TX - 'Lori Ruff', Longview, WhtFem UP9863, *General Discussion and Theories* #1

[AngelaE8654]

I wish we had a video of FLEK--I think her height is the key to getting people to remember her. I'm 5'9", and most people describe me as "tall" when talking to others about me, so I'm guessing her 5'10" frame would be memorable.

(I married a man who is 5'6", so my "tallness" is even more of a memorable trait of mine!:floorlaugh

My best friend and my step daughter are both 5'10" and they are both seen as "tall". That is not unheard of for women (there are a few women over 6' tall) but it's relatively uncommon and causes people to remember that about the person.

 

[AngelaE8654]

Doesn't seem odd to me.

My uncle is named David, I have a cousin named David (same side of the family), and my STBX is also David.

I actually have a nephew named Jesse Lynn on my husband's side and an uncle named Jesse Lynn on my side. They both live about 90 miles from one another in Texas, too.

 

[neesaki]

Doesn't seem odd to me.

My uncle is named David, I have a cousin named David (same side of the family), and my STBX is also David.

Well, I don't believe that Lori is nearly as common a name as David, which is an extremely common Christian name since biblical times. Jmo of course.

 

[chris24]

To my knowledge Lori was a common name in the 70s and 80s.

Family names are not uncommon. My name is my grandmas and my middle name is my aunts middle name...and we have more Chris' as well!

 

[Treelights]

http://www.babycenter.com/babyNameAllPops.htm?babyNameId=2883

This link will show the Popularity rank of the name LORI out of a million babies for that particular year in the USA population starting with the year 1946.
Here are just a few of the years and status for the name LORI below. See link for more..
1969 #20 7,954 babies
1968 #22 7,681 babies
1967 #24 7,899 babies
1966 #21 8,361 babies
1965 #19 8,591 babies
1964 #15 9,517 babies
1963 #8 12,028 babies
1962 #11 11,049 babies
1961 #14 10,537 babies
1960 #20 8,985 babies
1959 #27 7,228 babies
1958 #30 6,311 babies

 

[ClaireNC]

The names Lori and Laura were number 15 and 16 of the top girls names in the 1960's. Here is a fun website: http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/decades/names1960s.html

 

[neesaki]

The names Lori and Laura were number 15 and 16 of the top girls names in the 1960's. Here is a fun website: http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/decades/names1960s.html

But the aunt was considerably older, a rather unusual name for someone of her generation.

 

[Tripmap]

Yes, I read your entire post, and the gist of it seemed to be that for all we know there might have been many other documents in that box. I agree, there were, according to the article. We have no evidence about what other iems were in the box. The only evidence that we have is what has been released. and based on that, the Parachute certificate seems odd to include with all of the other items related to her new identity.

Don't mean to ruffle any feathers. Just thinking here.

I agree that the paragliding or parachuting certificate is odd to include in the document released or mentioned to the public. Especially if it was in the name of Lori Kennedy or Lori Ruff, since it would point nowhere having to do with her original identity.

Must also say that it's hard to say if she was having psychological problems etc... that everything in that box is necessarily going to make sense. They say her house was a mess of papers and such, some of which she could have put into that box near the end of her life. I guess we all just have to go on what has been presented.

My belief is that it will take someone who recognizes her from her original/previous life/identity to finally i.d. her. Emphasis needs to be on getting the story out to more people, as some have been trying to do by contacting news outlets.

 

[Liebchenmutti]

I agree that the paragliding or parachuting certificate is odd to include in the document released or mentioned to the public. Especially if it was in the name of Lori Kennedy or Lori Ruff, since it would point nowhere having to do with her original identity.

Must also say that it's hard to say if she was having psychological problems etc... that everything in that box is necessarily going to make sense. They say her house was a mess of papers and such, some of which she could have put into that box near the end of her life. I guess we all just have to go on what has been presented.

My belief is that it will take someone who recognizes her from her original/previous life/identity to finally i.d. her. Emphasis needs to be on getting the story out to more people, as some have been trying to do by contacting news outlets.

It may be that they are looking for people who remember her taking classes there--it does seem odd that they didn't provide info related to her business association (I'm blanking on the name)--it seems like she would have friends there. Maybe the sky diving was an activity from her past also?

 

[Tripmap]

I have a Master's in Library Science & was an undergrad English major. Writing is a completely different animal than reading. That's why they are taught separately. Reading comprehension can be taught before Kindergarten, writing the English language is something taught later. I taught underprivileged students in a border town school district in Texas. I had elementary through high school.

It's like learning any foreign language--reading is easier than forming proper grammatical sentences in the same language. That's why Spanish speakers who sign up for Spanish get D's. It's the written portion that trips them up.

Yes, and IF she had learning disabilities or dyslexia it could have affected her ability to get down on paper what she really wanted to write. What was in her head to put down in writing might have been brilliant, but what actually came out on paper might not be. Also, if her handwriting and/or spelling was not good, the grader could have not been able to read her writing or graded her lower for the misspellings, don't know what the standard for grading is on written parts of the GED testing.

 

[Liebchenmutti]

Interesting lead from the comments section of the Seattle piece leads to this article:

http://articles.latimes.com/1985-08-07/local/me-3831_1_execution-style-murders

Deborah J Stalder was a witness to murder & got immunity for her testimony

The killer was from North Hollywood

'84 Execution-Style Slaying : N. Hollywood Man Guilty in Death
May 17, 1988|GABE FUENTES | Times Staff Writer



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A North Hollywood man was convicted of murder and kidnaping Monday in the 1984 execution-style slaying of a man described by prosecutors as a fellow drug dealer.

After a three-month trial and four days of deliberation, a Van Nuys Superior Court jury found Timothy Patrick Hoban, 33, guilty in the shooting death of Jon Cassanelli, 28, of North Hollywood.
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"Hoban and an accomplice killed Cassanelli in a dispute about drugs and possibly about the victim's girlfriend, who became the prosecution's chief witness, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Stephen A. Baron.

The girlfriend, Deborah Stalder, testified that she saw Hoban fire a single shot at the victim from a .41-caliber revolver after he and Steven Zimmer had taken Cassanelli and her to a remote area near Kanan Road in Agoura on Jan. 15, 1984. Stalder told the jury she later persuaded Hoban not to kill her as well.

Zimmer, 39, of North Hollywood, in 1985 was convicted of murder and kidnaping in the case and is serving a state prison sentence of 32 years to life."

 

[OC Lady]

wonder if anyone has approached People magazine? Seems like it would e an interesting story for them?

 

[Bsublime]

Couple of things re LEK’s parachuting. The certificate says that it was Tandem Solo Flight (not sure how it can be both tandem and solo at the same time) of a Buckeye Powered Parachute. This is like a go-kart attached to a parachute. They fly low and slow. Think of flying just above the trees. Supposedly they are great for taking aerial photography. Anyway, the point is that this is a very different experience from jumping out of a plane.

The interesting thing about the certificate is that it doesn’t say who she did her training with. I found a couple of places outside Dallas that offer this kind of training, but no examples of certificates. One website said solo training was $60/hour.

The certificate has the signature of a trainer which was already mentioned, but it also has the signature of a witness. It could be that this person was a friend of Lori’s. Most people I know do this sort of thing with a friend often on a big birthday.
Final thought, she did this in 1996 when we she was not yet married but was going by LEK. I wondered if this is how investigators traced the ex-boyfriend who said such negative things about her. I have always wondered where that one past link popped up from when no one else has come forward that we know of. This is the one piece of evidence that we have that could probably be traced back to a person. Total guess though.

 

[neesaki]

But the aunt was considerably older, a rather unusual name for someone of her generation.

My only point being, that all three are unrelated. Idk, everything about this LEK is weird.

 

[Bsublime]

People with learning disabilities very often have huge discrepancies in their academic achievements. So it would not be unusual for someone to be good at reading comprehension while struggling with writing. It's also not uncommon to see their scores fluctuate, particularly if ADHD is also a factor.

With that being said, I think it is just as likely (if not more so) that the bad spelling and uneven/fluctuating skills were the result of mental illness. IMO that's why this case is so difficult. It's hard to figure out who someone "was" if who they were changed drastically over time.

I thought it might be helpful to post LEK’s GED scores and that dates. She took the GED over the course of a month (not two days as was said earlier). Also, if you look at her raw scores, they are all pretty close to each other. It is interesting that the same raw score result in such a different score percentile-wise.
Writing 4/7/90 52 (58%)
Social Studies 4/14/90 64 (93%)
Science 4/23/90 49 (43%)
Reading 4/14/90 68 (95%)
Math 5/5/90 56 (70%)

FWIW, I don’t find it at all odd that she would score well in reading and not in writing. Especially since we already have evidence that writing is not a strong point with her. Now if she scored 100% in writing that would seem odd to me in light of the handwriting we have seen. But as has already been said, when I scribble notes, my handwriting and spelling is pretty poor. When I am actually tying (forms, greeting cards etc.) it is much neater.

One thing I was thinking about these scores though is that she did the worst in science. It has been speculated that she may have been home-schooled or raised in a very religious (cult?) environment. Science is often held in poor regard with the very religious. It could be she had no science education because of that.

 

[Occam's Razor]

I thought it might be helpful to post LEK’s GED scores and that dates. She took the GED over the course of a month (not two days as was said earlier). Also, if you look at her raw scores, they are all pretty close to each other. It is interesting that the same raw score result in such a different score percentile-wise.
Writing 4/7/90 52 (58%)
Social Studies 4/14/90 64 (93%)
Science 4/23/90 49 (43%)
Reading 4/14/90 68 (95%)
Math 5/5/90 56 (70%)

FWIW, I don’t find it at all odd that she would score well in reading and not in writing. Especially since we already have evidence that writing is not a strong point with her. Now if she scored 100% in writing that would seem odd to me in light of the handwriting we have seen. But as has already been said, when I scribble notes, my handwriting and spelling is pretty poor. When I am actually tying (forms, greeting cards etc.) it is much neater.

One thing I was thinking about these scores though is that she did the worst in science. It has been speculated that she may have been home-schooled or raised in a very religious (cult?) environment. Science is often held in poor regard with the very religious. It could be she had no science education because of that.

I agree that she might be from a background of people at war with the empirical method.

 

[Ngaio]

http://parachutepilot.com/myphotos.htm

http://www.hopspoweredparachutes.com/

 

[Liebchenmutti]

I agree that she might be from a background of people at war with the empirical method.

<modsnip>

And if you ever want to enlighten yourself with a brilliant author on science and religion you can pick up The Summa by Aquinas. Not all religious are backwards rubes.

 

[Bsublime]

Please don't disparage people with a different background than you.

And if you ever want to enlighten yourself with a brilliant author on science and religion you can pick up The Summa by Aquinas. Not all religious are backwards rubes.

I am sorry if you took my comment that way. I didn’t mean to say that everyone who is religious is anti-science, or that everyone who homeschools does so for religious reasons. However, there are many survey’s including a recent Dept. of Education one that say one of the top reasons for choosing to homeschool is “to provide religious or moral instruction”. These days there are tons of resources available to people who choose to homeschool that really make it possible to provide a very rigorous and structured education to homeschooled children. There are again, lots of studies that show that students homeschooled through a structured educational program actual score higher scores than public school children on standardized tests.

But LEK (if she was homeschooled) would have been educated before a lot of those resources were available. Homeschooling was only made legal in Arizona in 1982. Several states didn’t fully legalize it until the 90’s. Texas on the other hand has some of the most lax laws regarding homeschooling. There are no minimum education requirements, no rule about how many hours spent learning, and there is no requirement to teach science at all.

The low science score is a potential sign that she was homeschooled. One of the subjects that is hardest to teach without outside resources is science.

 

[Liebchenmutti]

I am sorry if you took my comment that way. I didn&#8217;t mean to say that everyone who is religious is anti-science, or that everyone who homeschools does so for religious reasons. However, there are many survey&#8217;s including a recent Dept. of Education one that say one of the top reasons for choosing to homeschool is &#8220;to provide religious or moral instruction&#8221;. These days there are tons of resources available to people who choose to homeschool that really make it possible to provide a very rigorous and structured education to homeschooled children. There are again, lots of studies that show that students homeschooled through a structured educational program actual score higher scores than public school children on standardized tests.

But LEK (if she was homeschooled) would have been educated before a lot of those resources were available. Homeschooling was only made legal in Arizona in 1982. Several states didn&#8217;t fully legalize it until the 90&#8217;s. Texas on the other hand has some of the most lax laws regarding homeschooling. There are no minimum education requirements, no rule about how many hours spent learning, and there is no requirement to teach science at all.

The low science score is a potential sign that she was homeschooled. One of the subjects that is hardest to teach without outside resources is science.

I was commenting on OccamsRazor's post on the "empirical method," not to your post--not sure how that got confused. :waitasec:

I'm not sure that having a low score on the GED science portion necessarily corresponds to a lack of exposure to the subject--I love to read & write and have little interest in science, so my scores would most likely reflect that.

But, it could also be that FLEK was uneducated in science. She's such an enigma I truly hope we find out the answers about this woman--she is so unreadable!