She was found 33 years ago lying partially clad in a water-filled ditch along a New York State highway, just hours after she was shot four times at close range.
In the pocket of her high-quality trench coat was a mysterious note scribbled on a notepad from a Vancouver hotel the rough-and-tumble Blue Boy on Southeast Marine Drive, which has since closed.
Today, the victims name remains unknown, as does the identity of her killer and the meaning of the undecipherable letters and numbers jotted down on paper from a hotel more than 4,000 kms away.
It is a cold case that will not thaw, despite the efforts of police near where the body was found in Ellery, N.Y., about 100 kms southwest of Buffalo.
The problem is everyones information is now almost 35 years old, said Lt. Lori Holder, supervisor of the Chautauqua County Sheriffs criminal investigation division. It is getting really, really cold. It is almost frozen now. But we do keep the case open.
Jane Doe was found by a truck driver on Dec. 6, 1983, shot once inside the mouth, once in the back, and twice in the chest. Police believed she was Canadian or European, in part because she was using a European-made IUD birth control device that was not sold in the U.S. but was available in Canada.
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Since taking over, Holder has scanned Internet chat rooms for tips and re-watched a videotaped police interview done years ago with a convicted killer, serving a life sentence in an Oklahoma prison, who had boasted of killing Jane Doe.
Mysterious numbers on a notepad from the old Blue Boy motor hotel in Vancouver. Chautauqua County Sheriff / PNG
The Blue Boy note appears to read: Sas.k.R.h. 24233, K.R.Ba. 68301, Sarg. 74261. Vancouver police questioned Blue Boy staff and customers at the time, but no one could remember seeing the woman.
Then Vancouver Sun reporter Bob Sarti interviewed Vander Schaaff in 1991, who said then that the letters and numbers might have been code for three internal phone lines at New Yorks John F. Kennedy airport. Today, Holder said police over the years developed theories about the significance of the letters and numbers, but remain unable to determine what they mean.
NamUs contains so much information about Jane Doe that anyone who knew her should be able to identify her. She was in her 30s, white, 5-foot-3, with brown eyes and shoulder-length brown hair. She had a wart above her left eye, a large mole behind her left ear, a scar on her throat, and had expensive dental work with gold fillings. She had had at least one child, possibly 15 years before her death.
http://vancouversun.com/news/crime/...vancouver-connection-almost-frozen-police-say
