The families of these two girls have come together to raise awareness that they are missing under suspicious circumstances. Sheila was last heard from by her son on 2-2-14 Danielle went missing one week later on 2-9-14. The two girls did not know each other; however, they were last seen by the same man, who is a person of interest in their disappearances. Both girls are missing from Humboldt County. Sheila went missing from Rio Dell, Ca. and Danielle from Carlotta, CA. Sheila’s mother died suddenly last May, not knowing what happened to her daughter. In February it will mark the one year anniversary of the girl’s disappearance. We are seeking the public’s help in finding them. This nightmare has to end!
http://www.krcrtv.com/north-coast-news/news/family-continues-search-for-missing-woman/31182956Danielle Bertolini has been missing for a year, and her family said they refuse to give up on finding her. "I don't get to hug her anymore, I don't get to tell her I love her, you know, and it was ripped away from us,” Billie-Jo Dick, Bertolini’s mother said. Bertolini’s family reported her missing to the Fortuna Police Department after they hadn't heard from her for a couple days, something out of character for her, they explained.
“She is my life, she was my child, you know. I fought really hard to bring her into the world, and now I’m fighting really hard to bring her home,” Dick said. “There's really nothing else that I can do except for what I’m doing, and I can't keep going like this because it's killing our family."
Read the whole Dateline article at this link.Dateline NBC’s online “Missing in America” online series has turned its attention to two Humboldt County women who went missing one year ago: Danielle Bertolini and Sheila Franks, of Fortuna and Rio Dell respectively.
The two went missing within a couple of days of each other in February 2014, and family members and friends, who have have long been frustrated with the slow pace of the investigation, early on suspected that the two cases were linked. NBC manages to wheedle a new bit of information out of law enforcement — they believe the cases are linked as well, and they have identified the person who was last seen with both the women:
Fortuna Police Department Chief William Dobberstein told Dateline investigators believe the two women’s cases are connected and there is a person of interest in the cases.
“Both cases are on-going investigations. We’re working with the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Department closely and following all our leads, but yes, we have identified a person of interest in both cases and it’s the same man. We aren’t releasing his name at this time,” Chief Dobberstein said.
Blue Slide Road resident Chris Ghidinelli was cutting a new ATV path through the brush, on his way back from his favorite Eel River fishing hole when something caught his eye. Round and white, with two molars jutting from the upper jaw — as an experienced outdoorsman, Ghidinelli immediately knew these were not the remains of a deer or bear. It was a human skull.
"I don't think it could have been there that long," said Ghidinelli, who visits the site often, "I think it must have washed down from upstream. It was half-buried in the sand and caught by a willow branch"...
The skull was found just upstream from Howe Creek. The area will be examined by a forensics team at a later date. Enright confirmed that it was the first such find of 2015.
Today, hoping to get answers for the families of five Humboldt women that disappeared under suspicious circumstances, missing person activists launched a social media campaign. The campaign includes a Facebook page for the five missing women, share-able graphics (see image above,) a hashtag (#‎HumboldtMissingFive‬ and an interactive map (see photo below) of where the women disappeared. So-Cal Advocates For The Missing and their partners urge community members to share these images and this story in hopes that clues to the whereabouts of the women might emerge.
Heather Miller, a family advocate for NorCal Alliance for the Missing, designed the map. She said she was asked by a colleague to create it and was surprised by how much she learned in the process. I was already familiar with the cases from research I had done on Humboldt and the surrounding counties .I think [this] gives a new perspective, by combining their information and photos with a map showing you the locations that they are missing from.
http://kymkemp.com/2015/04/01/the-humboldt-five-so-many-missing-from-such-a-small-area/Who Are the Missing Women:
A spokesperson for the Humboldt Missing Five page said she found it curious that so many were missing from such a small area. She had recently formed a successful campaign around five men who had vanished in the Bay Area and has hopes that grouping the women together will help the community think about the disappearances in new waysways which might lead to uncovering what happened to them.
“The skull found in eel river a couple months ago has been confirmed by DNA that it is my daughter Danielle,” reads a message posted earlier this afternoon in the Help Find Sheila Franks and Danielle Bertolini Facebook group, which was set up by members of the two women’s families. “REST IN PEACE SWEET ANGEL”
But the Sheriff’s Office is not ready to confirm the facts of the case. Deputy Sheriff-Coroner Trevor Enright told the Outpost earlier today that he is still waiting for an official report from the Department of Justice, which is testing the remains. “I cannot confirm that I have conclusive findings at this point,” Enright said, adding that he should have more information in a week.
Authorities in Humboldt County, California have reportedly identified remains found in a river as that of Danielle Bertolini.
The remains were found in the Eel River back in March, according to the Times-Standard. Bertolini's family posted on the 'Help Find Danielle Bertolini and Sheila Franks' Facebook page Thursday with the news and police later confirmed the information.