NY NY - Manhattan, Riverside Park, Wht/HispFem 40-65, UP17517, bike path, running clothes, Feb'18

[sobreebriedad]

I discovered this Jane Doe (UP17517) while browsing NAMUS and could not find a thread for her here. All info below copied directly from NAMUS. It strikes me as unusual that she apparently hasn’t been identified for 7+ months, because the circumstances suggest that this woman could’ve been attacked while out for a run (given her clothing, headphones, and location found). In my observation, “missing jogger” type cases have attracted a lot of attention and fear amongst the public. If she was in fact out jogging, that could mean she lived or at least was staying nearby. I wish there was a reconstruction or even some photos of her clothing/shoes. Shouldn’t someone be missing her?

Unidentified Person Case

DATE FOUND: February 1, 2018

LOCATION FOUND: in a wooded area off of a bicycle path just underneath the [George Washington] Bridge in Riverside Park, Manhattan, New York

CIRCUMSTANCES OF RECOVERY: Partially skeletonized remains - All parts recovered - Not recognizable - Near complete or complete skeleton

SEX: Female

RACE: White, possibly Hispanic

EST. AGE RANGE: 40-65

EST. HEIGHT: 5’0 - 5’4 (60-64 in)

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Long brown wavy/curly hair

EST. DATE OF DEATH: 2017 (postmortem interval estimated as “months”)

ACCESSORIES (found near the body): Black fanny pack; Black hair scrunchy; iPhone head phones

CLOTHING (on the body): Dark blue yoga pants, brand "Lululemon"; Gray sports bra, brand "Avia", size XXL; Dark gray tank top, size XXL; Black zip-up hooded shirt; White patterned underpants, brand "Gap Body"

FOOTWEAR (on the body): Black "Sketchers" brand sneakers, size 8.5; Black socks with a pink "Under Armour" logo

 

[sobreebriedad]

This is the general area where she was found on Google Maps:Google Maps

One peculiar thing about the stated location is that technically she wouldn’t have been in Riverside Park, which only goes up to 158th St. (Riverside Park : NYC Parks). The GW Bridge is at 179th Street and there, the park on the west side of Manhattan is Fort Washington Park. However, I’m not sure there is a formal marker delineating the two and many people probably think it’s all Riverside Park.

I know the Washington Heights area and I’ve been to the portion of the park underneath the GW, but I’m not a runner or a biker, so I am not familiar with the paths. Maybe someone else here has some insight into that.

 

[Inthedetails]

Doesn't sound like a homeless person with that outfit. Definitely sounds like someone out for a run or walk.

All the clothes are on the body. If she is 5'4" or shorter and is wearing XXL clothing, she might have been overweight. That area is very hilly. Maybe she overexerted herself and had a heart attack and fell off the path? IDK.

Very disturbing that she hasn't been linked to someone missing. Seems like a local woman who went out for exercise and never came home.

jmo

 

[JSolt1210]

Oh wow, this is so scary! I live in the Washington Heights area, and just two months ago, I was walking in this very area with a friend of mine. We walked from 181st all the way to the "state park" on 125th before heading back up. We even went to the Little Red Lighthouse!

Now, granted, it was a Thursday afternoon on a bright summer's day so there were a lot of people around. But most of this area is very secluded, hard to get to, and out of the way—even very hilly, except for the trails, so most New Yorkers will keep to the trails because what New Yorker wants to walk on hilly unpaved ground when they don't have to? So it unfortunately shouldn't surprise me that a body was left here and lay unseen for months.

NYC is MUCH safer now than when I was a kid, but I still don't trust these out-of-the-way places. I remember being around 10 or 11, going to the playground on Dyckman with my mom, aunt, and cousin, only to find out it was closed because they found a 4-year-old girl stuffed in a cooler there earlier that day. That case still haunts me, even though her uncle was eventually caught and charged with the murder like 15 years later or something.

I would never go jogging there.

 

[Inthedetails]

Could it have been someone dumped from the highway and rolled down the hill?

Just thinking of scenarios to explain why she isn't someone whose family is looking for her.

jmo

 

[Inthedetails]

I'm looking through the missing people listed here: Missing Person Archives - NYPD News

She was found in Feb 2018 and seems to have been deceased for months, so I'm starting with 2017 missing persons.

 

[Inthedetails]

I'm not finding any news coverage of the discovery of this body. Seems like this would be newsworthy! I'm wondering if she was indeed ID'd but NAMUS isn't updated? Anyone know how NAMUS is updated? Maybe no one provided info?

Just weird that this case didn't get any attention whatsoever when the victim seems like someone who would be missed (going by her clothing and age....not a runaway teen, unlikely to be homeless, etc.)

jmo

 

[sobreebriedad]

I would never go jogging there.

JSolt1210, just wondering, can you explain exactly why you say that? Since you’ve been to the path, do you know if people commonly jog there? Are there other nearby locations more attractive to joggers?

I have looked and looked for news coverage of this discovery and turned up empty, which I find totally puzzling. This person was not a transient and should be relatively easy to identify.

 

[cvaldez1975]

Doesn't sound like a homeless person with that outfit. Definitely sounds like someone out for a run or walk.

All the clothes are on the body. If she is 5'4" or shorter and is wearing XXL clothing, she might have been overweight. That area is very hilly. Maybe she overexerted herself and had a heart attack and fell off the path? IDK.

Very disturbing that she hasn't been linked to someone missing. Seems like a local woman who went out for exercise and never came home.

jmo

the sports bra and top were larger, maybe she was just busty. I highly doubt she fell and had a heart attack though.

 

[cvaldez1975]

Could it have been someone dumped from the highway and rolled down the hill?

Just thinking of scenarios to explain why she isn't someone whose family is looking for her.

jmo

im thinking her family is responsible. maybe a domestic abuse homicide case

 

[MaryG12]

I Googled some information on Riverside Park - is it trying to compete with Central Park?

Muggers On Bicycles Sought In String Of Riverside Park Robberies

 

[JSolt1210]

JSolt1210, just wondering, can you explain exactly why you say that? Since you’ve been to the path, do you know if people commonly jog there? Are there other nearby locations more attractive to joggers?

I have looked and looked for news coverage of this discovery and turned up empty, which I find totally puzzling. This person was not a transient and should be relatively easy to identify.

I've only been to the area once, and I don't know... there were just so many hidden, solitary places along the way. Even by the highway near 181st, where my friend and I started walking, there are hidden nooks and crannies under the elevated roads feeding into the bridge. When you cross the highway, there's an open park area where there were a lot of people. But to get there, you have to go through some sketchy isolated paths.

Maybe if I return with my friend, I'll take pictures and post them so you can see what I mean.

I can see, however, why this area might be attractive to joggers—or even city dwellers who just need a break from the noise. Even I, for a bit, thought "well, maybe I should come here and write, or just relax."

But for me, the bottom line is that there were so many out-of-the-way places. Me being into crime shows and IDGo, etc., my first thought was "can I come across a body here?" , or that I could run into the wrong kinds of people in this area. And then of course thinking about my childhood experience which I posted above (the 4-year-old stuffed in a cooler near Dyckman), I just wouldn't be comfortable in this area alone.

 

[carbuff]

Another possibility is that she worked in the Washington Heights area and went out for a run before or after her shift. There's a large commercial district, a couple of big hospitals, and some government offices up there.

 

[JSolt1210]

I'm posting some pictures I took yesterday afternoon to give everyone an idea of what this area is like. I don't think we know the exact area where the body was found. But these pictures were taken near the Henry Hudson Parkway around 180th Street, which was about as close as my friend and I could get to the area of the Little Red Lighthouse because of construction.

If you click on this link, you can see the parkway is split into two near the bridge—southbound lanes on the left, and northbound lanes on the right. My friend and I are in that white path in between.

Images 5323 and 5324 show how much the trees can obscure the ground below, so unless you're intentionally looking for something, you might not readily observe anything below. In fact, the southbound lanes of parkway is in both pictures, but the trees obscure it. In 5324, you can see the Hudson River near the top, but that's about it.

Images 5325 and 5330 give a better image of the southbound lanes—a car is visible in 5330. In both of these images, you can clearly see a triangular structure which transients may have set up as temporary shelter. Again, unless you're paying attention, you can easily walk by without seeing it. And anything—or anyone—can be hidden under this kind of a shelter.

Images 5331 and 5332, believe it or not, contain a paved foot trail. 5332 captures the light of a lamppost along one of the trails. From where I was standing, I could see the trail, but I guess I couldn't quite get it to come out on camera for some reason. This was the trail my friend and I were on back in July, but because of construction, you can't access it from 180th street. You have to go to 157th or so—about 20 blocks (1 mile) away.

Image 5333 is of the George Washington Bridge itself (so, near 179th street) and the southbound lanes of the parkway. I forget if there's an accessible path on the other side of the lanes where you can see the trees. If there isn't, then that just makes that area even more hidden and secluded.

Image 5334 is of the foot trail I mentioned earlier. (At this point, my friend and I started to walk back.) You can see that it's paved and fenced. The southbound lanes of the parkway are behind it, but completely covered by trees.

My friend and I hope to return and take more pictures along the foot trail, and maybe even of the Little Red Lighthouse. But I hope these pictures give a general idea of what I meant when I said how "out of the way" and secluded this area can be, and why I personally wouldn't go jogging there.

 

[carbuff]

Huh, hasn't changed much since the last time I was there, which I think was like 1998 or something. It's cleaner now; it was really really seedy back then. We didn't want to stop there but one of the kids had read the Little Red Lighthouse book and wanted to see it.

 

[DJT2004]

I lived in Washington Heights from 2002 to 2011. I jogged the paths near and under the bridge several times a week (at all different times) and never felt threatened. I’ve had people I discussed this with suggest she jumped from the bridge but I just don’t see someone putting on their good exercise gear to do so. Same with the idea of her being homeless. Part of why I keep thinking of this woman is because she sounds just like she could be me. I was looking for missing women from NY and NJ. I crossed the bridge to NJ to run many times.

They mention headphones but no phone. Maybe robbery? I have just started searching. Nothing in NAMUS or big news

 

[cvaldez1975]

maybe she was not close to family and in town on business? its so strange.

 

[JSolt1210]

Here are some pictures showing more of the general area around the George Washington Bridge. I took these when I returned with my friend on Sunday, September 30—but I've just been super busy and haven't had the chance to upload them on here!

We were on the south side of the Bridge, so judging from how far it looked, I'd say we were around 170th-175th streets.

Images 5418-5422 show a really creepy underpass to get pedestrians across the West Side Highway. I took these pictures around 2:30pm, and even in broad daylight you can tell how abandoned it is. Image 5419 shows only one person coming up towards us. I can't imagine what this must be like when it's dark. Plenty of hidden corners and nooks.

Images 5423 and 5424 show the path that comes after the underpass. In 5423, I tried to capture how abrupt the transition is from paved walkway to just dirt road. And on either side of the path, you can see how thick the brush can get.

Images 5426 and 5427 are going down a paved walkway en route to a bridge that goes over the Amtrak Empire Line as it reaches its conclusion at 34th Street–Penn Station. You can see that there's more thick brush as you approach the train tracks.

Image 5428 shows the Little Red Lighthouse! Not so impressive, in my opinion lol. This was actually the only area that had a decent amount of people around, so even though the link above says this is where she was found, I'm inclined to believe it's an estimate. Then again, brush runs parallel to this open area, so I guess it's possible to drag a body into it in order to hide it?

 

[bombardier]

bumping in 2020
just came across this case, shocked at the lack of info online and the lack of NYC MP posted on Namus! Only 47 with only one person between 2000 and 2010?? Does anyone know if there is a functional, up-to-date database for the missing people of new york?
edit: just realized that sometimes on NamUs, they get more specific than the city and list their location as the burough of the city, which makes it difficult to search all at once...

 

[victoriarobinson642]

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
Has Marisela Guerrero been suggested?