Cases That Haunt You

[pdxmama]

Being a Colorado native and having lived here my whole life, the local cases are the most haunting for me.

The Bennett Family Murder
The murder of Al Kite Jr
Jon Benet Ramsey
Christopher Abeyta
Cassandra Susan Rundle, her son Detriecht Sturm, and daughter Melanie Sturm
Jakeob McKnight

On a national scale, the ONS/EAR absolutely haunts me
The Zodiac
The Girl Scout Murders

This woman was a distant relative of mine, I have tried to search here to see if her case has been posted about before, but am not able to use the search function. My mother talks about this and it still bothers her a great deal.

http://mylifeofcrime.wordpress.com/2006/02/07/langston-family-murder-4111970/

I just wanted to bump this post and ask any experienced Cold Case sleuthers to come over to Christopher Abeyta's thread. We have a family member posting and I'm wondering if anyone has some good advice for how to get the case moving. The family has a suspect. Please check it out here: CO CO - Christopher Enoch Abeyta, 7 months, Colorado Springs, 15 July 1986 - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community

 

[Lera213]

Every unsolved missing child out there haunts me!

 

[bflocket]

I was looking through the DoeNetwork updates and saw an entry that made me think of a very unsettling case in my local news.

The case on Doe was a child who, along with his sister, didn't come back with her mother when she returned from travelling with a carny. Needless to say, they didn't have a very good income or living conditions. The son wound up dying (probably starving or lack of medical care) and she sold the daughter to someone. In trying to track down her son's remains, all the mother could remember was that she put him in a bag, in a dumpster, somewhere in Louisiana.
http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/91dmco.html

Reading it reminded me of the Andrew Compton death in Louisville. He was a gay "kid" (18 y/o freshman) attending a Louisville trade school. From what I understood, he was kind of awkward and/or shy so he would hook-up with people he met online. He wound up meeting up with a 40 y/o creep, Gregory O'Bryan. Compton winds up dying of either positional asphyxia or a broken neck while they're doing their thing.
Many would've considered it an accidental death at that point. But O'Bryan realizes that he is dead, yet continues! Later, he put the body in a TV box and it was taken away with the garbage.
They tracked down which landfill that load would have gone to and an approximate location, but haven't been able to find his remains. But they'd have better luck finding Compton that the Bowling kid. He was tossed into a garbage can somewhere in the state of Louisiana, date uncertain.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-20027836-504083.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/10/andrew-compton-search-con_n_781389.html



Compton's death may not be a true "mystery." We basically know that he's gone, what happened, who did it and what happened afterward. But his remains aren't recovered, and it's now unlikely that they will be.
I saw Tammy Leppert and Kiplyn Davis mentioned. They're kind of in the same boat. We are pretty sure they were murdered and pretty sure who killed them, but we just haven't found their mortal remains.

People are lost at sea, covered by avalanches, burned up in fires or even eaten by others sometimes. It's terrible that we can't put their remains to rest, but it's not as bad as these two. Being disintegrated or eaten by sharks would be bad. But I would much rather that happen to me than to be trapped between layers of rotten, filthy garbage forevermore.

Being buried deeper and deeper in filthy, slimy, rancid trash every day...
what could be more disgusting?

 

[JayCeeVee]

I started a thread with this title about four years ago so I know what you mean about how certain cases haunt us.

Evelyn Hartley-1953
Beverly Potts-1951
Connie Smith-1952
Sheila and Katherine Lyon-1975
Janice Pockett-1973
Trenny Lynn Gibson-1976
Daniel Barter-1959
Alan and Terry Westerfield-1964
Karen Tompkins-1961
Ann Marie Burr-1961
Anna Waters-1973
Suzanne Lyall-1998
The three women missing from Indiana Dunes In July 1966-Patricia Blough, Ann Miller and Renee Bruhl
Madeline Babcock-1968
Michelle Pulsifer-1969
Jodi Huisuntruit-1995
Victor John Theel-1944

Edited to add:
Georgia Jean Weckler- 1947
Andy Puglisi (spelling?)-1976
Unsolved murders of Barbara and Patricia Grimes and Judith Mae Anderson-all in Chicago during the 1950's.

As one can see from the dates of these disappearances, the world was never really safe. It drives me nuts when people think that only recently has it been this way. They have no clue about these cold cases. It is good there are people like us who do know about these cases and keep their memory alive!

Is there a statistical base to show just how many men/women/children there actually are by state missing and never found in the US? I'm afraid it would be overwhelming. The world has never really been safe but I do feel that missing wives/children are beyond epidemic stages at present. There are too many people writing books on how to commit the perfect crimes. Then too, this husband knew his chemicals. There have been more than one man/woman to place their spouse in a barrel with the right mix to make them disappear. I truly have wondered about this with Gail. She didn't just simply go away, never to return. Sometimes I feel that we will never really know what happened to her.

 

[jane the dood]

If I live to be 100, the day that Casey Anthony was acquitted of murdering her daughter Caylee Marie will continue to be one of the worst days ever. Justice certainly took a vacation that day. My knees buckled and I was overcome with grief and anger as the "not guilty" verdicts were read. Horrible. That case will haunt me forever.

 

[SheRa]

This has been such a fascinating thread to read through. There are so many cases that haunt me:

-Tangena Hussain, missing little girl from Michigan. It just seems like nobody cares that she's gone! On her Charley Project profile, she has such sadness in her eyes...

-Haleigh Cummings, missing girl from Florida. It haunts me that we will probably never know what happened to her or where she is.

-Leah Roberts, a young woman from North Carolina who went missing after taking a road trip to the Pacific Northwest. I can see myself doing something like this, and whatever happened to her just frightens me on multiple levels.

-Asha Degree, young girl who went missing whom a witness supposedly saw walking alone along the side of a road very late at night.

-Diamond and Tionda Bradley, two little missing girls from Chicago. I lived in the Chicago area when this happened and it was big news. Where are they??

-Bradley Olsen, who went missing from a bar in DeKalb, IL a few years ago. I used to attend the university there and walked by the locale many times. He seems to have just vanished, right from the very spot I passed by on foot so many times before.

-The St. Louis jane doe (little girl) found, beheaded, in 1983. Good lord, who did that??? And who is she, and why does no one care?

-Amy Billig. I read the true crime book by Greg Aunapu and her poor mother was cruelly taunted by multiple figures throughout the rest of her life, and still never found out what happened to Amy. Was she really kidnapped by bikers, or was she picked-up while hitchhiking and something happened to her the very day she vanished?

-Brian Shaffer. HOW did he exit the bar without anyone seeing him, and why in the world would anyone want to kill him...or is he still alive? Baffling.

-Little Miss Panasoffkee, jane doe found strangled in Florida.

-All of the cases on the Charley Project where it simply says, "so-and-so was never seen again. Few details are available in this case."

 

[scriptgirl]

What is the name of the 2 girls who went missing on the night of their graduation and their car was found outside a popular restaurant? this happened in texas

 

[Stella]

What is the name of the 2 girls who went missing on the night of their graduation and their car was found outside a popular restaurant? this happened in texas

Are you thinking of Stacey Madison and Susan Smalley?

 

[scriptgirl]

yes-do they have a thread here?

 

[LinasK]

Mark Dribin-my 2nd cousin
Ilene Misheloff-local to me
Lisa Irwin
Susan Powell
Natalie Holloway
JBR
Maddie McCann

At least Jaycee Dugard was found alive, and there was closure for Candace Starr!!!

 

[scriptgirl]

Who is/was Candace Starr?

 

[OldSteve]

Maura Murray - first case I saw on TV when I became interested in cold cases and missing people. Haunting because she was gone so quickly after being seen.

Amy Ahoen - because there is so little coverage and she just vanished.
CO CO - Amy Ahonen, 38, Golden, 08 July 2011 - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community


Steven T. Koecher - like Amy, his car was found, but no sign of him. Unlike Amy's case, his did get some coverage.

Holly Bobo - because it seems to be the perfect abduction, and also because of the contrast between lots and lots of web sleuthing versus very very little news from LE.

Lauren Spierer - because there were so many POI's friends around her, yet maybe it was a random abduction.

McStay Family - truly bizarre case.

Amanda Knox - what really happened at that cottage!

Patricia Akins - someone got away with murder.
OH OH - Patricia "Patti" Adkins, 29, Marysville, 29 June 2001 - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community


Okay, I can go on and on...

 

[LinasK]

Who is/was Candace Starr?

Childhood playmate of mine, who disappeared in 1975. She was abducted from California and murdered in New Mexico by the guy she had been seeing. For many years, her body was a Jane Doe.

 

[amber1]

These cases haunt me the most, I pray I may live to see them all solved:

Amy Billig,
Deanie Peters
Jodi Huisentruit,
JAcob Wetterling,
Gina Dejesus,
Amanda Berry
, Stacy Madison & Suzy Smalley,
Springfield Three,
Roseanna Marie Forcum & April Geyer
Rachel Mellon-Skemp
Kimberly Doss
Traci Calico
Anna Waters
Michaela Garecht
Laura Bible & Ashley Freeman

WHO IS PRINCESS DOE????

 

[amber1]

Bold by me:

http://tinyurl.com/c9jqmw

I agree with all the cases you added, totally forgot them on my list! Especially Evelyn Hartley and Beverly Potts!!

 

[Essbee]

For me it would be:

Johnny Gosch and Eugene Martin (paperboys in Iowa, disappeared in the early 1980s
Jodi Huisentruit (anchorwoman in Mason City, IA, 1995)
Michael Negrete (UCLA freshman disappears from dorm, never seen again, 1999)
Steven Koecher (Las Vegas, 12/2009)
the McStay family (northern San Diego County, 2/2010)

There are others, too, but these are the first that come to mind.

 

[serveitup]

Heaven LaShae Ross

She was found deceased; remains recovered from underneath flooring of an old vacant house at Holt and no one has ever been charged.
http://www.websleuths.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-320.html

 

[M86]

What a great thread... So many cases that I was unaware of. The links below are to Charley Project.

The one that haunts me the most, and the one I think about the most, and which brought me to WebSleuths originally is the Lauria Bible/Ashley Freeman case:

Lauria Bible & Ashley Freeman - 16 year olds missing from Welch, Oklahoma on December 30, 1999. The two went missing after a fire destroyed the Freeman trailer. Ashley's mom was found, by LE, shot to death, and Ashley's dad was later found, by the Bible family, shot to death (LE apparently missed this)... Ashley's brother was shot to death prior to the fire by LE after stealing a vehicle. Locals stated Ashley's dad was harassing LE, and LE was harassing the Freeman family. There are numerous theories as to what happened, including drug involvement and/or LE involvement. Ashley's dad was supposedly a small-time drug dealer. I really, really want to see this one solved.

The rest are:

Michael Hughes/Sharon Marshall - Michael is a 6 year old abducted by Franklin Floyd from Choctaw, Oklahoma on September 12, 1994... Very complex case.

Reachelle Smith - 3 year old missing from Minot, North Dakota on May 16, 2006... I'm at a loss on this one... Such a sweet girl from the pictures.

Maura Murray - 21 year old missing from Haverhill, New Hampshire on February 9, 2004... Another bizarre case.

Morgan Nick - 6 year old abducted from Alma, Arkansas on June 9, 1995... She was abducted at a baseball game, and witnesses remember seeing the alleged abductor.

Sherrill Levitt, Suzanne Streeter, & Stacy McCall - The Springfield Three, missing from Springfield, Missouri on June 7, 1992.

Jodi Huisentruit - 27 year old allegedly abducted from Mason City, Iowa on June 27, 1995... TV news anchor who was abducted from her apartment parking lot.

Brandon Swanson - 19 year old missing from Marshall, Minnesota on May 14, 2008. I lived in the area then, and remember the extensive local news coverage about it, and the extensive searches. I don't believe he is still alive, but I really hope they find him.

Branson Perry - 20 year old missing from Skidmore, Missouri on April 11, 2001... Literally vanished into thin air, in a very small town.

Gordon Page Jr. - 28 year old missing from Grand Rapids, Michigan on May 27, 1991. He was autistic and ran away from a group home, and was later seen hitchhiking. I have an autistic brother, so this one hits a chord with me... So sad.

Pamella Jackson & Cheryl Miller - 17 year old missing from Vermillion, South Dakota on May 29, 1971. I don't feel that they are still alive... They had some rather recent developments, but they ended up not getting too far. I grew up and lived in SD for 24 years.

John Gosch & Eugene Martin - 12 & 13 year olds that disappeared from Des Moines, Iowa in 1982 & 1984. Both were newspaper delivery boys. Another case that hits close to home.

Jacob Wetterling - 11 year old abducted from St. Joseph, Minnesota on October 22, 1989. Another case that hit close to home.

Steven Koecher - 30 year old missing from St. George, Utah/Las Vegas, Nevada on December 12, 2009.

There's many more, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. Many don't necessarily haunt me, but I find just intriguing... especially the ones where it sounds like they left of their own accord.

 

[forjoe]

My friend, Joe Helt, has been missing since 1/16/1987. With the 25th anniversary of his disappearance coming up in just a few days, his case continues to haunt those of us who knew Joe as well as the entire community of Ellenville NY where Joe disappeared from.

Joe attended a party that night and later left with three individuals. All three made it home safely, yet Joe was never seen again.

LE never added Joe's cases to NCMEC or the NYS Police list of Missing Persons until 23 years AFTER he disappeared. And this is just one of the many mis-steps in Joe's case.

Even with numerous inconsistencies in their statements, authorities state that the three are not considered suspects. Yet with this in mind, they have FORBIDDEN the PI working with Joe's family from ever contacting the three!

For more info on Joe's case, please go to:

For more information on Joe's case, please check out the following pages:

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Justice.For.Joe.Helt?sk=info
Website: http://forjoehelt.webs.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/JusticeForJoeH
http://www.flickr.com/photos/forjoehelt/


And check out the thread about his case on this site at: NY NY - Joseph David Helt, 17, Ellenville, 16 Jan 1987 - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community

 

[HoneyWest]

The case the haunts me, angers me, saddens me, frustrates me (along with a lot of other emotions) is without a doubt the still-unsolved case of the Girl Scout Murders at Camp Scott, Locust Grove, OK. It's personal to me and I hope and pray this case is solved during my lifetime.