Spinellicat

Jean Townsend, born on March 11th, 1933, was the victim of an unsolved murder in Ruislip, England. She was a 21-year-old woman who was murdered in September 1954. Despite an extensive police investigation, the case remained unsolved. It was reopened in 1982 following a few anonymous tips, but no conclusion has been reached so far.

She lived with her parents in Bempton Drive, South Ruislip, and worked in the West End of London. On the evening of September 14th, 1954, she attended a social function in the West End and then took the central line train back. She left the station at 11:45 PM and walked down Victoria Road. The next morning, her body was discovered on waste ground to the north side of Victoria Road, near the Angus Drive junction. St. Gregory the Great Catholic Church now stands there (opened in April 1967).

The autopsy revealed that she had been strangled with her own scarf. Despite several items of clothing being removed, there was no evidence of sexual assault. The coroner expressed surprise during the inquest that, apart from the obvious cause of death, there were no signs of struggle or physical resistance from the victim.

While there were suspicions that her murder might be connected to the nearby American Soldiers who had a base at the South Ruislip Air Station, no concrete evidence was found. Rumour's intensified when a resident living near the crime scene reported hearing a woman cry for help, and two male voices were heard arguing, one of which seemed to have an American accent. Allegedly, the United States Air Force (USAF) was reluctant to cooperate with the Metropolitan Police. Many women came forward to report being approached or accosted by strange men. In response to the murder and the publicity surrounding the assaults, local residents formed patrols to escort women from the station to their homes every night.

Side note: Although it is unfortunate that such circumstances require their existence, it is heart warming to witness how communities come together to support one another in the wake of such horror.

Investigators found some possible connections to a few cases of harassment and attacks on nearby women, including the possibility that the murder of another woman in London around the same time was related. There were suspicions that the Townsend murder was connected to an attack on another woman and the 1957 murder of a young mother. Both of these cases occurred a short distance from where Townsend's body was found. Additionally, in 1971, another murder involving strangulation with a scarf took place very close by. The press at the time highlighted these similarities and attempted to establish a connection.

In 2005, a family friend applied for access to the files under the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, but the request was denied, and the files will remain withheld from the public until 2031. Due to this publicity, a new theory emerged mentioning an expatriate Italian nobleman; however, the police stated a lack of evidence and dismissed the idea.

A Pittsburgh woman who went missing more than 30 years ago in a case that stumped authorities who later declared her legally dead has been found living in a nursing home in Puerto Rico.

Patricia Kopta left behind a husband and siblings and meandered through northern Puerto Rico for a while before she was taken as a person "in need" to the adult care home in 1999, according to details announced at a news conference this week in Ross Township, where she once lived.

Kopta, once known as a street preacher in her home town, initially kept her past secret while in Puerto Rico. But she began to divulge details as she suffered progressively from dementia, Ross Township Deputy Police Chief Brian Kohlhepp said.

Kohlhepp said those who knew her in Puerto Rico finally made the connection and contacted Ross Township police, CBS Pittsburgh reported.

Patricia Kopta, a well-known Pittsburgh street preacher known as "The Sparrow," was found alive in Puerto Rico more than three decades after she went missing.

Last year, a social worker at the home alerted authorities back home about the now-83-year-old woman. A DNA test has confirmed her identity, Kohlhepp said.

Her husband, Bob Kopta, and her surviving sister, 78-year-old Gloria Smith. filled in details of Kopta's life at the news conference and in telephone interviews Friday with The Associated Press.

"Shock. I didn't believe it. Total shock," Gloria Smith said of learning the news.

Patricia Kopta had been nicknamed "The Sparrow" because of her slight build, and often frequented parking lots and busy roads in the largely residential community of about 31,000 north of Pittsburgh, where she would caution passersby and motorists about the end of the world. Her family said she suffered from mental health issues and feared being institutionalized, CBS Pittsburgh reported.

"She would always hang out down in Pittsburgh where things were going on. When there was a baseball game going on, when a concert was going on, she would be talking to people," Bob Kopta said about his wife.

But before she began preaching, Kopta was a straight-A student who became a model and dance instructor. After graduating high school, she worked in finance at a Pittsburgh plate glass company and would attend ballroom dancing events weekly, according to her family.

She would vacation often in Puerto Rico with her friends before she got married, Smith recalled.

"She just loved the ocean, the beach, the warm sunshine," Smith told the AP.

Smith said her sister quit her job at the glass company after 10 years because of migraines that doctors blamed on stress. She then got a job as an elevator operator at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh.

That's when family members noticed a change in her.

"She said something about seeing an angel there," Smith recalled.

Shortly afterward, Kopta began preaching and was briefly institutionalized after doctors diagnosed her with "delusions of grandeur" and said she had signs of schizophrenia. Upon her release, she kept preaching until she vanished in 1992.

"I come home one night, and she's just gone," Bob Kopta told the AP.

They had been married for 20 years.

Kopta, now 86, recalled how they met near a river in Pittsburgh where he had a boat. He gave her and her friends a ride and fell in love. In 1972, they married.

The disappearance stumped authorities and family alike. Police went as far as to consult a psychic, while Kopta recalled his wife once mentioned she would like to go to Puerto Rico because of its balmy weather. So he published ads in Puerto Rican newspapers, but never got a response.

Years went by with no sign of her. He obtained a death declaration about seven years after her disappearance.

"I went through a lot," said Bob Kopta, a retired truck driver. "Every time they'd find a body somewhere (I wondered), 'Is it Patricia? Is it Patricia?'"

Meanwhile, Patricia Kopta apparently was wandering the island's northern towns of Naranjito, Corozal and Toa Alta, located just southwest of the capital of San Juan. When she first was taken in at the adult home, she had hinted that she had arrived in Puerto Rico via a cruise ship from Europe, Kohlhepp said.

After a social worker contacted police in Pennsylvania, it took almost a year for DNA samples to confirm that the woman was indeed Patricia Kopta.

"It's a sad thing, but it's a relief off my mind," her husband said. "When your wife goes missing, you're a suspect."

Bob Kopta, who did not remarry, said he doesn't plan to visit, and that he's now trying to forget the past, though he's glad to know she's being taken care of.

"She could have come home at any time. She always said she wanted to go to a warm climate," he said.

Smith, on the other hand, wants to go to the island to see her older sister. She says she's been unable to speak to the elder sibling on the phone because she cannot hold a conversation, given her dementia. A twin sister of Patricia Kopta died without knowing her fellow twin was still alive.

"Whether she knows me or not, I still want to see her and give her a hug and tell her I love her," Smith said. "I thought maybe she had died."

What post do you just have to keep reading and searching about, maybe hoping for an update or convinced the official judgement is wrong and you feel there is another suspect out there. For me I come back to the West Memphis 3 and still keep trying to get more information to try and figure out the right suspects. Also the The Springfield 3 what happened to them, how did they get all 3 out of the home, will we ever get to the bottom of it? Please share your cases or theories.

Welcome to True Crime, I'm hoping to build a community to share news and case write ups and help bring awareness to all cases. I really hope to see many different types of cases and latest news on ongoing cases. I will be gathering some of the cases that interest me over the next few days and posting some of them I hope we can all respectfully come together to discuss mine and any of your own.