Apearn,
Did you turn in Diana Martinez as a possible match? IIRC, LE can start the ball rolling on collecting a DNA sample and photo.
SBM - or to cover scars. I'd suggest searching for missing women fitting this description but substituting the tattoo info for a scar on the same calf and see if anything pops up. JMO
ETA - whoops, now that I've read the whole thread I see this has been touched on already.
In reading this post and looking at the tattoo it made me think. Could she have had another tattoo under this and the tiger could actually be a cover up tattoo. Usually larger tattoos with lots of black are covering something smaller underneath. I was looking at the tiger and it looks like there is a green blue shape in its body but I cannot really tell.
Also Tattoos were legalized in NYC until 1997, so when she got it done (that is if she got it done in NYC) there would not have been many shops like there are now.
Police release new sketch of 'Tiger Lady,' still unidentified 23 years after her body was found
Oh I thought that was a photo of the actual tattooWe'll never know if it's a cover up because we only have a drawing of her tattoo; they were popular back then
Oh I thought that was a photo of the actual tattoo
Also Tattoos were legalized in NYC until 1997, so when she got it done (that is if she got it done in NYC) there would not have been many shops like there are now.
I am roughly the same age as the UID. Tattoos on young women were not viewed the same way back then. As a middle-class teen if I got a tattoo I would have had to hide it from my parents and school community. Only 'bad girls' got tattoos, they were associated with drugs, bikies and running with the wrong crowd. I'm not sure what it indicates about this UID's life or family connections but it certainly seems she was a non-conformist.
also, 4 piercings in the left ear, not real common then either. almost certainly, she would have stood out and been known if she was a local.
Not so in Jersey. I have 5 holes in my left ear that were done before 91. I know that because a guy I was seeing punched me in the left side of my head bending all the post earrings I had in March 91.
I also have 6 tattoos from back then as did other women that rode motorcycles, or rode on the back.
I remember that happening. They blamed it on the tiger lady, but most locals think that tiger came from 6 flags.
Oddly, I found at least six other tiger sanctuaries in New Jersey. And that led me to poke around some more until I uncovered this information: America Has a Tiger Problem And No One’s Sure How to Solve It | Science | Smithsonian Apparently there are between 5,000 and 10,000 tigers in captivity in the US, ranging from circuses and zoos to cages at roadside truck stops to backyard cages. Other big cats have similar problems. So @da fino is probably right about remembering a lion or tiger kept on Rte 94.
not to sound snarky, but i know i'm right. i'm 100% sure it was a tiger or lion, i just don't remember which. i grew up in a nearby town and traveled the route semi-regularly. i was a kid, and this was a highlight for me. i can even point to the building on google maps, i looked it up after posting to see if the building was still there. it is.