TX - 'Lori Ruff', Longview, WhtFem UP9863, *General Discussion and Theories* #5

[ladyrider223]

This article says that John Paul Sr married a Hope Haywood: http://articles.latimes.com/1985-03-10/sports/sp-25900_1_john-paul-sr
I'll go read through that page again though to see if a Holly is mentioned anywhere. Thanks.

You are right Gardener it was Hope. Sorry about that.

 

[Laughing]

Thanks for the encouragement Sunnynz! I am trying to find out more about Holly but there is very little to find. I did find an arrest record for someone with her name and the right age in 1998: https://www.questia.com/newspaper/1G1-57460668/police-report
Legal experts: If Holly had a record, would her fingerprints be in CODIS? Would she be an automatic rule out or would they need to check Lori's prints against hers to be sure?

Worth a try, I say. Apparently we've spurred some rule-outs recently, a rule-out is still part of the bigger answer. I've read the "automatic" DNA explanation & don't understand it, I recommend a human compare the fingerprints. Tomorrow, if possible.

 

[Gardener1850]

Worth a try, I say. Apparently we've spurred some rule-outs recently, a rule-out is still part of the bigger answer. I've read the "automatic" DNA explanation & don't understand it, I recommend a human compare the fingerprints. Tomorrow, if possible.

Do you think just her likeness and the fact there are fingerprints to compare is enough right now to submit? I feel like I have to have an explanation for why Holly would have stolen the ID in 1988 but did not officially go missing until 1999. IF Holly was married to John Paul Jr then getting ID to become Lori Erica Kennedy right before he got out of prison makes sense, IMO. We know very little about Lori's movements prior to 1999. Her resume is sparse--the jobs she held were only 6 months long and very basic, like entry level/internship type jobs. She might have lived a double life for a while. Maybe she wasn't really afraid JP Jr but was afraid of JP Sr. and went into hiding when he got paroled early? But I need help connecting Holly to the JP's. Anyone up for the challenge?

 

[scruffydog]

I really feel that if the Ruffs truly wanted to know who FLEK was, that they would submit the daughter's DNA to be added to the system, also run it through Ancestry.com's DNA site. I'm wondering----did BST's father give a sample for DNA? Here's a weird thought-could FLEK be an illegitimate child that belonged to him and got into trouble and she and her father thought up the idea of taking over BST'S identity?

 

[llywrch]

No, we are just speculating that FLEK might have seen the story about Turner girls dying in a fire if she or a family member saved the paper from that day for another article or if she was researching her own family history and saw that article. I think there is a possibility she was into genealogy because she took interest in the Ruff family history. I don't have anything to prove this however, it's just an impression I have. SHe might have also taken an interest in the Ruff genealogy in an attempt to bond with her MIL. Blake's mom published several books on their family history long before Lori was her DIL. So I could see it either way.

I threw out a theory many months ago -- but so many posts have been made here that I expect many here either never saw or have forgotten -- that maybe LEK learned about the death of BST thru someone's genealogical research. In other words, she saw a family tree that included BST's birth & death information, which is how she learned of that death. And would mean that LEK is a distant relative of, or a friend of a distant relative of, BST. If this is the case, it wouldn't usefully narrow the pool of possible suspects, but it does narrow it.

Of course, it would take LE to pursue this lead: they would have the resources & authority to usefully investigate it. But it's an idea worth considering.

 

[dvo]

I really feel that if the Ruffs truly wanted to know who FLEK was, that they would submit the daughter's DNA to be added to the system, also run it through Ancestry.com's DNA site. I'm wondering----did BST's father give a sample for DNA? Here's a weird thought-could FLEK be an illegitimate child that belonged to him and got into trouble and she and her father thought up the idea of taking over BST'S identity?

It has been much speculated here that LEK was an illegitimate daughter of TT (BST's father.) There is a thread dedicated to discussing this theory, and many people see a strong resemblance between LEK and TT. However, according to the reports released, none of the Turners questioned recognized LEK. TT did, however, suggest that she might be one of the daughters of FH of Springdale, WA. Some wonderful and dedicated folks here are sleuthing this key lead which is exciting, but the H0wder family tree is very complicated...

 

[nerosleuth]

No. She could have been from anywhere but remember that back in the 1980's there was no internet. She had to find out about the girl's deaths somehow. The most common way in the 70's and 80's was to walk through a cemetery and choose a dead child close to their age.

This woman strikes me a both highly motivated, reasonably intelligent, and likely educated. Back in the 1980's, the library in a major city such as Seattle may well have had a major genealogy collection--prior to the internet, such libraries played a major role as physical information repositories.

What I'm trying to say is that back in the 1980's, finding an individual fitting a particular birth/death profile (as did Becky Sue) was mostly a matter of simply knowing where to look for such profiles.

There are plenty of ways as to how FLEK could have come across BST’s name back then.

Walking through a cemetery was one way. Looking at old newspapers on microfilm at the public library was another way.

While looking at old newspapers on microfilm at a public library can be time consuming, if one went to a public library in a major city such as Seattle, it likely had local newspaper index books for each year.

A newspaper index book is a book listing the names and subject categories of all newspaper articles appearing for that year in a local newspaper. Newspaper articles about BST would have been listed under accidental deaths, fires, and obituaries in the news index book.

Now it could be possible that BST’s name was found from a newspaper index book. And it could be possible that BST’s name appeared in an in memoriam notice in the newspaper on the anniversary of her birthday or death while looking at old newspapers on microfilm.

As Hank has mentioned above, the genealogy department at a public library is another way of getting the names of individuals fitting certain birth/death profiles if one had the smarts in knowing how to do the research.

I agree that FLEK could have been from anywhere, was likely educated, and knew how to do the research looking for new identities.

And there is also the possibility that FLEK may have previously worked at an office handling sensitive personal records before changing her identity to BST.

 

[llywrch]

The quesion I have as to whether this woman was motivated by fear, by shame, or by a more practical consideration. If she was motivated by fear, i.e. she changed her idenity to hide from somebody in her previous life, it strikes me that this was a secret that sooner or later she would have shared with somebody such as, for example, a spouse. On the surface, it makes a lot more sense that she was motivated by shame, i.e. she didn't want people in her new life to know the details of her previous life. This is the kind of secret that one shares with absolutely nobody, and in this case, is literally taken to the grave. I know that is a relatively broad, simplistic categorization, but if she was trying to escape a religious cult, evade an abusive spouse, or hide from organized crime, she really didn't benefit at all by keeping that secret from people in her new life.

Another new idea. One that might have come up sooner if folks had tried to work up a profile of LEK, rather than be too focused on connecting her to her pre-1988 identity.

Shame would be a powerful motivator. And implies more to the story about her father as a "failed stockbroker", & her step-mother as "his wife".

 

[llywrch]

3. Lastly, I know the identity broker theory has been tossed around a bit, and while it does seem that her methods were sophisticated, how likely is this? Maybe, having not been up to any dubious activities in the 80s, I underestimate how common/accessible this type of person was. But thinking in current times, if I personally was trying to change my identity, I would have NO idea how to track down a 'professional' who does this. If you're truly trying to disappear, you probably wouldn't call random people or ask friends/family if they knew anyone in the identity changing business. So without a connection to organized crime or very sketchy people, I can't imagine how an 18-22 year old girl would even know where to look for an identity broker.

So does anyone have any information about "identity brokers"? A famous story, criminal case, reasonable anecdote?

I won't claim to have lived an entirely law-abiding life, but I have no idea how this would work, how these agents build up an "inventory" or contact possible customers. If it's anything like other criminal businesses (like drug dealing), people get caught & arrested, maybe not all of them, but most eventually do, so there ought to be some examples of this. But in the several years of this thread, no one has offered an example of an identity broker.

I'm wondering if this isn't one of those things that are far more common on tv crime shows than real life. Like computer hackers compromising computers in minutes & at will. (Yes, any computer can be cracked, but it's not that easy in most cases & the ones that do interesting things take a bit more time to crack.)

 

[llywrch]

Just curious: for those who have been working this case and know it well - what is/are your favourite explanations for who Lori was? And/or which options are you currently most hopeful about?

I ask because I lurk here a lot but rarely post, it's hard to keep up there are so many tangents!! Great sleuthing, I'm in awe of you all by the way... I just need a few little summaries!

My own theory is that LEK was someone who had personality problems who thought that she could escape them by radically changing her identity. I don't want to use words like "mentally ill", because while she might have presented symptoms that could lead to a diagnosis out DSM-IV, her mental health was good enough that most people would have likely categorized her as "someone who just refused to live up to her potential". (And yes, I know a few women like my image of LEK who changed their names in part. So maybe I'm reading into what little we know about her my own preconceptions.)

Which means that we may never know her birth name.

But on the other hand, I'm aware that any other theory proposed here has as much potential to be the correct one. Well, except for those that propose LEK was a refugee from some fundamentalist LDS splinter group: in the last few weeks, we've had unconfirmed reports that no one in those groups recognize her. It's likely. That's a very small world, & while they might not be on good terms with each other, they know enough about each other that someone from that world would see one of LEK's photos & say, "Hey that's Betsy Ann! So that's where she went."

And the LEK was a KGB mole theory is only good for entertainment purposes. (On a whim, spent an hour looking up how to become a spy & see if LEK could possibly fit the profile. It's not at all possible; not only she didn't match the personality of known, self-admitted spies, she failed to show the resourceful spies are expected to have. I wonder if the Ruffs were actually joking when they mentioned that possibility once upon a time.)

 

[nerosleuth]

One thing I found interesting is that the only commonly asked for piece of info on an application for the birth record that a stranger would not easily know was mother's maiden name. And it said that info could be found on the death certificate. That is the only reason she might have gotten the death record, IMO. But a birth announcement in a paper would sometimes also have the mother's maiden name or the obituary could have it too.

During the late 90’s when I was researching my family’s genealogy at an out of state public library, the genealogy department at a public library in one state had index books of birth and death certificates for most years during the 20th century.

The birth index books listed the child’s name, mother’s maiden name, date of birth, the county where the child was born, and the birth certificate number. That’s how I saw my own name listed in the birth index book from that state.

 

[sunnynz]

Some more on Holly: Her parents are both recently deceased but she has siblings we could contact if we could track them down. Her mother died less than a week ago so not sure if it would be too hurtful to bring up Holly at this time. http://www.jacksonvillememorygardens.com/obituary/Darlene-L.-Stanley/Jacksonville-FL/1647257 Holly's father died in 2015: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/name/charles-foster-obituary?pid=1000000176333253
.

I found Holly's sister on facebook - search the sister's name and the town she lives in (according to the mother's obit) and you'll find her son's profile - she's on his friend's list. I think that given the recent death of the mother it may be worth holding off on contacting the family though.

It looks like that police report from '98 matches up to be the right Holly. As far as I know we don't have a lot of info about FLEK's whereabouts in '98 correct? So it's conceivable that it could be her but she would need to have made her way from TX after graduating business school in '97, back to Jacksonville by the January to get arrested for the drugs charges as per police report. Not out of the question, if she'd been having a tough time dealing with bankruptcy etc in the previous year, and we don't know anything about whether she had a previous history of using drugs during the 80s/90s.

I'm kind of rambling but overall I think yes you should submit based on likeness alone. If you can connect to the JP's that would be a great back-up. I don't see how I can help with that one though sorry.

 

[Gardener1850]

I threw out a theory many months ago -- but so many posts have been made here that I expect many here either never saw or have forgotten -- that maybe LEK learned about the death of BST thru someone's genealogical research. In other words, she saw a family tree that included BST's birth & death information, which is how she learned of that death. And would mean that LEK is a distant relative of, or a friend of a distant relative of, BST. If this is the case, it wouldn't usefully narrow the pool of possible suspects, but it does narrow it.

Of course, it would take LE to pursue this lead: they would have the resources & authority to usefully investigate it. But it's an idea worth considering.

This was my theory when I first started looking at the case. Especially since she took an interest in the Ruff genealogy, she may have had experience researching family trees or had a family member who did genealogy. Another possibility along the same lines is that her last name was Turner or she had Turners in her family but she had no connection to the Turners who died in the fire. Often when doing genealogy on a common name I will come across records for someone unrelated with the same surname. With the internet today I can trace the records quickly and know it's not someone in the line I'm researching pretty fast. But "back in the day" before all these resources were online, if I came across an interesting article or a birth announcement for someone with the same surname I would make a note of it at the very least so I could reference it latter if I found out they were related.

 

[Coco'sMommy]

I really feel that if the Ruffs truly wanted to know who FLEK was, that they would submit the daughter's DNA to be added to the system, also run it through Ancestry.com's DNA site. I'm wondering----did BST's father give a sample for DNA? Here's a weird thought-could FLEK be an illegitimate child that belonged to him and got into trouble and she and her father thought up the idea of taking over BST'S identity?

So weird you would think that, it occurred to me yesterday too. Does anyone know if TJT is still around?

 

[Gardener1850]

So weird you would think that, it occurred to me yesterday too. Does anyone know if TJT is still around?

He is still alive and living in Hawaii. AFAIK, no one took his DNA for comparison and it would be hard to make a case to compel him to give it. It would have to be a case where the Turner family volunteered to do a DNA comparison to prove to people that FLEK was not related to them. Has anyone considered contacting his surviving daughter to ask for her take on this whole story? If Lori was really no relation of the Turners, how awful for them that they are constantly be talked about as if they had something to do with her fraud. Perhaps the daughter would volunteer to put it to rest once and for all with a DNA sample?

 

[mrseeker]

He is still alive and living in Hawaii. AFAIK, no one took his DNA for comparison and it would be hard to make a case to compel him to give it. It would have to be a case where the Turner family volunteered to do a DNA comparison to prove to people that FLEK was not related to them. Has anyone considered contacting his surviving daughter to ask for her take on this whole story? If Lori was really no relation of the Turners, how awful for them that they are constantly be talked about as if they had something to do with her fraud. Perhaps the daughter would volunteer to put it to rest once and for all with a DNA sample?

My opinion is FLEK had no connection with the Turners. If you think about it, if you were trying to completely change your identity, why would you want any trail that could lead back to your real identity. It would be smarter and just as easy to locate a dead infant at random. That is what the books said to do. Just start searching death notices for the appropriate years..nothing special. The only complication would have been, how did she go from a death notice, to bakersfield to get the birth certificate? Was it possible the death notice also appeared in a Bakersfield paper since BST's grandparents apparently still lived there? Did any of the death notices mention BST was born in California? I know the death certificate said born in California. I am a little unclear whether the death certificate was actually found in the box. I don't think it was. Perhaps the connection if any, FLEK was acquainted with BST's grandparents and heard the story that way. Wonder if BST's grandparents were alive at the time of this investigation and if they were ever asked to look at a photo of FLEK.

 

[docbh]

My opinion is FLEK had no connection with the Turners. If you think about it, if you were trying to completely change your identity, why would you want any trail that could lead back to your real identity. It would be smarter and just as easy to locate a dead infant at random. That is what the books said to do. Just start searching death notices for the appropriate years..nothing special. The only complication would have been, how did she go from a death notice, to bakersfield to get the birth certificate? Was it possible the death notice also appeared in a Bakersfield paper since BST's grandparents apparently still lived there? Did any of the death notices mention BST was born in California? I know the death certificate said born in California. I am a little unclear whether the death certificate was actually found in the box. I don't think it was. Perhaps the connection if any, FLEK was acquainted with BST's grandparents and heard the story that way. Wonder if BST's grandparents were alive at the time of this investigation and if they were ever asked to look at a photo of FLEK.

Agreed. The point of changing identities is to cut ties with your past not link yourself to it. The sort of conventional wisdom at the time was to find a deceased infant or child to take an identity from.

I have always suspected the lawyer in california might have provided FLEK some advice or assistance in her name change and that he may have known the BST story... or she was in California anyway (hence the lawyer connection) and found BST herself.

I can't imagine anyone from BST family would have any interest in genetic testing related to this case. I think in their shoes I would find the suggestion painful and offensive, honestly.

Sent from my SM-G930P using Tapatalk

 

[llywrch]

My opinion is FLEK had no connection with the Turners. If you think about it, if you were trying to completely change your identity, why would you want any trail that could lead back to your real identity.

My "genealogical theory" assumes that LEK is either distantly related to the Turners, or is a friend of a distant relation. Which means only a dogged investigator with ample resources might find that trail.

Back in the 1970s & 1980s, there was a minor vogue in genealogy: it seems that everyone was doing it back then, & every family seemed to have at least one book that listed all of their relations who shared a common grandparent or great-grandparent. In my case, there are four: one for my father's family (which consists of four or five pieces of typewritten paper stapled together, one for my maternal grandfather's family (which was published this year by my second cousin), one for my maternal grandmother's family (done by a relative in Canada, who had it professionally printed & bound), one for my stepmother's first husband's family (which was mailed to me for some reason & I still have somewhere). All of them are full of people I either have never met, or wouldn't recognize if you showed me their pictures. Add to this collection a wider circle of friends & acquaintances, & there are easily a few hundred people who would know I existed & might even be in a position to "borrow" my identity.

That is the connection I suspect might exist between the dead little girl & LEK.

Now assume that this is the case, & you are an investigator with the time & resources to track down everyone in that family tree. Maybe interviewing everyone would lead you to LEK's birth identity, assuming you not only meet with everyone but remember to ask every person if they remember anyone who resembles LEK. (There is a chance LEK found out about BST thru being a casual acquaintance: say a friend of a friend who happened upon the family tree while attending a party she more or less crashed, or an acquaintance of a short-term roommate, or the like.)

I'm not saying this line of investigation, if correct, would crack the case, but it is better than publicizing the case & hoping someone who knew LEK by her birth name comes forward. The only other likely lines of investigation would be to match any surviving genetic markers with existing databases & hope that leads somewhere -- & creating a profile for LEK & seeing what that reveals.

 

[Gardener1850]

My opinion is FLEK had no connection with the Turners. If you think about it, if you were trying to completely change your identity, why would you want any trail that could lead back to your real identity. It would be smarter and just as easy to locate a dead infant at random. That is what the books said to do. Just start searching death notices for the appropriate years..nothing special. The only complication would have been, how did she go from a death notice, to bakersfield to get the birth certificate? Was it possible the death notice also appeared in a Bakersfield paper since BST's grandparents apparently still lived there? Did any of the death notices mention BST was born in California? I know the death certificate said born in California. I am a little unclear whether the death certificate was actually found in the box. I don't think it was. Perhaps the connection if any, FLEK was acquainted with BST's grandparents and heard the story that way. Wonder if BST's grandparents were alive at the time of this investigation and if they were ever asked to look at a photo of FLEK.

I lean that way as well. I don't think she is related to them by blood. If it were not for the strikingly similar features the Turners share with Lori I think this would not have been discussed as much as it has been. I don't have much on the maternal grandparents but the paternal grandparent (Turners') died in 2000 and 2007. Could Lori have known them somehow in the 1980's? It's possible. 3 girls dying in a fire is a family story that would get told often, IMO and the family and anyone one close to the family (neighbors, coworkers) could know the story.

The death certificate was NOT found in the box. It was obtained as part of the investigation after Lori died. She didn't leave any direct evidence of her fraud for an untrained eye to find. If her husband and his family had not been suspicious and hired a private investigator they could have chosen to believe her birth name was Becky Sue Turner who changed her name to Lori Erica Kennedy in 1988. There was nothing to indicate otherwise, AFAIK. She left the name change records for them to find. There are many legitimate reasons for people to legally change their name. It was the fact that she had been so evasive in answering questions and that she had changed her name that made them hire the neighbor to investigate and eventually ask a congressman friend to get the SSA involved. IMO, had she destroyed the lockbox contents (which had the BST birth Certificate, BST Idaho ID and name change records) her husband and daughter may never have found out at all about her fraud. For some reason she left them in the box to be found and here we are.

 

[Gardener1850]

Agreed. The point of changing identities is to cut ties with your past not link yourself to it. The sort of conventional wisdom at the time was to find a deceased infant or child to take an identity from.

I have always suspected the lawyer in california might have provided FLEK some advice or assistance in her name change and that he may have known the BST story... or she was in California anyway (hence the lawyer connection) and found BST herself.

I can't imagine anyone from BST family would have any interest in genetic testing related to this case. I think in their shoes I would find the suggestion painful and offensive, honestly.

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I meant no offense with my suggestion. I don't think they should have to take a DNA test. But if I were them I would be offended that people were suggesting I was connected with a fraud. People are saying things like maybe FLEK was a secret love child or maybe one of the daughters didn't really die in the fire. All kinds of off-the-wall and hurtful suggestions are being made. Most people mean well and just want to solve this case but in the process they are dragging victims of ID theft through the mud. Some people think FLEK's identity theft was a victimless crime but the people she stole the ID from have had to pay for being associated with her. The Turners have a way to stop those suggestions but they probably would never do it (nor should they have to, IMO). FLEK's husband and daughter will continue to suffer from not knowing as well unless they pursue DNA testing further. JMO. I think DNA will solve this.