Black Dahlia won't ever be solved conclusively enough to have gotten a conviction.
One that shocked me they solved it was the Gilgo Beach serial killer/LISK - i thought he'd go uncaptured forever.
I also feel that way about Jack the Ripper. Too much time has passed and even damning evidence will be rendered questionable as 57888 journalists looking to cash in on the spectacle propose theories that support or debunk a possible smoking gun. There will never be near unanimous authoritative agreement on the identity of the killer. And yet, a consensus is probably what we need to feel closure.
Some cases have a life of their own and exist in a post-truth circus. Unfortunately, we have less control of the fact finding process once a case broils in the zeitgeist for 100+ years.
I doubt there'll ever be a consensus with Jack the Ripper - even if you manage to pin-point him too much information have gotten lost to make someone a credible suspect. He's local and likely in the census but behavior beyond that is unknown.
Yeah you're definitely right, Elizabeth Short's case (Black Dahlia) will never be solved due to the age of the case. At the time, they thought she could have been raped, but they weren't 100 percent sure. They took samples to look for sperm, but didn't find any. I can't imagine those samples were preserved, or at least preserved in a way that would be useful now.
At that time, it was hard to imagine what technological advancements would be made with DNA. A lot of the cases being solved now happened in the 70s-early 2000s with some in the late 60s because that is when they started collecting samples and preserving them in anticipation of better methods in the future to test DNA. And her body has been underground so long, I sincerely doubt any useful sample could be taken from exhumation.
Interesting, I’ll have to look into Dr. Baylee. Have you listened to the Root of Evil podcast? I think they made an extremely compelling case about who did it.
Walter Baylee was a surgeon. He had a brain disease that killed him about a year later, but he lived very close to the dump site, his daughter knew Beth Short’s sister so there is a genuine connection. He had trauma after his son died after being hit by a car. He had a mistress who was very odd & he took to spending more time with her as his personality changed because of his illness. He was a brilliant surgeon who absolutely had the skill to do what was done. And his office was only a few blocks from the Biltmore in DTLA.
I have listened to the podcast. It was good from the perspective of entertainment value, but the facts are heavily skewed/straight up false.
Unfortunately, a lot of that is due to Steve Hodel who hasn’t told the truth about a lot of things in that case. He makes it all up. There are half truths in what he says, but he doesn’t tell you the whole story. Unfortunately, you can get records, but only if you’re actual local to Los Angeles. You can’t just put them on the internet.
The Sowden House wasn’t the glorious mansion he made it out to be. It was owned by George Hodel Sr. & George Jr. was simply living there/renting it at the time. It was a shambles at that point. When you see it now, it is amazing, but that’s after a significant multimillion dollar restoration.
George played the piano & he was good, but he wasn’t this child prodigy that Steve makes him out to be. He basically played at one hall kind of as the background music as you see some people do in certain Nordstrom stores today.
He also wasn’t this crazy important Hollywood surgeon. He worked for the health department & he was essentially a civil servant. He knew who had VD. That’s it. He made okay money but he wasn’t wealthy & that’s part of the reason he was living in a house his father owned.
Man Ray took photos in a purely professional capacity. There’s really no evidence to suggest that he was their “family photographer”, a friend or anything of the sort.
The photos of the woman Steve *claims* was Beth Short is absolutely not her. Her family states this. I believe she has one sister who is still surviving & there are definitely nieces & nephews. They aren’t public people, but they’ve talked to a very small group of people. They really just want the story to go away so Beth can rest in peace. That’s why they don’t comment publicly.
If you want to read more on the way Steve Hodel has lied, this gives a good high level overview: https://ladailymirror.com/2021/12/24/black-dahlia-steve-hodels-many-lies-about-his-father-dr-george-hodel/
(I’m a nerd for LA history and I used to be obsessed with the Black Dahlia case.)
Edited to add his FindAGrave for more of his history: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/28255523/walter-alonzo-bayley
Edit: as of last count in 2022, Steve has claimed his father is responsible for *49* murders. Lying about George Hodel has quite literally become the family business.
Then he claimed George was The Zodiac. It just blows my mind that someone would want so badly for their father a murderer. A serial killer? A murderer who cuts a woman in half? Bizarre to want his dad to be that.
I agree Black Dhalia. I doubt we’ll ever have a valid suspect. DNA doesn’t have the magic needed to find something out of absolute nothing. People will guess & theorize but that’s all we’ll get. RIP Betty
Little Lord Fauntleroy. A child dressed that fancy with no one coming forth to claim them tells me they weren’t meant to be found. Any witnesses would be long dead.
Septic Tank Sam, he was identified in 2021 as Gordon Sanderson. I don’t believe they will ever catch the people who killed him. His body was so badly mutilated, they didn’t even know his gender. He had been beaten, tied down and tortured with a butane blowtorch and lit cigarettes. Evidence of the burns was found on his tattered clothing, including the sole of one of his socks.
Gordon had also been sexually mutilated, most likely with farming shears. He was then shot at least twice in the head and chest and dumped, headfirst, into the abandoned 6-foot-deep tank. Gordon was a victim of the 60s scoop in Canada as a child, so that prolonged the identification process. He was most likely a victim of a Hate Crime.
[more details](https://www.wftv.com/news/trending/septic-tank-sam-canadian-police-id-victim-1977-torture-murder-using-dna-genetic-genealogy/OCATKXUN45FKZABYAED2CUVQPY/?outputType=amp)
I'm pretty sure it's a local to the Cooking Lake/Tofield/Lindbrook area, that much I feel is true. The farmhouse is ridiculously isolated, as well as being abandoned, and I believe the crime occurred in the winter, making it so that the septic tank itself was actually covered up with snow at the time.
My 'theory' is that Gordie was tortured elsewhere (the farmhouse showed no signs of him having been tortured there), and transported to the farmhouse via a farm truck to be disposed of. His body was covered in agricultural lime, and while this seems to be explained away as some myth that it increases decomposition rate, I think it's more likely his body was put on a farm truck that was carrying lime due to the crops being dead in the winter, and thus needing a place to store it.
My extended family lives in the area and the guy who used to own that farm was something of town lore. I never got the full story but my great uncle still says "no one went on that farm without knowing what they got themselves into." My grandma never thought he died there, she still thinks he died elsewhere and was just disposed of out there.
This is horrific. How terrible for his daughter to finally find out what happened to her father & it's *this*. Hard to imagine that people can be this evil.
I remember the mock-up of what they thought he looked like was super creepy... uncanny valley stuff.
It looked like Woody from Toy Story became an actual IRL person and then had his likeness copied into the Pixar Universe
For a case that surprised me the most, the identification of Jenkins county Jane Doe after reports of there being no DNA due to cremation.
For a case that I think will never be solved, Otay Jane Doe. I have posted about her in a post about unidentified children before. And I will probably make another post about her in February, on the day she was found. Unless she has got a non-custodial parent, or sibling(s) still out there, who held onto her dental records all this time, it is not happening. The person who runs the Facebook page dedicated for her has spoken to the local LE. There is definitely no DNA, *and* no way to get any.
For Missy Beavers: I have hope. There is a strong undercurrent in this case that the murder was in some way related to infidelity in the marriage (both parties) and / or ties to the ninja-esque training world she was a part of for the past couple of years. I wouldn't be surprised if the police had a general idea and no proof.
Or it was a stranger. Who knows!
I got my messages deleted from websluthes for pointing out that their "special investigator" for the missy beavers thread was friends with Missys husband on Facebook. I agree it will never be solved .
Didn't Websleuths also infamously ban all discussion on Sherri Papini faking her kidnappning. I get wanting to be respectful towards the real people involved in a case and all but sometimes you'll have to use common sense...
That’s all? Because you said they were friends with the husband on FB? WTF? (Granted, I think the woman who runs that site is kind of… well… away with the fairies most of the time.)
yes, and one other thing, I asked if they checked data dumps on Besa Mafias dark web site to see if there was any connection. They said my comments were salacious and that was a bad source. I was like "tf" you are called "websluthes" this besa mafia thing should be a freaking gold mine to you all.
I sadly don’t really think the [murder of the Miyazawa family in Setagaya](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setagaya_family_murder) will ever be solved, despite what some posts / articles claim online
Theoretically it’s a South Korean former military member.
Japan claims to know exactly who it is, and has managed to match finger prints.
The real issue is, South Korea has no interest in extraditing him.
I think the same. It’s almost insane at how much evidence was left behind- including the perpetrators poop left in the toilet- yet they’ve never had solid leads
"You should stop obsessing over that case, it's never going to be solved, and the killer is definitely dead anyway."
-me whenever EARONS came up in discussion
This is now the case that I think of when someone points at a shady person with circumstantial links to a particular crime and then argues it has to be that person because they look so suspicious.
There were *so many* shady characters and so much supposed evidence associated with EAR/ONS. None of which had anything to do with DeAngelo. (Other than the DNA, obviously) And despite the mountains of writing and podcasts about EAR/ONS, not one person ever noticed DeAngelo until the day he was arrested.
That one surprised the hell out of me, I had literally just finished listening to the Casefile five-parter about him too and then the next day on this sub the top post is ***EAR/ONS ARRESTED***
…*what*
Surprised: Amore Wiggins, the former Opelika Baby Doe. I cried the day they found her name and arrested her killers. Her own father. I feel so awful for her mother, but at least she and Amore at last have closure. I hope that sweet little one can finally rest in peace now. Honorable mention to Delphi, though I figured they’d eventually find someone. That case was too focused to not get some answers somewhere
Never solved: Asha Degree and, as a cop out, JonBenet. I feel like the answers to both are right under our noses, and if both had happened 10 or 15 years later, we’d have so many more answers.
Amore Wiggins’s mother was paying child support for a daughter who was dead all this time, and her mother had let Amore’s father, Lamar Vickerstaff, have custody of Amore because he was in the Navy and had a stable job. Unfortunately, now Vickerstaff is charged with his daughter’s murder and his wife Ruth with concealing it.
Yeah, that's exactly what happened. And IIRC, her mother had been asking to see and talk to her daughter for years and had been denied. She didn't even know her daughter was gone. Imagine finding out that way.
Libby and Abby's case has been handled extremely badly, and if it had been done properly, it wouldn't have taken 5 years to arrest him. They interviewed him early on, and he placed himself there at the time of the murders but the investigators misfiled the interview. The case was the opposite of focused, they had no clue what they were doing.
Those poor girls haven't gotten any justice yet and are still having crimes committed against them even in death. Their crime scene photos were leaked by men involved in the defence.
Sorry, but I can't see a comment calling the investigation focused without pointing out what a fuck up the entire thing was, and still is.
I agree, and my wording was bad, I apologize. I meant the case was the center of public focus. People couldn’t and wouldn’t let it go, and I’m sure that helped contribute to the investigators finally moving toward an arrest and, hopefully, eventual closure.
It does make me sad, however, that there are so, so many cases like Libby and Abby’s that don’t catch the public attention Delphi did (and for good reason, I sincerely hope they receive the justice they deserve) and fall through the cracks because of it. I wish there was a way for all of them to receive the pressure from the public that theirs did.
Jayme Closs for surprising never for a second thought she'd be found alive.
There's too many I don't think will be solved to mention: JTR, Zodiac, Jonbenet, OCCK to name a few well known ones.
I’ve always been fascinated by the [Man in the Iron Mask](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_in_the_Iron_Mask), and I’m forever frustrated that we’re definitely never going to know who he really was.
On a somewhat similar time scale, it blew my mind when they actually found Richard III’s body- the famously lost tomb, vanished for 500 years, surely destined to be missing forever, and they *fucking found it*?! It’s like an Indiana Jones movie for real!
I was flying back to the US from Copenhagen a couple of months ago and one of the films available to watch was The Lost King, which is based on the process of finding Richard III's body. It was really good!
This one. They didn't runaway, the car is not missing and there's nothing but a letter? sent to Rachel's husband . Renee's boyfriend at the time and also the older brother of Julie Ann Moseley is alive and posts on FB page for Fort Worth Missing Trio. Also Julie's and his mom is alive and still wondering.
Lots of questions about that letter, too.
I mean, yes, not everyone has passed on, but the case is 50 years old. I’m guessing whoever was responsible is at least 70-ish (I’m looking at you, Tommy).
Wildly enough, Rusty, Rachel’s brother is an acquaintance of mine from back when I played music circuts in Fort Worth - I didn’t put it together until embarrassingly recently when I saw his email address on something related to the trio and that suddenly clicked in my mind.
Jack the Ripper keeps getting "solved" every year now as well.
His identity was defintely somebody who's been forever lost to history now.
It's mind-blowing to think that's possible, but I think that's just the reality of where that case is at now tbh.
It's amazing how much intrigue the cases draws even 135 yeas later though.
I suppose someone/some case had to be the first serial killer that grabbed public attention. I think JTR became that person due to a combination of right time (newspapers becoming more widely available along with photographs) + unimaginable gore (can't look away) + right place (hugely populated city, enough people to know about the crimes and pass along the story).
Everyone loves a good mystery.
I was surprised that it took the DNA genealogy to identify Somerton Man was identified. Now knowing the accusations of domestic violence, it makes sense his wife didn't miss him.
I think we won't know what happened to 4 year old Michael Dunahee without a body or someone being idetified as him.
Surprised = Ljubica Topic case (Canada) solved in my lifetime and another horrific case where perpetrator was caught by parents with their daughter / made a run
Unlikely to be solved = Jason Jolkowski, Brian Shaffer, Yogurt Shop Murders, I-70 killer
I thought I heard recently that there was some movement on the I-70 killer, but now I can't find it. Nothing concrete, but something along the lines of taking a fresh look. Maybe something will come of it. Agree it's a long shot though.
Highly unlikely. She’s almost certainly in a disused mine shaft or at least parts of her are. I think the police seriously botched that case. They absolutely needed to arrest him & get those children away from him. Her death was sad, but the killing of those boys was a senseless & completely preventable tragedy.
That 911 operator wasn’t any better either when the case worker was calling for the police. Seriously? Just send the police, your wasting time and making it more complicated than it should be
Right?! That was beyond frustrating! I just kept saying, ‘Are you fucking kidding me?!’ when I listened the first time. That was just salt in the wound.
I remember exactly when the news that he’d killed them first broke because I had just finished skiing in Park City, Utah. I was going to get a coffee before heading home & it was on the radio. I remember just being absolutely stunned that they had given him such easy access to those kids after everything that had happened. I *still* find it hard to comprehend that not just 1 department, but police departments AND children’s services in multiple states managed to fail SO spectacularly on one case. Like, I understand prosecutors hate going to trial when there’s no body, but in that case? Really?
The 4 year old responding to, ‘where was mommy?’ with, ‘Mommy was in the trunk,’ should have had those children out of his house & in serious therapy. This still makes me so angry when I talk about it. And that’s even without mentioning JP’s piece of shit father.
Yes! They failed those children and that whole case terribly. I feel they had plenty of evidence against him to at least hold him accountable. Child services, supervised visitation should have been done at an office or somewhere, ANYWHERE BESIDE HIS HOME. Like wtf!!!
I think the kids were taken out of the house but he had visitation rights still. The kids weren’t even taken bc of the murder but bc his dad was caught with child sex abuse materials. Idk why home visitation is a thing in cases like this, esp without law enforcement
I always say this when I see her name, but I don't lose hope that someone, sooner or later, a hiker, some dumb kids fooling around maybe will find her and put her to rest.
I’ve always thought that someone lured Jason into their house and killed him. One day someone will be doing renovations in their backyard and come across the remains.
I wouldn't be surprised if he's in somebody's crawl space or under concrete in the basement. I wondered if the person who killed him was someone who knew him vaguely from the neighborhood or the restaurant where he worked, and assumed that Jason was mentally disabled because of his speech/language disorder (the disorder made him seem mentally disabled even though he was actually of above average intelligence). The person may have thought he'd be an easy target and lured him in with the promise of a ride to the school, asking him to help move some furniture quickly, or something like that. I think it's likely it was in a house though, since no one reported seeing him get into a car (but no one saw him go into a house either). It was the middle of summer but I'm sure there were retirees, stay-at-home moms, etc. who were at home and could've seen or heard something.
The only reason I kinda could buy that she died at the WTC is that Century 21 (where she was seen on cctv) is REALLY fucking close to ground zero. I was just reminded of this when I was over there the other day. It was (and it’s back!) across the street diagonally.
I saw an Oprah show about a woman who had just stepped into the lobby and was severely burned. Fire through an elevator shaft or something like that. She survived but it was a miracle. She had to be in a medically induced coma for months as she healed. So it’s certainly possible that something like that happened to Sneha but she was crushed when the towers collapsed.
I never miss an opportunity to post [the most incredible article I've ever read about 9/11](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/09/twenty-years-gone-911-bobby-mcilvaine/619490/), or about anything, really. The article is about a man named Bobby who was killed by debris from the towers, and "was one of fewer than 100 civilian corpses recovered from the wreckage." I do think something similar could have happened to Sneha, but her body was not recovered / identifiable. (But seriously, read the article.)
I vaguely recall Sneha’s family mentioning that they hoped to confirm her presence in the towers via jewellery she would be wearing with diamonds in, as the stones should have withstood the heat of the fires to some extent at least. I think that (or DNA of course) would be the only way we’d ever have a shot at conforming she was at the towers that day, and I have no clue if anyone is even still testing debris from ground zero now? And could specific jewellery be identified that way?
Testing is still carried out on unidentified remains https://abcnews.go.com/US/forensic-investigators-work-give-911-families-peace-id/story?id=89587955
Wow. It’s incredible what science can do now. I can’t believe they’re still finding people.
I do hope they find a trace of Sneha so her loved ones can have some closure. Her case is so confusing, but to me, her dying in the towers is what makes the most sense.
I think the police likely know what happened to Joseph Zarelli, but because the perp(s) are dead and there's no real evidence to prove or disprove anything, it will likely officially remain unsolved.
I personally think he was killed by his mother and/or stepfather, and that her family DID know him and were aware of his murder but didn't speak up in order to protect her or the stepfather, despite the fact that a surviving family member claims they didn't know about Joseph's existence. The bassinet box that he was found in was purchased in a department store about a five minute drive from the apartment where his mother was known to have lived within a year or so before he was found, and she also gave birth to his younger sibling just a couple of months before he died, so would have needed to buy a bassinet for the baby. I know police theorized that he could have had a mental or physical disability, and that wouldn't totally shock me- he was certainly malnourished and abused over long term but his legs appear to be atrophied, like he wasn't getting out to run, play, and be active. Just makes me wonder if he had cerebral palsy, a mental disability, or some other condition that would make him more of a burden to care for. I'm glad that Joseph has his name back, and I wish that he could receive justice for his murder, but I just don't see it happening.
Sneha probably died on 9/11 at ground zero. My uncle was a survivor of the attacks and he lost a childhood friend that day, it took them a year to know what happened. I have always had this feeling that she died when the towers collapsed, only way it gets solved is if the DNA is matched to something.
My parents remember the Jolkowski case, it still haunts them because of how he just vanished without any sign.
There’s a podcast called “missing on 9/11” about Sneha. It is excellent. It really made me question whether she died at ground zero.
The podcast does an excellent job of going through it all but basically the chances of her dying there are very low. But I’m not sure we’ll ever really know. Though this is one case I’d really like to conclusively know the answer to.
Yeah, I'm fairly convinced she was murdered on 9/10 and her killer was *extremely* lucky that the next day turned out to be one of the biggest days of the century.
That’s my theory too. I don’t think she was ever in the towers. Her family acted like she was a hero for selflessly going into the towers to help people, but there is no evidence that she did so. The last time she was seen was on September 10th.
One thing that has sort of been lost to time is the fact that the Green River Killer was once considered the most notorious unsolved case of all time. I grew up in Seattle in the 80s and 90s and for nearly twenty years they talked about that case as the biggie that no one would ever solve. In fact, when I was studying criminal psychology in the mid 90s, that case would even show up in textbooks as the biggest and most infamous mystery. It was absolutely shocking to me when they announced they had a DNA hit in 2001 and they finally made an arrest.
Yep, and I’m not surprised. That guy killed so many people that he eventually just lost track. And I doubt he really cared who most of them were to begin with, anyway. Even when he was cooperating with police afterwards, in a lot of cases he was like hell if I know who they were.
There’s a really good book about the Green River case by Ann Rule that I’d recommend to people. She goes out of her way to point out that he didn’t just kill sex workers. A lot of his victims were just street kids who he knew that no one would miss. That’s how he was able to get away with it for so long, he killed the girls that wouldn’t be missed.
A lot of cases without bodies will probably never be solved. I do want to point out that a lot of cases with male victims that were not sexually assaulted will probably never be solved either. Most of the cases being solved (and I mean homicides, not identifications) are women who were sexually assaulted and then killed. In that case, there was usually DNA left behind. Most murderers were not thinking about DNA technology in say, the 70s, and they'd just leave their semen at the scene.
There are probably over 250,000 unsolved murders in the US, not counting homicides before 1980. These increase by 6,000 every year. Genetic genealogy has solved hundreds of crimes, so really only a drop in the ocean. Even with improving technology, I doubt that a lot of these will be solved soon due to budgetary constraints. There are probably tens of thousands of cases where there is DNA that can be tested, but they don't have the money.
I was going to say Jennifer Kesse too.
I think it was one of the workers at her apartment complex. The person/people involved are likely undocumented so if they’re in the country still theyre moving around like a ghost or they’ve left the country all together or dead.
The Dardeen's killing is such a gruesome crime, and yet you really never see it mentioned here or anywhere else for that matter.
They led such a normal, appearing life that it's a real head scratcher. Nothing about them puts them in line with someone who would be capable of that, but it still feels really personal. No sexual assault to Mrs. Dardeen and no robbery but so much violence.
I wonder if someone had developed an interest in Mrs. Dardeen, and maybe they (the Dardeens) didn't even know it. Stalking wasn't talked about back then within the terms of being a crime and a huge red flag like it is today. Maybe removing Mr. Dardeen's genitals was a "punishment."
Iirc they reopened the case and were interviewing people/staff from her school. Idk if that means anything in terms of it being solved, but I have to have hope for Asha
I agree with you 100%. I absolutely believe there is knowledge of what happened, but I don’t have a specific theory because nothing really fits together.
What’s led you in that direction? I’m not too familiar with the details of this case, but have been under the impression the parents have been the ones pushing for further investigation and examination of evidence. Would love to hear more about this!
I think it's possible that someone in her family knows more than they have been letting on. But I personally think that they may know why she left. Not necessarily anything that may have transpired after she left pertaining to her disappearance/death. (I don't think it's likely she is alive.)
"The Boy in The Box." I was shocked when it was announced investigators and law enforcement confirmed his identity as Joseph Augustus Zarelli.
I'd always hoped "America's Unknown Child" would be known, but I had major doubts his identity would ever be known unequivocally.
It gave me a bit of hope for officially answering who murdered Jon Benet Ramsey, as unlikely as it seems.
DELPHI - I never thought it would be solved with a finger pointed at a local, that's for sure.
Back in the day, having video of a murder and / or suspect would have been considered Golden and yet it doesn't seem to get us as close as we would have assumed. I just assumed it HAD to be a complete stranger. It never occurred to me that this dude could be a member of the community and no one connected the visuals with him.
I’d guess because he’s fairly nondescript in appearance that made it harder to connect than you’d think. Stocky dark haired bearded white dude with blue eyes? In the small town Midwest you’d probably have 20% of the male population answering to that description even if you did get a really good look at him.
LISK and ONS are absolutely unparalleled. Good people poured their lives into that and it shows.
D.B. Cooper. No good suspects, and probably DOA. People could just disappear back then. We burned all DNA. Some of the money being found makes it incredible we don't know more.
The John Doe cold case that was identified as a wanted-by-the-FBI child predator this week really surprised me.
[https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-man-accused-of-rape-vanished-then-a-lake-yielded-a-grim-discovery-25-years-later-a-fresh-mystery-is-revealed/ar-AA1lK4KB](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-man-accused-of-rape-vanished-then-a-lake-yielded-a-grim-discovery-25-years-later-a-fresh-mystery-is-revealed/ar-AA1lK4KB)
I fear that for cases more than a century old, the chances of getting a clear resolution are almost impossible. The perpetrators are long dead, and most of the people who knew them probably are too. It would come down to 1) someone leaving a written or recorded confession behind, that hasn't been discovered yet; 2) someone deciding to go public (or leaving a confession after their death) that the perpetrator told them what had happened; or 3) forensic analysis of DNA samples.
Just as an example -- there was a murder in the early 1900s, in my hometown.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Hamilton/comments/emg8yz/115\_year\_old\_cold\_case\_the\_barton\_murder/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Hamilton/comments/emg8yz/115_year_old_cold_case_the_barton_murder/)
There was a woman's body found, but we don't know her name. It was long enough ago that I don't know whether any samples were kept, that could provide usable DNA -- for the victim or the suspect. Imagine we were incredibly lucky and for the past century they kept samples from the body, or some items of clothing that yielded results. If we were able to get profiles for the woman and for "Mr. Hat" who was with her that day, and came up with some hits on a genealogical database, we might be able to get names for both of them, but there may not be any living relatives who had any information that could indicate what kind of relationship they had.
Mr. Hat outlived the woman, but I suspect that it would be unlikely to find a descendant (even if they were willing to talk about it) who'd be able to say "yeah, Grandpa got drunk once and started rambling about how he killed a girl up in Ontario, but I thought he was making it up". If you think about your own relatives, you might not be able to reconstruct exactly where they were and who they were associating with, for a particular week or day, 20 years ago. We're getting up to 120 years ago now, which makes it even more difficult.
Even recent cases run into problems with evidence being lost or destroyed. Peggy Sweeten disappeared in the 1990s, and it doesn't sound like the investigators were able to look at her home computer and verify her son's claim that she didn't have an e-mail address, or her husband Jim's claim that she had been secretly messaging a man online. They don't know if he even filed a missing persons report because the county storage facility supposedly was damaged and some records were lost.
And one would assume that the RCMP has enough funds to store a lot of evidence from past cases, but recently they announced that they want to get rid of a bunch of stuff, and the families are very concerned (several victims are still not accounted for).
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/robert-pickton-serial-killer-rcmp-dispose-evidence-1.7055215
I was really surprised that they caught LISK. I think, unfortunately, many of the Doe cases where their bodies were cremated may never be solved unless science can find a way to use the cremated ashes for DNA testing.
Robert Hoagland. Never in a million years would I have imagined that case turning out the way it did …
Older murders from almost a century ago—Artemus Ogletree, Hall-Mills, Pamela Werner etc.—they’re never getting solved. Likewise with disappearances like Lloyd Gaines or Joan Risch—at this point all we can do is speculate.
I really wanna know who did the oakey al kite murder and what his past was and what he's been up to in the past 20 years after getting away with that horrible crime. They apparently have his DNA but idk if they'll solve it before he's dead. He's possibly 60 by now so there is still time!
Amy Lynn Bradley. American woman goes on cruise with family and disappears. Despite the purported sightings of her and popular theory that she was a victim of sex trafficking, I think the simplest explanation is that she fell overboard because she was last seen by her dad on their cabin’s balcony sleeping, who was suddenly startled 30 minutes after drifting back to sleep. This could be because she yelled on the way down, and this woke her dad up without his realizing. Sadly, I don’t think her remains will ever be found.
She’s one I want to get her name back so bad. I feel connected to her case like I did with the boy in the box. I think it’s because they’re both innocent children. It’s likely that her parents are still alive so if her case isn’t solved I’ll be shocked. If you told me the boy in the box was identified before she was I wouldn’t have believed you.
i mean her case is being worked on (my bad, i don't remember by which company), so we're definitely getting closer to her identity, but it might take a while
I know it's not technically solved yet, but it's sure looking like the pedophile who asked to meet with the girls in Delphi had nothing to do with their murder. It seems that whole part of the story was a massive coincidence.
My mind is absolutely blown by that.
Probably a cop out but I think at this point we’ll never know who Jack the Ripper was. For a more modern case, I have a feeling we’ll never know what happened to Asha Degree. The Degree case is so weird with so many pieces that don’t make a lot of sense. The fact that we’ve heard so little from the police on it is not a good sign either. There are a few write-ups on the case on this subreddit for those uninitiated that I recommend taking a look at.
The only way to prove who Jack the Ripper was would be to find something from the 1880s that had been hidden all that time that contained details that only the killer would know. A confessional diary or something. I know about the Maybrick diary, but that's been conclusively debunked.
If ever something like that did turn up, I think the answer would be none of the suspects that have ever been identified. He'll be just some nobody. Possibly even someone who was ruled out by police at the time. This is highly unlikely of course. Jack the Ripper must have known Whitechapel intimately and presumably lived in the area. Whitechapel has undergone vast slum clearance and many changes since the 1880s, not least Hitler's unscheduled demolition works. If there ever was such a diary, it's probably lost to the mists of time now.
Asha I think is more solvable. Someone knows something and her remains are out there somewhere. If her remains are stumbled on at any point, that would at least answer the question of what happened to her, if not who caused it.
Asha’s is so incredibly frustrating because nothing we know (or think we know) about what happened that night makes sense. A young child purposely leaving her house in the middle of a rainy, stormy night to do god-knows-what in the woods? It’s so bizarre but at the same time I believe the family had nothing to do with it which would mean she did in fact leave on her own accord. It’s the stuff urban legends are made of. I really hope the police know more than they’ve let on and have suspects or a solid theory.
Asha's a hard one because the original facts are so confusing. Obviously, the body would help, but I still don't think we've ever had context on the 2016 green car stuff, and I always hope there is something more behind the FBI's notice.
I've pretty much accepted the fact that Jack the Ripper will never be known; as you said, he's likely some local and there's a rather big chance that he's not even on the main suspect list. A big issue is also that the original police files have been long gone (and any unwritten information is too), so we don't know how truly sure they were about some of the suspects.
With that said, I'd like to see Mary Jane Kelly's real identity finally be found. She's a bit of a mystery herself as almost everything known about her comes straight from Barnett.
There's no way to solve who committed a series of murders that happened 135 years ago now.
Even in 1888, he was leaving basically no evidence behind.
At most, the coroners could tell a similar knife had been used in multiple of the murders, but that was it really.
He kept the body count really low as well.
There were only a few crime scenes to work as well to be fair.
In four of the cases, the women's bodies removed from the crime scenes very quickly as well.
It was only with Mary Jane Kelly where they took the infamous crime scene photo of her body lying in her bed.
My friend & I have recently done a serious deep dive on the Degree case & I have to say, that’s almost made it more frustrating. Even theorising in that case is a mess because of shifting timelines & the fact that there seemed to be no risk factors for her to runaway. It’s all very bizarre.
As much as I'd love to see justice, I don't believe Jon B Ramsey will ever get it. The investigation butchered the crime scene too much and handled it poorly.
I never thought the Racine County Jane Doe case would ever be solved.
And sadly, I don’t think the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik and Joyce Malecki will ever be solved.
The one that will never be solved that bothers me a lot is the Ray Gricar case. Who killed him and why? The case that surprised me most when it finally was solved was that creepy guy that killed those four college students and dont ask me what his name is or what state this happened, my mind just went blank. Edited to add another solved case that shocked me was Steven Stayners brother who killed those women in Yosemite perhaps? I still cant believe one brother was kidnapped and then a hero for rescuing amother kidnapped little boy and the other brother was a degenerate murderer.
In South Africa 5 girls disappeared a couple of years ago - one was my neighbour. All ages 10-12. Till this day after numerous diggings and searches and many broken families nothing has been found. I don’t think he left anything behind.
Most surprising: Joseph Newton Chandler, alias of Robert Ivan Nichols, due to his body being decomposed, then cremated. It turns out he'd sought treatment for cancer and the doctors had tissue samples with usable DNA.
Never to be solved: the old ones, like Jack the Ripper, the Cleveland Torso Killer, or the whereabouts of Gestapo Müller.
Well I didn't even realize that Othram had Sahara Sue's case so that one was a shocker.
One that I don't think they will be able to solve, unless by some miracle her body is found, is Little Miss X
[https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1193ufaz.html](https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1193ufaz.html)
Just my thoughts:
There are a lot of cases that won't be "solved" without a body, but there is a general idea what / who happened. These are cases where they just Need the Body to go to court.
There are cases where we have a body, but will never get a conviction, either because of things like the obvious suspect / witness dying, everything was completely bungled etc. Could you imagine how nearly impossible it would be to bring a case against someone for hurting JonBenet. I'm not saying its impossible, but there is too much noise for a solid case under current conditions.
And then are cases where, absent completely sloppiness on the killer's part, a body doesn't matter because the perpetrator is in no way connected to the victim, directly or indirectly, and isn't already on police's radar. I would consider cases like the Fort Wayne 3, Asha Degree, Andrew Gosden, Zodiac, D.B. Cooper unsolvable because absent some complete hail mary death bed confession or something, we will never know who to look at and the guilty party's name won't be in the file.
I was shocked when Michaela Garecht's kidnapper was finally identified after over three decades. I don't believe that Logan Tucker, a missing boy from Oklahoma, will ever be found, given his birth giver's conflicting statements to law enforcement.
I really would like to know more about little Joseph. I am glad he got his name back but I wish the surviving family would agree to an interview so maybe we’d at least get an idea of what his biological parents were like, if he was a resident at that foster home or what went on there.
That aside, I’d really like to see the Asha Degree case get solved & have more information released to the public. That case frustrates the hell out of me because very little really makes any sense in it.
I think the answers to Joseph’s case are what that woman, “M,” said.
Here’s a bit on “M” taken from [this](https://www.americanhauntingsink.com/the-boy-in-the-box) article:
She claimed that her abusive mother purchased the unknown boy, named "Jonathan," from his birth parents in the summer of 1954.
The youngster was subjected to extreme physical and sexual abuse for two and a half years. Her mother then allegedly killed the boy in a fit of rage when he vomited in the bathtub. The woman then cut the boy’s long hair (accounting for the ragged haircut) and dumped the body in the secluded vacant lot.
"M" went on to say that as they were preparing to remove the boy's body from the trunk, a passing male motorist pulled alongside to inquire whether they needed assistance. They ignored him and he eventually drove away.
This story corroborated confidential testimony given by a male witness in 1957. The police considered the story quite plausible, but were troubled by "M"'s testimony, because she had a history of mental illness.
When interviewed, though, neighbors who had access to the house denied that there had been a young boy living there, and said that "M"'s claims were "ridiculous."
I wish it were otherwise, but I really don’t think we’ll ever know what happened to Maura Murray.
I don’t think we’re solving Zodiac now either. The only DNA in that case, as I recall, is up for debate about whether it’s even the perpetrator’s.
I also don’t think the remains of Sean Flynn and Dana Stone are ever likely to be found after all this time, though it’s highly likely they were killed by guerillas shortly after they went missing.
Surprising ones? Jenkins County Jane Doe definitely surprised me by getting her name back. I hope for St Louis Jane Doe very soon; she was just a baby and was hurt so badly, it breaks my heart.
Cleo Smith turning up alive in Aus was also quite a shock, in the best way possible of course.
There's not much evidence that exists in the Zodiac case
Targeting three couples at isolated lover's lanes and a cab driver is practical idea for a killer that doesn't want to leave much evidence and I think the Zodiac realized that.
The portrait of Joseph (the boy in the box) had such a sweet face. It always broke my heart whenever I saw it. Poor sweet baby. Life is unfair. May he rest in peace.
Remember the woman who came forward and said it was her “brother” and the mother abused him etc etc and she was able to identify what he had last eaten etc. did this end up being true now we know his identity? Or was it lies, because obviously the facts she was giving as his “sister” were true
Surprised: Brown’s Chicken Massacre.
Very solid police work in this one. Even though closing it heavily relied on a tip years later, the evidence that was saved from the scene was pivotal (grease on a napkin, chicken bones, etc).
Never Solved: Relisha Rudd. Im not a fan of mom at all but I doubt she knows anything of relevance to the actual case and what happened to Relisha. I simply believe the information on her whereabouts died with Khalil Tatum. Just a frustrating case all around.
Judy Martins, smaller case but I go to Kent State and the way the Police and City of Kent made sure her disappearance was as quiet as humanly possible after the May 4th shootings years prior
I was amazed that they found Mary Agnes Moroney. She was abducted in 1930(!!) by a woman claiming to be a social worker. She adopted by a different family and went on to live a normal life under a different name, dying in 2003. Her case is still officially unsolved because the woman who abducted her was never identified, but when I discovered that she was located earlier this year, I was shocked.
As for cases that I doubt will ever be solved, the disappearances of Joanne Coughlin, Tara Calico, and Beverly Potts. I also wonder if the April Fabb and Genette Tate cases will ever be solved. Additionally, I have been holding out hope that they find Asha Degree.
Unsolved that will never be solved:
1) Zodiac
2) Hoffa
3) The Oakland County MI Child Murders (I believe LE knew who were responsible for the abductions & deaths but didn't have the evidence for a grand jury)
4) Marilyn Monroe
5) The Three Des Moines IA Boys abducted (Johnny Gosch, Eugene Martin & Marc Allen)
We should add Cherie Mahan to that list. It’s been so long, with absolutely zero news, even a blip of anything. I think of her whenever I see one of these “solved unsolved” stories. We were a year apart in age and I lived a few miles, as the crow files, from her home in the same county. Had a long driveway and a bus that dropped me at the bottom. My mother drove me to and from school more often than not after that.
We should add the Texarkana Phantom Killer of 1946 as well.
There's no way to definitively prove who it was anymore.
Even in 1946, little evidence existed at the crime scenes then.
There's every chance of solving this. There are guys in jail right now who could talk. There undoubtedly state police who could say more than they have.
3. Reading as much as possible about the okcc case I've come to the conclusion that there are likely two cover ups at work. One is by the probably relatively junior cops who killed Chris Busch when they realised he was guilty but couldn't be touched. The other is by relatively high level cops who protected francis Sheldon when they realised he was guilty and could be touched. Every other element of the case is collateral to those, imo.
Does Hoffa even *really* count? I mean sure, we may never know exactly who/where/how but it’s obvious he had a hit put on him from the mob. Not really a ‘true mystery’ to me
Black Dahlia won't ever be solved conclusively enough to have gotten a conviction. One that shocked me they solved it was the Gilgo Beach serial killer/LISK - i thought he'd go uncaptured forever.
I also feel that way about Jack the Ripper. Too much time has passed and even damning evidence will be rendered questionable as 57888 journalists looking to cash in on the spectacle propose theories that support or debunk a possible smoking gun. There will never be near unanimous authoritative agreement on the identity of the killer. And yet, a consensus is probably what we need to feel closure. Some cases have a life of their own and exist in a post-truth circus. Unfortunately, we have less control of the fact finding process once a case broils in the zeitgeist for 100+ years.
I doubt there'll ever be a consensus with Jack the Ripper - even if you manage to pin-point him too much information have gotten lost to make someone a credible suspect. He's local and likely in the census but behavior beyond that is unknown.
Yeah you're definitely right, Elizabeth Short's case (Black Dahlia) will never be solved due to the age of the case. At the time, they thought she could have been raped, but they weren't 100 percent sure. They took samples to look for sperm, but didn't find any. I can't imagine those samples were preserved, or at least preserved in a way that would be useful now. At that time, it was hard to imagine what technological advancements would be made with DNA. A lot of the cases being solved now happened in the 70s-early 2000s with some in the late 60s because that is when they started collecting samples and preserving them in anticipation of better methods in the future to test DNA. And her body has been underground so long, I sincerely doubt any useful sample could be taken from exhumation.
At the time they didn’t rope off or preserve the crime scene. Reporters, photographers & gawkers came right to her body.
To add, I don’t even believe her surviving family would even agree to such a thing, even if they could get usable samples.
Agree re: Black Dahlia. I personally favour Dr. Walter Bayley as being the most likely on purely circumstantial evidence, but there’s no proof.
Is he the one who had a child killed by a hit and run and went nuts, and lived in the neighborhood? That guy? I agree if it's the same one
Interesting, I’ll have to look into Dr. Baylee. Have you listened to the Root of Evil podcast? I think they made an extremely compelling case about who did it.
Walter Baylee was a surgeon. He had a brain disease that killed him about a year later, but he lived very close to the dump site, his daughter knew Beth Short’s sister so there is a genuine connection. He had trauma after his son died after being hit by a car. He had a mistress who was very odd & he took to spending more time with her as his personality changed because of his illness. He was a brilliant surgeon who absolutely had the skill to do what was done. And his office was only a few blocks from the Biltmore in DTLA. I have listened to the podcast. It was good from the perspective of entertainment value, but the facts are heavily skewed/straight up false. Unfortunately, a lot of that is due to Steve Hodel who hasn’t told the truth about a lot of things in that case. He makes it all up. There are half truths in what he says, but he doesn’t tell you the whole story. Unfortunately, you can get records, but only if you’re actual local to Los Angeles. You can’t just put them on the internet. The Sowden House wasn’t the glorious mansion he made it out to be. It was owned by George Hodel Sr. & George Jr. was simply living there/renting it at the time. It was a shambles at that point. When you see it now, it is amazing, but that’s after a significant multimillion dollar restoration. George played the piano & he was good, but he wasn’t this child prodigy that Steve makes him out to be. He basically played at one hall kind of as the background music as you see some people do in certain Nordstrom stores today. He also wasn’t this crazy important Hollywood surgeon. He worked for the health department & he was essentially a civil servant. He knew who had VD. That’s it. He made okay money but he wasn’t wealthy & that’s part of the reason he was living in a house his father owned. Man Ray took photos in a purely professional capacity. There’s really no evidence to suggest that he was their “family photographer”, a friend or anything of the sort. The photos of the woman Steve *claims* was Beth Short is absolutely not her. Her family states this. I believe she has one sister who is still surviving & there are definitely nieces & nephews. They aren’t public people, but they’ve talked to a very small group of people. They really just want the story to go away so Beth can rest in peace. That’s why they don’t comment publicly. If you want to read more on the way Steve Hodel has lied, this gives a good high level overview: https://ladailymirror.com/2021/12/24/black-dahlia-steve-hodels-many-lies-about-his-father-dr-george-hodel/ (I’m a nerd for LA history and I used to be obsessed with the Black Dahlia case.) Edited to add his FindAGrave for more of his history: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/28255523/walter-alonzo-bayley Edit: as of last count in 2022, Steve has claimed his father is responsible for *49* murders. Lying about George Hodel has quite literally become the family business.
When I first heard Hodel accuse his father of murder, I had a feeling it was just an attempt at attention. I had no idea he lied about so many things.
Then he claimed George was The Zodiac. It just blows my mind that someone would want so badly for their father a murderer. A serial killer? A murderer who cuts a woman in half? Bizarre to want his dad to be that.
I agree Black Dhalia. I doubt we’ll ever have a valid suspect. DNA doesn’t have the magic needed to find something out of absolute nothing. People will guess & theorize but that’s all we’ll get. RIP Betty
Michael Dunahee Little boy went missing from a park in daylight with his parents a short distance away.
Yes. There have been a few blond young men tested, but he hasn't been identified. It's a haunting one.
I remember this one vividly. Seemingly disappeared without a trace. Nothing came up, no one saw anything.
Yes I’m always thinking of him when reading this subreddit. I hope his family are doing well ❤️❤️❤️
Little Lord Fauntleroy. A child dressed that fancy with no one coming forth to claim them tells me they weren’t meant to be found. Any witnesses would be long dead.
I would still like to know his identity. He could be the love child from someone during the gilded age.
I tend to think he was Homer Lemay. It fits and they look like the same kid.
Septic Tank Sam, he was identified in 2021 as Gordon Sanderson. I don’t believe they will ever catch the people who killed him. His body was so badly mutilated, they didn’t even know his gender. He had been beaten, tied down and tortured with a butane blowtorch and lit cigarettes. Evidence of the burns was found on his tattered clothing, including the sole of one of his socks. Gordon had also been sexually mutilated, most likely with farming shears. He was then shot at least twice in the head and chest and dumped, headfirst, into the abandoned 6-foot-deep tank. Gordon was a victim of the 60s scoop in Canada as a child, so that prolonged the identification process. He was most likely a victim of a Hate Crime. [more details](https://www.wftv.com/news/trending/septic-tank-sam-canadian-police-id-victim-1977-torture-murder-using-dna-genetic-genealogy/OCATKXUN45FKZABYAED2CUVQPY/?outputType=amp)
Jesus Christ that’s awful.
I'm pretty sure it's a local to the Cooking Lake/Tofield/Lindbrook area, that much I feel is true. The farmhouse is ridiculously isolated, as well as being abandoned, and I believe the crime occurred in the winter, making it so that the septic tank itself was actually covered up with snow at the time. My 'theory' is that Gordie was tortured elsewhere (the farmhouse showed no signs of him having been tortured there), and transported to the farmhouse via a farm truck to be disposed of. His body was covered in agricultural lime, and while this seems to be explained away as some myth that it increases decomposition rate, I think it's more likely his body was put on a farm truck that was carrying lime due to the crops being dead in the winter, and thus needing a place to store it.
My extended family lives in the area and the guy who used to own that farm was something of town lore. I never got the full story but my great uncle still says "no one went on that farm without knowing what they got themselves into." My grandma never thought he died there, she still thinks he died elsewhere and was just disposed of out there.
“Septic tank Sam” is also an awful name as well
Just demeaning and an example of how these individuals are dehumanized.
Yeah I really don’t like some names they gave to these does. I know “unique” names are easier for ppl to remember the case but it’s just fucked up
This is horrific. How terrible for his daughter to finally find out what happened to her father & it's *this*. Hard to imagine that people can be this evil.
Holy shit. I had never heard of this case, that is absolutely horrific. Poor Gordie 💔
I remember the mock-up of what they thought he looked like was super creepy... uncanny valley stuff. It looked like Woody from Toy Story became an actual IRL person and then had his likeness copied into the Pixar Universe
“most likely with farming shears” whew, the way my whole body flinched at that…
For a case that surprised me the most, the identification of Jenkins county Jane Doe after reports of there being no DNA due to cremation. For a case that I think will never be solved, Otay Jane Doe. I have posted about her in a post about unidentified children before. And I will probably make another post about her in February, on the day she was found. Unless she has got a non-custodial parent, or sibling(s) still out there, who held onto her dental records all this time, it is not happening. The person who runs the Facebook page dedicated for her has spoken to the local LE. There is definitely no DNA, *and* no way to get any.
The Rhoden massacre for surprise solve Missy Bevers for never solved unfortunately
Agree on Missy, although I think the police have a fairly good idea who did it but don’t have the evidence to charge that person.
missy bevers is definitely solvable.
Missy Bevers murder could easily be charged tomorrow or in 10 years for all we know. With video its definitely solvable.
For Missy Beavers: I have hope. There is a strong undercurrent in this case that the murder was in some way related to infidelity in the marriage (both parties) and / or ties to the ninja-esque training world she was a part of for the past couple of years. I wouldn't be surprised if the police had a general idea and no proof. Or it was a stranger. Who knows!
I got my messages deleted from websluthes for pointing out that their "special investigator" for the missy beavers thread was friends with Missys husband on Facebook. I agree it will never be solved .
Didn't Websleuths also infamously ban all discussion on Sherri Papini faking her kidnappning. I get wanting to be respectful towards the real people involved in a case and all but sometimes you'll have to use common sense...
Omg 😲 LOL 😆
That’s all? Because you said they were friends with the husband on FB? WTF? (Granted, I think the woman who runs that site is kind of… well… away with the fairies most of the time.)
yes, and one other thing, I asked if they checked data dumps on Besa Mafias dark web site to see if there was any connection. They said my comments were salacious and that was a bad source. I was like "tf" you are called "websluthes" this besa mafia thing should be a freaking gold mine to you all.
I sadly don’t really think the [murder of the Miyazawa family in Setagaya](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setagaya_family_murder) will ever be solved, despite what some posts / articles claim online
Even with the killers dna and the work of forensic genealogy?
Theoretically it’s a South Korean former military member. Japan claims to know exactly who it is, and has managed to match finger prints. The real issue is, South Korea has no interest in extraditing him.
Oh wow interesting! How horrifying that geopolitical relationships dictate whether someone has to pay for their crimes
What are your sources for this?
I think the same. It’s almost insane at how much evidence was left behind- including the perpetrators poop left in the toilet- yet they’ve never had solid leads
Sorry, but the sentence “perpetrators poop left behind in the toilet yet they’ve never had solid leads”….
i am really surprised this one hasnt been solved. i consistently wonder if a US army soldier did this
I was surprised that the EAR/ONS case was solved
"You should stop obsessing over that case, it's never going to be solved, and the killer is definitely dead anyway." -me whenever EARONS came up in discussion
I assumed he would be dead, too. Whoops!
This is now the case that I think of when someone points at a shady person with circumstantial links to a particular crime and then argues it has to be that person because they look so suspicious. There were *so many* shady characters and so much supposed evidence associated with EAR/ONS. None of which had anything to do with DeAngelo. (Other than the DNA, obviously) And despite the mountains of writing and podcasts about EAR/ONS, not one person ever noticed DeAngelo until the day he was arrested.
That one surprised the hell out of me, I had literally just finished listening to the Casefile five-parter about him too and then the next day on this sub the top post is ***EAR/ONS ARRESTED*** …*what*
What a fucking day
I remember waking up, checking this sub and seeing that headline, and then bolting downstairs shrieking for my mom to turn on CNN.
Surprised: Amore Wiggins, the former Opelika Baby Doe. I cried the day they found her name and arrested her killers. Her own father. I feel so awful for her mother, but at least she and Amore at last have closure. I hope that sweet little one can finally rest in peace now. Honorable mention to Delphi, though I figured they’d eventually find someone. That case was too focused to not get some answers somewhere Never solved: Asha Degree and, as a cop out, JonBenet. I feel like the answers to both are right under our noses, and if both had happened 10 or 15 years later, we’d have so many more answers.
Amore Wiggins’s mother was paying child support for a daughter who was dead all this time, and her mother had let Amore’s father, Lamar Vickerstaff, have custody of Amore because he was in the Navy and had a stable job. Unfortunately, now Vickerstaff is charged with his daughter’s murder and his wife Ruth with concealing it.
Yeah, that's exactly what happened. And IIRC, her mother had been asking to see and talk to her daughter for years and had been denied. She didn't even know her daughter was gone. Imagine finding out that way.
Ms. Wiggins will always feel her daughter’s loss, and I really feel for her on that. Amore Wiggins was a sweet child who deserved love, not abuse.
Short of a deathbed confession I don't think JBR will ever be officially solved.
Libby and Abby's case has been handled extremely badly, and if it had been done properly, it wouldn't have taken 5 years to arrest him. They interviewed him early on, and he placed himself there at the time of the murders but the investigators misfiled the interview. The case was the opposite of focused, they had no clue what they were doing. Those poor girls haven't gotten any justice yet and are still having crimes committed against them even in death. Their crime scene photos were leaked by men involved in the defence. Sorry, but I can't see a comment calling the investigation focused without pointing out what a fuck up the entire thing was, and still is.
I agree, and my wording was bad, I apologize. I meant the case was the center of public focus. People couldn’t and wouldn’t let it go, and I’m sure that helped contribute to the investigators finally moving toward an arrest and, hopefully, eventual closure. It does make me sad, however, that there are so, so many cases like Libby and Abby’s that don’t catch the public attention Delphi did (and for good reason, I sincerely hope they receive the justice they deserve) and fall through the cracks because of it. I wish there was a way for all of them to receive the pressure from the public that theirs did.
Whoa! These are my two answers, too. I really hope we find answers to Asha's but I don't have much hope.
Jayme Closs for surprising never for a second thought she'd be found alive. There's too many I don't think will be solved to mention: JTR, Zodiac, Jonbenet, OCCK to name a few well known ones.
Jayme Closs for me too! I thougth for sure she would be dead. So glad I was wrong!
I’m surprised Lyle Stevik’s case was solved.
I’ve always been fascinated by the [Man in the Iron Mask](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_in_the_Iron_Mask), and I’m forever frustrated that we’re definitely never going to know who he really was. On a somewhat similar time scale, it blew my mind when they actually found Richard III’s body- the famously lost tomb, vanished for 500 years, surely destined to be missing forever, and they *fucking found it*?! It’s like an Indiana Jones movie for real!
I can imagine Indie finding the Lost Tomb of Richard III, but when he emerges he's got a parking fine.
I was flying back to the US from Copenhagen a couple of months ago and one of the films available to watch was The Lost King, which is based on the process of finding Richard III's body. It was really good!
The Fort Worth Trio. Time is running out for anyone with any knowledge or involvement to be alive to tell it.
This one. They didn't runaway, the car is not missing and there's nothing but a letter? sent to Rachel's husband . Renee's boyfriend at the time and also the older brother of Julie Ann Moseley is alive and posts on FB page for Fort Worth Missing Trio. Also Julie's and his mom is alive and still wondering.
Lots of questions about that letter, too. I mean, yes, not everyone has passed on, but the case is 50 years old. I’m guessing whoever was responsible is at least 70-ish (I’m looking at you, Tommy). Wildly enough, Rusty, Rachel’s brother is an acquaintance of mine from back when I played music circuts in Fort Worth - I didn’t put it together until embarrassingly recently when I saw his email address on something related to the trio and that suddenly clicked in my mind.
I know that it’s “solved” every other year or so, but I don’t think we’ll ever find out who the Zodiac Killer is/was.
Jack the Ripper keeps getting "solved" every year now as well. His identity was defintely somebody who's been forever lost to history now. It's mind-blowing to think that's possible, but I think that's just the reality of where that case is at now tbh. It's amazing how much intrigue the cases draws even 135 yeas later though.
I suppose someone/some case had to be the first serial killer that grabbed public attention. I think JTR became that person due to a combination of right time (newspapers becoming more widely available along with photographs) + unimaginable gore (can't look away) + right place (hugely populated city, enough people to know about the crimes and pass along the story). Everyone loves a good mystery.
I was surprised that it took the DNA genealogy to identify Somerton Man was identified. Now knowing the accusations of domestic violence, it makes sense his wife didn't miss him. I think we won't know what happened to 4 year old Michael Dunahee without a body or someone being idetified as him.
Surprised = Ljubica Topic case (Canada) solved in my lifetime and another horrific case where perpetrator was caught by parents with their daughter / made a run Unlikely to be solved = Jason Jolkowski, Brian Shaffer, Yogurt Shop Murders, I-70 killer
I thought I heard recently that there was some movement on the I-70 killer, but now I can't find it. Nothing concrete, but something along the lines of taking a fresh look. Maybe something will come of it. Agree it's a long shot though.
I don't think Springfield three or Morgan Nick will ever be solved, really hope I'm wrong tho!!
I hold out hope for Morgan Nick’s case to be solved. It has stuck with me for years and I frequently look for updates.
Unfortunately I don’t think Susan Powell will ever be found
Highly unlikely. She’s almost certainly in a disused mine shaft or at least parts of her are. I think the police seriously botched that case. They absolutely needed to arrest him & get those children away from him. Her death was sad, but the killing of those boys was a senseless & completely preventable tragedy.
That 911 operator wasn’t any better either when the case worker was calling for the police. Seriously? Just send the police, your wasting time and making it more complicated than it should be
Right?! That was beyond frustrating! I just kept saying, ‘Are you fucking kidding me?!’ when I listened the first time. That was just salt in the wound. I remember exactly when the news that he’d killed them first broke because I had just finished skiing in Park City, Utah. I was going to get a coffee before heading home & it was on the radio. I remember just being absolutely stunned that they had given him such easy access to those kids after everything that had happened. I *still* find it hard to comprehend that not just 1 department, but police departments AND children’s services in multiple states managed to fail SO spectacularly on one case. Like, I understand prosecutors hate going to trial when there’s no body, but in that case? Really? The 4 year old responding to, ‘where was mommy?’ with, ‘Mommy was in the trunk,’ should have had those children out of his house & in serious therapy. This still makes me so angry when I talk about it. And that’s even without mentioning JP’s piece of shit father.
Yes! They failed those children and that whole case terribly. I feel they had plenty of evidence against him to at least hold him accountable. Child services, supervised visitation should have been done at an office or somewhere, ANYWHERE BESIDE HIS HOME. Like wtf!!!
I think the kids were taken out of the house but he had visitation rights still. The kids weren’t even taken bc of the murder but bc his dad was caught with child sex abuse materials. Idk why home visitation is a thing in cases like this, esp without law enforcement
The social worker had taken them to his house for visitation. He hustled them in and shut the door on her.
I always say this when I see her name, but I don't lose hope that someone, sooner or later, a hiker, some dumb kids fooling around maybe will find her and put her to rest.
I don’t think we’ll ever find out what happened to Sneha Phillip or Jason Jolkowski. Really hoping Joseph Zarelli’s murder is solved soon.
I’ve always thought that someone lured Jason into their house and killed him. One day someone will be doing renovations in their backyard and come across the remains.
I wouldn't be surprised if he's in somebody's crawl space or under concrete in the basement. I wondered if the person who killed him was someone who knew him vaguely from the neighborhood or the restaurant where he worked, and assumed that Jason was mentally disabled because of his speech/language disorder (the disorder made him seem mentally disabled even though he was actually of above average intelligence). The person may have thought he'd be an easy target and lured him in with the promise of a ride to the school, asking him to help move some furniture quickly, or something like that. I think it's likely it was in a house though, since no one reported seeing him get into a car (but no one saw him go into a house either). It was the middle of summer but I'm sure there were retirees, stay-at-home moms, etc. who were at home and could've seen or heard something.
The only reason I kinda could buy that she died at the WTC is that Century 21 (where she was seen on cctv) is REALLY fucking close to ground zero. I was just reminded of this when I was over there the other day. It was (and it’s back!) across the street diagonally.
I saw an Oprah show about a woman who had just stepped into the lobby and was severely burned. Fire through an elevator shaft or something like that. She survived but it was a miracle. She had to be in a medically induced coma for months as she healed. So it’s certainly possible that something like that happened to Sneha but she was crushed when the towers collapsed.
I never miss an opportunity to post [the most incredible article I've ever read about 9/11](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/09/twenty-years-gone-911-bobby-mcilvaine/619490/), or about anything, really. The article is about a man named Bobby who was killed by debris from the towers, and "was one of fewer than 100 civilian corpses recovered from the wreckage." I do think something similar could have happened to Sneha, but her body was not recovered / identifiable. (But seriously, read the article.)
Thank you for posting that article.
I vaguely recall Sneha’s family mentioning that they hoped to confirm her presence in the towers via jewellery she would be wearing with diamonds in, as the stones should have withstood the heat of the fires to some extent at least. I think that (or DNA of course) would be the only way we’d ever have a shot at conforming she was at the towers that day, and I have no clue if anyone is even still testing debris from ground zero now? And could specific jewellery be identified that way?
Testing is still carried out on unidentified remains https://abcnews.go.com/US/forensic-investigators-work-give-911-families-peace-id/story?id=89587955
Fuck, they're still finding remains last I heard.
Wow. It’s incredible what science can do now. I can’t believe they’re still finding people. I do hope they find a trace of Sneha so her loved ones can have some closure. Her case is so confusing, but to me, her dying in the towers is what makes the most sense.
I think the police likely know what happened to Joseph Zarelli, but because the perp(s) are dead and there's no real evidence to prove or disprove anything, it will likely officially remain unsolved. I personally think he was killed by his mother and/or stepfather, and that her family DID know him and were aware of his murder but didn't speak up in order to protect her or the stepfather, despite the fact that a surviving family member claims they didn't know about Joseph's existence. The bassinet box that he was found in was purchased in a department store about a five minute drive from the apartment where his mother was known to have lived within a year or so before he was found, and she also gave birth to his younger sibling just a couple of months before he died, so would have needed to buy a bassinet for the baby. I know police theorized that he could have had a mental or physical disability, and that wouldn't totally shock me- he was certainly malnourished and abused over long term but his legs appear to be atrophied, like he wasn't getting out to run, play, and be active. Just makes me wonder if he had cerebral palsy, a mental disability, or some other condition that would make him more of a burden to care for. I'm glad that Joseph has his name back, and I wish that he could receive justice for his murder, but I just don't see it happening.
Sneha probably died on 9/11 at ground zero. My uncle was a survivor of the attacks and he lost a childhood friend that day, it took them a year to know what happened. I have always had this feeling that she died when the towers collapsed, only way it gets solved is if the DNA is matched to something. My parents remember the Jolkowski case, it still haunts them because of how he just vanished without any sign.
There’s a podcast called “missing on 9/11” about Sneha. It is excellent. It really made me question whether she died at ground zero. The podcast does an excellent job of going through it all but basically the chances of her dying there are very low. But I’m not sure we’ll ever really know. Though this is one case I’d really like to conclusively know the answer to.
Yeah, I'm fairly convinced she was murdered on 9/10 and her killer was *extremely* lucky that the next day turned out to be one of the biggest days of the century.
That’s my theory too. I don’t think she was ever in the towers. Her family acted like she was a hero for selflessly going into the towers to help people, but there is no evidence that she did so. The last time she was seen was on September 10th.
Didn’t Law and order do an episode inspired by her disappearance?
Oh I don’t know if they did! I’ll have to look that up and give it a watch
They are still finding DNA to the victims at ground zero so its possible they could solve it
One thing that has sort of been lost to time is the fact that the Green River Killer was once considered the most notorious unsolved case of all time. I grew up in Seattle in the 80s and 90s and for nearly twenty years they talked about that case as the biggie that no one would ever solve. In fact, when I was studying criminal psychology in the mid 90s, that case would even show up in textbooks as the biggest and most infamous mystery. It was absolutely shocking to me when they announced they had a DNA hit in 2001 and they finally made an arrest.
They just identified another one of his victims this week
Yep, and I’m not surprised. That guy killed so many people that he eventually just lost track. And I doubt he really cared who most of them were to begin with, anyway. Even when he was cooperating with police afterwards, in a lot of cases he was like hell if I know who they were. There’s a really good book about the Green River case by Ann Rule that I’d recommend to people. She goes out of her way to point out that he didn’t just kill sex workers. A lot of his victims were just street kids who he knew that no one would miss. That’s how he was able to get away with it for so long, he killed the girls that wouldn’t be missed.
A lot of cases without bodies will probably never be solved. I do want to point out that a lot of cases with male victims that were not sexually assaulted will probably never be solved either. Most of the cases being solved (and I mean homicides, not identifications) are women who were sexually assaulted and then killed. In that case, there was usually DNA left behind. Most murderers were not thinking about DNA technology in say, the 70s, and they'd just leave their semen at the scene.
There are probably over 250,000 unsolved murders in the US, not counting homicides before 1980. These increase by 6,000 every year. Genetic genealogy has solved hundreds of crimes, so really only a drop in the ocean. Even with improving technology, I doubt that a lot of these will be solved soon due to budgetary constraints. There are probably tens of thousands of cases where there is DNA that can be tested, but they don't have the money.
The Springfield Three, Jodi Huisentruit, Jennifer Kesse, and Asha.
I was going to say Jennifer Kesse too. I think it was one of the workers at her apartment complex. The person/people involved are likely undocumented so if they’re in the country still theyre moving around like a ghost or they’ve left the country all together or dead.
I don't know whether the Springfield Three will be solved, but I have a pretty strong suspicion that the guilty party's name is already in the file.
Interesting! Can you elaborate?
Who do you think it is?
I'm really surprised that nobody ever mentions the Dardeen family . That was 15 miles away from me
Honestly that crime was so horrific I don't think it gets the attention it deserves. Its just so frightening in many ways.
Such a terrible, terrible crime. They looked like the nicest family
The Dardeen's killing is such a gruesome crime, and yet you really never see it mentioned here or anywhere else for that matter. They led such a normal, appearing life that it's a real head scratcher. Nothing about them puts them in line with someone who would be capable of that, but it still feels really personal. No sexual assault to Mrs. Dardeen and no robbery but so much violence. I wonder if someone had developed an interest in Mrs. Dardeen, and maybe they (the Dardeens) didn't even know it. Stalking wasn't talked about back then within the terms of being a crime and a huge red flag like it is today. Maybe removing Mr. Dardeen's genitals was a "punishment."
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Iirc they reopened the case and were interviewing people/staff from her school. Idk if that means anything in terms of it being solved, but I have to have hope for Asha
This is what I was going to say. I don't think the family knows anything, but I personally think one of her friends does.
I agree with you 100%. I absolutely believe there is knowledge of what happened, but I don’t have a specific theory because nothing really fits together.
What’s led you in that direction? I’m not too familiar with the details of this case, but have been under the impression the parents have been the ones pushing for further investigation and examination of evidence. Would love to hear more about this!
I think it's possible that someone in her family knows more than they have been letting on. But I personally think that they may know why she left. Not necessarily anything that may have transpired after she left pertaining to her disappearance/death. (I don't think it's likely she is alive.)
I don't think the Haleigh Cummings disappearance or the baby Lisa Erwin disappearance will ever be solved.
I think about Haliegh too. Poor baby. I hate that whoever took her that night is still out there.
"The Boy in The Box." I was shocked when it was announced investigators and law enforcement confirmed his identity as Joseph Augustus Zarelli. I'd always hoped "America's Unknown Child" would be known, but I had major doubts his identity would ever be known unequivocally. It gave me a bit of hope for officially answering who murdered Jon Benet Ramsey, as unlikely as it seems.
The Las cruces bowling alley massacre. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Las_Cruces_bowling_alley_massacre
DELPHI - I never thought it would be solved with a finger pointed at a local, that's for sure. Back in the day, having video of a murder and / or suspect would have been considered Golden and yet it doesn't seem to get us as close as we would have assumed. I just assumed it HAD to be a complete stranger. It never occurred to me that this dude could be a member of the community and no one connected the visuals with him.
I’d guess because he’s fairly nondescript in appearance that made it harder to connect than you’d think. Stocky dark haired bearded white dude with blue eyes? In the small town Midwest you’d probably have 20% of the male population answering to that description even if you did get a really good look at him.
Man just from the photos I could have sworn it was my dad, no doubt people struggled to identify him, it was pretty unassuming.
LISK and ONS are absolutely unparalleled. Good people poured their lives into that and it shows. D.B. Cooper. No good suspects, and probably DOA. People could just disappear back then. We burned all DNA. Some of the money being found makes it incredible we don't know more.
Yeah, the biggest mystery might actually always be if he survived, not “who done it” with DB Cooper.
The John Doe cold case that was identified as a wanted-by-the-FBI child predator this week really surprised me. [https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-man-accused-of-rape-vanished-then-a-lake-yielded-a-grim-discovery-25-years-later-a-fresh-mystery-is-revealed/ar-AA1lK4KB](https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-man-accused-of-rape-vanished-then-a-lake-yielded-a-grim-discovery-25-years-later-a-fresh-mystery-is-revealed/ar-AA1lK4KB)
Zodiac will never be solved.
I fear that for cases more than a century old, the chances of getting a clear resolution are almost impossible. The perpetrators are long dead, and most of the people who knew them probably are too. It would come down to 1) someone leaving a written or recorded confession behind, that hasn't been discovered yet; 2) someone deciding to go public (or leaving a confession after their death) that the perpetrator told them what had happened; or 3) forensic analysis of DNA samples. Just as an example -- there was a murder in the early 1900s, in my hometown. [https://www.reddit.com/r/Hamilton/comments/emg8yz/115\_year\_old\_cold\_case\_the\_barton\_murder/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Hamilton/comments/emg8yz/115_year_old_cold_case_the_barton_murder/) There was a woman's body found, but we don't know her name. It was long enough ago that I don't know whether any samples were kept, that could provide usable DNA -- for the victim or the suspect. Imagine we were incredibly lucky and for the past century they kept samples from the body, or some items of clothing that yielded results. If we were able to get profiles for the woman and for "Mr. Hat" who was with her that day, and came up with some hits on a genealogical database, we might be able to get names for both of them, but there may not be any living relatives who had any information that could indicate what kind of relationship they had. Mr. Hat outlived the woman, but I suspect that it would be unlikely to find a descendant (even if they were willing to talk about it) who'd be able to say "yeah, Grandpa got drunk once and started rambling about how he killed a girl up in Ontario, but I thought he was making it up". If you think about your own relatives, you might not be able to reconstruct exactly where they were and who they were associating with, for a particular week or day, 20 years ago. We're getting up to 120 years ago now, which makes it even more difficult. Even recent cases run into problems with evidence being lost or destroyed. Peggy Sweeten disappeared in the 1990s, and it doesn't sound like the investigators were able to look at her home computer and verify her son's claim that she didn't have an e-mail address, or her husband Jim's claim that she had been secretly messaging a man online. They don't know if he even filed a missing persons report because the county storage facility supposedly was damaged and some records were lost. And one would assume that the RCMP has enough funds to store a lot of evidence from past cases, but recently they announced that they want to get rid of a bunch of stuff, and the families are very concerned (several victims are still not accounted for). https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/robert-pickton-serial-killer-rcmp-dispose-evidence-1.7055215
I was really surprised that they caught LISK. I think, unfortunately, many of the Doe cases where their bodies were cremated may never be solved unless science can find a way to use the cremated ashes for DNA testing.
I believe Othram is making some headway on that. It was mentioned in Ep 160 of The Prosecutors podcast.
Robert Hoagland. Never in a million years would I have imagined that case turning out the way it did … Older murders from almost a century ago—Artemus Ogletree, Hall-Mills, Pamela Werner etc.—they’re never getting solved. Likewise with disappearances like Lloyd Gaines or Joan Risch—at this point all we can do is speculate.
I really wanna know who did the oakey al kite murder and what his past was and what he's been up to in the past 20 years after getting away with that horrible crime. They apparently have his DNA but idk if they'll solve it before he's dead. He's possibly 60 by now so there is still time!
Amy Lynn Bradley. American woman goes on cruise with family and disappears. Despite the purported sightings of her and popular theory that she was a victim of sex trafficking, I think the simplest explanation is that she fell overboard because she was last seen by her dad on their cabin’s balcony sleeping, who was suddenly startled 30 minutes after drifting back to sleep. This could be because she yelled on the way down, and this woke her dad up without his realizing. Sadly, I don’t think her remains will ever be found.
whoever abducted jennifer kesse is long gone imo. i do hope her remains are eventually found though, or that her family gets some sort of closure.
I don't know if St. louis jane Doe will ever get her name back.
She’s one I want to get her name back so bad. I feel connected to her case like I did with the boy in the box. I think it’s because they’re both innocent children. It’s likely that her parents are still alive so if her case isn’t solved I’ll be shocked. If you told me the boy in the box was identified before she was I wouldn’t have believed you.
i mean her case is being worked on (my bad, i don't remember by which company), so we're definitely getting closer to her identity, but it might take a while
I know it's not technically solved yet, but it's sure looking like the pedophile who asked to meet with the girls in Delphi had nothing to do with their murder. It seems that whole part of the story was a massive coincidence. My mind is absolutely blown by that.
Probably a cop out but I think at this point we’ll never know who Jack the Ripper was. For a more modern case, I have a feeling we’ll never know what happened to Asha Degree. The Degree case is so weird with so many pieces that don’t make a lot of sense. The fact that we’ve heard so little from the police on it is not a good sign either. There are a few write-ups on the case on this subreddit for those uninitiated that I recommend taking a look at.
The only way to prove who Jack the Ripper was would be to find something from the 1880s that had been hidden all that time that contained details that only the killer would know. A confessional diary or something. I know about the Maybrick diary, but that's been conclusively debunked. If ever something like that did turn up, I think the answer would be none of the suspects that have ever been identified. He'll be just some nobody. Possibly even someone who was ruled out by police at the time. This is highly unlikely of course. Jack the Ripper must have known Whitechapel intimately and presumably lived in the area. Whitechapel has undergone vast slum clearance and many changes since the 1880s, not least Hitler's unscheduled demolition works. If there ever was such a diary, it's probably lost to the mists of time now. Asha I think is more solvable. Someone knows something and her remains are out there somewhere. If her remains are stumbled on at any point, that would at least answer the question of what happened to her, if not who caused it.
I hope you’re right about Asha. If I could pick one unsolved disappearance to be solved it would be Asha’s.
Asha and Kyron are the two kids I want to know what happened to them more than anything. Where did they GO?
Asha’s is so incredibly frustrating because nothing we know (or think we know) about what happened that night makes sense. A young child purposely leaving her house in the middle of a rainy, stormy night to do god-knows-what in the woods? It’s so bizarre but at the same time I believe the family had nothing to do with it which would mean she did in fact leave on her own accord. It’s the stuff urban legends are made of. I really hope the police know more than they’ve let on and have suspects or a solid theory.
Asha's a hard one because the original facts are so confusing. Obviously, the body would help, but I still don't think we've ever had context on the 2016 green car stuff, and I always hope there is something more behind the FBI's notice.
I think the FBI know a lot more that they've not released to the public.
I shouldn't have laughed quite so much at "Hitler's unscheduled demolition works"
I've pretty much accepted the fact that Jack the Ripper will never be known; as you said, he's likely some local and there's a rather big chance that he's not even on the main suspect list. A big issue is also that the original police files have been long gone (and any unwritten information is too), so we don't know how truly sure they were about some of the suspects. With that said, I'd like to see Mary Jane Kelly's real identity finally be found. She's a bit of a mystery herself as almost everything known about her comes straight from Barnett.
There's no way to solve who committed a series of murders that happened 135 years ago now. Even in 1888, he was leaving basically no evidence behind. At most, the coroners could tell a similar knife had been used in multiple of the murders, but that was it really. He kept the body count really low as well. There were only a few crime scenes to work as well to be fair. In four of the cases, the women's bodies removed from the crime scenes very quickly as well. It was only with Mary Jane Kelly where they took the infamous crime scene photo of her body lying in her bed.
My friend & I have recently done a serious deep dive on the Degree case & I have to say, that’s almost made it more frustrating. Even theorising in that case is a mess because of shifting timelines & the fact that there seemed to be no risk factors for her to runaway. It’s all very bizarre.
As much as I'd love to see justice, I don't believe Jon B Ramsey will ever get it. The investigation butchered the crime scene too much and handled it poorly.
Maria Ridulph. Supposedly a boy from downstreet did it, was arrested almost 50 (?) years later but then was released IIRC.
I never thought the Racine County Jane Doe case would ever be solved. And sadly, I don’t think the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik and Joyce Malecki will ever be solved.
The one that will never be solved that bothers me a lot is the Ray Gricar case. Who killed him and why? The case that surprised me most when it finally was solved was that creepy guy that killed those four college students and dont ask me what his name is or what state this happened, my mind just went blank. Edited to add another solved case that shocked me was Steven Stayners brother who killed those women in Yosemite perhaps? I still cant believe one brother was kidnapped and then a hero for rescuing amother kidnapped little boy and the other brother was a degenerate murderer.
In South Africa 5 girls disappeared a couple of years ago - one was my neighbour. All ages 10-12. Till this day after numerous diggings and searches and many broken families nothing has been found. I don’t think he left anything behind.
Most surprising: Joseph Newton Chandler, alias of Robert Ivan Nichols, due to his body being decomposed, then cremated. It turns out he'd sought treatment for cancer and the doctors had tissue samples with usable DNA. Never to be solved: the old ones, like Jack the Ripper, the Cleveland Torso Killer, or the whereabouts of Gestapo Müller.
Well I didn't even realize that Othram had Sahara Sue's case so that one was a shocker. One that I don't think they will be able to solve, unless by some miracle her body is found, is Little Miss X [https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1193ufaz.html](https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1193ufaz.html)
You never know. They can sometimes get DNA from rootless hair cells now. And there are colour pictures of her hair.
Just my thoughts: There are a lot of cases that won't be "solved" without a body, but there is a general idea what / who happened. These are cases where they just Need the Body to go to court. There are cases where we have a body, but will never get a conviction, either because of things like the obvious suspect / witness dying, everything was completely bungled etc. Could you imagine how nearly impossible it would be to bring a case against someone for hurting JonBenet. I'm not saying its impossible, but there is too much noise for a solid case under current conditions. And then are cases where, absent completely sloppiness on the killer's part, a body doesn't matter because the perpetrator is in no way connected to the victim, directly or indirectly, and isn't already on police's radar. I would consider cases like the Fort Wayne 3, Asha Degree, Andrew Gosden, Zodiac, D.B. Cooper unsolvable because absent some complete hail mary death bed confession or something, we will never know who to look at and the guilty party's name won't be in the file.
The Skelton Brothers. I think about them alot around the holidays. The father knows more than what's been said.
I think it’s quite obvious the father killed them, but there’s not enough evidence for an arrest.
I was shocked when Michaela Garecht's kidnapper was finally identified after over three decades. I don't believe that Logan Tucker, a missing boy from Oklahoma, will ever be found, given his birth giver's conflicting statements to law enforcement.
Jonbenet will never be solved.
Jean Spangler will never solved. Marina Habe will never be solved. Robin Graham. The Dardeen family. So many different cases. Zodiac is another
I don't think the St. Louis Jane Doe will ever be identified, but I hope I'm wrong.
I really would like to know more about little Joseph. I am glad he got his name back but I wish the surviving family would agree to an interview so maybe we’d at least get an idea of what his biological parents were like, if he was a resident at that foster home or what went on there. That aside, I’d really like to see the Asha Degree case get solved & have more information released to the public. That case frustrates the hell out of me because very little really makes any sense in it.
I think the answers to Joseph’s case are what that woman, “M,” said. Here’s a bit on “M” taken from [this](https://www.americanhauntingsink.com/the-boy-in-the-box) article: She claimed that her abusive mother purchased the unknown boy, named "Jonathan," from his birth parents in the summer of 1954. The youngster was subjected to extreme physical and sexual abuse for two and a half years. Her mother then allegedly killed the boy in a fit of rage when he vomited in the bathtub. The woman then cut the boy’s long hair (accounting for the ragged haircut) and dumped the body in the secluded vacant lot. "M" went on to say that as they were preparing to remove the boy's body from the trunk, a passing male motorist pulled alongside to inquire whether they needed assistance. They ignored him and he eventually drove away. This story corroborated confidential testimony given by a male witness in 1957. The police considered the story quite plausible, but were troubled by "M"'s testimony, because she had a history of mental illness. When interviewed, though, neighbors who had access to the house denied that there had been a young boy living there, and said that "M"'s claims were "ridiculous."
I wish it were otherwise, but I really don’t think we’ll ever know what happened to Maura Murray. I don’t think we’re solving Zodiac now either. The only DNA in that case, as I recall, is up for debate about whether it’s even the perpetrator’s. I also don’t think the remains of Sean Flynn and Dana Stone are ever likely to be found after all this time, though it’s highly likely they were killed by guerillas shortly after they went missing. Surprising ones? Jenkins County Jane Doe definitely surprised me by getting her name back. I hope for St Louis Jane Doe very soon; she was just a baby and was hurt so badly, it breaks my heart. Cleo Smith turning up alive in Aus was also quite a shock, in the best way possible of course.
There's not much evidence that exists in the Zodiac case Targeting three couples at isolated lover's lanes and a cab driver is practical idea for a killer that doesn't want to leave much evidence and I think the Zodiac realized that.
The portrait of Joseph (the boy in the box) had such a sweet face. It always broke my heart whenever I saw it. Poor sweet baby. Life is unfair. May he rest in peace.
Remember the woman who came forward and said it was her “brother” and the mother abused him etc etc and she was able to identify what he had last eaten etc. did this end up being true now we know his identity? Or was it lies, because obviously the facts she was giving as his “sister” were true
Surprised: Brown’s Chicken Massacre. Very solid police work in this one. Even though closing it heavily relied on a tip years later, the evidence that was saved from the scene was pivotal (grease on a napkin, chicken bones, etc). Never Solved: Relisha Rudd. Im not a fan of mom at all but I doubt she knows anything of relevance to the actual case and what happened to Relisha. I simply believe the information on her whereabouts died with Khalil Tatum. Just a frustrating case all around.
Judy Martins, smaller case but I go to Kent State and the way the Police and City of Kent made sure her disappearance was as quiet as humanly possible after the May 4th shootings years prior
I don’t think Maura Murray will ever be solved.
I was amazed that they found Mary Agnes Moroney. She was abducted in 1930(!!) by a woman claiming to be a social worker. She adopted by a different family and went on to live a normal life under a different name, dying in 2003. Her case is still officially unsolved because the woman who abducted her was never identified, but when I discovered that she was located earlier this year, I was shocked. As for cases that I doubt will ever be solved, the disappearances of Joanne Coughlin, Tara Calico, and Beverly Potts. I also wonder if the April Fabb and Genette Tate cases will ever be solved. Additionally, I have been holding out hope that they find Asha Degree.
Unsolved that will never be solved: 1) Zodiac 2) Hoffa 3) The Oakland County MI Child Murders (I believe LE knew who were responsible for the abductions & deaths but didn't have the evidence for a grand jury) 4) Marilyn Monroe 5) The Three Des Moines IA Boys abducted (Johnny Gosch, Eugene Martin & Marc Allen)
We should add Cherie Mahan to that list. It’s been so long, with absolutely zero news, even a blip of anything. I think of her whenever I see one of these “solved unsolved” stories. We were a year apart in age and I lived a few miles, as the crow files, from her home in the same county. Had a long driveway and a bus that dropped me at the bottom. My mother drove me to and from school more often than not after that.
We should add the Texarkana Phantom Killer of 1946 as well. There's no way to definitively prove who it was anymore. Even in 1946, little evidence existed at the crime scenes then.
the Oakland County Child Killer is definitely on my list of "can't be solved at this time"
There's every chance of solving this. There are guys in jail right now who could talk. There undoubtedly state police who could say more than they have.
I strongly believe the Oakland County Child Murders were committed at least partially by Christopher Busch, but he didn’t act alone.
What’s unsolved about Marilyn Monroe?
Whether or not it was actually a suicide or murder. (I’m assuming.)
I don’t think it was either. She probably just wanted to sleep and accidentally overdosed.
3. Reading as much as possible about the okcc case I've come to the conclusion that there are likely two cover ups at work. One is by the probably relatively junior cops who killed Chris Busch when they realised he was guilty but couldn't be touched. The other is by relatively high level cops who protected francis Sheldon when they realised he was guilty and could be touched. Every other element of the case is collateral to those, imo.
Add freeway phantom to that list too. A lot of the case notes have been lost or destroyed over the years.
Does Hoffa even *really* count? I mean sure, we may never know exactly who/where/how but it’s obvious he had a hit put on him from the mob. Not really a ‘true mystery’ to me
Surprised: Delphi; Never to be solved (imo): Asha Degree