GA GA - Elaine Nix, 18, Gainesville, 20 Sept 1999

[LR1]

From this video from 2010 showing crime scene tape being strung out, http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/video?clipId=7101222&autostart=false it appears she was left behind a company called United Enterprises Inc. a commercial flooring contractor (ceramic tile/marble) located at 3131 Verona Ave, Buford GA.

Google maps show a slightly different spot on that road but Bing maps has it pinpointed correctly.
click on birds eye and zoom in.

http://www.bing.com/maps/default.aspx?encType=1&where1=3131+Verona+Ave+NE%2c+Buford%2c+GA+30518%2c+United+States&cp=34.1309420764446~-83.9696183055639&FORM=MIRE2#Y3A9MzQuMTMwOTQyfi04My45Njk2MTgmbHZsPTIwJnN0eT1yJnE9MzEzMSUyNTIwVmVyb25hJTI1MjBBdmUlMjUyME5FJTI1MkMlMjUyMEJ1Zm9yZCUyNTJDJTI1MjBHQSUyNTIwMzA1MTglMjUyQyUyNTIwVW5pdGVkJTI1MjBTdGF0ZXM=

I'm a little confused on the date of her disappearance I've seen a couple different dates. She went to the store on Sunday night the 19th and her mother reported her missing the following Monday?

Someone asked about the weather that night and it looks like at the time she was on the phone it would have been around 65 degrees. I doubt the car hood would've held residual heat for more than 1 - 1.5 hours tops.

One thing I would do given the place she was discovered was a place the perp had to be at least slightly familiar with is see if there was any ex employees or former acquaintances that had a bone to pick with the management there. You would be surprised how stupid some criminals are. They would also get frequent deliveries of supplies to the back of that building so some drivers would familiar with the place.

The Cottrell plant down the road and across the street from the phone she used, I wonder if this was a 24/7 operation and if it was what time was shift change. The small black truck that was caught on camera around the time she was on the phone not coming forward throws up some red flags. I wonder if the driver ever came forward or if he/she was ever asked to. And why don't we have a photo of the vehicle. I also wonder if the stop at the store by the cop to check out her car was logged through dispatch or was it by chance brought up after the fact.

These cases where the motive is not clear are often impossible to solve. The clothes being missing while the jewelry is left behind is strange. maybe he didn't want to take a chance of fibers or his DNA being found on them.

Gary Hilton would certainly be on my radar for this crime as well as James Carringer.

 

[December]

LRI, she didn't go to the store until about 11 p.m. on the 19th. Then someone saw her around midnight which would have been Monday morning. Some of the links don't work, but I thought I read that the police officer checked on her car around 2 a.m.

It just says her mother came to get the car in the morning. I don't know what time "morning" would be... it could have been as early as 2 a.m. I get the impression after sunrise. But, I'm not sure.

Maybe her mother thought at first Elaine had just gone to spend the night at a friend's house. But when she found the car with the keys in the ignition and Elaine's purse (and cigarettes) inside, she knew something was really wrong and called the police?

I wonder why the police officer stopped and checked on the car. Is that standard operating procedure or had someone placed a call to the police about either the car or seeing something unusual at the convenience store?

I wonder how often Elaine went to use that pay phone... If she made a habit of it, the murderer may be someone who had noticed her there before and especially noted that she tended to stay after the store had closed in order to talk on the phone. Of course, this may be the one and only time she used that phone for all I know.

It was smart of you to check on the exact temperature. I think that proves the car had to have been running not long before the police officer felt the hood.

I feel so bad for Elaine. She only wanted to use the phone.

 

[LR1]

December,

Yes its common for police to check out an abandoned vehicle and make a log of it with the dispatcher you know in case something happens, that way they will have a record of it (tag number) ect. Its a little disconcerting that the officer didn't follow up (make a phone call to the address that the registration came back to) seeing the keys were in the ignition and purse in plain view. I doubt it would have prevented the murder but you never know. Some passerby might have seen something and been more inclined to report it if they saw a cop car investigating her car when the passerby passed back by. If that makes any sense.

just to clarify, I wasn't being critical of the mother at all just trying to get the date straight.

I didn't see where someone saw her around midnight, must have missed that.
Speaking of midnight, the store was said to close at midnight. That seems awful late for that little country store to stay open, especially on a Sunday night. I still wonder why no photo was released of the truck seen on the security video.

 

[December]

LR1, I understood what you meant. It seems like one of the articles is written in a little bit of a confusing manner, but then again.. I don't know what time she was reported missing. I wonder what time it actually was?

One of the more precise articles says she was on the phone with her boyfriend from 11:10 p.m. to 12:10 a.m. Since the store closes at midnight, I can see why someone probably noticed her around then.

I have been to Gainesville, Georgia. One thing I noticed is that stores tend to stay open late. I'm not even sure why this would be... I thought this store was on a highway; not really isolated. I will have to ask someone I know who knows Gainesville better than I do what the store is like and the area is like.

Good point about the black truck on the video. If it is a person who regularly drives that road, I believe someone would recognize the truck. Or at least have been able to say when they generally saw it driving around.

Thank you also for the explanation of why the police officer might have checked her car as a matter of routine. I guess he would know when the store closed and especially take note of a car parked outside of it.

I do know that around the time Elaine went missing at least one neighborhood in Gainesville went from a fairly safe family area to being pretty dangerous. I will try to find out specifically what neighborhood it was.

 

[LR1]

A partial pay per view article from the AJC.


Roadblock turns up leads in teen's death

Date: October 1, 1999 Publication: The Atlanta Journal and The Atlanta Constitution Page Number: B6 Word Count: 522

Longing to talk with her boyfriend late one night, Jacqueline Elaine Nix drove two miles to call him from a pay phone.

It was her last call.

Nix, 18, talked from 11 p.m. until midnight to Billy Millwood, also 18, about going camping. She told him she loved him and hung up. Within 90 minutes of that Sept. 20 call, a Hall County sheriff's deputy found her car parked next to the pay phone. The window was down and the key was in the ignition. On Wednesday, workers found her nude body...



So I'm now thinking this went down on Monday night the 20th. and it would have been around 1:30AM when the police noticed her car parked there. I don't know if this article goes on to mention the car hood being warm, I've actually only seen that reported in one article. It could be that she cranked up and before she could pull away was blocked in and was forced to leave with someone. I think its possible the hood would still hold some heat from that and not necessarily because it was driven recently by the perp.

 

[December]

I talked to someone from Gainesville. That area started to really go downhill after about 1995. So, while at one time it might have been safe to talk on the phone at that location at that time it was no longer a good idea.

LR1, but then it would have been the 21st not the 20th that she was last seen albeit in the first hour of the day. I think she went very late Sunday and was last seen very early Monday.. only about an hour all told, but an hour during which the date changed. I think...

 

[liz b.]

Did Elaine live at home ? Wonder why she didn't call the BF from home ? Is it known that she went into the store ? moo

strange that she was stripped, yet not sexually assaulted/raped ? jmo

and no actual cause of death,even after an autopsy ? Strange too that LE still has never indicated how Elaine died,even to her own family ? moo

 

[December]

Did Elaine live at home ? Wonder why she didn't call the BF from home ? Is it known that she went into the store ? moo

strange that she was stripped, yet not sexually assaulted/raped ? jmo

and no actual cause of death,even after an autopsy ? Strange too that LE still has never indicated how Elaine died,even to her own family ? moo

She did live at home. The phone call to her boyfriend was long distance, so that is why she didn't use her parents' phone. I guess that was her parents' deal because using a pay phone to talk for an hour isn't exactly free.

Some I mentioned this to suggested that maybe she was given drugs that burned out of her system before the autopsy. If she was particularly sensitive to a certain type of drug or allergic or whatever, then it might not take much at all. Some drugs suppress respiration. Maybe the murderer thought she was dead when she was just barely alive? So, whatever drugs were gone before the tox screen during the autopsy? I don't know how likely this is, but I'm just trying to think of a scenario.

Also, there is another thread where a girl was assumed not to have been sexually assaulted, but there was semen later found in her bra and panties. I wonder if it rained during the time before Elaine's body was recovered?

 

[liz b.]

Nothing new. Just adding an article from 2009.

A decade later, Nix's murder still a mystery

^^continued at the link

(Blog, non-MSM)

Who Murdered Elaine Nix and Left Her Nude Body in the Woods?
^^Much more at the link
​

This article states that Elaine went out at around midnight to call her bf. It was around 1 am when she ended the call ? If she wasn't allowed to call her bf from the house, and this was the closest pay phone, I am guessing she used this payphone on a regular basis. moo. wonder if the workers in the store knew her ?

I read in a post upthread that some areas in the town "became less safe around 1995 ". I will * speculate * that this was because of crack coming into the communities ?

Was the toxicology report from the autopsy ever made public ?

It's hard to find the motive for this crime. It was reported that the autopsy report found no indications of sexual assault or rape. I do not really think LE would hold back this information, if Elaine had been raped. moo
This was not a robbery,or a car jack, because her purse was found in her car, and she had her jewelry on when she was located.

If the cause of death is undetermined, how is it known for sure that this was a homicide ?

The fact that her shoes were taken is very interesting. moo could she have been in an area with distinctive soil,or red clay being that it was Georgia ? An area that her killer or killers might have been linked with ? Could she also have been dragged at one point,getting such clay or mud on her clothing ? Thus the need to remove her clothing ? moo

Very sad case...

 

[December]

Lizb, I don't know about crack... probably.

There are a lot of illegal immigrants in Gainesville. Among them, there are very bad criminals who cannot find work in Mexico. Therethere are Mexican gangs. The person I talked to had a relative who owned a house there and had to move because the area went downhill very quickly.

 

[Proud Country Gal]

Was thinking about Elaine today and thought I would look up if anything new had come up in her case. NOPE
I can answer a few questions that have been asked here....
Elaine had dropped out of East Hall High School, but wanted to get her GED and study nursing, also her BF Billy was living with his mother in Cleveland, about 30 miles north, and the “long distance” at the Nix home was blocked. They talked a couple times a week from the payphone.
As for not finding the cause of death I think it had to do with she laid more than a week in the late summer sun, highs were still in the mid-upper 80's lows in the upper 50's-mid 60's, the decomp could have been why it was impossible to determine a cause of death.


What bother's me is that Zack's and where her body were found we "trucker pull over" areas. The area she was found was an isolated industrial park, not somewhere that you just stumble on to. (Oh and it was also had lots of illegal dumping) The only reason I knew about it was because my DH's friend has a small manufacturing business there and VERY close to my house. Another thing that bothers me is that her clothes were missing but she still had her jewelry on. There was a report of a a dark-colored, small pickup truck in Zack's parking lot the night she went missing but no info was given out on that.
I had a strange run in with a blond young man that was walking up Buford Highway that tried to get me to pull off down into the industrial park within a year of her disappearance. I had picked him up because it was so hot and I was young and stupid. Yes I talked to the PI "Hal" that was looking into the case and he wanted to interview me but then blew me off.
I so wish someone would slip up or tell something they know or heard and they would solve Elaine's murder.:banghead:

 

[Kell1]

First a lot of questions about the victim need to be answered. It appears she had a history of running away, which often = disputes at home

I. Victimology: Why did this person become the victim of a violent
crime?
A. About the victim
Lifestyle
Employment
Personality
Friends (type, number)
Income (amount, source)
Family
Alcohol/drug use or abuse
Normal dress
Handicaps
Transportation used
Reputation, habits, fears
Marital status
Dating habits
Leisure activities
Criminal history
Assertiveness
Likes and dislikes
Significant events prior to the crime
Activities prior to the crime
B. Sexual Assault: Verbal Interaction
Excessively vulgar or abusive
Scripting
Apologetic
C. Arson and bombing: targeted property
Residential
Commercial
Educational
Mobile, vehicle
Forest, fields
II. Crime Scene
How many?
Environment, time, place
How many offenders?
Organized, disorganized
Physical evidence
Weapon
Body disposition
Items left/missing
Other (for example, witnesses, escape plan, wounded victims)
III. Staging
Natural death
Accidental
Suicide
Criminal activity (i.e., robbery, rape/homicide)
IV. Forensic Findings
A. Forensic analysis
Hair/fibers
Blood
Semen
Saliva
Other
B. Autopsy results
Cause of death
Trauma (type, extent, location on body)
Overkill
Torture
Facial battery (depersonalization)
Bite marks
Mutilation
Sexual assault (when, sequence, to where, insertion,
insertional necrophilia)
Toxiological results
V. Investigative considerations
A. Search warrants
Home
Work
Car
Other
B. Locating and interviewing witnesses


-Last known location, and last contacts
-Has she ever been in trouble with the law ?
-Anyone in her family immediate or otherwise ever been in trouble with the law?
-Any medical history (psychological or physical)
-Did she have ay problems?
-Was she on any meds?
-For What ?
-How often administered?
-Did she do this regularly?
-How was her financial situation?
-Did she have any problems at work?
-Did anything recently happen or change in her life ?
-How was her mood in the days prior to her murder?
-Was there anything in her lifestyle that would make her a target ?
-Was she or is there any indication she was involved, with anyone either professionally, or romantically?
-Did they have any problems if she was?
-Did she keep a diary, or any writings?
-Was she afraid of anything or anyone? (had she ever mentioned being stalked?)
-List of friends especially anyone who visited recently
-Any unusual occurrences prior to the murder?
-Past employment history
-Would anyone be willing to help with the investigation? Names ?

One thing id be interested in is the phone record from that phone, to see if she possibly contacted someone else as well.

Once we have a thorough understanding of the victim, we can assign a risk factor, apparently running away from home wasn't unheard of in Elaine's case, and looking at her behavior neither was going to this store to make phone calls late at night .

However she was obviously comfortable enough there to leave the keys in the ignition of her unlocked car. In the pitch dark as well, as the store is closed by midnight.

The location and dump sites makes it tough, because, her killer could have been by sheer happenstance, OR someone who regularly observed her using the phone possibly someone who lived or worked nearby.

It seems more than coincidence however, she went missing from a stop frequented by truckers, and found in a place frequented by truckers. I wouldn't doubt that she may've been killed in the area where she was found.

No obvious signs of death are interesting as well, it can mean she was too decomposed, to discover a cause of death such as strangulation, however I believe in one article it said there were no obvious signs of strangulation..

I assume a toxicology panel was done, and the results, would've been made public, though its possible they hadn't, with no other form of trauma, leaves, me with one other possible cause of death

Asphyxia

She was found nude, and her clothes were never recovered. So either her killer kept them as a trophy, OR he knew there was evidence that could be traced on them (DNA)

The pickup truck in the video is a tantalizing lead, but because its a truck stop type place, anyone from anywhere across the country could've been pulling through there, HOWEVER, its unlikely someone just passing through would know about the dumpsite as well .

Regulars to Zack's would most likely know the store was closed at that hour , and phone records state that she was on the phone till around 1 am. Its possible someone was closing up shop as Zack's and noticed her,

But its completely possible someone was passing by and saw her , or saw her and waited.

Because this is an area frequented by truckers, there is a chance this could be tied into The vast amount of highway Serial Killings, which is being investigated by the FBI
http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2009/april/highwayserial_040609

Many of these killers have turned out to be truckers.

Without more evidence its going to be very tough to solve, unless there have been similar abductions in the area . But the issue with the Highway serial killer is how vast the distances between the 2 can be.

 

[LR1]

http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/news/2013/sep/21/murdered-13-years-apart-deaths-of-two-young-women/

Here's an article from last September that I don't think has been posted.

On Sept. 29, 1999, someone cutting the grass behind a Buford industrial park — some 17 miles away, a few hundred feet inside the Gwinnett County line — saw a body. Elaine was just inside the woodline

I don't remember reading that she was that close to the building that she was found behind so if this is the case the perp drove right up behind it as opposed to entering that area from the eastern side where the trailer park is and didn't bother going very far in with her.

That property according to a site I was looking at was built in 83, sold in June 99 (3 months prior to her death) and sold again in 2005

 

[LR1]

GAINESVILLE - For the 15th year, friends and family of murder victim Elaine Nix gathered Monday evening for a grave side vigil at Gainesville's Memorial Park Funeral Home cemetery.

http://www.accessnorthga.com/detail.php?n=280151

 

[December]

we know the police officer found the car with the window down and the keys in the ignition, but we do not know that Elaine deliberately left it that way. I would think the more likely situation was she was inside her car with the window down and the keys in the ignition, but was forced away from it. Jmo

 

[lindamichelle1]

Just came across this case, so sad, days before cell phones and risking being out in the middle of the night to talk to your boyfriend for an hour, she must have felt safe. scary to think this guy must have been watching her waiting for her to hang up. It does seem odd her keys were in the ignition, but maybe she just left it that way while she was on the phone coz she could see it. these days you wouldnt do it but if she felt safe enough to be on the pay phone at midnight then im sure she felt safe enough to leave her keys and purse in the car

 

[Backwoods]

I learned something I hadn't known the other day -- that Texas EquuSearch founder Tim Miller's daughter Laura -- whose disappearance and murder, of course, sparked Miller's founding of the search organization -- disappeared while or after using a pay phone at a convenience store. And that another woman who was found murdered was last seen at that same convenience store (some sources say using the same pay phone).

.

.Shortly after Tim Miller's teenage daughter Laura went missing from her League City home in September 1984, he had a feeling he wasn't really searching for Laura but for her body.
.
Six months earlier, a dog had dug up a human skull in a pasture off Calder Road in League City, leading police to the rest of what turned out to be a 25-year-old woman who'd disappeared in October 1983. Heide Fye lived with her parents, about three blocks from the Millers. The medical examiner believed she'd been beaten to death. She was last seen at the same convenience store where Laura's mother dropped Laura off in September 1984. The 16-year-old had planned to use the pay phone to call her boyfriend and walk home afterward.

Miller was bothered by the coincidence. ...

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/news/2015/01/tim_miller_killing_fields_clyde_hedrick.php


Just got me to thinking (and a quick google search confirms) that talking on an outdoor pay phone -- in Texas or Georgia or anywhere -- probably figures into a good many missing person/murder cases from back in the days when pay phones were more common, and more commonly used. I bet there were predators who checked out pay phones regularly hoping to find a young woman, alone, preoccupied with whatever her call was about, and off guard. Even "after hours", so to speak, as in Elaine's case, when stores or whatever would be closed, a young woman likely felt a (perhaps unwarranted) sense of safety and security as long as she had that "open line" to the boyfriend or whomever -- but when the phone call ended, she would be in a very vulnerable situation if someone had been observing.

 

[Backwoods]

Thinking about Elaine on this date. What happened, 16 years ago?

 

[Backwoods]

Here's a link to a report dated this year on Elaine's case that I THINK has never been posted here. It could be that the web site is not allowed at WS -- I guess it's a blog -- and I guess I will find out if it is a disallowed one when I try to post the link. Anyhow, there is some info in it that I don't recall having encountered before (though I could have just forgotten) such as a report that the medical examiner said Elaine may not have died until several days after she was reported missing. Take it all with a grain of salt, though (if I'm even able to link it), because I don't know one way or another about the reliability of this web source:

http://truecrimediva.com/elaine-nix-1999-murder-case-still-a-mystery-over-15-years-later/

 

[Backwoods]

[h=2]16 years later, Elaine Nix remembered[/h]Family and friends gathered to remember Elaine Nix, whose murder in 1999 remains unsolved....

more and photos at: http://www.gainesvilletimes.com/m/section/6/article/112445/