Identified! TX - Huntsville, 'Walker County Jane Doe', WhtFem 14-16, 91UFTX, 1 November 1980 - id'd November 2021 - Sherri Ann Jarvis (14)

[WalkingTheCow]

I am not convinced that WCJD was one of Rhoades victims. He kept his kidnapped victims prisoner for days or weeks, raping them repeatedly before finally killing them. His first verified kills were ten years after WCJD was killed. Does not seem to fit his MO. JMO

You are right in that Robert Ben Rhoades kept his victims captive for a really long time.

We know for sure he comitted crimes around 1990, but when caught he said he had been committing murder for 15 years. So he could have been killing in 1980.

I always thought it was possible that he was doing the prisoner thing towards the end of his crime spree. If he started around 1975, he would only have been killing for 5 years, and he might not have had the ability to keep them as long, for example he might not have had the "torture chamber" in the cab of his truck.

 

[Melly53]

I have been absent from Websleuths for a couple of years, but am back now and find this case interesting, and want to work with all of you in attempting to identify this young girl. There is something about her face that just draws me to her. After reading most of the posts in this thread, I believe that she was a runaway either from her family, foster care or a group home. In the 70's and 80's many reports of runaways were only made to their local LE agency's which could be why there is no national missing person data available on her. If she is the same girl as in the picture of Cathy/Kathy (which I believe is highly possible because of their similar stories, it might be possible that she was attempting to locate a relative in prison (grandfather, father, brother, uncle, or friend) or was attempting to visit some prisoner that she was pen pals with. They may have never met her in person or even seen a picture of her (or known how old she was) which is why no one at the prison recognized her when shown her picture. I would assume they were shown her morgue picture at the time rather than one of the reconstructed sketches available now marking it more difficult to recognize her. Also if the information regarding Cathy/Kathy had been available at that time, LE could have shown her picture to prisoners/employees in the Central Unit in Sugarland, TX where someone may have recognized her. Hope I can be of some help in giving this girl her name back.

 

[Melly53]

You are right in that Robert Ben Rhoades kept his victims captive for a really long time.

We know for sure he comitted crimes around 1990, but when caught he said he had been committing murder for 15 years. So he could have been killing in 1980.

I always thought it was possible that he was doing the prisoner thing towards the end of his crime spree. If he started around 1975, he would only have been killing for 5 years, and he might not have had the ability to keep them as long, for example he might not have had the "torture chamber" in the cab of his truck.

Rhoades physically raped and tortured her victims whereas WCJD was beaten and raped with an instrument. Don't remember any mention of WCJD being tortured.

 

[kdsmith21]

Pem M Briggs is not in Namus... not sure about Charley Project etc... can anyone contact the mother who posted and show her Snohomish County jane Doe and see if she can submit her daughter to Namus?

 

[CarlK90245]

Pem M Briggs is not in Namus... not sure about Charley Project etc... can anyone contact the mother who posted and show her Snohomish County jane Doe and see if she can submit her daughter to Namus?

She is in NamUs. I entered it. Her casefile is not yet published.

Pem's mother is deceased. It was her sister who came forward on the Snohomish County JD thread.

 

[Moosebegoose]

You are right in that Robert Ben Rhoades kept his victims captive for a really long time.

We know for sure he comitted crimes around 1990, but when caught he said he had been committing murder for 15 years. So he could have been killing in 1980.

I always thought it was possible that he was doing the prisoner thing towards the end of his crime spree. If he started around 1975, he would only have been killing for 5 years, and he might not have had the ability to keep them as long, for example he might not have had the "torture chamber" in the cab of his truck.

Also, killers evolve or the opposite, get more sloppy.

 

[Alleykins]

She is in NamUs. I entered it. Her casefile is not yet published.

Pem's mother is deceased. It was her sister who came forward on the Snohomish County JD thread.

Has her family given a DNA sample yet?

 

[Springrain]

I've been gone forever! Hi all! I don't think she was a Rhoades victim either.I wish we had been able to find more info about the girl in the photo, "Kathy".

 

[Alleykins]

I've been gone forever! Hi all! I don't think she was a Rhoades victim either.I wish we had been able to find more info about the girl in the photo, "Kathy".

WB Springrain! Missed ya!

 

[yogasleuther]

WB Springrain! Missed ya!

Hi springrain welcome back. Paul...I see you think Walker is not Kathy...despite story being so similar...a while back it was mentioned that Kathy in the picture has 2 toes same size it has a name I forget...if she were exhumed from grave that could be checked but I'm sure it's a money issue. I see your point chasing to a dead end. Nobody too consult, waitress dead, where's the couple etc...

 

[paul1980]

Yeah. that's one of the downsides of it being nearly 40 years, everyone who saw WCJD that night is dead, including possibly the killer.

 

[Bit of hope]

Hi springrain welcome back. Paul...I see you think Walker is not Kathy...despite story being so similar...a while back it was mentioned that Kathy in the picture has 2 toes same size it has a name I forget...if she were exhumed from grave that could be checked but I'm sure it's a money issue. I see your point chasing to a dead end. Nobody too consult, waitress dead, where's the couple etc...

I think you mean Morton toe; is the condition of a shortened first metatarsal in relation to the second metatarsal. The second is sticking out from the rest of the toes.

 

[Finders]

I do agree it is probably not Rhoades but I do know that SK's evolve, so its not out of the realm of possibility that it was him. I think I want it to have been a known SK bc I hate the idea and reality that there are people out there that do these things and never get caught.

 

[Finders]

I was very skeptical that Kathy and WCJD are one in the same but i'm starting to believe that it is her. In her pic, the necklace she's wearing is tilting toward under her shirt, indicating to me that the necklace has a charm or something with weight on it. I wish we could find more pics of this girl!

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

I was very skeptical that Kathy and WCJD are one in the same but i'm starting to believe that it is her. In her pic, the necklace she's wearing is tilting toward under her shirt, indicating to me that the necklace has a charm or something with weight on it. I wish we could find more pics of this girl!

Yeah if we could see the necklace it would be more of an identifier. That drove me nuts the first time I saw the picture.

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[paul1980]

I hope that WCJD had friends that are looking for her... but it's been 37 years, you'd think they'd have shown up by now.

 

[Roselvr]

I hope that WCJD had friends that are looking for her... but it's been 37 years, you'd think they'd have shown up by now.

Honestly, unless they do what we do, they're looking on social media, probably thinking the friend is under the radar, not using social media.

 

[Alleykins]

I think it can be difficult to track down women on social media because of name changes. I know a lot of women include their former last names in their FB accounts, but some do not. If they have a common name, forget about it.

I have two childhood friends I've been trying to track down for years. One has a common name with thousands of potential matches. I wade through them every once in a while looking for her.

The other has an unusual/uncommon last name and I still can't find her. I'm not sure if she's not on social media or just not using her former last name. Her son has a common last name, so I can't go that route, it's too daunting. I found one other potential relative but he hasn't been on FB for years. Like my college roommate, I'm sure she'll pop up someday.

I recently found a childhood friend that I hadn't seen since the early 80s. The last time I saw her, she was 17 and had just hitchhiked from FL to Maine with a guy. Now, if that doesn't sound like a classic missing teenager scenario waiting to happen, I don't know what else does. I found a Jane Doe in FL that looked just like her back then and thought for sure it could be her. It wasn't, I was finally able to track her down. And just because I hadn't heard from her in all that time, didn't mean she'd met an untimely demise, we had just lost touch. Which, before the internet, happened a lot if someone moved around a lot and you lost their address and phone number, you lost that person. There was no whitepagesdotcom in the 80s.


So, it is possible WCJD's friends ARE looking for her, they just aren't having any luck and haven't put two and two together yet and searched through unidentified remains. It might not have occurred to them yet to do so. Maybe they are waiting for her to pop up one day on social media, which has happened to me twice.

But, keep in mind Jimmy Reymer. His sister had been looking for him in the mid-west for 30+ years, and his JD photo was all over the internet, and it still didn't "click" for her or the investigators helping her. He was in NC the whole time. It took a classmate to finally recognize his picture and connect the dots. But for me, because this is something I'm interested in, of course I keep my two friends in the back of my mind when I go searching through remain, but it's not something I'm actively sifting through with them in mind.

 

[aThousandYearsWide]

I think it can be difficult to track down women on social media because of name changes. I know a lot of women include their former last names in their FB accounts, but some do not. If they have a common name, forget about it.

I have two childhood friends I've been trying to track down for years. One has a common name with thousands of potential matches. I wade through them every once in a while looking for her.

The other has an unusual/uncommon last name and I still can't find her. I'm not sure if she's not on social media or just not using her former last name. Her son has a common last name, so I can't go that route, it's too daunting. I found one other potential relative but he hasn't been on FB for years. Like my college roommate, I'm sure she'll pop up someday.

I recently found a childhood friend that I hadn't seen since the early 80s. The last time I saw her, she was 17 and had just hitchhiked from FL to Maine with a guy. Now, if that doesn't sound like a classic missing teenager scenario waiting to happen, I don't know what else does. I found a Jane Doe in FL that looked just like her back then and thought for sure it could be her. It wasn't, I was finally able to track her down. And just because I hadn't heard from her in all that time, didn't mean she'd met an untimely demise, we had just lost touch. Which, before the internet, happened a lot if someone moved around a lot and you lost their address and phone number, you lost that person. There was no whitepagesdotcom in the 80s.


So, it is possible WCJD's friends ARE looking for her, they just aren't having any luck and haven't put two and two together yet and searched through unidentified remains. It might not have occurred to them yet to do so. Maybe they are waiting for her to pop up one day on social media, which has happened to me twice.

But, keep in mind Jimmy Reymer. His sister had been looking for him in the mid-west for 30+ years, and his JD photo was all over the internet, and it still didn't "click" for her or the investigators helping her. He was in NC the whole time. It took a classmate to finally recognize his picture and connect the dots. But for me, because this is something I'm interested in, of course I keep my two friends in the back of my mind when I go searching through remain, but it's not something I'm actively sifting through with them in mind.

Exactly, my mother and her siblings were adopted by their step-father when she was three years old, so she had a different name then her birth name. After my grandmother and my mom's biological father divorced they cut ties completely. He remarried and had another child eventually. He told her about her other siblings and she searched for them. Without a surname I'm sure it was impossible. It wasn't until a few years ago I found her on ancestry that my mother even knew she had a missing sibling.

Another time I was searching for my preschool best friend I haven't seen since we were 5 years old. He had a uncommon last name, but still I didn't find him until a year later.

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[Ibiz]

Maybe this girl was headed to see someone who worked at the prison. Or the prison was just a direction landmark to the home she was actually headed too.

Great post!!! I don't believe she was going to visit anyone at the prison, but this was simply a landmark. Great call!!!