VA VA - Barbara Monaco, 18, Virginia Beach, 20 Aug 1978

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Barbara Jean Monaco
Missing since August 20, 1978 from Virginia Beach, Virginia
Classification: Endangered Missing

Vital Statistics

Date Of Birth: August 19, 1960
Age at Time of Disappearance: 18 years old
Height and Weight at Time of Disappearance: 5'4"; 110 lbs.
Distinguishing Characteristics: White female. Brown, shoulder length hair; brown eyes.
Clothing: Long sleeved, yellow shirt; blue jeans; a brown belt and wooden clogs.
Medical: She had just been sick with Guillane-Barre syndrom.
Dentals: Available

Circumstances of Disappearance

On August 20, 1978, Barbara Monaco drove to the beach from Derby, Connecticut with her older sister. The girls registered at the Old Aloah Motel on 15th Street. They planned to stay for a week.

In the wee hours of August 23, Barbara Jean left her sister and set out on foot for Peabody's where she had a date with a bartender. Somewhere along Pacific Avenue, she vanished. Witnesses told police they saw her get into a car.

The spring after her disappearance, an informant came forward, seeking a reward. He told of local guys who drove Barbara Jean to a cottage near Oceana where they raped and strangled her. They dumped her body in the water, he said. The informant reportedly passed a police polygraph test, but prosecutors declined to offer him immunity in return for his testimony because they thought he was involved in the killing.

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

Virginia Beach Police Department
757-427-4101

Source Information:

HamptonRoads.com/PilotOnline.com
Crime Solvers
The Doe Network: Case File 1765DFVA

Link:

http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1765dfva.html
 
This case, and the other two listed, brings to mind the murders of Lynn Seethaler and Janie Pietropola, both 19. The two were vacationing in Va Beach when, on June 30th of 1973, their bodies were discovered in the cottage they had rented in Farrar's Tourist Village (10th St and Atlantic Ave). Both had been shot, strangled and stabbed. Pietropola had been sexually assaulted; Seethaler had not.
The case is still carried by the Va Beach police as unsolved.

When viewing the VA Beach Police website, I was surprised at the number of unsolved murders---More than 60 cases.

http://www.vbgov.com/vgn.aspx?vgnex...010VgnVCM100000870b640aRCRD&vgnextfmt=default (Va Beach PD site)

http://www.crimesolvers.com/crime/Seethaler_Pietropola Homicide.php (Va Beach Crimesolvers website)
 
This case, and the other two listed, brings to mind the murders of Lynn Seethaler and Janie Pietropola, both 19. The two were vacationing in Va Beach when, on June 30th of 1973, their bodies were discovered in the cottage they had rented in Farrar's Tourist Village (10th St and Atlantic Ave). Both had been shot, strangled and stabbed. Pietropola had been sexually assaulted; Seethaler had not.
The case is still carried by the Va Beach police as unsolved.

When viewing the VA Beach Police website, I was surprised at the number of unsolved murders---More than 60 cases.

http://www.vbgov.com/vgn.aspx?vgnex...010VgnVCM100000870b640aRCRD&vgnextfmt=default (Va Beach PD site)

http://www.crimesolvers.com/crime/Seethaler_Pietropola Homicide.php (Va Beach Crimesolvers website)

thats a great point....i used to vacation there as a child in the 80's (im 35) and i remember watching the area change not for the good, i know they are trying to renovate the boardwalk, their is such an enormous military population and their just seems to be a large transient community
 
http://hamptonroads.com/2010/10/va-beach-joins-national-effort-solve-missing-persons-cases

October 4, 2010

Now, if a body is found or pulled from storage that matches Monaco's NamUs profile, which includes dental records, DNA samples and other information, the database will make the link.

More at link.

https://www.findthemissing.org/cases/947/0/
NamUs Profile:
Dental: Available and entered
DNA: Sample submitted-tests not complete
Fingerprints: NA

https://identifyus.org/cases/102
Barbara ruled out as UID Jane Doe
 
The Charley Project has more details on the case here:

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/m/monaco_barbara.html

It seems that the main suspect in the case, as said above stopped cooperating with authorities, because he was not granted immunity from prosecution. Charley Project said that he agreed to take a polygraph test, but committed suicide outside his apartment only hours after making the statement. Wow!

Note that this is different from the post above that says the informant reportedly passed a polygraph test. Or maybe Charley Project is referring to a second polygraph test, which the informant never took, before taking his own life.

Satch
 
I mentioned on the Judy Ann Sylvester thread how I was starting to wonder if this case, Judy's, another missing and 3 unsolved murder cases in the same area, in the same time period with similar victims could be related. I shared links to those cases on Judy's page.
 
Mother deserves to know what happened to daughter who vanished in Virginia Beach 39 years ago

https://pilotonline.com/news/local/columnist/kerry-dougherty/mother-deserves-to-know-what-happened-to-daughter-who-vanished/article_51c971ca-029e-5b26-bc7a-4dc27c711abb.html

An informant using the alias “Condor” arranged to meet Joseph Monaco in the lobby of an Oceanfront hotel. The missing girl’s dad wore a bulletproof vest and carried a bag with the cash. When the informant arrived, Beach police took him into custody.

There, he reportedly took a polygraph test, telling authorities that Barbara Jean had been taken by a group of local guys, driven to a cottage by a borrow pit, gang-raped and strangled. Her body had been tethered to a cinder block and dumped in the water.

The commonwealth’s attorney refused to give the informant immunity in return for testimony about the killers because he believed the man himself might have been involved in the crime.

Cold case detectives told me this week that the Monaco case is still active, but there are no new developments, except one: The informant from 1979 – Condor – died last year of cancer.
 
The Charley Project has more details on the case here:

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/m/monaco_barbara.html

It seems that the main suspect in the case, as said above stopped cooperating with authorities, because he was not granted immunity from prosecution. Charley Project said that he agreed to take a polygraph test, but committed suicide outside his apartment only hours after making the statement. Wow!

Note that this is different from the post above that says the informant reportedly passed a polygraph test. Or maybe Charley Project is referring to a second polygraph test, which the informant never took, before taking his own life.

Satch

It was a different person of interest. The one who went to police in 1979 died last year.

https://pilotonline.com/news/local/columnist/kerry-dougherty/mother-deserves-to-know-what-happened-to-daughter-who-vanished/article_51c971ca-029e-5b26-bc7a-4dc27c711abb.html

In 2001, there was a break when cold case detectives revisited one of the “persons of interest” who lived in the area. He provided critical details about the clothes Barbara Jean was wearing the night she disappeared.

The cops let him go home. They planned to speak with him again the next day.

That night, the suspect ran a hose from the exhaust pipe to the interior of his truck.

He was dead by morning.
 
No more replies? this case should get the headlines. It's so disturbing. They know what happened to her, who is responsible but there is little proof for the DA to proecute the responsible people, and nobody is talking, apart from that one guy. Barbara needs justice!

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
Barbara Jean Monaco – The Charley Project

Barbara Jean Monaco
  • barbara_jean_monaco_1.jpg
  • barbara_jean_monaco_2.jpg
  • barbara_jean_monaco_3.jpg
  • barbara_jean_monaco_4.jpg
  • barbara_jean_monaco_5.jpg
Monaco, circa 1978; Age-progression to age 51 (circa 2011)

  • Missing Since08/23/1978
  • Missing FromVirginia Beach, Virginia
  • ClassificationEndangered Missing
  • Date of Birth08/19/1960 (58)
  • Age18 years old
  • Height and Weight5'4, 110 pounds
  • Clothing/Jewelry DescriptionA long-sleeved yellow shirt, blue jeans, a brown belt and clogs.
  • Distinguishing CharacteristicsCaucasian female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Monaco previously suffered a hairline fracture to her left arm. She may go by her initials, B.J. She is blind in her one eye.
Details of Disappearance
Monaco and her older sister lived in Derby, Connecticut in 1978. They took a vacation trip to Virginia Beach, Virginia on August 20, the day after Monaco's eighteenth birthday, and registered at the Aloha Motel on 15th Street. They planned to stay in Virginia for a week.

Monaco and her sister went to the Country Comfort bar on Pacific Avenue on the night of August 22. A man there kept urging Monaco to go out with him, and told her he had a yacht, but she was uninterested. Monaco was last seen at 1:00 a.m. August 23, when she left her sister and began walking to a bar called Peabody's, where she had a prearranged a date with a bartender.

The bar was six blocks away. Witnesses saw Monaco get into a car on Pacific Avenue; the vehicle reportedly contained four or five men. She never arrived for her date and has never been heard from again. Her sister tried to report her as a missing person later that day, but the police refused to take a report for 48 hours.

Eight months after Monaco's disappearance, her family advertised a $10,000 reward for her recovery, dead or alive. In response to the ad, a man came forward claiming he had witnessed Monaco's rape and murder the night of her disappearance. He told investigators that Monaco's killers had abducted her as she walked along Pacific Avenue, put her in a sedan, drove her to a lakeside cottage near Oceana, Virginia, killed her and dumped her body in a lake.

Authorities dragged the lake and found a cinder block with a rope tied to it, but they didn't find Monaco's remains. The informant reportedly passed a polygraph exam, but he ceased cooperating after authorities refused to offer him immunity from prosecution in exchange for his testimony.

Other witnesses and suspects have been interviewed over the years. James L. "Jimbo" Moore Jr. spoke to the police in 2001 and reportedly gave them information he could only have known if he was with Monaco on the night of her disappearance. He agreed to take a polygraph to verify the authenticity of his story, but only hours after he made his statement, before he could take the test, took his own life outside his apartment.

No arrests have been made in connection with Monaco's case. Her family held a memorial service for her in 2003, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of her disappearance.

Monaco is a graduate of Derby High School; she was a drum majorette there. Foul play is suspected in her disappearance due to the circumstances involved.
 
1978. DNA Technology was possibly an idea in a scientist's mind. But LE did not possess the procedures they have now.

Preservation of anything discovered would be tantamount to getting anywhere with this case. Unless, of course, they revisited the suspect who would only talk with immunity.

Would they change their minds, knowing he was possibly one of BMs attackers? How long, if ever, to get to that point?
 
BJMonaco.jpg
BJMonaco1.jpg
BMonaco2.jpg


Barbara Jean Monaco
Missing since August 20, 1978 from Virginia Beach, Virginia
Classification: Endangered Missing

Vital Statistics
    • Date Of Birth: August 19, 1960
    • Age at Time of Disappearance: 18 years old
    • Height and Weight at Time of Disappearance: 5'4"; 110 lbs.
    • Distinguishing Characteristics: White female. Brown, shoulder length hair; brown eyes.
    • Clothing: Long sleeved, yellow shirt; blue jeans; a brown belt and wooden clogs.
    • Medical: She had just been sick with Guillane-Barre syndrom. Hairline fracture to her left arm (10-12 years of age). Blind in one eye (unknown which eye).
    • Dentals: Available
    • DNA: Available
    • Nickname: BJ
Circumstances of Disappearance

On August 20, 1978, Barbara Monaco drove to the beach from Derby, Connecticut with her older sister. The girls registered at the Old Aloha Motel on 15th Street. They planned to stay for a week.

In the wee hours of August 23, Barbara Jean left her sister and set out on foot for Peabody's where she had a date with a bartender. Somewhere along Pacific Avenue, she vanished. Witnesses told police they saw her get into a car.

The spring after her disappearance, an informant came forward, seeking a reward. He told of local guys who drove Barbara Jean to a cottage near Oceana where they raped and strangled her. They dumped her body in the water, he said. The informant reportedly passed a police polygraph test, but prosecutors declined to offer him immunity in return for his testimony because they thought he was involved in the killing.

Investigators

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

Virginia Beach Police Department
757-427-4101


Agency Case Number: 1978-085134/
NamUs MP# 947
NCIC Number: M278495193
NCMEC Number: NCMA1161976

Source Information:
HamptonRoads.com/PilotOnline.com
Crime Solvers
NamUs
NCMEC
The Doe Network: Case File 1765DFVA
Barbara Jean Monaco – The Charley Project
 
Written by Kerry Dougherty in 2018.
Barbara Jean Monaco: Missing for 40 Years — KERRY:


Still no body, no answers, no one in prison.

Forty years since 18-year-old Barbara Jean Monaco came to Virginia Beach for a week’s vacation with her sister and a friend. Forty years since she vanished along Pacific Avenue between 15th and 21st Streets.

Forty years since some local boys, not much older than she, likely abducted her and spent the night in rural Virginia Beach assaulting the pretty majorette who’d just graduated from high school.

A night that ended in her death.

For 40 years Beach police have been fairly certain they know who was with her that night. They’ve tried repeatedly to get that “handful of persons of interest” to tell them what happened to the missing girl.

“They’re still refusing to talk,” sighed Det. Kristy Curtis of the Virginia Beach Police Department’s Cold Case unit on Wednesday, noting that although this is almost certainly a homicide, the “BJM case” as they call it, is still categorized as a “long-term missing person” file.

It's one of the oldest open cases in the city.

“We know they’ve talked about it at parties, to their spouses and friends," Curtis says of the guys suspected of being with her that night. “But no one wants to come forward and talk to us.”

Police have always said the number of those involved is what makes this case so unique. It’s unusual for four or five people to keep their mouths shut for decades about a killing. Usually someone tries to clear their conscience. Or blabs to the wrong person.

But not these local lowlifes.

It won’t be long before everyone who played a part in the drama that surrounded the disappearance - or rather homicide - of Barbara Jean Monaco on August 23, 1978 is dead.

So far, two of the “persons of interest” in the case have died. One killed himself on August 22, 2001 - the eve of the 23rd anniversary of her disappearance. That was just hours after he submitted to a polygraph from Beach police and gave them details about Barbara Jean that had never before been made public. He agreed to return to the police station the next day to tell them everything he knew about what happened to the girl on that long-ago August night.

Instead, he ran a hose from the exhaust pipe to the cab of his truck and turned on the ignition.

The other died of cancer in 2016.

Earlier this summer, former Virginia Beach Commonwealth’s Attorney Andre Evans, who made the decision in April of 1979 not to grant immunity to an informant in return for details about the homicide, died at the age of 85.

In May of 2011, Joseph Monaco, Barbara Jean’s father, died at 88 without knowing what happened to his youngest daughter.

The family placed a photo of Barbara Jean in his casket.

Even the Aloha Motel at 15th Street, where the girls stayed that week, is gone. Razed in 1999.

Pauline Monaco is 88 - she was 47 the last time she saw her daughter - and still living in Derby, CT where Barbara Jean grew up. Her other daughters, Theresa and Joanne (who was with Barbara Jean at the Beach that week) live nearby.

Joanne Monaco-Stec remembers exactly where she was 40 years ago today. She was frantically looking for her younger sister up and down the resort strip. Barbara Jean had left the Aloha Motel on foot shortly after midnight. She had a date with a bartender at Peabody’s, who was about to finish his shift. Somewhere between the Aloha and the bar on 21st Street, she disappeared.

“I went to the police first thing in the morning,” Joanne recalled yesterday in a phone interview. “I knew something was wrong. We were that close. We wore each other’s clothes. I knew.

“But the police said I had to wait 48 hours to file a missing person’s report.”

By then Barbara Jean was probably dead. The trail was cooling. And tourists who might have seen something that could help police had left the city, unaware that a girl had vanished.

Pauline and Joseph Monaco rushed to Virginia Beach with photos of their missing daughter. The police promptly lost them, Joanne says. Those pictures of their pretty brunette eventually made the front page of the local paper and the evening news.

etc.
 
Dennis Bowman is a serial killer serving two life sentences for murder. In September of 1980, he brutally murdered Kathleen O'Brien Doyle of Virginia Beach in her home. Bowman was a Naval Reservist from Michigan who was in Virginia for active duty training. Could he have been involved in Barbara's disappearance a year earlier?

LINK:

MI - Dennis Bowman, Western Michigan, 1970's to 2012
 

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