Identified! VA - Annandale, WhtFem 245UFVA, ~60, 'NO CODE, DNR, No Penicillin', Dec'96

[rosesfromangels]

Could some kind soul please post the link to her namus page? I can't seem to find it. Thank you.:blushing:

https://identifyus.org/en/cases/6279

 

[rosesfromangels]

As I was getting the NAMUS link for Belfastgirl, I was looking at the very long and extensive list of exclusions on this case....wow! I mean hats off to everyone and the diligent LE who have tried to identify our Christmas tree lady over many years now.

I'm going to go back to a theory that has been niggling at me for the past week or so. At first, I thought this must be some kindly widow or spinster auntie who quietly disappeared not wanting to bother anyone. The plastic sheet spoke to a tidy person not wanting to create a "mess". The theme of disposal keeps coming to mind as well. "Here's 50 bucks to dispose of my body....do it quickly and neatly. No fuss, no muss, no mess. And most of all, no one knows."

The only hint of reaching out or showing any emotion at all was the poem....it was a statement of sorts. It sounded a bit hard.....non-emotional....but the Christmas tree completely conflicts with that impression! It is a sign of a sentimental person, of hope of a savior...."and the weary world rejoices".....

A weary woman in a weary world....who was tired and needed to SLEEP. Her poem referenced sleep as well.

But WHY didn't she want to be identified? Was she in this life, A BAD PERSON? Was the Christmas tree a sign of a hope for redemption?
Can we not find her because maybe she had warrants out for her? Was she an ex con who had disappeared? I know this is sounding very sensational and far fetched....but do we know who might have been "on the lam" in her age group at that time?

Going down a strange path here.....but what a strange case this is indeed. I think out of the box thinking is required at this point. So many exclusions.....we have to think differently on this one.

WHY WAS SHE HIDING HER IDENTITIY? We have to come up with every possibility, and that might lead us someone that we haven't yet gone with this!

 

[Classito]

Was she an ex con who had disappeared? I know this is sounding very sensational and far fetched....but do we know who might have been "on the lam" in her age group at that time?

I've always thought Annadale was Alice...The red hair, children's graves, stylish clothing, wanting to be anonymous...no one reporting her...But without proof of her being gone or proof she still exists....

If only I could find her husbands obit...Double sigh..

Classito

 

[pokypuppy67]

I just watched a really fascinating and touching video on assisted suicide and the role played by Final Exit. It's a real inside exposé showing what those who chose suicide went through. And also, what those who assisted them went through.

It's a good resource for comparison with this case. I'm not saying that this case was the same as the ones in the video were, but it's certainly worth making the comparison to see if any differences might appear significant.

The people in this video contacted Final Exit and submitted a letter explaining their suffering and reason for wanting to die. A Medical reviewer would approve the case or not. He was very liberal in his approvals...if someone said they were suffering he basically approved them. No medical documentation required. So, had Jane made such a request it would likely have been approved.

Once approved, a date was set and the person wanting to die would obtain all of the necessary items themselves. Supposedly, FE guides didn't bring any "stuff", and didn't supply anything, although it seemed like they would have if the sufferer couldn't obtain them. One obtained meds from his son...another one bought all the meds she needed online. FE does provide info on how to obtain.

On the set date the sufferer would set everything up as described by FE, would eat a small meal hours before to aid in absorbtion, and then would take pills and use a hood (modified plastic bag) or buy helium tanks and use tube to feed helium into hood. Their family members would pretty much always know and be supportive -- the ones in the video anyway.

They would also usually be with them, though FE instructed them to tell police they hadn't been there at the time and to remove any tools used to cause death...I.e., helium tanks. The hood would need to remain on for at least a few hours so that they couldn't be revived if found.

If there was no family, or if the sufferer wanted an "exit guide", one or two of a number of volunteers would come to their home, talk them through everything, hold their hand, basically provide "compassionate care", and be there so that they didn't have to die alone. After death was confirmed, they would leave, taking the evidence of the method of death with them.

The exit guides had to be sort of "cloak-and-dagger" about the whole thing. They were instructed not to touch anything in the home, and to remove all paraphernalia pertaining to the death. The sufferers were instructed not to choose a day when someone would likely be stopping by, to leave a copy of the book Final Exit nearby so that the cops would understand that this was a suicide, and were also encouraged to leave a note stating that fact, to protect anyone who assisted them or may have been suspected of assisting them. Understanding this point (that there were people involved who required protection, and that FE included this in their protocol) helped me to understand the inclusion of Jane's first line.

I had, at one point, theorized the possibility that this could have been either a murder staged as a suicide or an assisted suicide. I still consider those possibilities because of several elements of the case and because it is important to keep an open mind to all possibilities...at least until I am satisfied in my own mind that I can exclude them. That first statement in Jane's suicide note is a protective measure, and it's very possible that she did have an exit guide who required protection.

It is actually my belief that this guide may have, in fact, made the call the following day, posing as SS, to create a "contact" with law enforcement. I am currently pursuing that.

But as far as differences between JD's death and those in this video...hers is much different than all of theirs.

First, most of those people died in their own homes, although one other laid in his garden, shot himself with a rifle. None of them subjected themselves to uncomfortable climate conditions. None of them died alone. I think they all left a copy of Final Exit nearby for the police to find. None of them, not even the two who didn't inform family first, signed their suicide note as John or Jane Doe -- or in any way chose to remain anonymous. They DID all make sure that they were found the next day (in one case, one of the Exit Guides pretended to be a church friend, called the sufferer's sister and said she was concerned and could the sister go and check on the sufferer. That was to make sure she was found the next day.) None were mentioned as having left behind a typewritten note and none had requested no autopsy...but this could possibly have gone unmentioned.

I think it's distinctly possible that Jane didn't die alone, and that somebody did help her. Or maybe at least got her there and helped her get set up. The headphones playing as she died sounds like a very personal thing, that she would have been alone for that.

But then again...so many possibilities for what actually happened.


http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/suicide-plan/

 

[pokypuppy67]

I've always thought Annadale was Alice...The red hair, children's graves, stylish clothing, wanting to be anonymous...no one reporting her...But without proof of her being gone or proof she still exists....

If only I could find her husbands obit...Double sigh..



Classito

Who is Alice? Do you mean Alice Crimmins?

 

[astridxx]

Poky, really, really interesting piece about the final exit! Thanks for that.

She was found the next morning by cemetery maintenance men. Not sure if that means they arrived to work to work per usual and noticed her (in the location she was, she wouldn't be hard to miss -- it's near the front of the cemetery, off of the main road near the entrance). Or maybe they were tipped off -- either way, thank you for summarizing that documentary. It sounds fascinating!!


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[Mouse]

If she had been on the run from the law, wouldn't her fingerprints have been on file? (Although, they may not have printed JD's body to do a search.) And would she care about having her identity known by LE after her death? In some ways, if you'd eluded LE for years, having them know your identity after death would be like the ultimate flipping-the-bird at LE: "Ha! Screw you, coppers! You never did catch me, and now I'm beyond the reach of the long arm of the law!" (Or maybe that's just how I would think.)

I feel like she didn't really do all that much to obscure her identity, beyond signing her name as "Jane Doe." She didn't cut the tags out of an exclusive brand of clothing, or dump what appears to be a specialized pair of prescription glasses elsewhere so they wouldn't be found with her, or go someplace really far off the beaten path where she might not be found for months or years. I feel like she just was...unremarkable, in the way that the vast majority of us are unremarkable. A gazillion of us have lived and died on this earth without leaving a mark or a memory behind. It's probably not that hard to do if you're essentially a loner.

I also don't think she had anyone with her when she died. But...it's possible that if she did, that she used the name "Jane Doe" so that no one close to her could be tracked and possibly prosecuted for assisting in her death.

Or maybe dying under a pseudonym was a sort of "f you!", but to family. There's been some criticism of Derek Humphry (author of The Final Exit) and the Hemlock Society, and the possibility of exerting subtle (or not-so-subtle) pressure to commit suicide so that you don't burden the family. Humphry's second wife, Ann, felt quite strongly that when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, her husband's overriding reaction was, "Well then, be a good girl and spare me having to see you through a long illness by committing suicide. You know, like my first wife with breast cancer did." (In fact, Ann Humphry's cancer was in remission and not active at the time she died*: http://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/08/magazine/a-fight-to-the-death.html?src=pm&pagewanted=1) So, possibly Annandale JD felt that her loved ones thought she was a burden, and her choosing to die this way was a sort of, "Fine then, I'll just disappear if that's what you want!" And her family hasn't come forward because they feel ashamed about how they treated her. I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it.

*And I know that Derek Humphry's reaction to Ann's suicide was to say that well, she'd been mentally ill, that it had nothing to do with him. But you know, "B****es be crazy," has always been a standard way to discredit women.)

 

[Mouse]

Who is Alice? Do you mean Alice Crimmins?

Her NAMUS page says "fingerprints are available elsewhere," so I don't think she can be Alice Crimmins, or anyone else with a record in the US. Unless they just haven't run her prints for a comparison. (I don't remember if there's a national fingerprint database, or if it's state-by-state.) Alice Crimmins is pretty notorious, though, so you'd think they might have checked her prints against AC's.

O/T: When I was a kid, I read my parents' copy of Dorothy Uhnak's The Investigation, and it alternately fascinated and creeped me out and the same time. Probably had a lot to do with shaping my interest in crime.

 

[Mouse]

Poky, really, really interesting piece about the final exit! Thanks for that.

She was found the next morning by cemetery maintenance men. Not sure if that means they arrived to work to work per usual and noticed her (in the location she was, she wouldn't be hard to miss -- it's near the front of the cemetery, off of the main road near the entrance). Or maybe they were tipped off -- either way, thank you for summarizing that documentary. It sounds fascinating!!


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[Sorry for so many posts in a row--]

Also, I've been thinking a lot about the cemetery, and I'm not so sure it's meaningful as far as having someone JD knew buried there or anything. I actually quite like cemeteries--they're usually in nice settings, with large trees, nice grass, and birds and squirrels running around. Sometimes, they're the biggest area of greenspace you have in a city. And they can be better than a park, because they're quiet, and everyone's being respectful, and nobody's letting their kid run around screaming, or hitting you in the head with a frisbee, or panhandling you, and nobody's dog is running up to stick a nose in your crotch. And I feel quite comforted when you go to a cemetery and see that people's families cared enough to erect nice tombstones, and that even people who died decades ago will have fresh flowers on their graves, because people still care. It makes me feel hopeful about death in a way. Having said that, I WOULD NEVER BE IN A CEMETERY AFTER DARK, BECAUSE I'M NOT CRAZY AND DO NOT WANT TO HAVE GHOSTS SUCK IN MY BLOOD.

Which leads me to my second point about why a cemetery--any cemetery--actually makes sense for a suicide: Where else are you going to lay down for a half-hour (or however long it takes) to commit suicide, and be close to 100% sure you won't be bothered or discovered too soon? You can't do it in a store parking lot or behind an empty school, because there may be security guards patrolling. You can't do it in a park, because you run the risk of being discovered by teenagers who are there to have sex, or someone trying to mug you, or bothered by police who are there to roust out the homeless (or in winter, looking to encourage the homeless to go to a shelter for the night). But you probably want to be outside somewhere, because I seem to remember some mention from The Final Exit about letting hypothermia help matters along, especially in the winter. And there's not going to be as much security or police patrolling around a cemetery, because it's the living who cause problems, not the dead. And while the occasional teenage shenanigans may take place in a cemetery, for the most part, people are like me: might not have any problem with cemeteries in the daytime, and might be eminently logical and rational people otherwise...but still a scaredy-cat about being in a cemetery at night. Not a lot of muggers, or oversexed teenagers, to bother you or discover you before the suicide is completed in a cemetery at night. (And of course, if you're committing suicide, being surrounded by the dead isn't going to be in issue for you since you're planning to join them.)

And if you're considerate of those who will find you (as Annandale JD seems to have been), you want to be found by someone who probably isn't squicked out by death. I always feel so bad for the hotel maids who find dead bodies in rooms, because your average hotel maid didn't really sign up for that, and it probably causes some mental trauma. But cops, nurses, cemetery workers...they've seen dead bodies, or at least aren't freaked out by the notion of death. You can't really be left alone to commit suicide in a hospital or a police station, but you can in a cemetery at night. And yeah, there's a difference between being a mortician, and being the guy who does the maintenance work in a cemetery. But if you're working in a cemetery to begin with, you're probably a little more sanguine about death than the average body-finder would be, and less likely to be traumatized by it.

 

[FiveFelines]

I've always thought Annadale was Alice...The red hair, children's graves, stylish clothing, wanting to be anonymous...no one reporting her...But without proof of her being gone or proof she still exists....

If only I could find her husbands obit...Double sigh..

Classito

Everything I've found says that he died in 1998 and they were still together when he died.

 

[carbuff]

It occurs to me that that's the kind of nice outfit people tend to choose for older female relatives to wear in their coffins. I think she wanted to look nice when she was found.

 

[LaLaw2000]

She had a scar from a caesarean, so quite possibly had a child. If she was despondent because of the death of a child or grandchild, could that grandchild be buried in the cemetery where she committed suicide?

This site lists all the names of those who are buried in the Pleasant Valley Memorial Cemetery in Annandale VA.

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gsr&GSob=n&GScid=51693&

I lurk on this thread quite a lot because this case fascinates me.

There is one grave there that is interesting to me: Brandi Rae Ballard, no birth date listed, date of death is December 18, 1989. Has this angle been looked at? I don't know the layout of the cemetery so I don't know what area this grave is in.

I have been familiar with that area since 1972. My sister-in-law (husbands' side of family) lived on Lorene Lane. That is just off of Little River Turnpike. Anyway, in 1994 J. (sister-in-law) found out she had lung cancer. She passed away in 2002. Her birthday was December 18th. My youngest daughter's birthday is December 18th. Just coincidences. J. was approximately 5' tall and did a lot of shopping at Nordstroms, Saks, and all of the high end stores. She would always give last season's clothes away; I don't know to whom. She had never worked because they were wealthy but her usual attire was usually something on the order of what our unknown was wearing.

What J. and this woman had in common was the hair. She kept her hair short and wore a wig. She would sometimes even put her hair in little pin curls under her wig. Our unknown's hair looks as if she usually wore a wig. Apparently she did not have it on when she went to the cemetery, but I am convinced she usually wore a wig. I am also convinced this woman had cancer. She may have decided she was going to just stop her treatments and go in a manner she chose herself.

I don't believe this woman was even remotely well-to-do. I honestly believe she got those clothes from a thrift shop or through donations. Some of the seamstresses in that area are Cuban, Spanish, and so forth. There was also a 'Learning Center' along Little River Turnpike in the 1980's. Quite a few people would go there to learn proper English as well as get their GED. Had a wealthy woman in the area gone missing, it would have certainly been known.

I did not mean to write a book here, lol, but I just cannot forget this woman. I so want her identified. Forgive me for this long post!

 

[astridxx]

LaLaw -- poky brought up the Brandi angle a couple threads back. We are still messing around with that angle.


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[LaLaw2000]

LaLaw -- poky brought up the Brandi angle a couple threads back.


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Thanks, astridxx. I must have missed. Of course this woman could have been a grandmother with a last name different from Brandi Ballard. Our unknown may have been a nanny for that matter.

Anyway, thanks!

:seeya:

 

[EmiLove832]

I lurk on this thread quite a lot because this case fascinates me.



There is one grave there that is interesting to me: Brandi Rae Ballard, no birth date listed, date of death is December 18, 1989. Has this angle been looked at? I don't know the layout of the cemetery so I don't know what area this grave is in.



I have been familiar with that area since 1972. My sister-in-law (husbands' side of family) lived on Lorene Lane. That is just off of Little River Turnpike. Anyway, in 1994 J. (sister-in-law) found out she had lung cancer. She passed away in 2002. Her birthday was December 18th. My youngest daughter's birthday is December 18th. Just coincidences. J. was approximately 5' tall and did a lot of shopping at Nordstroms, Saks, and all of the high end stores. She would always give last season's clothes away; I don't know to whom. She had never worked because they were wealthy but her usual attire was usually something on the order of what our unknown was wearing.



What J. and this woman had in common was the hair. She kept her hair short and wore a wig. She would sometimes even put her hair in little pin curls under her wig. Our unknown's hair looks as if she usually wore a wig. Apparently she did not have it on when she went to the cemetery, but I am convinced she usually wore a wig. I am also convinced this woman had cancer. She may have decided she was going to just stop her treatments and go in a manner she chose herself.



I don't believe this woman was even remotely well-to-do. I honestly believe she got those clothes from a thrift shop or through donations. Some of the seamstresses in that area are Cuban, Spanish, and so forth. There was also a 'Learning Center' along Little River Turnpike in the 1980's. Quite a few people would go there to learn proper English as well as get their GED. Had a wealthy woman in the area gone missing, it would have certainly been known.



I did not mean to write a book here, lol, but I just cannot forget this woman. I so want her identified. Forgive me for this long post!

Don't you think it's curious that her whole outfit was the same brand?

I can't imagine going to Goodwill and finding that many pieces of the same high end brand.






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[astridxx]

No worries! One theory thrown out to us was that possibly Shirley Sprang (a potential match with a HORRIBLE driving record) may have hit BRB. I think some people dug around and couldn't find anything on BRB having been victim of a car accident. Haven't explored other angles of brb and the UID tho.


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[LaLaw2000]

Don't you think it's curious that her whole outfit was the same brand?

I can't imagine going to Goodwill and finding that many pieces of the same high end brand.






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No, I do not think that is curious. Remember that this unknown was only 5' tall. She would want clothing that would fit her. For instance, J (sis-in-law) was only 5'2" tall and very often put together an outfit with pieces from the same store. I've been shopping with her. She donated clothing.

Our unknown could not wear clothing or at least pants belonging to a person who wore average height clothing. Or tall. Sure, she could find a matching outfit of the same brand from the Goodwill Store if numerous pieces of clothing were donated at the same time. Not curious at all, IMO.

ETA: If our unknown usually wore high end clothing, then what I do find curious is that her panties were ordinary Fruit of the Loom and her bra had no markings at all. Those two items are not high end, IMO.

 

[LaLaw2000]

No worries! One theory thrown out to us was that possibly Shirley Sprang (a potential match with a HORRIBLE driving record) may have hit BRB. I think some people dug around and couldn't find anything on BRB having been victim of a car accident. Haven't explored other angles of brb and the UID tho.


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I remember now, duh!!!!! I'm following so many cases I forget what I have read. I started reading about this case way over a year ago and caught up with it in a single night.

 

[LaLaw2000]

I just want to add that I worked for our parish Sheriff's Office for over 10 years. I moved to working at the Sheriff's Office Correctional Center as a promotion. We housed females there as well as males. The females wore jail issued bras that had no markings at all on them.

Could our unknown been institutionalized, Not jail, but in an institution of some sort? Institutions can buy bulk underwear with no markings.

MOO

 

[Tssiemer]

No, I do not think that is curious. Remember that this unknown was only 5' tall. She would want clothing that would fit her. For instance, J (sis-in-law) was only 5'2" tall and very often put together an outfit with pieces from the same store. I've been shopping with her. She donated clothing.



Our unknown could not wear clothing or at least pants belonging to a person who wore average height clothing. Or tall. Sure, she could find a matching outfit of the same brand from the Goodwill Store if numerous pieces of clothing were donated at the same time. Not curious at all, IMO.



ETA: If our unknown usually wore high end clothing, then what I do find curious is that her panties were ordinary Fruit of the Loom and her bra had no markings at all. Those two items are not high end, IMO.

Because high end undies are expensive. Hell regular bras at Walmart are like $25. I can't fit into those cute little ten dollar sets for size 0 girls lol.


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