CANADA Canada - Donna Awcock, 17, London, Ont, 13 Oct 1983

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JeannieC

JeannieC

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Donna Jean Awcock was a quiet, shy girl who loved children, lived with her family in the Cheyenne Ave. complex and was babysitting on the night of October 13, 1983.

The woman who hired her got a ride home from a bar with a stranger. She had brought pizza for her and Donna to share.

After they ate, she asked Donna to go to a nearby variety store to buy her cigarettes. Donna never returned.

Her body was found the next day. Donna had been abducted, raped, and strangled. Her body was dumped near Fanshawe Dam.

Donna's sister has never given up the hope of finding who committed this terrible act and of bringing them to justice.

Donna's father has passed away and her mother still cries not knowing what happened to her daughter.

Pray for Justice for Donna Jean Awcock
 
Thank you Jeannie C for posting about Donna Jean Awcock. Here is more on this case

Awcock family tries to find closure

Any tips can be given to History Homicide at 519-690-2354.
http://www.thelondoner.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2849834

http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&source=www.google.ca

The long hunt for a killer

UNSOLVED 1983 SLAYING: Donna Jean Awcock's sister is trying to raise money to hire a private investigator
Tammy Dennett still tears up just talking about her sister, Donna Jean Awcock.
Her voice breaks and face contorts in pain when she imagines her baby sister’s last terrifying moments alive.
The 17-year-old’s badly beaten body was found Oct. 14 1983, near London’s Fanshawe Dam. She’d been raped and strangled to death.
Nearly 30 years later, with no arrests, Awcock’s family still grieves
http://www.lfpress.com/news/london/2011/05/29/18208941.html
 
Patience said:
Thank you Jeannie C for posting about Donna Jean Awcock. Here is more on this case

Awcock family tries to find closure

Any tips can be given to History Homicide at 519-690-2354.http://www.thelondoner.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2849834

http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca&source=www.google.ca

The long hunt for a killer

UNSOLVED 1983 SLAYING: Donna Jean Awcock's sister is trying to raise money to hire a private investigator
Tammy Dennett still tears up just talking about her sister, Donna Jean Awcock.
Her voice breaks and face contorts in pain when she imagines her baby sister’s last terrifying moments alive.
The 17-year-old’s badly beaten body was found Oct. 14 1983, near London’s Fanshawe Dam. She’d been raped and strangled to death.
Nearly 30 years later, with no arrests, Awcock’s family still grieves
http://www.lfpress.com/news/london/2011/05/29/18208941.html
Click to expand...

WS's understand the pain this family has suffered and they do everything they can to show their support. Let's hope someone can add to the information Tammy already has!

Our prayers go out for them always! Thank you for joining in for Donna Jean!
 
"I don't want people to forget about my sister. We deserve answers. She can't speak so I will be her voice. I am not going to leave this alone until the day I die or they get caught." The words from Tammy Dennett as she speaks about her sister Donna Jean Awcock are filled with anger and frustration. And rightly so, it's been 27 years since Donna Jean's raped and beaten body was found on Kilally Road, October 14, 1983, with no *suspect to be had after all this time.
 
Did LE ever find out who took the babysitter home that night?
 
http://www.chathamdailynews.ca/2013...er-killed-her-17-year-old-sister-donna-awcock

"One of the London region’s coldest unsolved murders is nearing a crucial anniversary, a point at which not only many key clues have vanished — but also people who could shed light on the slaying.

But even now, almost 30 years since the badly beaten body of Donna Awcock was found near London’s Fanshawe Dam, family members have hope.

That hope is renewed by a $50,000 reward — double its original value — for information leading to the conviction of the 17-year-old’s killer.

But one expert says it’s not the number of zeros in a reward, but technological advances and forensic evidence that are the best bets to crack cold cases.

Awcock’s family is undeterred.

“Money talks,” said Tammy Dennett, who’s fought tirelessly to keep her sister’s case alive.

This year, she pushed the Ontario Provincial Police to double the reward. She’s also plastered the new reward signs around East London.
"
“I just feel in my heart that someone out there knows. Someone must know,” she said Wednesday
 
http://www.londoncommunitynews.com/news-story/1358415-sister-seeks-justice-/
bbm.
" Police issued a description and sketch of a potential suspect in the case, a white man seen in the vicinity of Cheyenne Avenue when Donna disappeared. He was described as white and in his late 20s or early 30s at the time of the killing. He stood five-foot-six to five-foot-nine, weighed 150 pounds and had a thin, small build with short, neatly combed brown wavy hair. The suspect was last seen wearing faded blue jeans and brown cowboy boots and was known to frequent hotels with pool tables. He also drove an older model full-size car that was white or light in colour, possibly with a dark vinyl roof. While Dennett said she’s sure the person who killed her sister is still alive, she’s uncertain whether he or she is still in London. But Aaron Broughm, executive director of Search International 5, a private London-based organization focused on finding missing persons, said he has a feeling the suspect is still in the city. Broughm organized a search of the site Friday where Donna’s body was found to coincide with Dennett’s memorial. After placing a memorial cross in the ground where searchers discovered her body, Broughm and other volunteers combed the area with metal detectors and shovels in the hopes of finding anything that could offer a clue as to who was behind Donna’s murder. He said Donna’s keys and the shoes she was wearing when she disappeared were never found. Broughm said he lived in the same building where Donna was babysitting the night she disappeared and remembers a man fitting the OPP’s suspect description also living in the building at the time. He said he has heard reports that the man still frequents a local bar in London. On Thursday, Broughm met with the OPP to share information he could recall about the man, telling police he remembered the man had a thick French accent"
 
http://www.lfpress.com/2014/02/28/oprah-winfrey-network-debuts-to-catch-a-killer-saturday

They are the familiar names of innocent teenagers whose names are forever linked to London’s painful, puzzling criminal past.

Donna Awcock was 17 when her body was found near Fanshawe Dam in 1983. She was last seen at a variety store in northeast London.

Jacquelyn English was 15 when she was abducted while walking over the Wellington Rd. overpass at Hwy. 401 in 1969. Her body was found in Big Otter Creek near *Tillsonburg.

Lynda White was a 19-year-old Western University student from Burlington who disappeared after writing a French exam. Her body was found in a shallow grave near St. Williams.
 
http://www.lfpress.com/2014/02/28/oprah-winfrey-network-debuts-to-catch-a-killer-saturday

They are the familiar names of innocent teenagers whose names are forever linked to London’s painful, puzzling criminal past.

Donna Awcock was 17 when her body was found near Fanshawe Dam in 1983. She was last seen at a variety store in northeast London.

Jacquelyn English was 15 when she was abducted while walking over the Wellington Rd. overpass at Hwy. 401 in 1969. Her body was found in Big Otter Creek near *Tillsonburg.

Lynda White was a 19-year-old Western University student from Burlington who disappeared after writing a French exam. Her body was found in a shallow grave near St. Williams.
 
myzzy said:
http://www.lfpress.com/2014/02/28/oprah-winfrey-network-debuts-to-catch-a-killer-saturday

They are the familiar names of innocent teenagers whose names are forever linked to London’s painful, puzzling criminal past.

Donna Awcock was 17 when her body was found near Fanshawe Dam in 1983. She was last seen at a variety store in northeast London.

Jacquelyn English was 15 when she was abducted while walking over the Wellington Rd. overpass at Hwy. 401 in 1969. Her body was found in Big Otter Creek near *Tillsonburg.

Lynda White was a 19-year-old Western University student from Burlington who disappeared after writing a French exam. Her body was found in a shallow grave near St. Williams.
Click to expand...

rbbm.
Coincidence that Lynda W.disappeared after writing a French exam and a possible poi in Donna Awcock case, " had a thick French accent" , as per my post # 8 upthread..

"He said he has heard reports that the man still frequents a local bar in London. On Thursday, Broughm met with the OPP to share information he could recall about the man, telling police he remembered the man had a thick French accent"
 
Also posted in Toronto cold case thread.
Donna Awcock will be featured on this new cold case show, To Catch a Killer, which is debuting tonight at 8.pm.

http://ownca.oprah.com/Shows/To-Catch-A-Killer/Schedule.aspx


http://www.thestar.com/entertainmen...ch_a_killer_features_canadian_cold_cases.html

"“They raped her, they beat, her, they strangled her. And then they stared into her face and watched her life slip away. What kind of animal does this?” asks Carolyne Awcock, the mother of Donna Jean Awcock, who failed to return home after babysitting in October 1983.

Her remains were found a day later not far from the place she was babysitting. But no arrest has been made.

Unlike the scripted Cold Squad, of course, viewers can’t expect a neat Hollywood ending. A good conclusion is often when the team manages to come up with another clue, which leads to more questions. And actual names and clues are sometimes excised from the broadcast for legal reasons.

The show is essentially a public service announcement dressed up as middling entertainment. But if it helps to find one more killer, and to give mothers like Awcock some sense of peace, then it’s hard to argue that it doesn’t fulfil the OWN mandate of making the world a slightly better place."
 
Sorry, 3 in row but really want to get these news links up and hopefully work their magic!


http://www.lfpress.com/2014/02/28/oprah-winfrey-network-debuts-to-catch-a-killer-saturday

"They are the familiar names of innocent teenagers whose names are forever linked to London’s painful, puzzling criminal past.

Donna Awcock was 17 when her body was found near Fanshawe Dam in 1983. She was last seen at a variety store in northeast London.

Jacquelyn English was 15 when she was abducted while walking over the Wellington Rd. overpass at Hwy. 401 in 1969. Her body was found in Big Otter Creek near *Tillsonburg.

Lynda White was a 19-year-old Western University student from Burlington who disappeared after writing a French exam. Her body was found in a shallow grave near St. Williams.

Their families have held out the faint hope that maybe, somewhere, the mystery surrounding their tragedies would finally be solved.

Over the decades, there have been cold case revivals and the odd news story. Nothing has shaken out.

Until, perhaps, now, on an international TV network involving a team of civilian experts and led by a London police officer and Western professor.

Saturday night, on the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN), is the debut of To Catch a Killer, the brainchild of Londoner Mike Arntfield, produced by Halifax’s Ocean Entertainment.

“I want people in custody,” Arntfield said of his motivation behind the work.

The series is a natural progression from Arntfield’s Western course on unsolved crimes, but this time involves seasoned professionals, not students, who have long histories in examining old cases in Ontario.

“They’re all solvable,” he said. “It’s just a matter of how and when.”
 
I watched Donna Jean's episode of "To Catch a Killer" tonight, very interesting. In the end a new composite sketch was made of a man known to the family, he apparently resides in BC, no name has been given that I've noticed. I hope it's ok to post a link to it? SO different from the original sketch...

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10152207498379000&set=gm.722013621165762&type=1&theater

I hope more start posting in this thread, the more discussion... the better.
 
There were several murders of children/young adults in the 1960-1980 time period in a small geographic area London/Sarnia and surrounding. Some of these cases fall under the jurisdiction of the OPP and others to municipal forces. I know that Project Angel re-looked at some of these cases in the late 1990s but I would love them to be gathered together and really carefully considered as a whole again.

These are the ones that I know of that I think bear some similarities. Many were found near/in water....some similarities in age/time period/manner of death.

Donna Awcock, aged 17, 1983 (London)
Karen Coughlin, aged 14, 1974 (Sarnia)
Soraya O'Connell, aged 15, 1970 (London)
Patricia Bovin, aged 22, 1969 (London)
Robert Stapylton, aged 11, 1969 (London)
Jacqueline English, aged 15, 1969 (London)
Frankie Jensen, aged 9, 1968 (London) * found in the Thames river near Thorndale
Scott Leishman, aged 16, 1968 (Thorndale) *found in the river near port burwell
Helga Beer, aged 31, 1968 (London)
Jacqueline Dunleavy, aged 16, 1968 (London)
Keith Henry, agedd 9, 1963 (Waterloo) * not found
Susan Cadieux, aged 5, 1956 (London)
 
dotr said:
Has EG, been considered for any of the above cases?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/man-arrested-for-1967-murder-1.168464
"They have charged 66 year old Edward Gratton, of London, with first-degree murder.

The arrest is the result of Project Angel, an effort by the police to look into 20 unsolved murders in southwestern Ontario dating between the mid-fifties and mid-eighties"
Click to expand...

Unless I am confusing cases, EG, as mentioned above, was living with Glenda Tedball and her mother at their farm, as a farm hand. GT was pregnant and EG and the mother orchestrated a home abortion gone wrong, which resulted in her death. They then hid the body and reported her missing to conceal the truth. If so, I doubt he is connected to any of the above.
 
airplanelamp said:
Unless I am confusing cases, EG, as mentioned above, was living with Glenda Tedball and her mother at their farm, as a farm hand. GT was pregnant and EG and the mother orchestrated a home abortion gone wrong, which resulted in her death. They then hid the body and reported her missing to conceal the truth. If so, I doubt he is connected to any of the above.
Click to expand...

That settles that, sorry saw the bit about the Angel project and thought there was a connection, would the Sharron Prior case from Montreal be out of the question?
 
dotr said:
That settles that, sorry saw the bit about the Angel project and thought there was a connection, would the Sharron Prior case from Montreal be out of the question?
Click to expand...

I think during the project angel investigations tedball's mother confessed. It was a project angel success.

I am not familiar with the other case you mention. I would not be surprised though if some of the cases I listed were the result of a serial killer.
 
WHy is no one giving the side eye to the woman that Donna babysat for? Why couldn't that woman get her own cigs? Was she questioned and who was the man the woman was with?
 
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