Identified! VA - Centreville, WhtFem 25-39, 120UFVA, clothes, Sz 8B sandals, earrings, Dec'93 - Sharon Kay Abbott Lane

[carbuff]

I might be a little late but does anyone know exactly where the landscape workers found her .. any geographic landmarks around ? Also, thought this was odd: when you put her specific Namus ID into Google, the name of a missing girl from the 60s comes up .. Ellen Fox her name is .. I just thought that was strange .

If you just used the number without the UP, you might have been in the missing section rather than the unidentified section. It seems to default to missing.

 

[JoRhino82]

If you just used the number without the UP, you might have been in the missing section rather than the unidentified section. It seems to default to missing.

Got it, thank you .

 

[summergirl1]

Based on the description of her injuries, I think she was murdered by someone who knew her or at least spent some time with her. It doesn't sound like a serial killer picking up a hitchhiker or something so much as it sounds like someone she was living with or spent time around surprised her from behind and attacked her?

 

[summergirl1]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1999/09/30/hoping-to-solve-a-skeletons-mystery/6764c30e-f00c-404a-8a1e-23014a1825eb/

 

[Mrs. Badcrumble]

*Bump*

With the recent identification of Patricia "Choubi" Gildawie, I do believe we should keep an open mind to Bone Lady's ethnicity, too. PMI is already kinda broad. There are certain similarities to the cases.

I must admit my heart stopped for a brief moment when I read that Fairfax Jane Doe had been identified, but then I understood that it was another Fairfax Jane Doe. I'm so looking forward to cross this Jane Doe off my signature list!


Choubi Gildawie's WS thread:

Identified! - VA - Mclean, BlkFem 15-20, UP6470, wooded area behind apart complex, clothes, jewelry, Sep'01 - Patricia Agnes "Choubi" Gildawie

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs) 504UFVA 504UFVA - Unidentified Female Victim's sweater and jewelry. Date of Discovery: September 27, 2001 Location of Discovery: Mclean, Fairfax County, Virginia Estimated Date of Death: 2000-2001 State of Remains: Skeletal...

www.websleuths.com

 

[Bit of hope]

How weird is this. I just went to look at this Jane Doe in NamUs. She once had over 959 rule outs... now its showing just 3!!! I had to double check I was looking at the right Doe.
The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
MP4000 Cheryl Kenney 02/27/1991 Vernon MO
MP23648 Susan Riedling 03/31/1986 Bullitt KY
MP9358 Angela Gwinn-Stephens 10/01/1993 Raleigh WV

I was thinking about this again. As VA has (done?) a project to compare all their files in Namus against MP's and UID's it might be the ones not showing are the VA cases, leaving cases outside VA?

 

[carbuff]

I was thinking about this again. As VA has (done?) a project to compare all their files in Namus against MP's and UID's it might be the ones not showing are the VA cases, leaving cases outside VA?

Yes that did happen a couple of years ago, and they were able to eliminate a lot of possibilities. But I don't think it would have been that many people.

 

[Bit of hope]

Yes that did happen a couple of years ago, and they were able to eliminate a lot of possibilities. But I don't think it would have been that many people.

Yes, good point. 959 "original" rule outs is really a lot. Back to the question Why are they not showing up anymore, only 3. Or does VA have far more MP's and UID's not publicly known/showing in Namus?

 

[Soulmagent]

Yes, good point. 959 "original" rule outs is really a lot. Back to the question Why are they not showing up anymore, only 3. Or does VA have far more MP's and UID's not publicly known/showing in Namus?

I could see VA having a ton of MP'S and UID's not showing up. So has Sharon Redmon been ruled out here?The Doe Network: Case File 823DFVA

 

[Melt71]

I'm hoping UP8493 gets her name back for Xmas this year.

 

[Soulmagent]

I'm hoping UP8493 gets her name back for Xmas this year.

Me too, her and the witches pond jane doe from 1997 ,in stafford VA . Virginia has too many UID persons. Parabon-nanolabs is located in Fairfax ,this is a little bit of money and a 30 minute drive!!!

 

[Mrs. Badcrumble]

Yes, good point. 959 "original" rule outs is really a lot. Back to the question Why are they not showing up anymore, only 3. Or does VA have far more MP's and UID's not publicly known/showing in Namus?

I do not have any answers here -I just as confused as you are-, but I wouldn't be surprised if Jane Doe turned out to be someone who was originally ruled out, nor would I be surprised if she's someone we've never heard of before, either. This can go in all directions, tbh, and I hope Othram doesn't run into too many obstacles in order to provide some answers to her loved ones.

 

[othram]

I'm hoping UP8493 gets her name back for Xmas this year.

SOLVED: After 27 years, Fairfax County Jane Doe (1993) is Identified

 

[chaddylex]

SOLVED: After 27 years, Fairfax County Jane Doe (1993) is Identified

Thank you once again Othram!

 

[chaddylex]

Woman found slain in 1993 is identified through genetic genealogy

Woman found slain in 1993 is identified through genetic genealogy​

Story by Tom Jackman • 47m ago
ReactComments


In December 1993, a land surveyor was working in a heavily wooded area of Centreville, Va., then being converted into a Fairfax County subdivision, when he found a woman’s skeletal remains among the trees. The medical examiner determined she had been stabbed to death and had been dead for anywhere from one to six years.

he Fairfax homicide unit worked the case for years, just trying to figure out who the woman was. In 1999, an officer crafted a three-dimensional likeness of her face and showed it to the media, in hopes that someone would recognize her. A composite drawing was released. News conferences near the site of what is now Sharpsburg Drive were held over the years, trying to drum up leads. Nothing.
Hoping to Solve a Skeleton's Mystery
But the rapidly evolving science of genetic genealogy has provided an answer: Sharon Kay Abbott Lane, a mother of two who was raised in northwest Indiana, and lived for a time in Big Stone Gap, Va., was the homicide victim. She would have been 34 years old in 1993, when her body was found.

The Fairfax police again turned to Othram, a forensic lab based out of The Woodlands, Tex., to identify a woman who had been nameless for nearly three decades. Earlier this year, Othram identified a McLean woman found shot to death in 2001 as Patricia Gildawie, and also a woman who had taken her own life in an Annandale cemetery, Joyce Meyer Sommers, in 1996.
Sometime in the mid-1980s, Kimberly Lane said, her mother called her out of the blue. Kimberly was between 8 and 10 years old. “She gave me a phone number where I could reach her,” Kimberly Lane said, and mentioned living in Fairfax. “Asked me if I loved her. I carried that phone number in a pocketbook for years, ended up losing it, never had contact with her. I always thought I’d hear from her in my adult years, but we didn’t.”

After Fairfax police provided Othram with DNA samples from the unidentified woman, the lab was able to conduct advanced genome sequencing and work with public source DNA databases to locate a cousin, and police then found a brother of the woman, Fairfax cold case Detective Jon Long said. The brother said that Sharon Lane had a daughter named Kimberly and a son named Michael in Virginia. Long and Detective Melissa Wallace began calling Kimberly Lanes in Virginia and eventually found the right one. Kimberly Lane supplied her DNA and confirmed the identify of her long-missing mother.

Genealogy tests give answers to family of woman missing for 47 years
“I heard stories from my dad,” Kimberly Lane said. “She was really young, really wild, into some drugs, around the wrong people. He felt like he couldn’t leave us with her.” Kimberly Lane has a memory of trying to feed her crying baby brother some cereal when they were left alone in an apartment in Indiana. Her parents were separated by then, and her father was summoned to Indiana to take custody of the children, who then grew up in Big Stone Gap in southwest Virginia.
“I’ve always wondered what happened,” said Michael Lane, who said he has no memories of his mother. “I kind of always had a bad feeling in my gut. I would rather know this than not. It does give some closure. The timing is a bit of a shock. You kind of forget about it.”

Michael Lane said he had tried to contact his mother’s family over the years, but they also had little contact with Sharon Lane. He said he once tracked down his mother’s grandfather, who told him Sharon had called him collect from jail in Falls Church, Va., asking for money, which the grandfather refused.

Michael Lane said he also located one of his mother’s sisters, who said she had received a phone call in the middle of the night around 1991 with someone screaming, “Your sister’s dead, your sister’s dead!” He said he didn’t think his mother’s family filed a missing persons report.

“I thought maybe she’d started a new family somewhere,” said Michael Lane, who still lives in Big Stone Gap. “It kind of flips me out that she was still in Virginia. I’m sure she got mixed up with the wrong people.” Lane’s ex-husband, who also had no contact with her, declined to be interviewed.

Fairfax has between 10 and 20 homicides per year in a population of more than 1 million, so each one is worked aggressively and Lane was one of the older unsolved cases. Retired Lt. Bruce Guth, who ran the homicide unit from 1994 to 2009, said Lane’s case “was worked on by a lot of detectives who were frustrated we couldn’t ID her.”

“That case was one of those that sticks to one’s soul because I felt if we could ID her, then we could solve the murder,” Guth said. “I’m super excited that she’s been identified.”

Sharon Lane’s clothes were largely deteriorated, but she had jewelry, a red hair pick and a yellow barrette, and a Life Savers wrapper. Police said she was slender, stood between 5 feet and 5 feet 3 inches tall and had fairly thick dark-blonde to light-brown hair, and her teeth were in an advanced state of decay.

“We’re looking for anybody that knew her back then,” Long said. He said Sharon Lane’s siblings were also estranged from her. “Any information would be very helpful, because we’re starting with nothing. We’re really hoping to get some good phone calls.”

Anyone with information about Sharon Abbott Lane is asked to call 866-411-8477 or go to fairfaxcrimesolvers.org. A reward of up to $1,000 is available for information leading to a conviction in the case.

 

[John/Jane Doe]

Rest in peace Sharon

 

[Bit of hope]

SOLVED: After 27 years, Fairfax County Jane Doe (1993) is Identified

Happy and sad. Thanks Othram! And LE for asking help. I hope it's possible to find the one who killed Ms. Abbott Lane. May she rest peacefully.

 

[Mrs. Badcrumble]

Such a sad story. She seemed like a troubled soul.
My condolences to the loved ones of Sharon Abbott Lane.

 

[Soulmagent]

That picture with the baby ,reminds me so much of my mom and dads teen parent photo from the late 1970's ! So was so young there! Hopefuly they know where to start looking to find what her life was at that time.

 

[Melt71]

RIP Sharon and I am glad your family knows where you are this Xmas.