CA CA - Lompoc, WhtFem 16-25, 205UFCA, overbite, horseshoe earrings, Aug'69
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British Bella May Culley 18, missing from Thailand, arrested in Georgia, May 2025- Latest: astheworldfallsdown
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We will take a look. We would love to help, if possible.
This is a very interesting news article. It was published on Wednesday, 6 August 1969 only three days after Lompoc Jane Doe's body was discovered. It does not, however, mention her case - only that four other (different) cases might be connected with the murder of Roxie Ann Phillips.View attachment 398551Horror Sweeps Salinas As Killings Are Linked — Desert Sun 6 August 1969 — California Digital Newspaper Collection
California Digital Newspaper Collectioncdnc.ucr.edu
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The article mentions that Andrew Manuel was believed to have been in Salinas, California as recently as "last Saturday" which would have been 2 August 1969. He was very closely allied with John Norman Collins, and known to be his partner in numerous crimes. Both had returned from California to Michigan in late July 1969, but when he became aware that Michigan authorities were closing in, he fled back to California.
He was arrested by the FBI in Phoenix, Arizona at the home of his sister in early August 1969 and delivered to Michigan authorities. His route from Salinas, CA to Phoenix, AZ would have taken him through or near Lompoc.
In Michigan, he was offered a plea deal in which he would be charged only with theft of the camping trailer he and Collins had taken to California in return for his testimony against Collins in the Karen Sue Beineman murder trial.
Manuel provided no useful testimony, but was given only a short jail sentence for the theft charge. He was paroled early, during which time he again fled Michigan, breaking parole, and having to be apprehended again and returned to jail in Michigan.
He later served two terms in Federal prisons for other unspecified offenses.
Given the many similarities in the murder of Lompoc Jane Doe to the Michigan murders and to that of Roxie Ann Phillips (whose destination was Lompoc), AND the presence of Andrew Manuel at the time of Lompoc Jane Doe's violent murder, I believe that he should be considered a strong suspect in her death.
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LINK:
John Norman Collins Associate - Andrew Julian Manuel, Jr.
Andrew Manuel's Arraignment in Ypsilanti. It wasn't until Andrew Julian Manuel helped John Norman Collins fraudulently rent a seventeen...
fornology.blogspot.com
Andrew Manuel, associate of John Norman Collins, is no longer living. He spent several terms in state and federal jails and prisons, but was never ( to my knowledge) charged with murder.
Some investigators of the Michigan Co-Ed Murders felt that possibly more than one killer contributed to the murders of young women in the years 1967 to 1969. There is a long thread about John Norman Collins and those cases in the Serial Killer section.
Collins has been incarcerated in Michigan since 26 July 1969, first in pre trial confinement and then in prison (where he still resides) following his conviction and life sentence for the murder of Karen Sue Beineman.
Collins was indicted in California for the June 1969 murder of Roxie Ann Phillips, but not released by Michigan for extradition to California while his appeals were pending. When made available, California declined to pursue prosecution for financial reasons.
Andrew Manuel accompanied Collins from Michigan to California, where they stayed in a stolen camping trailer in June to July 1969. He very likely knew of Collins' crimes, and probably participated in them. Immediately following Collins' arrest back in Michigan, Manuel fled the state and returned to California by bus, disposing of Collins' revolver enroute.
Manuel spent a few days in Salinas, CA, carefully cleaning the stolen camper of all fingerprints and other potential evidence.
He left Salinas at some point (late July or early August) for Phoenix, Arizona where he was arrested by FBI agents on 6 August 1969. His route of travel would have taken him by or through Lompoc just about the time Lompoc Jane Doe was brutally stabbed to death.
Manuel was being sought by California authorities as a suspect in other murders of girls and young women at the time of his arrest. He was brought back to Michigan and agreed to testify against Collins in return for a guilty plea and light sentence for theft of the trailer.
In the end, Manuel provided no useful testimony at Collins' trial.
Could he have been the killer of Lompoc Jane Doe? Who was she, where did she come from, and how did she meet her killer?
Some investigators of the Michigan Co-Ed Murders felt that possibly more than one killer contributed to the murders of young women in the years 1967 to 1969. There is a long thread about John Norman Collins and those cases in the Serial Killer section.
Collins has been incarcerated in Michigan since 26 July 1969, first in pre trial confinement and then in prison (where he still resides) following his conviction and life sentence for the murder of Karen Sue Beineman.
Collins was indicted in California for the June 1969 murder of Roxie Ann Phillips, but not released by Michigan for extradition to California while his appeals were pending. When made available, California declined to pursue prosecution for financial reasons.
Andrew Manuel accompanied Collins from Michigan to California, where they stayed in a stolen camping trailer in June to July 1969. He very likely knew of Collins' crimes, and probably participated in them. Immediately following Collins' arrest back in Michigan, Manuel fled the state and returned to California by bus, disposing of Collins' revolver enroute.
Manuel spent a few days in Salinas, CA, carefully cleaning the stolen camper of all fingerprints and other potential evidence.
He left Salinas at some point (late July or early August) for Phoenix, Arizona where he was arrested by FBI agents on 6 August 1969. His route of travel would have taken him by or through Lompoc just about the time Lompoc Jane Doe was brutally stabbed to death.
Manuel was being sought by California authorities as a suspect in other murders of girls and young women at the time of his arrest. He was brought back to Michigan and agreed to testify against Collins in return for a guilty plea and light sentence for theft of the trailer.
In the end, Manuel provided no useful testimony at Collins' trial.
Could he have been the killer of Lompoc Jane Doe? Who was she, where did she come from, and how did she meet her killer?
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"Decomposed Body Found Near Lompoc," Californian [Salinas, CA], 4 August 1969, 2.
The unidentified and badly decomposed body of a young woman was found Sunday by a sheriff's detective in the bushes near State Highway five miles southeast of here.
Officer William Kelley found the body when called to the area to investigate a complaint of someone hunting illegally.
Vaughn Proctor, "Widespread investigation to identify murdered girl," Lompoc Record, 5 August 1969, 1.
Preliminary results of an autopsy revealed that the girl had been stabbed 15 times, eight times in the back, five times in the chest and two in the neck area.
[...]
The body was fully clothed in a dark blue, or purple shirt, white, bell-bottomed trousers with dark blue, daisy type flowers bearing red centers. Her feet were clad in sandals, size seven and a half. Another source revealed that the girl's fingernails were painted with silver polish.
"Young woman's body found near Lompoc," Peninsula Times Tribune [Palo Alto, CA], 5 August 1969, 12.
Sheriff's detectives sought clues today into the identity of a young woman two hunters found dead with repeated stab wounds in a remote gully.
Officers theorized the girl was killed somewhere else and her body dumped at the Santa Barbara County site, a quarter mile off California 1, because no missing persons fitting her description were known locally.
[...]
She was stabbed in the chest and back with a knife repeatedly, officials said.
Vaughn Proctor, "Young girl slayings compared by authorities," Lompoc Record, 6 August 1969, 1.
Efforts to identify the victim in Lompoc Valley have thus far proved futile. Officials said the body had lain alongside the road for up to five days and was badly decomposed. The time element is an important factor in [Sheriff's Inspector Peter J.] Zanella's thinking.
[...]
Preliminary results of an autopsy indicate the girl found in Lompoc Valley died as a result of 16 stab wounds, one of them through the heart.
Investigating officials said the slaying indicated a savage assault by a sadistic psychopath.
The Lompoc Valley victim is described as 5-feet-3 to 5-feet-4, weighing 120 to 125 pounds, with reddish blond hair, blue eyes and wearing a blue or purple shirt, bellbottomed trousers bearing daisy-type flowers.
Authorities were also interested in the fact that the Lompoc Valley victim had pierced ear lobes and was wearing small spring-type earings [sic].
Vaughn Proctor, "New evidence revealed in girl's murder," Lompoc Record, 8 August 1969, 1.
Sheriff's Inspector Peter J Zanella told the Record for the first time today that the girl's hands were bound at the wrist with a thin piece of white plastic wire at the time she was found. He said the wire was loosely tied to permit a six-inch space between the wrists. Crime lab technicians are analyzing the wire, Zanella said.
Vaughn Proctor, "Sheriff deputy relates theory on girl's death," Lompoc Record, 9 August 1969, 1.
Robert W. Kelley, a Sheriff's detective, made the statement yesterday in his first public account of the gruesome discovery. The statement is in conflict with previous opinions that indicated the girl had been killed elsewhere, then transported to the brush-choked ravine where she was found.
Kelley bases his theory on the discovery of a small amount of blood a couple of feet away from the point on the Grefco Quarry Road where the killer thrust the girl's body down the slope. The story is not a nice story, but it's all part of the continuing dialog that surrounds the unsuccessful efforts to identify the body.
Kelley theorizes that the blood along the edge of the narrow road indicates that a struggle took place there. He theorizes that the killer brought the girl still alive to the scene in a car, opened the door, wrestled the girl to the road, stabbed her repeatedly, then tossed her body down the brush clogged slope. Kelley figures it was then, almost as an afterthought, that the killer scrambled down the few feet to the girl's prostrate body and cut her throat to be sure she was dead. A large quantity of blood was found beneath the body.
[...]
The dental report indicates her molars had fillings and that one bicuspid in the upper teeth protruded outward slightly in a "bucktooth" fashion.
Kelley made the gruesome discovery late Sunday afternoon while hunting with a friend, on a lonely road, .2 of a mile from the intersection of Grefco Quarry Road and Highway 1.
Kelley said his attention was first attracted to a small wooden box just off the edge of the road. "I stepped closer to examine the box and noticed a peculiar smell," he said. "Then I saw the legs of a woman sticking up out of the brush just over the edge of the slope."
[...]
He [Kelley] says he also noticed "drag marks" from the edge of the road to the top of the slope overlooking rugged ravine below. The marks indicate that the body was dragged along the ground, probably after the stabbing, he said.
[...]
Kelley found that the killer had bound the girl's arms at the wrist with a three to four foot-long piece of white plastic telephone cord –– probably indicating that she was a prisoner of the killer and therefore alive when she was brought to the scene.
Sometime later Kelley found a blood-soaked denim shirt similar to western garb, about 40 feet from the location of the body.
The unidentified and badly decomposed body of a young woman was found Sunday by a sheriff's detective in the bushes near State Highway five miles southeast of here.
Officer William Kelley found the body when called to the area to investigate a complaint of someone hunting illegally.
Vaughn Proctor, "Widespread investigation to identify murdered girl," Lompoc Record, 5 August 1969, 1.
Preliminary results of an autopsy revealed that the girl had been stabbed 15 times, eight times in the back, five times in the chest and two in the neck area.
[...]
The body was fully clothed in a dark blue, or purple shirt, white, bell-bottomed trousers with dark blue, daisy type flowers bearing red centers. Her feet were clad in sandals, size seven and a half. Another source revealed that the girl's fingernails were painted with silver polish.
"Young woman's body found near Lompoc," Peninsula Times Tribune [Palo Alto, CA], 5 August 1969, 12.
Sheriff's detectives sought clues today into the identity of a young woman two hunters found dead with repeated stab wounds in a remote gully.
Officers theorized the girl was killed somewhere else and her body dumped at the Santa Barbara County site, a quarter mile off California 1, because no missing persons fitting her description were known locally.
[...]
She was stabbed in the chest and back with a knife repeatedly, officials said.
Vaughn Proctor, "Young girl slayings compared by authorities," Lompoc Record, 6 August 1969, 1.
Efforts to identify the victim in Lompoc Valley have thus far proved futile. Officials said the body had lain alongside the road for up to five days and was badly decomposed. The time element is an important factor in [Sheriff's Inspector Peter J.] Zanella's thinking.
[...]
Preliminary results of an autopsy indicate the girl found in Lompoc Valley died as a result of 16 stab wounds, one of them through the heart.
Investigating officials said the slaying indicated a savage assault by a sadistic psychopath.
The Lompoc Valley victim is described as 5-feet-3 to 5-feet-4, weighing 120 to 125 pounds, with reddish blond hair, blue eyes and wearing a blue or purple shirt, bellbottomed trousers bearing daisy-type flowers.
Authorities were also interested in the fact that the Lompoc Valley victim had pierced ear lobes and was wearing small spring-type earings [sic].
Vaughn Proctor, "New evidence revealed in girl's murder," Lompoc Record, 8 August 1969, 1.
Sheriff's Inspector Peter J Zanella told the Record for the first time today that the girl's hands were bound at the wrist with a thin piece of white plastic wire at the time she was found. He said the wire was loosely tied to permit a six-inch space between the wrists. Crime lab technicians are analyzing the wire, Zanella said.
Vaughn Proctor, "Sheriff deputy relates theory on girl's death," Lompoc Record, 9 August 1969, 1.
Robert W. Kelley, a Sheriff's detective, made the statement yesterday in his first public account of the gruesome discovery. The statement is in conflict with previous opinions that indicated the girl had been killed elsewhere, then transported to the brush-choked ravine where she was found.
Kelley bases his theory on the discovery of a small amount of blood a couple of feet away from the point on the Grefco Quarry Road where the killer thrust the girl's body down the slope. The story is not a nice story, but it's all part of the continuing dialog that surrounds the unsuccessful efforts to identify the body.
Kelley theorizes that the blood along the edge of the narrow road indicates that a struggle took place there. He theorizes that the killer brought the girl still alive to the scene in a car, opened the door, wrestled the girl to the road, stabbed her repeatedly, then tossed her body down the brush clogged slope. Kelley figures it was then, almost as an afterthought, that the killer scrambled down the few feet to the girl's prostrate body and cut her throat to be sure she was dead. A large quantity of blood was found beneath the body.
[...]
The dental report indicates her molars had fillings and that one bicuspid in the upper teeth protruded outward slightly in a "bucktooth" fashion.
Kelley made the gruesome discovery late Sunday afternoon while hunting with a friend, on a lonely road, .2 of a mile from the intersection of Grefco Quarry Road and Highway 1.
Kelley said his attention was first attracted to a small wooden box just off the edge of the road. "I stepped closer to examine the box and noticed a peculiar smell," he said. "Then I saw the legs of a woman sticking up out of the brush just over the edge of the slope."
[...]
He [Kelley] says he also noticed "drag marks" from the edge of the road to the top of the slope overlooking rugged ravine below. The marks indicate that the body was dragged along the ground, probably after the stabbing, he said.
[...]
Kelley found that the killer had bound the girl's arms at the wrist with a three to four foot-long piece of white plastic telephone cord –– probably indicating that she was a prisoner of the killer and therefore alive when she was brought to the scene.
Sometime later Kelley found a blood-soaked denim shirt similar to western garb, about 40 feet from the location of the body.
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Lompoc Jane Doe has been unidentified for 55 years today.
pentimento
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That is some really interesting information about the hands being tied and the western denim shirt. I'm still kind of stuck on the idea that this murder was related to the Manson murders. I just did a quick Google on "Tex Watson demin shirt" and this photo of the Manson family at Death Valley came up. I think this would have been just after the Los Angeles murders.
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The Case that Started it All | DNA Doe Project
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Aaaaand here's her DDP page as a current pending case!
dnadoeproject.org
Lompoc Jane Doe 1969 | DNA Doe Project
dnadoeproject.org
She was found recognizable just a week after her death; they even knew the color of her eyes (blue). It's a pity there isn't a better reconstruction that could help identify her. I guess things were different in the '60s.
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I've submitted the following cases for comparison, and to the DNA Doe Project.
On July 16, 1969, Niki Diane Britten ran away from her home in Albany, OR where she was living with her adoptive grandparents. Then, on August 3, 1969 in Lompoc, CA, an unidentified deceased female's body was found near a quarry. She had been stabbed to death.
The side-by-side below of the MP and UID share resemblance. The UID had an overbite, and it appears that Niki may have had one as well.
Niki Diane Britten
Niki Diane Britten – The Charley Project
OR - OR - Niki Britten, 15, Albany, 16 July 1969
Lompoc Jane Doe 1969
Lompoc Jane Doe 1969 | DNA Doe Project
CASE DISCREPANCIES:
-According to the details of Niki's disappearance, "Niki called family friends in September 1969, trying to get in touch with her grandparents. She said she was in New York, had a job and was all right." The UID's body was found in August 1969 which doesn't align with the timing of the phone call(s). It could be that her friends were involved in her running away.
-Niki's mother stated that "her daughter's eyes were green or hazel," and the UID who was found days after her death is listed as having blue eyes.
-Jawlines look different when comparing all the photos.
On July 16, 1969, Niki Diane Britten ran away from her home in Albany, OR where she was living with her adoptive grandparents. Then, on August 3, 1969 in Lompoc, CA, an unidentified deceased female's body was found near a quarry. She had been stabbed to death.
The side-by-side below of the MP and UID share resemblance. The UID had an overbite, and it appears that Niki may have had one as well.
Niki Diane Britten
Niki Diane Britten – The Charley Project
OR - OR - Niki Britten, 15, Albany, 16 July 1969
Lompoc Jane Doe 1969
Lompoc Jane Doe 1969 | DNA Doe Project
CASE DISCREPANCIES:
-According to the details of Niki's disappearance, "Niki called family friends in September 1969, trying to get in touch with her grandparents. She said she was in New York, had a job and was all right." The UID's body was found in August 1969 which doesn't align with the timing of the phone call(s). It could be that her friends were involved in her running away.
-Niki's mother stated that "her daughter's eyes were green or hazel," and the UID who was found days after her death is listed as having blue eyes.
-Jawlines look different when comparing all the photos.
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pentimento
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Looking forward to some DNA results on this case. In the meantime I came across something that seems relevant to a previous post of mine.
Gary Hinman was killed on July 27th 1969, his body found on July 31st. Hinman had been held captive for several days before being killed and among the killers was Bobby Beausoleil. Friends who tried to contact Hinman while he was being held reported a woman with a 'flimsy' British accent answering the door and/or phone telling people that he went off to visit his family in Colorado or somewhere (source book below).
Lompoc Jane Doe was discovered on August 3, 1969.
According to the book "Chaos, Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties" (which I am not done reading yet) Hinman's Fiat was discovered on the side of the road in San Luis Obispo with Bobby Beausoleil in it on August 7, 1969 (page 144).
San Luis Obispo is about an hour north of Lompoc and taking the highway 1 which goes through there is a logical way to get to SLO from Los Angeles. More popular and populated would be staying on the 101. I guess my point is that the timeline fits for having Manson family members potentially in the vicinity at the time. I can't get it to show on the map, but the northern endpoint is San Luis Obispo, going straight through Lompoc with the victim found just south of town yards from the highway.
More info on the arrest here. There's a paywall for the SLO paper, but you can read for free for 48 hours by submitting your e-mail if you choose.
Here you can see highway 1 and the vicinity to the quarry just south of town where Lompoc Jane Doe was found.
So Hinman was killed on July 27th, and his body was discovered on July 31 in Los Angeles.
Lompoc Jane Doe was discovered on August 3 just south of Lompoc.
Himan's stolen car with Bobby B. was found on August 7 in San Luis Obispo. A bloody knife was found in the wheel well of the car and when confronted with that information Bobby B. gave a confession of sorts.
***Was the blood on this knife ever tested for DNA?*** They didn't have that in the 60's, but they had his confession to the Hinman murder (given he was driving the dead man's car) and was convicted for that murder with that and other evidence.
Tate Murders occurred on August 8-9.
La Bianca murders occurred on August 9=10.
I'm not sure exactly when Hinman's murder was linked to the other Manson murders, as initially they were all thought to be unrelated and things were being handled by different jurisdictions. Perhaps this knowledge about the circumstances of Hinman's murder and Bobby B's arrest was not available to Lompoc detectives at the time.
ETA: Now I'm thinking about the woman with the British accent reportedly at Hinman's house. I'll have to figure out if she was ever identified. I'm rusty on the details. The identification of the accent as "flimsy" (I'm not sure where that description originated) seems to imply that they thought it was being faked. But what if it wasn't? What if Lompoc Jane Doe was in fact British (recall that detectives said her dental work indicated that she may have come from abroad) and a Manson family member, and because detectives couldn't account for a British girl at the Hinman murder scene the story evolved such that it was one of the other Manson girls at the scene putting on an accent? What if she had reservations about what happened there when they killed Hinman at the end, and they were afraid she might talk? Pure speculation and conjecture of course!
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pentimento
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Another thought: According to testimony found here, Mary Brunner claimed it was Susan Atkins using a fake British accent and stating that she was from London. Why do that? Could they have substituted Atkins' name for a British girl to cover up another murder? Atkins was already going to be or had been convicted for the Sharon Tate murder. Susan Atkins and Mary Brunner (the two women purportedly at the scene with Bobby B.) are both Americans. https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ca-court-of-appeal/1830516.html
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