Recently in missing Category

Los Angeles police will dig near two freeway ramps in Ventura County today in a search for the remains of a San Fernando Valley boy killed by a serial murderer 40 years ago.

LAPD officers, aided by dozens of FBI agents and police from other agencies, will excavate where four police dogs have indicated that human bones have been buried, the Ventura County Star reported Sunday.

A ground-penetrating radar unit from Caltrans has indicated a likely burial location, and a particle detector that sniffs out decaying human bones "went off like a Geiger counter in the same place," said Los Angeles Police Detective Vivian Flores.

The interchange of the 23 Freeway at Tierra Rejada Road in Moorpark is about 25 miles west of the Arleta home where Roger Dale Madison was last seen alive on Dec. 14, 1968. A construction crew chief who was building the freeway, Mack Ray Edwards, confessed to kidnapping and murdering the boy, throwing him into a hole and covering him up with rocks and fill dirt as the 23 was being built.

Edwards, known as the most-notorious serial killer of children in California history, confessed to as many as 18 kidnappings and murders dating back to at least 1953. Although he was never charged with killing Roger Madison, he confessed to the crime shortly before he hanged himself with a television cord while on death row at San Quentin.

Flores said Edwards' confession in the Madison case was not followed up in 1970, but the reasons

Elizabeth Duer, 27, missing for several days from her home on Kenoak Drive in Baldwin Park was found last night in a ward at the Los Angeles County/USC Medical Center, officials said.

Duer, a student at Cal Poly, was being sought by the Baldwin Park Police Department after her boyfriend and parents reported her missing.

A nurse at the hospital recognized Duer from news accounts, police said. During an earlier check of the hospital police were given the impression that Duer was not a patient there.

Information as to Duer's whereabouts for the past several days remains sketchy.

Police had been following up on some information obtained from a home computer by the District Attorney's Office, before Duer was finally located, authorities said.

Here's the latest story.

Family members of Elizabeth Duer, a 27-year-old missing Baldwin Park woman,  have turned to the Internet for help in their search. I came across a blog post that highlights their turmoil:

Almost two weeks ago my cousin went missing and we are all needless to say extremely worried and scared for her safety as there was a possibility of a stalker situation behind all this.

 

 

Police are searching for a 27-year-old woman who was reported missing from her Baldwin Park home. Here's the story as we know it now:

BALDWIN PARK - Police are looking for 27-year-old Elizabeth Duer, who has been missing from the area for more than a week under suspicious circumstances.

Duer, a landscape architect and student at Cal Poly Pomona, was last scene leaving her Baldwin Park home in her silver 2000 Honda Insight at 6 p.m. Sept. 7. She told her roommates she would return home later that evening, but that night they found she had not returned.

Duer's aunt, Pati Weaver, said that it is very unusual for her to leave her room unsecured.

"So many things about the situation are just so unlike her," Weaver said.

Duer is 5 feet 8 inches tall, 120 pounds and has brown hair and hazel eyes.

Detectives have apparently told a CBS reporter in New York that Duer took money from an ATM machine prior to her disappearance. Some family members hope Duer is on a camping trip, but her boyfriend apparently said "no way."

The boyfriend is unidentified.

*Some other blog posts and news reports:

True Crime Report 

In Session

Web Sleuths

KTLA

KABC

KNBC

*Baldwin Park Police Department is holding a 2 p.m. press conference to discuss the case

This from ABC7.com: (h/t commenter jensy nguyen)

A family of four that went missing after a weekend getaway was found Thursday night.

Johnny Nguyen, 28, his wife Jessica and their two sons Joshua and Jacob, ages 8 and 2, were last heard from via text message on their way to Laughlin on August 22.

They stayed at various hotels on the Las Vegas strip, and were expected to return to Woodland Hills but never returned.

Family members said the family returned Thursday night. No further information was available.

This comes from LAist:

Good news. Andrea Wilson-Smith, the 14-year-old we reported on yesterday, was found early this morning.

The LAPD writes in an update to the media... "On September 5, 2008, at around 3:00 a.m., a CHP patrol unit found missing person Andrea Wilson-Smith near Foothill Boulevard and Michillinda Avenue, in Pasadena. She was taken to LAPD's Northeast Division, where she was picked by her parent. Investigators still haven't determined why the teen ran away from her home."

Serene Branson at KCBS/KCAL reported today on the story of a family who went to Nevada for the weekend and disappeared. I didn't catch the family's name. Apparently the mom and dad haven't shown up for work ... but their credit cards have been used on the Las Vgeas Strip.

Reportedly there are security camera images of the Mom and Dad, but their two kids have apparently vanished.

I'll find the whole story on Google news and post it here later.

Don't know if this is a Caylee Anthony case or a Runaway Bride, but interesting nonetheless.

Pasadena PD may have an embarassing scandal on its hands in the wake of an article that appeared in Thursday's Pasadena Weekly.

Andre Coleman reexamines the investigation into the death of former police Lt. David Richter and turns up some interesting tidbits.

Here's the lede:

Homicide investigators with the LA County Sheriff's Department are taking a second look into the death of retired Pasadena police Officer David Richter -- a case that, although initially thought to be suicide, has already been at the center of an internal affairs investigation in Pasadena and caused at least one person to lash out anonymously against Pasadena police leadership.

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INDUSTRY - Police attempted Thursday to sort out the details of a custody dispute that mamy have resulted in the disappearance of an 8-year-old boy and his mother.

Jesus Puerta, of El Monte, was reported missing about a week ago. His father made the report to El Monte police. The case was turned over the the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department when it was determined the boy went missing from a day care center in Bassett, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Sgt. Gerard Velona said.

Detectives are also seeking Jessee Pheifer, 27, the boy's mother. "Everything is very preliminary," Velona said. "There is nothing to indicate this young man is in any kind of danger."

N0 amber alert has been issued, Velona said.

"We don't even have a car description," he said.

The missing mom and her daughter found in a Chatanooga bus depot had taken the bus there from Joplin, Missouri, police now say.

Apparently the pair were headed to Miami Florida. The unidentified man supposedly traveling with the family has not been located. Press conference is now scheduled for 4:30 p.m.

Police said they have a "happy ending" to report in the tale of two missing girls, a mom and a Lexus. Details are sketchy. A press Conference is scheduled for 20 minutes from now.

* The eight year old has been found in a McDonald's parking lot in the Lexus in Miami Oklahoma. They believe that an unidentified man is also involved. They don't know what his relationship is, but this was a planned thing, police are saying. The 12-year-old her mom and man are still missing. No amber alerts have been issued and the FBI has not been notified.

Monrovia seems to be in a lot of news stories these days. From NBC in San Diego:

Authorities want to talk to the mother of one of two girls, ages 12 and 8, who disappeared from San Dimas with their foster parents' car.

Two girls, ages 12 and 8, were reported missing Monday from their foster home in San Dimas, along with their foster parents' car, which the older girl may be driving, the sheriff's department reported. Sheriff's investigators said the girls may have been abducted, and since the older girl's mother, identified as Iris Pineda Zavala, of Monrovia, cannot be located, that may be a possible lead in the case