As you can imagine, both of this leads led nowhere. Like whoever had been carrying them had disappeared into thin air. [5] About two hours later (around 9:20 pm) the Crocketts' phone rang and was answered by her 7-year-old sister, who had waited at home while her family searched the neighborhood. Lets find out. From this, the detectives hypothesized that she might have known her killer, which led to her not being under compulsion while writing the note. "It took maybe up to the fifth victim when they really got the message that there was a problem," Jenkins added. Perhaps she knew her abductor, and wasn't too far away from her family's home at the time of the call. FREEWAY PHANTOM' VICTIMS Carol Denise Spinks May 1, 1971 Nenomoshia Yates October 1, 1971 Teara Ann Bryant November 26, 1972 Diane Williams September 6, 1972 Brenda Denise Woodard November 16, 1971 Darlenia Denise Johnson July 19, 1971 Brenda Fay Crockett July 28, 1971 CAPTION: Teara Ann Bryant CAPTION: Brenda Denise Woodard CAPTION: Carol Denise Spinks CAPTION: Nenomoshia Yates CAPTION: Diane Williams CAPTION: Brenda Fay Crockett CAPTION: Darlenia Denise Johnson. In the middle of July 1971, an employee of the D.C. Department of Highways and Traffic began experiencing car troubles. The investigators agreed. A search warrant was eventually obtained, and investigators dug through Askins' backyard. [4] Examination revealed she had been both physically and sexually assaulted and strangled, was dressed but missing her shoes, and had only been killed a few days previously. "From that moment on, our lives were never the same," said Williams, 40, who is a police officer. In 1983, Harper and Helen B. Collins wrote and published a book called "The Mystery of the Freeway Phantom," which details the killings. Likely, the inmate he was implicated in the Freeway Phantom murders. Detectives John Moriarty and Roy Lamb were called to the scene, amidst Vietnam War protests, and began canvassing the neighborhood. Unfortunately, an autopsy of the remains wouldn't be very efficient at locating any specific details. They dedicated many more man-hours to political scandals and dealing with Vietnam protests - and to the loved ones left without any answers - it seemed like detectives cared very little about six dead black girls. This was also supported by the contents of her stomach, which included some kind of citrus fruit. They had cataloged the evidence, and kept it all in-storage. Her thoughts seemed to be scattered, and she gave concerning details about her whereabouts. [13], The Freeway Phantom case has seen a myriad of investigators and garnered much interest over the years. [25][26] Authorities later determined that Barnes was not a victim of the Freeway Phantom and resumed their investigation on the murders.[12]. He also owns a car or truck, which he would drive the distances between the stores where the victims were abducted. Because the body of Diane Williams - the sixth and final victim - had been found near the D.C.-Maryland border, Maryland State Police had initially handled the investigation. Where Are They Now. The perpetrator might have served in the Army during the Vietnam War and may have been responsible for some war crimes such as rape and murder during massacres. Investigators hypothesized that the killer left her shoes because her name was inscribed on the pair. Brenda got off to catch a transfer, and said goodbye to her classmate. Their mother, Allenteen - a strict disciplinarian - was heading out to visit a nearby relative. wheN you cAtch me iF you cAn! Prosecutors at the time said there was no evidence linking the pair to the other slayings. He walked her to a bus stop nearby, along Martin Luther King Avenue. Facebook gives people the power. Unknown In fact, Maryland police claimed there were no similarities between Angelas death and the murder of six other girls in D.C. They were all African American females between the ages of 10 and 18 that lived along the Washington Beltway, who had been abducted while walking, and whose bodies had been dumped off of busy roads (such as interstates and freeways). Their resignation came following an incident after their guns went missing after Tommie, 26, claimed they were burglarized from his Temple Hills home in Maryland. I don't believe that police followed the leads they had. They were charged with Angelas murder and were held by Washington, D.C. police in Charles County jail in Maryland. The Ed Sullivan Show: With Ed Sullivan, Johnny Wayne, Frank Shuster, Ralph Paul. We know that this article of clothing was not tested for DNA by either the Maryland State Police or the FBI, but it was last in the possession of the Maryland State Police - who have not confirmed that they actually have the evidence. She had been sent to buy sugar, flour, and paper plates, and all indications would point to her having done so. January 26, 2023 by by The inmate being interviewed stipulated that he would provide the information only if he could remain unidentified, which was agreed upon. [5] Her stepfather asked her to have the man come to the phone. Less than three hours after her mysterious disappearance, the remains of Nenomoshia Yates would be found. This stood out, because he didn't live with any women - so where had he gotten these scarves? "I think what has happened is the community has forgotten, the police department has forgotten," Jenkins said. meadowbrook country club estates; michael mullen obituary; pamela gluckin obituary new york; antonio tonyboy floirendo jr biography This returned him to the scene of the first two crimes, and police would determine that this most recent victim, Diane Williams, had been abducted not too far away from where Carol Spinks and Darlenia Johnson had been kidnapped from. Occasionally, she flipped through a thick manila folder containing smiling portraits of eight black girls forever frozen in time. The following day - September 6th, 1972 - the body of Diane Williams was discovered by a trucker along Interstate 295. In 1980, the Washington Post wrote an article about the case, which included statements from two of the victims' family members. and Montgomery Counties, the Maryland State Police, and the FBI itself. episodes A Trout in the Milk, Adapt or Die, The Totally Excellent Adventures of Mack and the D, After, Before, As I Have Always Been, Stolen, Brand New Day, The End is at Hand and What We're Fighting For. Jan, 19, 2023; cemu android apk She remained permanently scarred after the death of her sister, and later became a Washington D.C. police officer as a result. Abduction and rapeManual strangulationLigature strangulation (once)Stabbing (once) Askins also seemed to match the criteria that investigators had established the Freeway Phantom would have: he was a middle-aged black man that lived in the neighborhood, had a proclivity for targeting similar victims, and harbored a violent grudge against women. Brenda said, "Well, I'll see you," and the call came to a sudden end. So, Detective Trainum then took back the evidence, and re-submitted it to the Maryland State Police. While she remains hopeful the killings eventually will be solved, Jenkins believes the passage of time already has diminished the chances of closing the case. insensititivity [sic] to people With the cooperating inmate no longer speaking, this lead quickly wilted. During her time as a homicide detective, Jenkins mainly investigated the deaths of children and babies. Valerie, Carol's 24-year old sister that lived across the hall in the apartment building, asked the kids if any of them would walk down to a nearby store for her. Askins remains one of the most popular suspects in the media, and many of the original detectives heavily favored him as the Freeway Phantom. She, however, had been 18 years old, and likely much more aware of what was happening to her. It is unknown where this piece of evidence now stands. [8] "A white man picked me up, and I'm heading home in a cab," Crockett told her sister, adding that she believed she was in Virginia before abruptly saying, "Bye" and hanging up. Written, hosted, and produced by Micheal Whelan, Borrtex - "Black Out"Blue Dot Sessions - "Arbic Tallow"Graham Bole - "Lurking"Percival Pembroke - "Pembroke-Schaffer Manifold (Parts 1 & 2)"Vitus Von Degen - "Pieta"Rest You Sleeping Giant - "Dead Waters"ROZKOL - "If These"Sann Gusmao - "Reescrever Fotografias Sobre Dias Que Me Rasgam"Organoid - "Cassini"Krackatoa - "Under An Ending Sun", Other original music created and composed by Ailsa Traves, Unsolved Child Murders: Eighteen American Cases 1956 - 1998 by Emily G. Thompson, The Washington Post - Six black girls were brutally murdered in the early 70s. The cause-of-death, though, appeared to be strangulation. One of the known victims didn't have green fibers, and because of the investigation's scarce reporting, I have struggled to determine who the outlier is or was. However, police struggled to come to grips with some other differences: such as the note found in Brenda's coat pocket - which seemed to taunt investigators - and the fact that Brenda was found still wearing her boots. Despite their differences in beliefs regarding this case, Trainum and Jenkins agree on a number of things regarding the Freeway Phantom. Sullivan and Simmons, two ex-cops, were arrested for the murder of Angela Denise Barnes. Yeah, that came back into play roughly 30 years later, in 2002, when Trainum submitted that piece of evidence for forensic testing. Following this casual dinner, they each began heading home. He obtained employment at St. Elizabeth's Hospital, where he worked as a computer technician, and lived a quiet life on his own. Why was this case never solved? Most of the people in the homicide unit now would know nothing at all about the Freeway Phantom." However, he traces the killer's origins to the neighborhood of Congress Heights, where, as Trainum states: "He felt safe there, he felt he could do his dirt and get away with it.". Are Green Vega Rapists Freeway Phantom? Common practice at the time was that case files at MPDC Detective Divisions were retained in files maintained by the detectives assigned to the case. Another exception of the modus operandi was the body of 14-year-old Angela Denise Barnes; her bullet-riddled body was found on an abandoned Maryland road in 1971. This did inspire plenty of tips - primarily through telephone hotlines and mail correspondence - but none of them would prove useful to investigators. Holland, OH Leesburg, VA Ashburn, VA West Lafayette, IN Germantown, MD State College, PA. Investigators would find defensive marks on her hands and arms, indicating some kind of struggle that ensued between Brenda and the culprit. These differences seemed to point to Brenda being an outlier, perhaps even an incorrectly-labeled victim. Most unusually, investigators would discover that Askins loved to use the word "tantamount." As you can imagine, this was as frustrating to the victims' loved ones as it was to the investigators. Despite the bodies of Sheila and Katherine Lyon never being found, a man named Lloyd Welch confessed to their murders, bringing some resolution to the surviving loved ones. Numerous investigative tips came from the general public by a telephone hotline operated by the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia (MPDC) and information also came by way of the mail. He was born in Concord, Massachusetts, the son of a Unitarian minister. She recalls her mother's devastating sobbing, and the gloom that fell upon the entire neighborhood. 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