FL FL - Wendy Huggy, 16, Clearwater, 7 April 1982

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Wendy Lynn Huggy Missing since 7 April 1982 from Clearwater, Florida

WENDY LYNN HUGGY

Case Type: Lost, Injured, Missing
DOB: Jul 21, 1965
Missing Date: Apr 7, 1982
Sex: Female
Race: White
Age at time: 17
Height:
5'9" (175 cm)
Weight: 110 lbs (50 kg)
Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Brown
Missing from: CLEARWATER, Florida, USA
Case Number: NCMC601962
Circumstances: Wendy was last seen on April 7, 1982 when she left from a relative's home to spend the day at the beach with some friends. Wendy was due to return home later that same night but she did not and she has not been seen or heard from since. She has a circular scar in the middle of her left thigh. Wendy may use the alias last name of Freeman.
 
Seems a shame that there's no more detail than this. It would be great to know what she looked like, what she was wearing, jewelry, etc. There are plenty of UIDs out there for that time frame but impossible to compare without some type of information other than what's listed. I wonder if the local police department would have other information such as what she was wearing etc? Was she walking or driving or riding with someone else? Was the name Freeman a family name?
 
I wonder why this case has never been entered into the Doenetwork. Might match with some of the Jane Doe cases recently discussed.
 
Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance
Missing Since: April 7, 1982 from Clearwater, Florida
Classification: Non-Family Abduction
Date Of Birth: July 21, 1965
Age: 16 years old
Height and Weight: 5'9, 110 pounds
Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Huggy has a circular-shaped dog bite scar on the outer center of her left thigh. She may use the last name Freeman.

Details of Disappearance

Huggy was last seen at a family member's residence in Patrician Apartments on Nursery Road and Belcher Road in Clearwater, Florida on April 7, 1982. She was supposed to receive a car ride to the Countryside Mall from an unidentified male friend known only as Don. She apparently also planned to spend the day at the beach with a group of acquaintances. Huggy was scheduled to return home later in the evening. She has never been heard from again. Huggy resided in Holiday, Florida at the time of her 1982 disappearance.


Authorities exhumed the body of an unidentified female in Tampa, Florida in June 2001, hoping that they would be able to identify Huggy. The woman had been tied to a concrete block and dumped in the ocean off of Anna Maria Island in Florida in 1982. Huggy's dental records did not match the victim and her case remains unsolved.

Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:

Pasco County Sheriff's Department
727-844-7755
OR
Florida Department Of Law Enforcement
888-356-4774

Source Information

The National Center For Missing and Exploited Children
Child Protection Education Of America
The Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Florida Department of Law Enforcement
The Charley Project: Wendy Lynn Huggy
The Doenetwork Case 208DFFL

LINKS:

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/h/huggy_wendy.html

http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/208dffl.html
 
huggy_wendy.jpg
huggy_wendy_ap.jpg

Missing Since: April 7, 1982 from Clearwater, Florida
Classification: Non-Family Abduction
Date Of Birth: July 21, 1965
Age: 16 years old
Height and Weight: 5'9, 110 pounds
Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Huggy has a circular-shaped dog bite scar on the outer center of her left thigh. She may use the last name Freeman.

Details of Disappearance

Huggy was last seen at a family member's residence in Patrician Apartments on Nursery Road and Belcher Road in Clearwater, Florida on April 7, 1982. She was supposed to receive a car ride to the Countryside Mall from an unidentified male friend known only as Don. She apparently also planned to spend the day at the beach with a group of acquaintances. Huggy was scheduled to return home later in the evening. She has never been heard from again. Huggy resided in Holiday, Florida at the time of her 1982 disappearance.

Authorities exhumed the body of an unidentified female in Tampa, Florida in June 2001, hoping that they would be able to identify Huggy. The woman had been tied to a concrete block and dumped in the ocean off of Anna Maria Island in Florida in 1982. Huggy's dental records did not match the victim and her case remains unsolved.

Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Pasco County Sheriff's Department
727-844-7755
OR
Florida Department Of Law Enforcement

888-356-4774
 
There are so many conflicting reports on Wendy's disappearance. One site says she disappeared from Countryside Mall, which is in Clearwater. Another report said she went to Clearwater Beach that day. Yet another said she was last seen at an apartment complex in Clearwater near the Largo border.

<modsnip: If it can't be linked, it can't be discussed.>

I would love to get more info and maybe find out what happened to Wendy.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Bump

It has been over 29 years since Wendy Huggy Disappeared. Living in the old neighborhood in Holiday,FL I get to wondering what really happened to her and I wonder if she just simply disappeared on her own or if there was something sinister out there that we had no idea could harm one of our group in 1982.

Like Wendy, I had only moved to Holiday that prior fall and left that next summer when my mom decided to move to Tallahassee. We where both new to the neighborhood for a time but I remember we both fit right in with the kids that had been there most of their lives. Good memories of listening to the garage bands and the skating rink. Cant imagine anyone would have hurt one of us.

I would really like to know what happened to her and hope one day that answer will come and she is out there married with kids happy. Not sure anymore though its been so long.
 
It's a shame we can't get the correct story as to what her steps were up to going missing. Maybe somebody who knows how to approach it can find out via the local paper doing a story. I've noticed after a story appears folk do seem to start recalling stuff.

Right??:waitasec:

There are reports that she went to Countryside mall and disappeared, reports that she was staying at a friend/relatives apt on the clearwater/largo border at the time, then she was staying at her house in Holiday and didnt come home, she went to Clearwater Beach with friends, and the most recent......according to Namus she went to a party and didnt come home.

Does LE let people look at files to see the original report? I always wondered if I could just go in there and ask to see it, but then would I go to Pasco County Sheriff (Holiday) or Pinellas County Sheriff Office??? There is no clear answer to any of it.

BTW, my dad's gf was murdered in Clearwater by a that was in jail for raping a woman on clearwater beach and released on a lower bond the day Wendy Disappeared. He murdered my dads gf (Phyllis) 2 days later. SO all these years Ive also had to wonder if Wendy did go to Clearwater Beach and came across him.

What a mess, thanks for leting me know that Im not the only one confussed.
 
Right??:waitasec:

There are reports that she went to Countryside mall and disappeared, reports that she was staying at a friend/relatives apt on the clearwater/largo border at the time, then she was staying at her house in Holiday and didnt come home, she went to Clearwater Beach with friends, and the most recent......according to Namus she went to a party and didnt come home.

Does LE let people look at files to see the original report? I always wondered if I could just go in there and ask to see it, but then would I go to Pasco County Sheriff (Holiday) or Pinellas County Sheriff Office??? There is no clear answer to any of it.

BTW, my dad's gf was murdered in Clearwater by a that was in jail for raping a woman on clearwater beach and released on a lower bond the day Wendy Disappeared. He murdered my dads gf (Phyllis) 2 days later. SO all these years Ive also had to wonder if Wendy did go to Clearwater Beach and came across him.

What a mess, thanks for leting me know that Im not the only one confussed.

I would think the Police wouldn't give much info, the local newspaper might research it for a story though.

Edited to add...especially if you tell them about your dad's GF and how you think there might be a connection, Most newspapers have a contact in LE.
 
<modsnip: Off topic>

... has Wendy Lynn's information been entered in Namus ??
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Thirty years later, Pasco girl's disappearance still a mystery

By Dan Sullivan, Times Staff Writer

Published Friday, April 6, 2012

CLEARWATER &#8212; Thirty years ago today, Wendy Huggy phoned her grandparents in Pasco County from the Countryside Mall to tell them she was getting a ride home from a friend. They never heard from her again.

The couple reported the 16-year-old missing, but finding nothing to indicate foul play, authorities surmised Huggy had disappeared by choice. They closed the case after just 15 days.

Three years later, in 1985, when Huggy's grandparents still hadn't from her they inquired about the case again. That's when deputies began to suspect that something untoward may have taken place.

They looked at the case again, but crucial time had been lost.

Today, the scant details of what is known about Huggy's disappearance are tucked inside a Pasco County sheriff's case file that through the years has passed between the hands of eight different investigators. One detective made it an obsession, trying to solve the case until the day he died.

These days, the assumption is that Huggy is dead, her body likely among those of thousands of unidentified homicide victims. It hasn't diminished efforts to find her.

"If we can find her remains, then I can start to find out what happened to her," said Lisa Schoneman, the latest Pasco County sheriff's detective to pursue the case. "She deserves it &#8212; to have the world know how she lived and how she died. I think everybody deserves that."

&#8226; &#8226; &#8226;

Wendy Huggy came to Florida looking to rebuild. Though she was only 16, she left behind a husband in her native Illinois. The marriage was an unhappy one and she intended to leave him for good, her family said.

She moved in with her grandparents, Sidney and Paula Richards, in Holiday. She had dropped out of high school, but she wanted to get a GED, said her aunt Patty Spragg. Her hope was to attend beauty school.

She had a plan. All she needed was a place to enact it.

"She was a darling little girl and I loved her," said Spragg, 59, of Hudson.

Huggy's mother, Susan Leverence, was a former Playboy bunny. In the 1970s she lived for a time at the Chicago Playboy mansion and traveled the country in Hugh Hefner's Playboy jet as one of the elite "Jet Bunnies."

Leverence, who later worked as a flight attendant for Air Wisconsin Airlines, was often away for long periods of time, unable to devote attention to her daughter. So Huggy came to Florida.

"She had a rough life bouncing back and forth between her mom and my parents," Spragg said. "But to me she didn't seem any different than any other child."

But there was something else, Spragg said. Something few people knew and no one talked about.

Huggy was pregnant.

&#8226; &#8226; &#8226;

Huggy had lived in Florida for two months when she disappeared. Her grandparents dropped her off the morning of April 7, 1982 a few blocks from the Patrician Apartments at Nursery Road and Belcher Road. She planned to meet up with her uncle, Greg Richards, who was five years her senior and lived in the apartment complex, according to a sheriff's report.

After that, the details become murky. At some point, Huggy met with a friend named Kim and Kim's mother, who also lived at Patrician Apartments, deputies said. They went to Clearwater Beach. Then, Huggy got a ride to Countryside Mall, where she called her grandfather.

She didn't need him to pick her up, she told him. A man named Don was going to bring her home.

A week later, with no word from her, Huggy's grandparents reported her missing. But the case was closed when deputies learned she was married &#8212; a fact that made her a legal adult, free to run away if she chose.

It wasn't unlike Huggy to wander away, her family said. But she was supposed to start work at a Wendy's restaurant April 8. They doubted she would have given that up or abandoned her dreams. Above all, they couldn't believe she would never contact them again.

&#8226; &#8226; &#8226;

Of all the cases that Det. Bobby Hamm investigated in his 27 years with the Pasco County Sheriff's Office, Huggy's was the one that seemed to stick with him the most, his colleagues say. He was a patrol deputy when she went missing. Years later, as a detective in the sheriff's crimes against children unit, he vowed to solve the case.

"She got to him," Schoneman said. "He always said if it was the last thing he did, he would find Wendy. I think he just really felt bad that this young 16-year-old, with her whole life ahead of her, was just gone and nobody knew why."

In 2001, Hamm worked what was perhaps the case's the biggest lead. Investigators that year exhumed the remains of a woman whose body was found floating in the waters off Anna Maria Island in September 1982. A rope was wrapped around her waist and tied to a concrete block. She wore two turquoise rings &#8212; similar to jewelry that Huggy was last known to be wearing.

But dental records and a blood comparison with Huggy's mother proved there was no match.

Hamm died in 2007. Four years later, authorities finally identified the remains as those of Amy Rose Hurst, who vanished from New Port Richey in 1982. Her husband, William Hurst, was later charged with her murder.

If nothing else, Spragg says, efforts to find Huggy led to closure for another family &#8212; the one bright spot in an otherwise dreadful mystery.

&#8226; &#8226; &#8226;

Few people alive today remember Wendy Huggy. Her grandparents have since died. So has her mother, who always held onto hope of finding her missing daughter.

But some still feel the void she left behind.

Cash Leverence is Huggy's half-brother. Though he never met his sister, having been born after she vanished, he witnessed the effects her disappearance had on their mother.

"She was tore up for years," said Leverence, 29. "It definitely bothered her."

As a child, Leverence remembers periodic phone calls his mother would receive from Florida sheriff's deputies or members of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. He remembers her anxiously awaiting the results of blood tests and dental comparisons.

"She talked about it a little bit, but not too much that I remember," Leverence said. "Growing up with her, you could see the toll it took."

Spragg too, remembers her sister quickly changing the subject whenever Huggy became a topic of conversation.

"We were all devastated because this is not what you expect or plan for," Spragg said.

She prays that Huggy is still alive somewhere. Even now, there are fleeting moments when she spots a young face at the supermarket or on TV and thinks her niece has returned. But she knows better.

"In my heart of hearts, I doubt very much that she is still with us," Spragg said. "At this point, I don't think we're ever going to know."

Times news researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. Reach Dan Sullivan at (727) 893-8321 or dsullivan@tampabay.com.

<mod add> http://www.tampabay.com/news/public...o-girls-disappearance-still-a-mystery/1223897
 

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