Tag: unsolved mysteries

‘It was creepy’: Woman found in prone position with no head or thumbs and blood drained from entire body is identified

Nearly 13 years after cops found a woman without her head or thumbs and with her blood drained from her body, they now know her name.

The Kern County Sheriff’s Office last week said it identified the woman found dead in a grape vineyard in Arvin, California, on March 29, 2011, as 64-year-old Ada Beth Kaplan. The scene that day in Arvin, which is about 30 miles south of Bakersfield, was brutal. In addition to having her head and thumbs chopped off, the woman now known as Kaplan also was nude and placed in a prone position that investigators considered sexual.

Detectives believe she was killed elsewhere and carefully placed in the vineyard. Coroners categorized the death as a homicide but could not determine the cause of death.

Ray Pruitt, then an investigator with Kern County Sheriff’s Department, described the scene as “surreal” in a 2018 interview with NBC affiliate KGET.

“I remember looking at the detectives and the sergeant on scene and the coroner investigator who had arrived on the scene and we were all kind of speechless,” Pruitt said. “We were all just looking at each other trying to get our minds around what we were looking at.”

Pruitt said the murder was one “that you come across maybe once in an entire career, maybe never.”

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New evidence discovered in D. B. Cooper skyjacking case

A microscopic metal fragment found on the tie of infamous plane hijacker D. B. Cooper could help reveal his true identity. Private investigator and researcher Eric Ulis is ringing in the new year with new breadcrumbs to share.

“I would not be surprised at all if 2024 was the year we figure out who this guy was,” said Ulis.

This particle is part stainless steel, part titanium. Ulis believes the itsy-bitsy discovery can be traced to a sophisticated metal-fabric shop.

According to Ulis, after his legendary disappearance 52 years ago, the man known as D.B. Cooper left behind a critical clue: a clip-on tie. After the money and the man vanished without a trace, this possession was spotted on Cooper’s seat on the back row of the plane, 18-E to be exact. Ulis says the tie was purchased at a J.C. Penny around Christmas 1964 for $1.49.

The evidence is currently under federal lock and key, but scientists who examined it were able to pull more than 100,000 particles from it.

“He applied these sticky stubs, they’re like little carbon circles that he could apply to portions of the tie and then when you pull them off, you’re pulling off some of the particles from the tie,” explained Ulis. “You apply modern state-of-the-art technology to it, things they didn’t have back 1971 when this occurred, it tells a story.”

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‘It was a heinous act’: Police now believe missing pregnant teen and boyfriend were executed and dumped at location where bodies were found 

Police have revealed new details regarding Savanah Nicole Soto, the pregnant 18-year-old in Texas who was reported missing last week when she failed to show up at the hospital to be induced and was later found dead in a car alongside her 22-year-old boyfriend, Matthew Guerra.

San Antonio Police Chief Bill McManus on Thursday gave a press conference during which he confirmed that Soto and Guerra’s bodies were both found inside the couple’s gray Kia sedan and both victims died from fatal gunshot wounds. Their unborn baby was also pronounced dead at the scene.

“Clearly, it was a heinous act,” McManus said. “It was unspeakable, the tragedy of it.”

Soto was last seen alive on Friday, Dec. 22 at the apartment complex where she and Guerra both lived. She had been scheduled to go to the hospital the following evening with her mother to be induced, but never made it to the appointment. Her family then reported her missing and a CLEAR alert was issued.

Soto and Guerra’s bodies were found in the vehicle located in the 5900 block of Danny Kaye Drive on Tuesday, with police saying that the car appeared to have been at that location for several days.

The Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Office determined that the cause of death for Guerra was a gunshot wound to the head. While authorities said that the manner of Guerra’s death has not been officially determined, McManus said that both deaths are being investigated as capital murder. He later clarified that investigators currently do not believe it was a murder-suicide, but noted that the possibility still “exists.”

In response to a question from a reporter, McManus further explained that investigators currently believe Soto and Guerra were killed at a different location and then driven to the area where their bodies were later discovered.

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Oscar Zeta Acosta: The Wild Life and Strange End of Dr Gonzo

In the annals of counterculture history, certain figures emerge as both mysterious and iconic, leaving an indelible mark on the zeitgeist of their time. Oscar Zeta Acosta, an attorney, politician, and writer, is one such figure.

Best known as Hunter S. Thompson’s larger-than-life companion, Acosta’s life is a tapestry woven with activism, literature, all leading to a mysterious disappearance. There are numerous theories as to what happened with Acosta but with a figure so controversial in his own time it can be hard to separate fact from fiction.

What happened to Oscar Acosta? Was it an accident, a drug deal gone wrong or something even more sinister?

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Major claim missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 could be found in ‘a matter of days’ finally bringing an end to the nine year mystery

The mystery of missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370 could be solved in a matter of ‘days’ if there was a new search, experts have revealed.

Flight MH370 disappeared about 38 minutes after leaving Kuala Lumpur airport in southern Malaysia en route to Beijing, China, on March 8, 2014.

Despite a frantic search by governments and private companies, the plane was never found and the fate of its 237 passengers remains unknown.

In September, aerospace expert Jean-Luc Marchand and pilot Patrick Blelly called for a new search based on revelations about the fate of the flight.

During a lecture before the Royal Aeronautical Society, the pair said the new search area could be canvassed in just 10 days in an open call for help.

‘We have done our homework. We have a proposal … the area is small and considering new capabilities it will take 10 days,’ Mr Marchand said.

‘It could be a quick thing. Until the wreck of MH370 is found, nobody knows (what happened). But, this is a plausible trajectory.’

The pair called on the Australian Transport Safety Authority, Malaysian government, and exploration company Ocean Infinity to begin a new search.

Last year, Ocean Infinity revealed it was interested in a restarting its search having canvassed swathes of Indian Ocean on a ‘no find, no fee’ basis.

Mr Marchand said the ‘swift’ search could be a good proving ground for the company’s new unmanned sub-nautical search technology.

Importantly, the pair told the RAS the new search area was based on the belief the plane was purposefully hijacked and downed in deep ocean.

Mr Marchad described it as an ‘atrocious one-way journey’, which he believed was likely carried out by an experienced aeroplane pilot.

‘We think, and the study that we’ve done has shown us, that the hijacking was probably performed by an experienced pilot,’ Mr Marchad said.

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What Was the Purpose of a Roman Dodecahedron?

One of the significant advantages any historian of ancient Rome has is a wealth of written material that has survived from 2,000 years ago to help explain to us what the remains of the Roman Empire mean.

For instance, we know how the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum ended up buried under volcanic ash because Pliny the Younger wrote about Mount Vesuvius erupting in 79 AD and destroying the two settlements.

Likewise, we know that the giant concrete arches dot Italy and France today’s landscapes today because many Roman authors dedicated sections of their work to the discussion of the aqueducts.

Julius Sextus Frontinus, a Roman engineer, even wrote a book called On Aqueducts in the first century AD.

But occasionally, historians are stumped by something from Roman times because there is no obvious answer for what it is, and there is also no documentary material from the time that discusses it. Such is the case with the Roman dodecahedra.

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12 Unsolved Mysteries from 2023

This past year featured an array of peculiar events and curious cases that defied explanation. From a wondrous piece of artwork (seen above) found near Las Vegas that was visible from space and an eerie black vertical line seen in the sky over a British town to an exhumed nun’s body that was found to be intact four years after her death and a series of drone incursions that left a Maryland family unsettled, 2023 saw a slew of inexplicable incidents emerge and leave us scratching our heads. With that in mind, here are 12 unsolved mysteries from 2023 that remain truly confounding…

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NEW suspect in case of DB Cooper is named as Pittsburgh engineer Vince Petersen – 52 years after hijacker got away with $200,000 ransom by parachuting out of the plane

A sleuth has named a new suspect in the case of DB Cooper – the hijacker who got away with a $200,000 ransom by parachuting out a plane 52 years ago never to be seen again.

Eric Ulis, a citizen investigator who sued the FBI for access to the case’s files and evidence, claims the man behind the November 24, 1971, mystery was engineer Vince Petersen from Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.

Petersen worked as a Boeing subcontractor at a titanium plant and fits the evidence left behind by the infamous hijacker, the DB enthusiast told told The U.S. Sun. He would have been 52 at the time of the crime and has been long dead.

Ulis – who was five when the plane-jacking occurred – first landed on Petersen’s name after analyzing microscopic evidence left on the clip-on black tie DB left before he parachuted out of the plane.

Several of the particles found were consistent with specialty metals used in the aerospace sector, such as titanium, high-grade stainless steel and aluminum, Ulis explained.

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The mystery of missing ‘French Madeleine McCann’: Estelle Mouzin disappeared aged nine on her way to school amid fears she was snatched by ‘Ogre of Ardennes’ killer… but her body has never been found

Over a span of more than 15 years, a series of killings of women and young girls haunted parts of France and Belgium, but perhaps none more than the murder of nine-year-old Estelle Mouzin – France’s Madeline McCann.

Between 1987 and 2003, at least 11 people disappeared across the region, with several of the cases seeming – at least at first – to be unconnected.

The first woman disappeared in Auxerre, in December 1987. The second vanished 90 miles away in Vitry-sur-Seine, a suburb of Paris, in 1988. 

Another woman went missing in Auxerre that same year, but then more vanished further north in Châlons-en-Champagne (1988) and Charleville-Mézières (1989. Then one in Saint-Servais in Belgium, then another in Rezé, over in the West of France.

After a flurry of eight disappearances from 1987 to 1990, there was a ten-year pause, but they restarted in 2000, in Charleville-Mézières again, then another in Sedan in 2001, and one more in Guermantes in 2003.

Of the places where the women went missing, only two appeared on the list more than once: Auxerre (three women) and Charleville-Mézières (two). When plotted on a map, the locations are spread across a vast area of 21,500 square miles.

It is easy to see, therefore, why authorities struggled to connect them to the culprit: dreaded serial killer Michel Fourniret, known as ‘the Beast of Ardennes’.

Finally arrested in 2003 in Belgium, Fourniret was convicted to life in prison in 2008 for the murder and rape or attempted rape of seven teenagers and young women, after he admitted to killing several women and girls.

Fourniret would go on to be convicted again after confessing to more killings, and he confessed to three more he was never convicted of – including 20-year-old British tutor Joanna Parrish, who was killed in Auxerre in 1990.

But of all of Fourniret’s horrific killings, one stood out in particular: That of nine-year-old Estelle, who went missing in 2003. The whereabouts of her body remain a mystery to this day, and is a secret that Fourniret took to his grave.

The youngest of Fourniret’s victims, Estelle’s disappearance has been likened to that of Madeleine McCann‘s, the three-year-old British girl who went missing in 2007.

As with McCann, who vanished in Portugal, Estelle disappeared without a trace, leaving investigators stumped while capturing the attention of the public and media.

The girl had been returning from school on January 9, 2003 in the commune of Guermantes, some 15 miles east from the centre of Paris.

The nine-year-old was last seen that winter’s day in front of a bakery, en route to the house belonging to her mother, Suzanne Mouzin.

Suzanne, who was in the middle of a divorce from Estelle’s father Eric, raised the alarm with the local police station at around 7pm that evening.

Little did she know, in going to the police she had lit the touch paper on an investigation that would span seventeen years, spark huge media coverage in France, and yet would never truly discover what had happened to her little girl.

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Could ‘baby in the post’ mystery finally be solved? 60 years after newborn’s rotting corpse was found in package sent across Australia, detectives have made a major move

One of Australia’s most gruesome unsolved cases dating back almost 60 years is a step closer to being solved. 

The body of a baby boy was found wrapped up in a parcel outside of a Darwin post office, in the Northern Territory, on May 11, 1965. 

The package was sent from Melbourne eight days earlier with staff making the grisly find inside the parcel after noticing a putrid smell emanating from it.

Mystery surrounded the identity of the baby with The Missing podcast making a breakthrough in June revealing the parcel had been addressed to a ‘J Anderson’.

Amelia was listening to the audio series when she immediately recognised the recipient was her father – former Aussie Rules player Jimmy Anderson.

She immediately offered to supply DNA samples to help put the case to bed.

In the latest development, the remains of the baby were exhumed from the cemetery in November – with a DNA test of the corpse set to be undertaken within days.

Ms Anderson said was shocked when she first found out the parcel was addressed to her father.

‘I’m 53 years old and to hear a cold case that…and if that’s got a connection to do with our father, well I want closure for that Detective who’s been on the case for so long,’ she said. 

Jim Anderson was a champion footballer who played for the Darwin Buffaloes in the Northern Territory Football League during the 1950’s and 60’s and won three premierships with the club. 

After Ms Anderson came forward, police and council staff began digging up the baby’s unmarked grave at the Darwin Central Cemetery in Jingili on Wednesday. 

The package, which was posted from a post office on Russel Street in Melbourne on May 3, 1965, emanated a putrid smell which alerted staff. 

The decomposed and naked body of the newborn was found wrapped inside a bunch of newspapers. 

The umbilical cord was still attached while a stocking was tightly wrapped around his neck. 

Police were notified of the shocking discovery and have been unable to close the case ever since.  

The return address claimed the parcel had been sent by a JF Barnes from 2 Woodridge Avenue in Mentone, Melbourne’s south-east.

Detectives quickly learned the address was a fake.  

Police were unable to extract fingerprints from the packaging – further delaying the closure of the case. 

Officials are now hoping the DNA test between Ms Anderson and the body of the baby could finally solve the mystery.

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