WA WA - Leah Roberts, 23, Whatcom Co, 13 Mar 2000

[JSolt1210]

So here is something interesting to keep an eye on that is happening in Norwood, NJ with an unidentified missing person that was found wandering in the street. She is claiming that she doesn't know her name, but walked from Washington State and was in a car wreck last year. Could this be Leah Roberts? The woman's account of when the accident took place is off, but knowledge of time and distance is off when you have a neurological issue. The police have already been notified of the Leah Roberts story and are following up on all leads.

link to news article: Amnesiac found wandering in North Jersey doesn't know who she is. Maybe you do?

There's now an "UPDATE" in that link underneath the woman's photo saying, "Our JANE DOE has been reunited with her family!"

I can certainly understand it if her real name isn't made public for privacy reasons. But I doubt it was Leah because there probably would've been more coverage.

 

[SandG]

So here is something interesting to keep an eye on that is happening in Norwood, NJ with an unidentified missing person that was found wandering in the street. She is claiming that she doesn't know her name, but walked from Washington State and was in a car wreck last year. Could this be Leah Roberts? The woman's account of when the accident took place is off, but knowledge of time and distance is off when you have a neurological issue. The police have already been notified of the Leah Roberts story and are following up on all leads.

link to news article: Amnesiac found wandering in North Jersey doesn't know who she is. Maybe you do?

it shows an update that she has been reunited with her family

 

[Eaps1987]

Im not sure this has been discussed or not, as I don’t follow this case really closely. I came across this on another page and remembered Leah Roberts has a surgical implant in her right femur. The location and dates are a bit off but anything is possible. Unidentified Person Case

 

[psychstudentni]

I jumped straight to this post when I saw this, thinking "Yes! She's been found!" I'm so sad that she is in fact still missing. I covered her case on my blog and she is one of the many cases I covered that I think of often and wonder if she'll ever be found.

 

[fidgeypie]

Bumping for Leah. Your out there somewhere lovely.

 

[Penny4YourThoughts]

Am I allowed to post a reddit link?

I have found an extremely unlikely coincidence involving the disappearance of Leah Roberts and a Whatcom County Doe. [Unexplained Disappearance] : UnresolvedMysteries

I don't know if this was ever discussed here on WS, but I thought it was very interesting. A user on reddit found an unidentified Doe located in Whatcom County that has the same kind of leg plate that Leah had, and it was from a batch that had been shipped out right around the same time Leah had her plate inserted. However, the Doe is listed as male. Just a crazy coincidence or error with the Doe? I've heard before of Does being listed as the wrong gender. There's a specific case that comes to my mind of two teenage Does found decades ago that were recently identified, and one of them had been labelled with the wrong gender. Anyone remember that?

FASCINATING FIND, Ali.!

 

[Midge Montana]

I think that needs to be closely re-examined. I'm not sure how they cannot track the s/n from the plate to a specific hospital. I was a buyer for a hospital for a career. I cannot begin to believe that the whatever company they got the plate from doesn't have a solid record of where it went. Even back to 2000, IMO, this would be true. I will dig around some to prove myself wrong when I get time.

 

[Richard]

Leah Toby Roberts

• Case Classification: Endangered Missing

• Missing Since: March 9, 2000

• Location Last Seen: Raleigh, NC

Physical Description
Listed information is from the time of disappearance.

• Date of Birth: July 23, 1976

• Age at Time of Disappearance: 23

• Race: White

• Gender: Female

• Height at Time of Disappearance: 5'6"

• Weight at Time of Disappearance: 130 lbs.

• Hair Color: Sandy blonde

• Eye Color: Blue

• Alias(s) / Nickname(s): Unknown

• Distinguishing Marks/Features: Surgical scar on her right hip. Metal rod inside entire length of her right femur. Beauty mark above her right upper lip. Pierced ears.

• Dentals: Not Available

• Fingerprints: Not Available

• DNA: Not Available

Clothing & Personal Items

• Clothing: Unknown

• Jewelry: A 14 Karat white gold diamond ring with a .45 emerald cut diamond, 2.07 carat baguettes on the sides and a pair of 14 karat gold earrings with .3 karat ruby in each.

• Additional Personal Items: She took her car, a 1993 white Jeep Cherokee. The North Carolina license plates were JVP-2881. It was later found abandoned.

Circumstances of Disappearance
Leah was last seen on March 9, 2000 when she set out for a trip for the northwest. The vehicle she was driving was located on March 18, 2000. The vehicle had been involved in an accident and abandoned on a logging road near Mount Baker, WA in a federal park. All of her belongings were located inside the vehicle.

Investigating Agency(s)
If you have any information about this case please contact:

Whatcom County Sheriff`s Office at Ph. 360-676-6707

• Agency Case Number: 2000A-4762

• NCIC Case Number: M590606162

• NamUs Case Number: MP #150

Please refer to this number when contacting any agency with information regarding this case.

Information Source(s)
The Doe Network: Leah Toby Roberts 3289DFNC

• NamUs

• WCSO

 

[Richard]

I have posted here a few times in the past regarding the possibility that James Allen Kinney (inmate 835603 in Washington State Penitentiary) might have been involved in the disappearance of Leah Toby Roberts.

While I do not have solid proof that they ever met, there are many coincidental factors which point to him (in my opinion). The location where Leah's Jeep was found is very close to the same area where Keri Sherlock's body was found (Kinney was convicted of Keri's murder). The mention of possible mental illness and hospitalization of Leah makes her a potential target of Kinney, who was himself mentally ill and who frequented VA hospitals and military bases in his travels around the country.

Also, the mention of Leah's Jeep having been messed with mechanically is something that Kinney liked to do.

Although only convicted of one murder (Keri Sherlock), Kinney was most likely a proficient and prolific serial killer with a particular like for young girls and women. He was definitely at large and avoiding capture when Leah disappeared and had previously been in close vicinity of where she went missing.

Kinney was/is a violent psychopath, but very cunning and capable of covering his tracks.

My personal feelings about Kinny were echoed in another website: "On the other hand, no one was shocked when regular James Allen Kinney was convicted of the 1998 murder of a Massachusetts woman. "Now, that guy was an obnoxious *advertiser censored*,"...

Since Kinney is incarcerated in Washington State Penitentiary, he is "locally" available for LE to question about this case. That is if it doesn't infringe on his rights or inconvenience his busy schedule.

LINK:

POLICE SEEK SUSPECT IN 3 DEATHS

Man at his best; Travel

 

[Penny4YourThoughts]

@Richard you got my attention! Are you going to call this in to LE?

And @Ali. Back to your DOE discovery upthread, did you ever call that in or was that one identified as someone other than Leah?

 

[Richard]

I forgot to mention, but Leah was from North Carolina, and that is the state where Kinney was eventually captured in March 2001.

 

[Richard]

Leah Toby Roberts

Roberts shortly before her 2000 disappearance
Born July 23, 1976
Durham, North Carolina, U.S.
Disappeared March 13, 2000 (aged 23)
Bellingham, Washington, U.S.
Status Missing for 19 years and 26 days
Nationality American
Known for Disappearance after cross-country trip
Height 5 ft 6 in
Weight 130 lb

 

[forestpuppy]

Just found this- another girl missing from Bellingham, WA. OR - OR - Maia Erica Miller, 19, ""Endless bummer Tattoo", 23 Sept. 2018

So eerie to me.

 

[Penny4YourThoughts]

Just found this- another girl missing from Bellingham, WA. OR - OR - Maia Erica Miller, 19, ""Endless bummer Tattoo", 23 Sept. 2018

So eerie to me.

You had me at EERIE ... What are your thoughts?

 

[Simply Caustic]

Leah Roberts is one of those cases that sticks with me and I check periodically. I really hope her family gets answers one day, because this is such a mystery

 

[JSolt1210]

You had me at EERIE ... What are your thoughts?

There are interesting similarities.

• Both women were living outdoors, so to speak.
(Maia was on the streets, and Leah was on a road trip.)
• Both women were 5'6".
• Both women were around the same age and weight.
(Maia was 19 and 110 lbs; Leah was 23 and 130 lbs.)
• Both women disappeared from Bellingham, WA.

From the podcast, one potential suspect in Leah's case ("Guy #2") abruptly moved to Canada after questioning. The border to Canada is just a 40-minute drive away from Bellingham, and I-5 runs right through the city. Definitely easy access for a repeat offender.

It could be coincidental, and I can't say I'm wedded to this idea. But at this point, who knows?

I was trying earlier today to look on Namus for other women around the same age that disappeared off I-5 from 2000–2018. Two looked promising, but one was a sex worker and the other an exotic dancer, neither of which fits the character of Leah or Maia.

 

[Maranasati]

A recent trip took me through the Everson and Bellingham area. A few days later I saw the 20/20 episode about the Mandy Stavik case. It reminded me of the Leah Roberts case I had listened to the week prior on the Crime Junkie podcast. An interesting coincidence to be sure and my brain wondered if the Universe was trying to direct my attention. I realize that making connections is what the brain does and most of the time it’s meaningless...but...it was the description his ex-wife gave of Timothy Bass that really made me think. He watched a lot of crime tv shows. He bragged about being smart enough to get away with murder. He was controlling, abusive and cruel. I think it’s unlikely that, having gotten away with rape and murder at such a young age, he was content to stop after the first one. So I wondered if he might have been responsible for the disappearances of other young women in the area. Perhaps even Leah Roberts? If she had conversations with two men at a restaurant perhaps they weren’t the only guys she spoke to? Maybe guy #2 wasn’t lying about the third person he saw her with. It’s not impossible she could have encountered Bass who would’ve been around 32 at the time. Everson is very close to Bellingham and I suspect if he were hunting for victims he wouldn’t do it in his neighborhood. I tried to look for other missing women of similar description since ‘89 but was largely unsuccessful given the way they’re tracked by city. I did find one recent case of a woman who disappeared shortly before he was apprehended. Vera Izhevskiy, a 25 yr old blonde woman last seen in Bellingham 11/10/2016 whose body was found near Verlot (further South but perhaps dumping in different counties is how he remained undetected) this February. There are similarities in all three victims’ age and appearance and somewhat in the circumstances of their disappearance although there’s not as much background detail for Vera’s case. It would be interesting to know if Bass’ DNA had been compared to any other DNA found at crime scenes and if there is a way to query young women who went missing in Whatcom County between 1989 and 2017.

 

[PaulR]

Izhevskiy was from Maple Falls which is not that far from Bellingham (28 miles according to Google Maps.)

Verlot is pretty far south of there, it's closer to the Seattle-Everett area. I'm not exactly sure where her body was found, but Mt. Pilchuck and Lake 22 are popular trailheads, and the Mountain Loop Highway in general is popular. It can also be approached from the north (Darrington area.)

 

[anniejanet]

It makes sense she was following Kerouac. I wonder what happened to her kitten.

 

[Hathor16]

Desolation Pk. is where she wanted to go (at a bad time of year for it) she ended up NW of there. As another pointed out to me, she may have accidentally been following directions to Mt. Baker. She was definitely seen, and car found, in the wrong direction.