Woman Found Deceased in Westport, Connecticut Still a Mystery

On the Doe Network website, she is Hot Case 114. Under the Cold Case Files of the Connecticut Department of Public Safety's website, she is simply referred to as "unknown female". For nearly twenty-five years, her death and real name have been a mystery.

She was found on May 18, 1985. Her body was partially dismembered and on fire. The location was off of the westbound shoulder of Interstate 95, near the Sasco Creek overpass, near exit 19 in Westport. Although never declared a homicide, her death was labeled suspicious.

There are few clues to go on but at the time of her discovery she was wearing a pair of blue or black jeans, a heavy wool sweater that was white/off white in color and a plain gold chain around her neck. She was a black female and is believed to be of African ancestry.

The Connecticut State Police are in charge of the investigation of the unknown woman's death.

"We put her on the [Department of Public Safety] Website in an effort to generate leads as to who she is and who maybe responsible for her death," said Lieutenant Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police. "It may be listed as a cold case but it is an active case that has a detective assigned and working on it."

Connecticut, unlike many of the larger states such as California, Texas and Florida, does not have a large amount of unidentified deceased individuals. There is no official number on how many unidentified deceased there are but according to Missing Person's activist Jan Smolinski, there are at least eighteen such cases in Connecticut. Smolinski is certain that there are even more cases because some police departments have either forgotten or choose not to continue their investigations. Four of the cases that she knows of are of women that were found behind a strip mall in the city of New Britain since 1995. Another more recent case that she cites is the discovery of a human skull found by a hunter along the Salmon River in Haddam on October 6, 2006.

According to Lieutenant Vance there is no central repository of how many unidentified deceased individuals there are in Connecticut. The DoeNetwork website which lists the unidentified woman found in Westport is an international voluntary database of missing and unidentified persons. The Westport Jane Doe is one of six cases from Connecticut listed on their site.

State Medical Examiner H. Wayne Carver remembers her case. His office has a major role in identifying deceased persons. They analyze fingerprints, dental records, and DNA. Most of the time they are successful. However, in some cases, additional police work is needed to give the deceased their proper name.

"Some of the unidentified in Connecticut could be from [the] Greater New York City Area or Boston since the state [Connecticut] is between these two major metropolitan areas," Carver said. "Some of these people are transient to the area and may not even be listed as a missing person. Others may not even be from this country."

The lack of a central database for unidentified deceased persons is a problem for Jan Smolinski. She knows the importance of identifying the unnamed. Her thirty-one year old son, Billy went missing from his Waterbury home on August 24, 2004 and to date has not been heard from. She knows that there is always a possibility that when an unidentified person is found here or out of state, it could be her son.

"I feel the authorities should make every effort available to solve these cases. Smolinski said. "They should mandate DNA collection and enter it into the National Database (CODIS). This is vital to help connect the dots to put a name and face on each and every unidentified person."

According to Smolinski, this database would be able to match DNA samples from families of the missing and match it to the unidentifieds found throughout the country. In recent years, DNA testing and the Internet have assisted in identifying the remains of person decades old.

Smolinski has also been pushing for medical examiners and coroners to put information of unidentified remains in the Unidentified Decedent Reporting System database. This database is open to the public to view at the Internet address of www.identifyus.org/. To date, Connecticut only has three cases listed in this database; an adult female found in the garage of a house in Waterbury in 2003, an Asian male found murdered and dumped in a wooded area of Milford in 1992 and a male of unknown race found in the Connecticut River in Old Saybrook in 1998. The unidentified female from Westport is not listed.

Sometimes these cases do get resolved after decades of police work. In March of 2007, Police in the town of Clinton were able to match the DNA from an unknown deceased infant found in their town in January of 1975. They matched her DNA to a woman that they suspected of being her biological mother. For over thirty years the case remained a mystery until a few years ago when family members of the parents of the little girl came forward with information. The case however, was not prosecuted because of the death of a key witness.

Lieutenant Paul Vance is still optimistic about solving the identity and cause of death of the Unidentified Woman found in Westport.

"Sometimes these case do [get a] break," Vance said. "A tidbit of DNA or someone coming forward is sometimes all we need to solve a case."

Jan Smolinski hopes that the "Unknown Female" receives justice and a name. The Cheshire resident and grandmother of two continues to search for her son and help others in the same predicament.

"It saddens me to think people have been tossed aside like a weed. Why are certain people considered more important than others?" Smolinski said. "Everyone is a child of God and should be treated with decency and respect."

If you have any information about the identity and murder of this woman you are urged to call the Connecticut State Police Western District Major Crime Squad at (800) 575-6330 or at (203) 696-2561. You can also email them at Wdist.mcs.sec@po.state.ct.us