started having care centers for their pregnant students. It's beyond baffling to think of kids have secs (I'm at work, some I'm too chicken to type out the word ) at that age. I knew a girl who was 16 with a 3 old. So yeah... do that math. Lisa needed help, and she needed help from somebody who truly cared for her to get her outta that environment. Most people, especially young girls find themselves in precarious predicaments during their early stages of freedom and exploration, most just end up with a crazy story to tell friends decades later. Its sad that somebody stole this story from Lisa.
May she RIP.
If Lisa was 17 in the late 80's, she was a few years older than me, since I didn't turn 17 till '91. I also knew kids who got pregnant young, and the resources didn't get better to the mid-90's where HS's actually started having care centers for their pregnant students. It's beyond baffling to think of kids have secs (I'm at work, some I'm too chicken to type out the word ) at that age. I knew a girl who was 16 with a 3 old. So yeah... do that math. Lisa needed help, and she needed help from somebody who truly cared for her to get her outta that environment. Most people, especially young girls find themselves in precarious predicaments during their early stages of freedom and exploration, most just end up with a crazy story to tell friends decades later. Its sad that somebody stole this story from Lisa.
May she RIP.
As a teenager in the late '70s - early 80s I have stories that make my hair raise up - more now than at the time, when comparable circumstances were considered sad, but not anyone else's concern. I knew pregnant 13-year-olds in junior high school. Not in the 'inner city', but in the supposedly placid suburbs. The sad thing was that these young girls were so stigmatized and marginalized, socially and in the classroom, considered "bad girls" whose example should serve as a warning to their peers – when in reality there should have been alarm bells ringing for all the adults around them, and efforts at intervention to literally save their lives. Today we would consider many of them the child victims of pedophiles - either in their own family, or from highly inappropriate relationships with non-familial grown men. Some of them were "dating" men in their 20s with parental permission - what did those parents think was going to happen?
I have to ask who were the grown-ups in Lisa's life, and why didn't any of them stand up for this clearly at-risk child before she wound up with a second teen pregnancy, at the bottom of a hole in an abandoned building. So sad to see her childhood so abbreviated, even before her life was snuffed out by someone who likely found her inconvenient.
Very sad all the way around. I've heard the horror stories about rampant corruption in Philadelphia back in the day. Police really bungled this case. I believe classism played a role in having her case file removed from the NCIC and not given another thought afterwards. If it was a girl from the "right" side of the tracks, who came from a well-to-do family in a "respectable" neighborhood, they'd have worked this case morning, noon, and night. It'd be plastered all over the place. Either it's good, old-fashioned classism, or mom and dad were so estranged from their daughter that they didn't care to follow up with the police or put some pressure on them to re-investigate over the years.
As sad as it is, I'm honestly not shocked that she was a runaway who'd dropped out of school and already had a young child (and another on the way) at 17. Many, if not most of the unidentified cases I stumble across involving a decedent estimated to be a teen (or young adult under 25) invariably share strikingly similar features to one another. Once positively IDed, it usually comes out that these previously unidentified kids were trying to escape a less-than-stellar home life. It's the same tired old tale virtually every time: parents just don't care, or are abusive in some way, and the kid then looks for love and acceptance in all the wrong places. Runaways are always extremely vulnerable to predatory adults and are low on the totem pole out in the streets.
In my community, it certainly isn't unheard of for middle-school and high-school girls to get pregnant. If the family's conservative they usually pressure their daughter to keep the baby, and the grandparents in those scenarios basically raise the baby.
She must have dropped out of school way earlier than 17 as she already had a 2 year old child when she disappeared. She must have gotten pregnant at 14 or 15 the latest. I wonder what happened to her that her life took such a turn?
I also wondered if she died by a non foul play situation. She was found seated in the pumphouse. While a killer may seat the victims, especially if they think they can get away easily with it, it also looks to me as if she sat down to rest in the pumphouse and died there. I guess anything is possible. Is the abandoned distillery far from civilization?.
Edit, checked it, it is within the city of Bensalem. No remote area at all.
Homocide Detectives see every case as a human being.
Sorry, but I know of a reputable source who's publicly told the story of how she was trafficked as an orphaned kid from the age of 12 to about 18 (when she was finally able to escape her traffickers); this occurred in the '70s and into the '80s in inner-city Philadelphia. The police were well aware of what was going on, and she tried to get help from them to leave the situation, but was just dismissed. In fact, the Philly police were often in cahoots with the traffickers themselves, and would often be "customers." This poor lady, as a sexual trafficking survivor who has now obtained an education and overcome that part of her life, currently does a lot of advocacy work trying to raise awareness of the human trafficking epidemic in the United States. Regarding the police, there were even some lawsuits brought against the Philly police dept. and the City of Philadelphia, alleging long-term corruption, human rights abuses, trumped-up charges, and collusion with criminal entities. Very seedy criminal underbelly to that city that did carry over into law enforcement.
If you are a poor kid in some parts of this country, you are not treated like an equal human being under the law. Especially back then. As a 17 year-old girl from a "bad home," it's likely you'd be written off as merely a runaway or some juvenile delinquent whose disappearance they didn't have to investigate too hard. That's just the sad truth.