Okay, I'm back after a 24-hour blitz (I pulled an all-nighter for the first time in awhile). I'll need to apologize in advance for this long tome. Also want to preface my comments a bit. A couple years ago I was compelled to track down a part of my own convoluted family history (involving adoptions and aliases with purposeful hiding of tracks). So I've acquired a bit of rudimentary experience at least in sniffing out that sort of situation. And I've found I enjoy the dig, so decided to try one with this situation.
What I've found in 24 hours fills up more than a dozen pages of legal pad notes (and a growing word doc Timeline), and while some of the connecting of dots may be circumstantial, the addresses, names, dates, and other facts on record are starting to look like they might come together a bit if I keep plugging. For me it's similar to forming the outside 'frame' of a puzzle. I use two or more genealogy sites with access to records like death indexes, city directories, gravesite records, newspapers, yearbooks, etc. What I do when I get online is do a general name search, then begin to assemble a tree, starting with the people closest to the person. Since we didn't know Lori's name for sure, I just went ahead and started with Lori Kennedy, with a ten-year birth range. The genealogical sites led me immediately to her possible relatives, other names she's used, as well as to her father's, brother's, and a probable mother's name based on the age at marriage and the year she divorced their dad. Besides the aliases there are several marriages, remarriages, and divorces cluttering up the research landscape...but the upside is, with all those otherwise random people interconnecting, you get a lot of 'place' clues and then some "aha" moments when you look at the correlating dates and make some connections. That same thing helped me in finding our missing half-families for our family tree in our alias situation. The only thing different with FLEK's family tree is, there are repeated and purposeful changing of birthdates, middle initials, and even the occasional random surname, by more than just one person. I'll interject here to say, lawyer Ben Perkins does seem likely to have been involved in helping this family hide their identities--at least at first glance. Either that or he was oblivious to at least two of those family members using his surname from time to time. In that he was disbarred for repeated misconduct, it would not surprise me...though I haven't found proof of that, yet. JMO. But I do find it coincidental that he was disbarred the year after FLEK's identity change.
I wish I'd had the time to read all these threads last night, but thought it'd be best to start with a clean mental slate to get the barebones down first by plotting facts on a timeline and tree. I did glance at the yearbook thread on here and the thread having to do with her Notes. The yearbook thread didn't help me as much since it seemed to be largely high school, so I checked for earlier ones on the genealogy site. I did find a "Lori Kennedy" (in CA) with an 8th grade group shot that I think may be her; the site I was using prompted me with that same school's yearbook 3 years later for another dark-haired gal with an altogether different name. But that photo is too dark for me to make a call. I'm not dissuaded by the different name; that happened almost every year with school kids' yearbooks with my own family tree. ("Every year I had a new last name," was how one relative put it when we had our reunion.)
Anyway, after my marathon genealogy search last night, and a short nap this morning I did take a chance to skim through a few pages of General Discussion and Theory thread 1, and was interested in this post #279 from Angel629:
Today, I read about a drug case that gave me some ideas why a young woman might have had to disappear quickly in the 80s. From 1986-early 1988, an American man named Brian Peter Daniels,
who lived in Bangkok (and owned a strip joint there), devised a plan to distribute very large amounts of pot throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Asia. With the help of friends in several countries (some, ex-military), he succeeded in becoming the largest pot distributor of all time (moving 42 TONS in one shipment alone).
The pot was brought, by ship, to the Pacific Northwest and distributed throughout the entire West Coast. One major base of operations was a ranch in Bakersfield, CA. The money was laundered in Reno, NV, which is where things unraveled after the arrest of the primary money mover. The entire syndicate was eventually dismantled, with the help of several key informants. People who played peripheral roles in this ring (and their families) were also affected. A couple of people who the feds wanted to speak with, disappeared. I could see a young woman who perhaps only dated one of the "small fish", having to take off.
http://www.websleuths.com/forums/sh...cussion-and-Theories*-1&p=9687329#post9687329
BBM
This post interested me because of the reference to Bangkok, Bakersfield, and the year 1988, which was a pivotal year for this mystery person. Besides all the 1988 happenings we have listed in the the thread media already, there are a few other things that came up last night in my searches (subject to future correction):
- FLEK appears to have used the alias Lori Kennedy prior to moving to Texas, while still living in Caifornia. If I've got the right gal, she appears to be labeled with that name in a photo in a 1973 junior high yearbook. (She is also ten years older than that 1969 birthdate if my digging is correct; born in 1959.) Three years later FLEK's class (now 11th grade) again has a group photo, but if it's her in that photo, she has an entirely different given name and surname...though I'm not as firm on if it's her since the group photo is too dark to see clearly. However, the genealogy site seems convinced these two same-age, same schooled gals are related when searching for hints under "Lori Kennedy."
- the name Lori Kennedy is used on the 1988 'job and rental' letter of recommendation which is signed by someone else who keeps popping up on my ancestry hints - and I only just now made the connection when reading that letter again. The letter is oddly typed on what looks to be hotel stationary from Bangkok, Thailand - which is interesting given the huge drug bust mentioned above with ties to Bangkok. The letter is signed by a "Roger Steinbeck". This person keeps coming up in my hints list, but I haven't found the time to explore him fully, yet--only that he was also a Californian who divorced a wife with an exotic-sounding name in 1975.
- FLEK's father and mother divorced in the 1970s; he married and divorced twice over the next dozen years an Asian woman who was naturalized in 1972 after marrying FLEK's dad. This Asian woman's name appears on a CA death index with the "Perkins" surname and slight variation to birthdate. I'm not 100% certain it's her, yet, but whenever I run that search, the Bangkok letter-signer's name also comes up (Roger Steinbeck) along with his 1975 CA divorce record. There is also, curiously, an association to the city of Jackson for the Asian lady which needs more exploring.
-FLEK's
mother's 2nd marriage, while short-lived, was to a man who had a RR (rural route) address
in Bakersfield, CA in 1988. Same time and place where FLEK picked up that birth certificate for a little girl born there years earlier; same time and place where the feds were closing down a major drug operation at a ranch there and rounding up witnesses.
- FLEK's father had several addresses in close proximity in CA in the 1990s (one the same town as her 8th grade yearbook town) and the relatives' names associated with the addresses include the Asian woman who divorced him in the 80s, FLEK'S brother, and a "Jennifer" - which might possibly be one of FLEK's aliases?? FLEK's dad died in same town where she attended junior high (if my research is correct).
This is all just the conglomeration assembled so far. My leanings at this stage should probably be thought of as researched opinion, and for that reason--at least at this point--I probably won't be sharing the names and photos I've found, though after I get a bit more organized and confident in what I've found I can pass them along. And since I'm new to the thread, for all I know, some of this may already be known by you, though it's all a new jumble to me.
Sorry for the length!
