When I first read the neighbors hearing furniture moving I thought she was contacted by someone on Craigslist or FB Marketplace and perhaps they offered to drop a piece of furniture off for her and she went home to meet them.
Good point and I think this possibility could well be worth pursuing.
Expanding this possibility further, could the victim of purchased a big piece of furniture from somebody, and then arranged via the internet for a third party to actually deliver the item?
I wonder if some vending sites also have lists of independent delivery contractors. Or, if there is a separate "Mov'in" site featuring delivery contractors? Such a contractor would not have a recognizable truck.
and a furniture delivery if she lived on the second floor would have been noticed by neighbors.
It might depend on how much furniture, what kind of furniture was involved and whether or not there was a formal delivery truck.
For example, a love seat, small to medium sized dressers (best to take the drawers out first) and some tables could probably be picked up or dropped off relatively quickly by a single male of average or above fitness.
Unless someone were in the stairwell, or in the doorway, neighbors might not notice such an individual. Perhaps he was in the process of picking up a sold item when he saw that the victim was attractive and alone?
But I'm sure LE would have been able to figure this out.
One would think, but at the same time, there might be a lot of 'Craigslist' type sites to go through. For example, the site 'Offer Up' has been associated with problems in my city. In addition, not all these sites may keep record of who contacted who, thus making possible contacts more difficult to trace back.
There is also the possibility of say, older detectives having varying degrees of knowledge and personal interaction regarding the vast and constantly changing on line / social media universe. Thus, they might not know of all sites or contact possibilities.
I think police departments need to have a designated officer(s) with in depth experience in the on line universe as "go to" references for certain cases. It would be even better if the FBI or state police offered courses regarding this universe to local officers with pre existing expertise.