PA BETH DOE & UNBORN CHILD: WF, 15-25, found in White Haven, PA - 20 December 1976 *EVELYN COLON*

1618544944504.png

1602978865034.png


Composite
Composite
Composite
ALT TXT
ALT TXT
ALT TXT
ALT TXT
169UFPA10.jpg
Suitcases
Blanket
Blanket
Blanket
enhanced image of blanket

Artistic renderings of the victim by NCMEC, Carl Koppelman and Frank Bender. Suitcases and blanket the victim's remains were placed in. Facial features such as the nose and the hair style are an artist's estimation to complete the image.

Date of Discovery: December 20, 1976
Location of Discovery: White Haven or East Side Borough, Carbon County, Pennsylvania
Estimated Date of Death: Less than 24 hours
State of Remains: Recognizable face
Cause of Death: Homicide - Strangled and shot in the neck

Physical Description
Estimated Age: 15-25 years old
Race: White
Gender: Female
Height: 4'11" to 5'4"
Weight: 140-150 lbs.
Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Brown
Distinguishing Marks/Features: She had a 5.5" scar on her left leg, just above the heel and a 2-inch scar on her left calf. She had a small circular mole above her left eye and a mole on her left cheek. She was carrying a full-term White female fetus. It is possible that the moles on her face developed at some time during her pregnancy. Blood type O.

Identifiers
Dentals: Available. she had suffered extensive dental disease resulting in three extractions, multiple restorations, and extensive decay. Her oral hygiene improved as she got older but at the time of her death she was still suffering from tooth decay and a fracture to her upper right lateral incisors that would have caused her serious pain and been noticeable to others.
Fingerprints: Available
DNA: Available

Clothing & Personal Items
Clothing: Unknown
Jewelry: Unknown
Additional Personal Items: Unknown

Circumstances of Discovery
On December 20, 1976, the dismembered remains of the victim were found in three suitcases along the Lehigh River (Carbon/Luzerne County Line) under a bridge of westbound Interstate Route 80 near Exit 273. The suitcases appeared to have been thrown from the Interstate bridge.

She had been strangled, then shot in the neck and then dismembered with a fine, serrated tool. Her killer had removed her nose, ears, and breasts.

There were letters and numbers written on her left hand in ink (color of ink unknown). While there were different interpretations of what was actually written on the hand, almost definitely was "WSR". Next to that was either a 4 or a 5. Below and to the right was either a 4 or 7. Police checked license plates and CB call signs but were unable to determine the significance of the notations. The ink would probably have lasted 8-12 hours.

The three suitcases the remains were found in were all the same size (23" x 14" x 7 1/2"). Two of them were blue in color, one was blue and tan plaid. The handles had been cut off of the suitcases before they were dropped at the site and the zippers had been painted with flat black paint.

Inside the suitcases, the police also found straw, dry packing foam, a cut up chenille bedspread and six sections of the New York Sunday News dated September 26, 1976. The bedspread was most likely originally pink in color, however, the worn and dirty condition made it appear more rust or coral colored. The bedspread had an embroidered yellow flower design.

Advanced forensic testing of her bones suggest that the female was possibly born in Western to Central Europe and likely migrated to the USA five to ten years prior to her death in her early childhood to teenage years.

She is known as Beth Doe.

Investigating Agency(s)
Agency Name: Carbon County Coroner's Office
Agency Contact Person: Thomas McAndrew
Agency Phone Number: 570-669-9898
Agency E-Mail: N/A
Agency Case Number: N03-027244

Agency Name: Pennsylvania State Police
Agency Contact Person: Thomas McAndrew
Agency Phone Number: 570-459-3890
Agency E-Mail: thmcandrew(at)state.pa.us
Agency Case Number: N/A

NCIC Case Number: U833004226
NamUs Case Number: 8913
NCMEC Case Number: 1104191

Information Source(s)
Namus
NCMEC
Pennsylvania Missing Persons
Wikipedia: Beth Doe
Beth Doe on YouTube - created by Theresa Golden

Admin Notes
Added: 7/22/00; Last Updated: 1/24/18




Unidentified Person / NamUs #UP8913
Female, White / Caucasian
Date Body Found December 20, 1976
Location Found East Side Borough, Pennsylvania
Estimated Age Range 15-25 Years


Case Information

Case Numbers
NCMEC Number--
ME/C Case Number N03-027244

Demographics
Sex Female
Race / Ethnicity White / Caucasian
Possible First Name --
Possible Middle Name--
Possible Last Name--
Possible Nickname--
Estimated Age Group Adult - Pre 30
Estimated Age Range (Years) 15-25
Estimated Year of Death 1976
Estimated PMI 7 Days
Height 5' 2"(62 inches) , Estimated
Weight 150 lbs, Estimated

Circumstances
Type Unidentified Deceased
Date Body Found December 20, 1976
NamUs Case Created July 11, 2011
ME/C QA Reviewed July 12, 2011

Location Found Map
Location East Side Borough, Pennsylvania 18661
County Carbon County
GPS Coordinates (Not Mapped) N41 03' 20 75.06/W75 46' 12.68
Circumstances of Recovery Victim was dismembered and placed in three suitcase. Suitcases were discarded next to Lehigh River (Carbon/Luzerne County Line). Suitcase throw from SR0080 (Interstate 80) Westbound Lane. Exit 273. Height Suggestion of 4'11-5'4 estimated.
Details of Recovery

Inventory of Remains--
Condition of Remains Recognizable face
Physical Description
Hair Color Brown
Head Hair Description--
Body Hair Description--
Facial Hair Description--
Left Eye Color Brown
Right Eye Color Brown
Eye Description--
Distinctive Physical Features
Item
Description
Scar/mark
2 inch scar on left calf.

Other distinctive physical characteristic
Mole on left cheek.

Clothing and Accessories
No Information Entered
  • Case Photo
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Just reading this one. How sad. A full term baby too. I wonder if they took DNA from the baby? A likely killer would be the father, just statistically.

Why mutilate her the way they did, and write numbers... There appears to be so much here, distinctive suitcases, blanket, etc. Who and why would you paint the zippers on suitcases? And who has three the same size? DNA in the cases or on the blanket?

It sounds like she may have been a victim of abuse or neglect as a child. Poor dental care, not that that is a total indication, it could just be due to poverty, but also scars on legs...

One thing that always surprises me in many of these unidentified cases is that they can't determine a closer age. This one is only a spread of ten years but many of them are far wider than that. I guess with all of the scientific advances it just surprises me they do not have a way of being closer on age, sometimes they do not even know race.

So the body was apparently thrown from the interstate. I would take that to mean she was disposed of nowhere near where she was from or where she was killed, making it more difficult, she could be from anywhere, as could her killer. NY Sunday News for a newpaper though... That gives right there a date it could not be earlier than...

I just happened into this thread by seeing her picture and clicking on it. I have to say though, it strikes me on reading it enough to comment because it is very odd. She was cut up with a fine serrated tool, that almost sounds like someone familiar with doing such a thing, ritualistic, or serial killer-ish... Or expert at such things in a profession... Someone had TIME and a place to do all of this to her... And then time to dispose of her, pack her, etc... Are there any similar cases?

It doesn't seem to say and I don't want to know how the baby died...

Sigh, I am no case solver but just seems like the things present in this one would help the experts solve it...
 
And zippers painted black. Weird. State of the bedspread leads me to think this was domestic. The person had a place and time to carry out this disgusting, Beyond comprehensive crime.
It sounds domestic but the dismemberment and symbols on her body are odd but then maybe that was to throw off the domestic thought... They cut the handles off of the suitcases and painted the zippers is just odd.

I guess with statistics there is a good chance it was the father of the baby... If they have it, DNA may solve this one with genetics, etc...
 
She has been identified as 15-year-old Evelyn Colon of Jersey City, New Jersey.

63-year-old Luis Sierra of Ozone Park, New York, has been charged with one count of criminal homicide.

 
She has been identified as 15-year-old Evelyn Colon of Jersey City, New Jersey.

63-year-old Luis Sierra of Ozone Park, New York, has been charged with one count of criminal homicide.

Thank you so much for the official update! WOW!
 
She has been identified as 15-year-old Evelyn Colon of Jersey City, New Jersey.

63-year-old Luis Sierra of Ozone Park, New York, has been charged with one count of criminal homicide.

so he was approx 18 when this happened. Next we will probably find out he was the father of the baby.
 
This article is shedding some light on Evelyn's life and family and events prior and after her murder. Pardon for sharing the whole article, but the page is access restricted for us outside the US :rolleyes:

"New details are emerging from a 1976 cold case murder that police say they have just solved.

Decades ago, the bodies of a 15-year-old girl and her unborn child were discovered in a suitcase. The pair were brutally killed, dismembered and then thrown over the Lehigh River bridge onto the bank below.

Police records say the girl was killed by manual strangulation. Her head was severed and nose and ears were cut off along with her arms and legs. Court papers also indicate she had been shot. Her full-term daughter died with her.

Though officials say they followed many tips and leads, they could not identify the remains. In 2007, the body was exhumed for a DNA test but that too yielded no matches to any known missing person.

In 2020, a piece of the girl’s femur was submitted to a lab in Texas where a DNA profile was obtained and a possible link to a living family member was found.

Police say Luis Colon Jr. was contacted by investigators and confirmed that his aunt had gone missing in the 1970s. His father positively confirmed through description that it was his sister, Evelyn Colon whose body was found. She was last seen alive in New Jersey.

Colon then recalled to investigators that the father of the unborn child was Luis Sierra, Evelyn’s then-boyfriend.

Evelyn’s sister, Migdalia Colon was interviewed by investigators. She recalled that in mid-December of 1976 Evelyn told their mother she had not been feeling well and asked for her to bring soup. When the mother arrived at the Jersey City apartment shared by Luis and Evelyn, she found that it had been cleared out. Migdalia told police that Luis had been abusive and jealous, going as far as locking Evelyn in their apartment.

In January of 1977, the Colon family received a letter with no legible return address but stamped in Connecticut. The letter stated in Spanish that Evelyn and the baby were doing well. The letter described the baby as a boy, weighing 9 pounds and said that if Evelyn needed anything, she would be in touch. However, based on Evelyn’s lack of ability to write, she was not believed to have been the one that penned the letter.

Evelyn was never reported missing.

After positively identifying the victim and interviewing the family, police say they turned their investigation towards Luis Sierra.

Sierra was found to be living in Ozone Park, New York. Police say he had initially denied knowing Evelyn but later admitted that he not only knew her but dated her and that she was to have his child. He then reportedly told investigators that he last saw Evelyn in their apartment in Jersey City prior to leaving for work and that when he returned, she was gone.

However, police say he couldn’t explain why he made little to no effort to get into contact with Evelyn and the child after she allegedly moved in with her father. Furthermore, he could not explain the letter, which would have been written after Evelyn’s death."

 
It baffles my mind that she went missing just one state over from her own and yet no one connected the two? How in the world do we get the word out there about these unidentified people? What we’re doing just doesn’t seem to be enough.
 
It baffles my mind that she went missing just one state over from her own and yet no one connected the two? How in the world do we get the word out there about these unidentified people? What we’re doing just doesn’t seem to be enough.
You seem to forget this was the 1970s; people could disappear in one county and be found in the neighbouring country, and it would still go decades before people connected the dots. Hell, there's even one case (I can't remember which, unfortunately) where a guy disappeared from one part of a city, was found in another part, and still remained a John Doe for several decades!

I believe it was Ted Bundy who noted that it was surprisingly easy to get away with murder: You simply abducted and killed someone in one county, dumped them in a second, and got rid of their belongings in the third, and no one would put the three together because LE didn't co-operate their findings with each other.
 
You seem to forget this was the 1970s; people could disappear in one county and be found in the neighbouring country, and it would still go decades before people connected the dots. Hell, there's even one case (I can't remember which, unfortunately) where a guy disappeared from one part of a city, was found in another part, and still remained a John Doe for several decades!

I believe it was Ted Bundy who noted that it was surprisingly easy to get away with murder: You simply abducted and killed someone in one county, dumped them in a second, and got rid of their belongings in the third, and no one would put the three together because LE didn't co-operate their findings with each other.
That's so sad for the past, but I'm talking about today. I'd like to come up with better ideas in which to reach families with loved ones who have been missing and weren't necessarily reported.
 
That's so sad for the past, but I'm talking about today. I'd like to come up with better ideas in which to reach families with loved ones who have been missing and weren't necessarily reported.
I don't know, but I think perhaps many next of kin of missing persons aren't prepared to consider the possibility that their loved ones might be 1. deceased, 2. a John or Jane Doe somewhere. There also seems to be some kind of blind faith in LE, like once you have reported someone missing, it's all in the investigators' hands?

In Evelyn's case, I'm kinda surprised (in a good way) to see that she had so many family members that's been looking for her and been worried about her all these years, but also seem to be genuinely surprised to find out that she has been deceased for as long as she's been gone. I can obviously understand that their shock is amplified by the manner of which she was murdered and disposed off! I mean, who wouldn't?
I also remind myself regularly that it is easy for us who are active in the true crime community to know where and how to search for information, who to contact, what to look for, how to navigate in the labyrinth that is databases, newspaper clippings, official documents, ancestry, follow leads, understand how LE and ME works and handle these cases, but that for someone outside the community it's just not something they have to relate to. To put it this way: The John and Jane Does that have almost a legendary status in the community (like Walker County Jane Doe or Princess Doe), are actually little to not known at all outside the community.
 
I don't know, but I think perhaps many next of kin of missing persons aren't prepared to consider the possibility that their loved ones might be 1. deceased, 2. a John or Jane Doe somewhere. There also seems to be some kind of blind faith in LE, like once you have reported someone missing, it's all in the investigators' hands?

In Evelyn's case, I'm kinda surprised (in a good way) to see that she had so many family members that's been looking for her and been worried about her all these years, but also seem to be genuinely surprised to find out that she has been deceased for as long as she's been gone. I can obviously understand that their shock is amplified by the manner of which she was murdered and disposed off! I mean, who wouldn't?
I also remind myself regularly that it is easy for us who are active in the true crime community to know where and how to search for information, who to contact, what to look for, how to navigate in the labyrinth that is databases, newspaper clippings, official documents, ancestry, follow leads, understand how LE and ME works and handle these cases, but that for someone outside the community it's just not something they have to relate to. To put it this way: The John and Jane Does that have almost a legendary status in the community (like Walker County Jane Doe or Princess Doe), are actually little to not known at all outside the community.
If the unidentified had even a tenth of the publicity as politics, things might move more quickly!
 

Forum statistics

Threads
2,885
Messages
217,086
Members
890
Latest member
Migueljum
Back
Top