MA LADY OF THE DUNES: WF, 27-49, found in Provincetown, MA - 26 July 1974 *RUTH TERRY*

1667238948993.png
fx7LpML.jpg


Lady of the Dunes was discovered on July 26, 1974 in the Race Point Dunes, Provincetown, Barnstable County, Massachusetts. Her naked, decomposing body was discovered by a teenage girl. Two sets of footprints were found leading to the body and tire tracks were located fifty yards from the scene. She was lying face down on a green towel, with folded Wrangler jeans and a blue bandanna placed under her head.

She had extensive and expensive dental work on her teeth, although several teeth were removed by the killer. Her hands had been removed; one at her wrist and the other at her elbow. She was nearly decapitated, possibly from strangulation. She had a massive wound on the side of her skull that was determined to be the official cause of death. There were signs of sexual assault at the scene.



*CLICK THE REPORT BUTTON IF YOU'D LIKE THIS CASE MOVED TO THE GENERAL DISCUSSION AREA TO BE OPENED FOR COMMENTING.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_of_the_Dunes

Lady of the Dunes

Lady of the Dunes (also known as Lady in the Dunes) is the nickname given to a woman whose unidentified remains were discovered on July 26, 1974 in the Race Point Dunes, Provincetown, Barnstable County,Massachusetts[2][3] Her body was exhumed in 1980, 2000, and 2013[4] in efforts to identify her and her murderer; these have proved unsuccessful, despite the reconstruction of her face a number of times.[5][6][7] The case was featured on the television series Haunting Evidence in 2006

Police were called to the scene where the naked, decomposing body of a woman was discovered by a teenage girl on July 26, 1974.[9][10][11] Sandra Lee, who later became a crime author, stated that she and her sister had found the remains two days before the report, which had traumatized the pair.[12] She later wrote a book about the case, titled The Shanty: Provincetown's Lady in the Dunes.[13] The body was found yards away from a nearby road and had a significant amount of insect activity.[9]

Two sets of footprints were found leading to the body and tire tracks were located fifty yards from the scene.[11] She was lying face down on a green towel, with folded Wrangler jeans, and had a blue bandanna placed under her head.[3][14][15] She had long auburn or red hair, which was pulled back into ponytail with a holder with gold sparkles, and she had painted pink toenails. Lady of the Dunes was approximately 5'6" tall (initially believed to have been 5'8"[16]), weighed 145 pounds, and was of an athletic build.[17][18] She had extensive dental work on her teeth, worth between five and eight thousand dollars, although several teeth were removed by the killer, likely as an attempt to prevent her identification.[3][16][19] Her hands had also been removed; one at her wrist and the other at her elbow. She was nearly decapitated, possibly from strangulation, and had a massive wound on the side of her skull, determined to be the official cause of death.[19][20] There were also signs of sexual assault at the scene, possibly performed with a piece of wood, likely after she died.[7][16]

Because of the effort her killer took to prevent her identification, some surmised that the decedent may have had a criminal history, as her fingerprints may have been on record.[21] However, her hands and thus fingerprints may have been removed to prevent ID of the victim and hinder identification of the violent offender who killed her. The age of the victim has been widely disputed, as most sources describe the woman's age between twenty-five to forty years old, although she could have been as young as twenty and as old as forty-nine.[22] Other sources state she was between twenty-seven to forty-nine, or twenty-five to thirty-five.[10][23]

"Lady of the Dunes"

LADY OF THE DUNES: WF, 27-49, found in Provincetown, MA - 26 July 1974 Fx7LpML


One of the most recent reconstructions of Lady of the Dunes, created in 2010.

Born 1925 – 1954
Status Unidentified for 42 years, 1 month and 24 days
Died c. July 1974 (aged 20–49)
Cause of death Homicide by blunt force trauma
Body discovered July 26, 1974
Provincetown, Massachusetts,U.S
Resting place Saint Peters Cemetery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, U.S.[1]
Other names "Provincetown Jane Doe"
Known for Unidentified victim of homicide
Height 5 ft 6.5 in (1.69 m) - 5 ft 8 in (1.73 m)(approximate)
Weight 145 lb (66 kg) (approximate)
 

Whitey Bulger, gays, and the Lady Of The Dunes murder mystery

NOTE: The following story was written by Sam Baltrusis and first appeared in the September/October 2014 issue of Boston Spirit magazine.

by Sam Baltrusis

It's the cold case that has haunted Provincetown for 40 years. The Lady of the Dunes' severly mutilated corpse was found at this spot on July 26, 1974. It's a secluded service road near Dunes' Edge Campground about one mile away from Race Point Beach. Buzzing insects sound like muted screams, alluding to the horrors that unfolded in the wooded area almost a half of a century ago.

Human monsters once roamed here.

The ghost of Provincetown's most infamous gone girl continues to follow Sandra Lee, author of The Shanty, and Provincetown regular since the 1970s. The crime writer was only nine-years-old when she claimed to have stumbled on the cold case of the century. According to Lee's exclusive interview with Boston Spirit magazine, the Lady of the Dunes' decomposing body continues to haunt her dreams. During an emotional discussion which stirred up childhood demons, Lee says the woman's dead body sounded like a string of pearls rubbing together.

Provincetown Crime Scene

"She was in the brush, in the sea grass about 15 feet from an access road," Lee recalls. "The road follows the backside of Dunes' Edge Campground. She was in the thick of the brush. It was nothing shy of horrific. It was something I will never forget."

Lee, who camped at Dunes' Edge every July in the early '70s, says it has taken her years to talk publicly about the horrors from her childhood. While there is a local teenage girl on record who is credited with calling responding officers at the scene in 1974, the 49-year-old author says she and her sister found the rotting corpse of the Lady of the Dunes two days before police were alerted.

"I stumbled down an incline with my dog," she continues. "The dog was ahead of me. My dog got excited about something. I heard a very strange noise. If you could imagine someone holding a string of pearls, I heard that sound. And then there was a horrible smell. At first, I attributed it to low tide," Lee recalls the horrific scene with emotion. "She was face down. Her hair was a mess and I could see a gouge in the right side of her neck. Her arms were tucked down in the sand so I didn't know anything was missing. I recognized the green blanket right away. The lower half of her body was covered with something."

Lee says the horrible sound has stayed with her for years. "It wasn't until much later that I realized that the sound of someone playing with a pearl necklace was from the maggots," she says. "Her body was covered with maggots. I believe there were a few people who found the body, but there is only one who spoke to police in person about it."

On July 26, 1974, the naked decomposing body of a woman in her 20s or early 30s was discovered by a girl (not Lee) walking her dog, which was lying face down with Wrangler jeans and a blue bandana crudely placed under her head. There was also a green blanket found at the scene. The murder victim had long auburn or reddish-colored hair clamped in a glittery, elastic-band ponytail and was approximately 5 foot 6 inches tall. She had an athletic build and was approximately 135 lbs. The Lady of the Dunes, as she has been nicknamed, had extensive dental work on her teeth, worth thousands of dollars. Several of those teeth were removed by the killer, a technique frequently used by James "Whitey" Bulger and his cronies. The Lady of the Dunes' hands had also been removed, and she was nearly decapitated, with what is believed to be a military entrenchment tool, and had massive trauma to the side of her skull. Police believe there was also sexual assault.

Oddly, the gruesome crime scene became the single most visited tourist attraction in Provincetown during its peak season in the summer of 1974.

Her body has been exumed twice, both in 1980 and 2001, to use modern-day forensic technology. No luck. However, new leads suggest the Lady of the Dunes was tied to notorious Winter Hill Gang leader, James "Whitey" Bulger. In fact, Bulger — who had a past as a gay-for-pay male hustler — was a regular at popular LGBT hangout The Crown & Anchor, and has been linked to a woman with a similar description to the Lady of the Dunes. There was also a size 10 shoe imprint found at the scene, the same shoe size as Bulger, and a green towel or blanket believed to be from the Crown & Anchor.

Did Bulger do it? According to Lee, he should be a person of interest.

F2l5NT1.jpg
 
http://www.capecodtimes.com/article/20100506/news/5060307

'Lady in the Dunes': New face on old P'town murder case

PROVINCETOWN — Her ears, nose, eye color and the shape of her lips are a bit of a guess, but police hope the latest images of the 1974 murder victim can help identity the "Lady in the Dunes," a breakthrough that could eventually lead them to her killer.

By MARY ANN BRAGG

Posted May. 6, 2010 at 2:00 AM

PROVINCETOWN — Her ears, nose, eye color and the shape of her lips are a bit of a guess.But police hope the latest images of the 1974 murder victim — created with recent computer analyses — can help identity the "Lady in the Dunes," a breakthrough that could eventually lead them to her killer.The case is Provincetown's lone unsolved murder, and it wasn't pretty.On July 26, 1974, the woman's nude body was discovered about a mile east of the Race Point Beach ranger station in the Cape Cod National Seashore. She lay on half a beach blanket, as if sharing it. Her head rested on a folded pair of jeans, and it was nearly severed, most likely by a tool such as a military trench digger. Both the woman's hands were cut off and missing. The left side of her skull was crushed.The woman was a redhead and fit, perhaps in her 30s, and of medium height. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Her toenails were painted pink. Given that it was the '70s, she had something rare: extensive and well-made dentistry, with gold crowns worth at least $5,000 at the time.She had died anywhere from several days to three weeks before she was found, the police said. The cause was blunt trauma. No weapon was found."It was a horrific, brutal crime," said Provincetown Police Chief Jeff Jaran yesterday.

Since 1974 police have tried — and tried — to get to the bottom of the case. In the late '70s, the police circulated a clay recreation of the woman's head, the traditional method of building a likeness, said Gerald Nance of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in Alexandria, Va.Over the years, Provincetown police have used DNA tests and age-regression drawings. Artists have sketched her face. Even a television paranormal show tried to get the right vibe on the dune where the body was found.All to no avail.Jaran, who was hired in 2008, is taking another stab at it. He hopes that new software available at the center and the worldwide reach of the Internet, can catch the attention of someone who might have known her."Every year that goes by, there's less and less chance that a person is alive who may have had contact with her," he said. "That's our urgency."In early November, Jaran and Provincetown police detective Monica Himes met with Nance, who heads up the cold case unit of the center, and Dr. David Hunt, a forensic anthropologist with the Smithsonian Institution who volunteers at the center.Jaran took the woman's skull, which has been stored at the state police crime lab, and the basic facts of the case. The woman's remains are buried in Provincetown, with no name on the burial marker.The composite images were created after Hunt analyzed the skull and gave his recommendations on age, sex, race and other identifiers of the victim, Nance said.At the same time, a CAT scan of the skull created a three-dimensional version of it in the computer. Then, based on what Hunt said were the likely identifiers, the software mapped layers of flesh onto the bone structure of the skull, based on extensive studies of cadavers that match those identifiers.For example, if the anthropologist believes the skull belongs to a 30-year-old Caucasian woman, the software finds the cadaver studies that match those characteristics and creates the flesh on the bones to match, he said.

The center, which specializes in children, took on the "Lady in the Dunes" case as a "special project," Nance said.It's rare that a victim's identity has remained unknown for so long, he said. And, there are only about four places in the country with the software that could help.In the latest color image, a finely boned young woman with a high forehead and a narrow nose stares straight ahead. She has heavy eyebrows and an oval face, with a youthful, alert look about her.Nance, after reviewing of the case file, said local police did a good and quick job with the investigation. But the challenge is the thousands and thousands of strangers that descend upon Provincetown during the month of July. "It would be different if this was a small town, not a resort town, and everybody knew everybody," he said.
 

Lady Of The Dunes


fx7LpML.jpg


Birth: unknown
Death: Jul. 26, 1974
Provincetown
Barnstable County
Massachusetts, USA

Crime Victim. The case has lingered for more than 40 years in police files without the young woman, estimated to be 25 to 40 years old at the time of her death, never having been identified. On July 26, 1974, the body of the woman, a Caucasian female, was found about one mile east of Race Point Beach by a hiker through the Province Land Dunes. Her hands had been cut off and were never found. Her head was almost severed from her body. The cause of death was determined to be blunt force injuries to the head. The woman was described as 5' 6 1/2" tall and weighing 145 pounds. She had long red or auburn hair and a bandana was found near her body. She also had extensive dental work--dental records were checked all over the world but no match. The case remains a "cold case" and has been featured on several television shows over the years. Her body had been exhumed several years back and returned to its original burial site for DNA testing--There is a stone marked "Unidentified Female Body Found Race Point Dunes" at St. Peters Cemetery with only the July 26, 1974 date on the tombstone.

Inscription:
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE BODY
FOUND RACE POINT DUNES
JULY 26, 1974

Burial:
Saint Peters Cemetery
Provincetown
Barnstable County
Massachusetts, USA
Plot: Bottom of Hill--Straight right from Chapel at Top of Hill then look down to bottom of hill.
 

Lady of the Dunes

Born 1925 – 1949
Status Unidentified for 41 years, 6 months and 16 days
Died c. July 1974 (aged 25–49)
Cause of death
Blunt force trauma
Body discovered
July 26, 1974
Provincetown, Massachusetts, U.S
Resting place
Saint Peters Cemetery, Provincetown, Massachusetts, U.S.[1]
Other names "Provincetown Jane Doe"
Known for Unidentified victim of homicide
Height Script error: No such module "convert". (approximate)
Weight Script error: No such module "convert". (approximate)
Website
Facebook page
Lady of the Dunes (also known as Lady in the Dunes) is the nickname given a woman whose unidentified remains were discovered on July 26, 1974 in the Race Point Dunes, Provincetown, Barnstable County, Massachusetts[2][3] Her body was exhumed in 1980, 2000, and 2013[4] in efforts to identify her and her murderer, but have since been unsuccessful, despite the reconstruction of her face a number of times.[3][5][6][7][8][9] The case was featured on the television series Haunting Evidence in 2006.[10]

Discovery
File:Lady of the Dunes body.jpg
The body of the victim upon her discovery
The naked, decomposing body of a woman was discovered by a teenage girl on July 26, 1974.[11][12][13] Sandra Lee, who later became a crime author, stated that she and her sister had found the remains two days before the report, which had traumatized the pair. The body was found meters from a nearby road and had a significant amount of insect activity.[11] Two sets of footprints were found leading to the body and tire tracks were located fifty yards from the scene.[13] She was lying face down on a green towel, with folded Wrangler jeans, and had a blue bandanna placed under her head.[3][7][8][14][15] She had long auburn or red hair, which was pulled back into ponytail with a holder with gold sparkles, and she had pink painted toenails. Lady of the Dunes was approximately 5'6" tall (initially believed to have been 5'8"[16]), weighed 145 pounds, and was of an athletic build.[3][17][18][19]She had extensive dental work on her teeth, worth between five and eight thousand dollars, although several teeth were removed by the killer, likely as an attempt to prevent her identification.[3][16][20] Her hands had also been removed; one at her wrist and the other at her elbow. She was nearlydecapitated, possibly from strangulation, and had a massive wound on the side of her skull.[13][11][19][20] There were also signs of sexual assault at the scene, possibly performed with a piece of wood, likely after she died.[9][16] Because of the effort her killer took to prevent her identification, it is suspected that the decedent may have had a criminal history, as her fingerprints may have been on record.[21] The age of the victim has been widely disputed, as most sources describe the woman's age between twenty-five to forty years old.[8] However other sources state she was between twenty-seven to forty-nine, or twenty-five to thirty-five.

continued

Investigation

File:Lady of the Dunes2.jpg
Other depictions of the victim, created between 1979 and 2006

After searching through thousands of missing person cases and the list of approved vehicles driven through the area, no suitable matches were found. At the scene, there was no sign of a struggle, as the sand and towel she was lying on were not disturbed. This has lead some to speculate that she had been killed at another location and disposed of in the Race Point dunes, or that she may have also known the perpetrator or was asleep when she died.[16] No evidence apart from what was found near the body has been found, although police searched extensively in the dunes.[13] The first facial reconstruction of the woman was created with clay in 1979 by Clyde Snow, who was a forensic artist.[16] Her remains were exhumed in 1980 for examination, (although the skull was not buried at the time[16]), which uncovered no clues. Again, in March 2000, the body was uncovered to extract the victim's DNA, which also did not uncover clues toward her identity.[21][22] In 1987, it was reported that a Canadian woman told a friend that she saw her father strangle a woman in Massachusetts, around fifteen years before. Police officers did not believe this entirely, although they attempted to locate the woman. Also in 1987, another woman also told police that the reconstruction of the victim looked like her sister, who disappeared in Boston in 1974.[16] Investigators also followed a lead involving Rory Gene Kesinger, who would have been 25 years old during the murder, who had broken out of the town's jail in 1973. After the skull was reconstructed, authorities saw a resemblance between both Kessinger and the victim.[21] This theory was later discarded, as DNA from Kessinger's mother compared to that of Lady of the Dunes' bone marrow did not match.[2][15][21][23] Another missing woman, Francis Ewalt, of Montana has also been ruled out.[12] The Lady of the Dunes was buried on October 19, 1974, in a grave reading "Unidentified Female Body Found Race Point Dunes, July 26, 1974" after the investigation went cold.[13] In May 2010, her skull was placed through a CT scanner that generated images that were then used by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to reconstruct. The final product was subsequently released.[24]

Tony Costa, a serial murderer from the area, was initially suspected in the case but was later eliminated as a suspect.[11] Costa died on May 12, 1974, which was inconsistent with the time period in which Lady of the Dunes died.[25]


Two years following the creation of the reconstruction, it was learned that a woman who resembled the composite was seen with mobster Whitey Bulger around the time the woman's death occurred.[2][3][18] Bulger was known for removing his victims' teeth, which was a consistency in this murder. Sandra Lee, the woman who claimed to have first discovered the body, believes the theory of Bulger's involvement, stating he should be a "person of interest." Lee also expressed that the victim may have been a prostitute and could have originated from a foreign country, such as Ireland. She elaborated that the victim may have been initially strangled, like some of the other victims of Bulger and that Lady of the Dunes was likely killed at another location.[11]


Currently, one of the investigators on the case is raising funds to rebury the body in a new casket, as the original has deteriorated.[14][11]


Hadden Clark confession

File:Lady of the Dunes facial reconstructions (with and without freckles).jpg

Additional reconstruction, depicting the victim with and without freckles

Serial killer Hadden Clark confessed to her murder, but many believe this to be a false statement, as Clark is known to be a notorious liar.[21] In 2004, Clark sent a letter to a friend stating that he had killed a woman in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.[26] He had also supplied two drawings: one of a handless, naked woman sprawled on her stomach, and another of a map pointing to where the body was found.[27][28]


“I could have told the police what her name was, but after they beat the **** out of me, I wasn't going to tell them ****. [...] This murder is still unsolved and what the police are looking for is in my grandfather's garden.”

—Hadden Clark


In April 2000, Clark led police to a search spot where he claimed he had buried two of his victims, both of whom were women murdered twenty years before. He had also stated that he had murdered several others in various states during a span from the 1970s to the 1990s.[27][28]


Authorities have had difficulty with Clark's statements due to the fact that he suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, a condition which has led others with the same mental illness to confess falsely to crimes.[27][28]
 

Unidentified Female(Lady in the Dunes)1974,Massachusetts

www.southcoasttoday.com/d...7sr113.htm

'Body in the sand' is exhumed
By Felix Carroll,
Cape Cod Times

PROVINCETOWN -- An ominous, thick fog shrouded St. Peter's Cemetery around 6:30 a.m. Thursday, as fog would be expected to do when a casket holding the remains of a murder victim is being unearthed.
Gravedigger Maurice "Moe" Gonsalves, with gloved hands, had his shovel in the earth. Working alone, he piled dirt onto the bed of a truck. He then covered the hole with a wooden plank and waited for the unmarked sedans to arrive.

He said people sometimes lay flowers at the small, Bible-size headstone that reads only, "Unidentified Female Body Found Race Point Dunes July 26, 1974." That gravestone lay to the side yesterday like a discarded mystery.
"I haven't seen flowers here for a while, though," Gonsalves said.
Nonetheless, the bones that lay beneath his feet -- zipped in a plastic body bag and set inside a cheap, steel casket -- are far from forgotten.
What has been known for 26 years simply -- and cryptically -- as the "Body in the Dunes" was exhumed for the purpose of taking genetic samples.
Law enforcement sources say they are trying to match the victim's DNA to a saliva sample given to investigators by a woman in Colorado who may be the mother.
The identity of the dead woman has confounded state and local police since the body was discovered by a 13-year-old girl walking her dog in the dunes about a mile east of the Race Point ranger station in the summer of 1974. The naked woman's hands had been severed and were not found at the scene. Her head was barely attached.
The unsolved murder, along with the mystery identity of the woman, is the oldest case in the state police Cold Case Unit.
Copies of the woman's dental records have been sent all over the country. Police once followed a lead into Canada and came up empty.
Investigators have suspected since the late 1980s that the unidentified woman was Rory Gene Kesinger, who ran away from home at 15, robbed banks, used five aliases, took hard drugs and escaped from prison in Plymouth. But until now, they have been unable to verify that.
One police source said the woman in Colorado is the mother of Rory Gene Kesinger, who has been missing since 1974, when she was 25 years old.
The body, between 5-foot-6 and 5-foot-8, matched Kesinger's height. The decomposed corpse was determined to be dead in the dunes anywhere from five days to three weeks. Forensic tests put her age between 25 and 35.
Although there is no direct evidence linking the dead woman to convicted killer Hadden Clark, investigators say he may have been on the Cape at the time she was killed.
Clark, 47, is serving time for killing a 6-year-old girl and a 23-year-old Maryland woman in 1992.
He told investigators that he killed at least 11 other women and buried some of them on the Cape -- in the National Seashore and near his grandparents' former home in Wellfleet. Investigators are expected to resume the search for these bodies sometime next month.
Clark and his brother Bradfield, now serving time in California for the dismemberment murder of a co-worker, both lived on the Cape as children.
Hadden Clark also lived and worked on the Lower Cape before joining the Navy. He was discharged in 1985.
Nine unmarked state and local police cars pulled into St. Peter's Cemetery around 10 a.m. yesterday.
Investigators held a tarp around the grave to block it from view as they lifted the remains from the casket and placed into a hearse owned by McHoul Funeral Home in Provincetown. The body was taken first to the funeral home on Harry Kemp Way, and later to the medical examiner's office in Pocasset.
David McHoul, director of the funeral home, said the body was not embalmed when it was first buried in the donated casket. He said the casket was made of light steel and suspected it might have taken in water over the years.
He said the body was dug up 20 years ago for blood samples. That was before DNA sampling became a key tool for crime investigators.
"Obviously," State Police Sgt. James Plath said at the cemetery, "respecting the privacy and
the sacredness of the deceased, this is not something we would do unless we thought it was necessary to do."
He said it could be months before investigators have any definitive answers regarding the identity of the dead woman. Though the case has remained open all these years, he said, investigators have been working "a little more intensely" in the past several months.
When asked whether Clark is being considered a suspect, he said, "We're not going to go into anything about the investigation at all."
 


www.provincetownbanner.co...9/7/2000/2

Tobias hopeful about solving fabled murder

Liz Winston
BANNER STAFF

If everything goes the way that Provincetown police Sgt. Warren Tobias hopes, a murder that occurred 26 years ago in the dunes off Race Point may soon be solved.

Results from DNA samples taken from the victim's body, which has never been identified and is buried in St. Peter's Cemetery, are due back from a Louisiana laboratory this week. If those samples prove that the body is a woman named Rory Gene Kesinger, as Tobias suspects, he says he knows who killed her - and hopes to soon be able to make an arrest.

For years, Tobias, along with many other Provincetown and state police officers, has been chasing leads in one of the most notorious unsolved murders ever to occur on Cape Cod. On Channel 7 News last week, Tobias announced that the pending lab results may mean the payoff of the years of work. Results of the DNA tests had been expected months ago, after the body was exhumed by state police in late March.

Though Tobias isn't saying who the suspect is in the case, he is ruling out one convicted murderer who was widely speculated to be the killer of the Woman in the Dunes.

'I do not believe [the killer] is Hadden Clark,' Tobias told the Banner after his Channel 7 appearance.

Clark, 47, is currently serving two consecutive 30-year sentences in the state of Maryland for the murders of 24-year-old Laura Houghteling and six-year-old Michelle Dorr. Diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic, Clark has confided in a cellmate, whom he believes to be Jesus Christ, that he committed many other murders, including that of the Woman in the Dunes.

To see if Clark could corroborate those claims, he and his cellmate were brought to the Cape this winter. They were taken to the property in Wellfleet where Clark spent time as a child at his grandfather's home and where he claims to have buried victims, and to the dunes near Race Point to identify the site where he claims to have left the body of a female victim in 1974, when he was living in Provincetown and working as a cook at the Moors restaurant - the year that the Woman in the Dunes was murdered.

Some police believe that Clark's story about the Woman in the Dunes is hot air, and may have been pieced together from information he got on the Internet or elsewhere. But just this week, an article in The New Yorker hypothesizes otherwise. In his piece, 'A Hole in the Ground,' longtime Wellfleet summer resident Alec Wilkinson outlines conversations he had with Clark in which the convicted criminal divulged information about the dunes murder which it would seem only the killer would know.

On July 26, 1974, a 13-year-old girl walking her dog in the dunes about a mile east of Race Point came upon a body. The woman was lying face down, naked, on a towel with her clothes folded near her head. Her hands had been cut off and her wrists shoved into the sand as if she were doing push-ups; her head was almost completely severed.

Wilkinson's speculations about the possibility that Clark killed her are based partly on the fact that Clark knew the detail about the woman's wrists having been shoved into the sand, and that he likely had little access to other sources of information about the crime, as some police involved with the case have speculated. In a phone interview with the Banner, however, Wilkinson said there were some parts of Clark's account of the murder that seemed weak, including the claim that he knocked the woman unconscious with a surf-casting pole.

'It is possible that Clark's [account of the murder is] imaginary,' Wilkinson's article states.

Around the time that a woman's body was found in the Race Point dunes, a young woman named Rory Gene Kesinger was running with a dangerous crowd. Kesinger and her friends had been involved in gun running and drug smuggling, Tobias has said, and were chased by federal authorities from Alaska across the U.S., and eventually to Pembroke, where Kesinger and others were arrested one night in a drug raid. After attempting to shoot a police officer during the bust, Kesinger was incarcerated in the Plymouth County jail, from which she escaped not long after - and not long before a body turned up near Race Point. She was never heard from again.

The description of the body found in the dunes matches that of Kesinger, and a forensic reconstruction of the murder victim's head done in the 1970s bears a striking resemblance to photos of the missing woman.

Kesinger's name was first connected to the unsolved murder case in 1990, when former Police Chief James J. Meads, who swore he would solve the crime, was about to retire. When Tobias later took over the case, promising connections between the victim and Kesinger seemed to fizzle out for awhile. Police had fingerprints from a criminal named or using the name Rory Gene Kesinger, but had no way to try to match them to the handless victim. No dental records could be found for Kesinger, and at the time, no family members could be tracked down by the detectives.

When Tobias was interviewed by then-Banner reporter George Liles about the Woman in the Dunes in August 1995, Tobias said he believed he knew the identity of the victim and had reason to believe that someone living in Provincetown at the time had a strong connection to the murder. A car registered to the person, who Tobias had recently interviewed, had been parked outside the house in Pembroke the night that Kesinger was arrested.

More recently, relatives of Kesinger agreed to DNA testing that could link them to the unidentified body buried off Winslow Street. On a foggy March morning this year, state and Provincetown police removed the gravestone that reads only 'Unidentified Female Body Found Race Point Dunes, July 26, 1974,' and transferred the corpse to a waiting hearse. After DNA samples were taken, the body was reburied at St. Peter's several days later.

State Police gave a brief statement at the edge of the cemetery, though they would not comment on whether the efforts had anything to do with the investigation of Hadden Clark. 'The bottom line,' said Det. Paul White, 'is that this is an unsolved murder, and we're continuing the investigation.'

Today, Tobias will not comment on whether the person he suspects is living in Provincetown, or whether they are already in jail for another crime. But he strongly suspects that the pending DNA results will prove that the Woman in the Dunes is Rory Gene Kesinger.

And he is also convinced that information will give him what he needs to charge someone with her death.
 


lady-big.jpg


In July 1974, a woman’s remains were found in the National Seashore in Provincetown. Her hands were amputated, and she had been nearly decapitated.

By Thomas Farragher Globe columnist July 23, 2014

Who killed her?

Who bashed in her skull and cut off her hands? Who left her lying naked and face down on a green beach towel, Wrangler jeans and blue bandana folded neatly into a crude pillow beneath her head?

For half a lifetime now, Provincetown detectives have ridden an investigatory roller coaster trying to solve this macabre riddle.

They’ve consulted dentists and psychics. They’ve exhumed the body and extracted DNA samples. They’ve used ground-penetrating radar. They’ve made a plaster reconstruction of her face. They’ve watched as suspects have tantalizingly presented themselves, only to have the trail grow cold again.

To say the case is cold describes the results of the so-far fruitless search, not its intensity.

As Lobur and one of her predecessors, retired Acting Chief Warren Tobias, review details of the brutal killing and the search for the killer, you get the feeling the search has become personal. “I know there’s a murderer out there somewhere loose,’’ said Tobias, who led the search for 22 years. “There’s a family out there that needs closure.’’

The victim’s hands were severed at the wrist and taken to thwart identification. She had long, reddish-brown hair, and seven expensive gold crowns. She was between 25 and 35, possibly older. She weighed 140 to 150 pounds, and stood 5 feet 6 to 5 feet 8 inches.

She had been dead for up to two weeks, her body ravaged by a searing summer sun and dune flies. “A year and a half ago, we absolutely thought we knew who it was,’’ Lobur recalled. “Nope,’’ Tobias said.



Lobur has marshaled an impressive amount of scientific firepower and has assembled a case file stored in a bookcase next to her desk that groans under its heft.

The latest DNA evidence was collected last summer and now forms the basis for the forensic scavenger hunt.

It is not a passing fancy for Lobur. She works on the case on her days off. She finds her mind wandering to it when a ‘70s song plays on the radio: Did she like this song?

She is convinced the killer will be found once, and if, the victim is known. The two were closely linked, investigators agree.

But 40 years have passed now. If the killer was about the same age as the victim, he, or she, could be pushing 70. “That window is closing, and it’s closing rapidly,’’ Lobur said.

For now, she’s trying to raise funds for a new coffin. After 40 years, the Lady’s thin metal casket is rusting out and falling apart.



Thomas Farragher is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at thomas.farragher@globe.com.
 

Unidentified Female (Lady in the Dunes) 1974, Massachusetts

www.provincetowngov.org/s...dunes.html

www.provincetown-ma.gov

The Lady of the Dunes

The Provincetown Police Department is seeking assistance with a 28-year old unsolved murder investigation.

Summary: On July 26, 1974 the body of an unidentified white, female was found in the dunes approximately one mile east of Race Point Beach. Both her hands were amputated and have never been recovered. The cause of death was determined to be a blunt force injuries to the head.
The description of the Lady of the Dunes:

Height Approximately 5' 6-1/2" tall
Weight 145 pounds
Age Between age 25 and 40 years old
Hair Long red/auburn color

Assistance Requested:
Recent technological advances has made DNA identification possible. If you have any information about this case, or know of any missing person who may fit the above description, please contact: Sgt. Warren Tobias at the Provincetown Police Department 508.487.1212.


Comments? E-mail Chief of Police Ted Meyer, or write to him care of the Provincetown Police Department, 26 Shank painter Road, Provincetown, MA 02657 (508) 487-1213.



BARyl9g.jpg


FSC2wjz.jpg


d1ybLzx.jpg


BjtObMx.jpg
 

Cape murder haunts police chief

By Teresa M. Hanafin GLOBE STAFF SEPTEMBER 06, 1987

This story is from the Globe archives. It originally appeared Sept. 6, 1987.

PROVINCETOWN -- Thirteen years ago, a beagle sniffing around the dunes of Provincetown, its young owner nearby, made a gruesome discovery: the body of a young woman who had been brutally murdered.

The body -- badly decomposed, its skull crushed, the head severed at the neck, the hands cut off and missing -- has never been identified, the killer never found.

pJMsboZ.jpg


Chief Meads
Related | Farragher: The mystery of Provincetown’s Lady of the Dunes

Earlier this summer, a woman in her early 20s who lives in Canada told an acquaintance a bizarre tale: she said she remembered seeing her father strangle a woman in Provincetown about 15 years ago, Meads said.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police were notified and they, in turn, called Meads and the Massachusetts State Police. In the meantime, the woman moved

from western Canada to the Montreal area, and police are trying to track her down. When she is found, a member of the State Police Crime Prevention and Control Unit in South Yarmouth and Meads plan to travel to Canada to interview her.

Then, last week, a woman from Maryland called Meads to say that she had not heard from her sister since the sister moved to Boston in 1974 -- the year of the murder. She also said her sister had auburn hair, the same color as the murder victim’s.


RELATED | 2000: Police hope second exhumation will identify victim

It is that relentness pursuit of any and all leads, tips and hunches that has marked Meads’ investigation of the only unsolved murder case out of the handful he has encountered during his 17 years as police chief.

“Ever since this happened, Jim won’t leave a stone unturned,” said Dr. Stanley M. Schwartz, head of diagnosis at the Tufts University Dental School and the state dental forensic examiner who pieced the murder victim’s skull and teeth back together.

“He has told me that he’ll never quit, and he never has. He’ll follow any lead. He’s a very intelligent, well-trained and experienced police officer. And very dogged.”

Meads was 41 years old and had been Provincetown’s chief of police just four years when the body of “The Lady in the Dunes” was found in a dense grove of scrub pine trees about 2 1/2 miles east of Race Point, on July 26, 1974.

The woman, estimated to be 25 to 30 years old, about 5 feet, 8 inches tall with a big-boned, athletic build, had been killed by a blow to the left side of her skull.

She was found nude, lying sideways on a light green, terrycloth beach blanket. Her dungarees and blue print bandanna were folded neatly under her head as though used as a pillow. Her blouse never has been found.

Her long, reddish-brown hair was held back with a barrette. On her teeth were seven gold crowns, worth about $5,000 to $8,000 at the time. She had been

sexually molested with a wooden object, evidently after her death.

Although pathologists said she had been dead only four or five days, the July heat and dune flies had left the body badly decomposed.

Since there was no sign of a struggle and the bed of pine needles on which she lay was undisturbed, Meads believes she knew her assailant and was asleep when attacked.

Schwartz reconstructed the teeth, jaw and skull, and Dr. Clyde Snow, a renowned forensic anthropologist for the Civil Air Medical Institute of the Federal Aviation Administration, now retired, created a clay model of the woman’s features.

Photographs of the model and artists’ renderings of the sculpture, were circulated worldwide. Desperate for leads, Meads got articles on the case published in dental journals and police and detective magazines. Thousands of dentists were contacted in an effort to locate the one who had done the expensive dental work. Meads appeared in national magazines and on network television. He has traveled extensively following leads.

In the intervening years, Meads has received thousands of letters and phone calls. About 50 have been able to supply dental records, but none have matched.

There have been seemingly promising leads. There was the man in prison in Maine who kept drawing pictures of women without hands; the women at a Provincetown campground who reported their friend missing -- she later turned up.

Meads even consulted psychics; one told him he would find the hands buried under a building at a certain address. It turned out that a cellar had been dug just the previous year.

On one side of Meads’ office, the stack of papers on the case stands 2 to 3 feet tall. In another corner, the victim’s skull sits in a cardboard box, waiting for an identity. A chunk of the skull about the size of a hand is missing, and a jagged 8-inch crack runs across the top.

Meads, now 54, is the only law enforcement official who has worked on the case continuously since the body was discovered; everyone else has either retired or been reassigned. He is contemplating retiring in three years when he will have 30 years of service.

“With most murders, you try to figure out who the murderer was,” he said quietly. “I’ve spent years trying to figure out who the victim was.”

Today, Meads is more resigned. “As the years dwindle on, more dentists will retire or die, more dental records will be lost and the opportunity for identification will diminish,” he said. “Maybe someone on death row will decide to cleanse his soul before he dies and confess to this murder.

“It appears that someday I’ll retire and the case still won’t be solved. But I’m sure whoever follows me in this job, if they get a lead, they’ll call me. And I’ll be ready.”

Meanwhile, every so often he pulls out the file and thumbs through it. Or stares at the skull.

“There’s always been something special about this case to Jim Meads,” Schwartz said. “He looked at it like, this is a human being that had something horrible done to her. He wants to identify her so the perpetrator can be brought to justice. He has always felt a contact of some sort with that young woman.”

Meads had the body buried in St. Peter’s Cemetery in Provincetown, and a stone there reads, “Unidentified female.” Schwartz said that for years, somebody placed a small vase containing flowers at the marker every July 26.
 


The Doe Network:
Case File 119UFMA


119UFMA.jpg
119UFMA2.jpg
119UFMA3.jpg
119UFMA1.jpg




Unidentified White Female

Located on July 26, 1974 in the Race Point Dunes, Provincetown, Barnstable County, Massachusetts.
Cause of death was a blow to the head.
Estimated Date of Death: 10 days to three weeks.
Her nickname is The Lady in the Dunes

Vital Statistics
Estimated age: 25 - 40 years old
Approximate Height and Weight: 5' 6-1/2"; 145 lbs.
Distinguishing Characteristics: Long, auburn or reddish-blond hair. Athletic body. 34" waist, 31" legs. Her hair was tied in a ponytail with a rubber-type barrette. Her toenails were painted pink.
Dentals: Extensive dental work. She had gold crowns on her teeth worth $5000 up to $10,000 at that time. The dental work was done in what dentists call "the New York style" of dental work. Dental charts available.
Clothing: Jeans were found at the scene. She wore a elastic barrette in her hair. She lay on one half of a light green, heavy cotton beach blanket.
DNA: Available

Case History

The victim was discovered in the dunes about a mile east of the Race Point ranger station in the summer of 1974.
The woman's hands were missing -presumably removed by the killer so she could not be identified through fingerprints - and her head was nearly severed from her body with an instrument similar to a military entrenching tool. The left side of her skull had been crushed. No weapon was found at the site.
Her nude body was discovered lying on a beach towel with her head resting on her folded jeans. There was no sign of a struggle, and the woman lay on half the towel, as if she'd been sharing it with a companion.
The body was exhumed in 2000, in an attempt to confirm her identity.


Investigators
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Provincetown Police Department
508-487-1212
508-487-1213
Email

By Mail:
Provincetown Police Department
26 Shankpainter Road
Provincetown, MA 02657
You may remain anonymous when submitting information.

NCIC Number:
U-615805149
Please refer to this number when contacting any agency with information regarding this case.

Source Information:
Provincetown Banner
Message from Chief of Police - Provincetown, MA
Cape Cod Times
People Magazine
Anthro Design Works
 

Forum statistics

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