The Mail Tribune
JACKSONVILLE, Ore. (AP) -- A pile of discarded clothing, discovered by foresters and stained with what could be human blood, has captured the attention of investigators in two counties.
Now detectives are taking the case to the community, hoping that someone will have details that will help them decide whether the clothes are evidence of a violent crime.
“I’ve looked at lots of dump sites and this is just a unique collection of items, so I want to make an effort,” Jackson County sheriff’s Detective Colin Fagan.
A forester first spotted the items wadded together in April 1999 -- but didn’t report the find until reading an article about unsolved “cold cases” recently. A contractor had punched in a rough access road the previous November for fire protection. Still-visible tire tracks showed a vehicle had backed up to the brush pile, then driven off down the road.
The tale piqued Fagan’s interest and he soon tracked down several unsolved cases the items could be linked to. In November 1996 Kaelin Glazier, a Ruch 15-year-old, disappeared from the area. The Grants Pass Public Safety Department had an open 1998 case of a missing woman, Catherine Ann Wallace, 42, who police feared had been murdered.
Investigators gathered a stained heavy-duty sheet like those at hospitals and motels with a W marked in the corner, two striped shop rags, a black sleeveless sheath dress from the Gap faded by the sun, and a floral-print dress.
At the Oregon State Police Crime Lab in Central Point, the sheet, one shop rag and the flowered dress tested positive for iron oxide stains consistent with those left by blood. Small, dark stains ranged across the dirty sheet in a curving pattern that suggests it was wrapped around a body.
But after so many seasons in the woods, the tests were inconclusive.
“We tested for hemoglobin, but it was too degraded to tell,” Fagan said. “It’s not paint. We think they are blood.”
Fagan wants to see if search and rescue dogs trained to find bodies will react to the stained materials. If they do, that could indicate the stains are from human blood, he said.
That confirmation could help Fagan convince the state crime lab in Portland to do a difficult test for mitochondrial DNA, a cellular component that can remain after other DNA degrades. Such a test could help identify the blood source.
“We just want to solve this mystery,” Fagan said.