WI WI - Evelyn Hartley, 15, La Crosse, 24 Oct 1953

A really interesting article here.

She could have had plans to meet someone at the game but had to change plans when her mom forced her to babysit - if so she could have told that person to come over to the house while she was babysitting.

Thinking outside the box:

Ive been trying to figure out why there was such a big difference in the clothing size - the jacket is way too small to belong to the person wearing the shoes. How do we know the jacket wasnt something a female was wearing?

She could have had a boy over that has a girlfriend and the girl saw them through the front window and decided to get inside the house by the basement window, go up the stairs and confront the two of them? That would make sense of the jacket size, someone small enough to get through the basement window and the sloppy crime scene.

I just find it hard to believe that this was a peeping tom or someone randomly picked her simply because of the time frame. She was heard screaming less than 40 minutes of being dropped off which makes me more inclined to think she called someone when she got there to tell them to come or she told someone to meet her there at x time.

It also seems strange that her dad was so fast to come over to check on her - She was dropped off a little after 7 and the dad came over a little before nine. Could there have been issues at home that made them feel they needed to come over and make sure she was there? She was at the age that she was starting to like boys and its possible she got into some sort of trouble regarding a boy which is why he came over after she didnt answer.

It just seems to me that him coming over so fast points more to what he thinks shes doing than him thinking shes hurt - most often people have to convince themselves that they arent being silly when it comes to stuff like thinking your kid is hurt. If he thought she was doing something with a boy he would have raced over as quickly as possible.

Do we know anything about the girl that was supposed to babysit that night?

I think we should find out more about the girl that should have been there, I agree. I also think there has to be a "oh duh" explanation to the shoe and jacket size. We're missing a key piece there.

punklove said:

A really interesting article here.

It also seems strange that her dad was so fast to come over to check on her - She was dropped off a little after 7 and the dad came over a little before nine. Could there have been issues at home that made them feel they needed to come over and make sure she was there?

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Evelyn had a routine of calling home an hour after she started a babysitting job to let her parents know things were OK. She didn't call, so her father went over to check on her. Nothing strange about it.

http://lacrossetribune.com/news/loc...cle_72435ede-7177-11e1-9e8f-0019bb2963f4.html

One of the detectives in Evelyn's case recently celebrated his 100th birthday.Still no answers of course, but good to see Evelyn's name in the paper again...

Bargle said:

Evelyn had a routine of calling home an hour after she started a babysitting job to let her parents know things were OK. She didn't call, so her father went over to check on her. Nothing strange about it.

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What I should have said was that the strange thing was Evelyn not calling, not her father checking on her when she didn't.

Thanks for the link, JoelleGirl.

joellegirl said:

http://lacrossetribune.com/news/loc...cle_72435ede-7177-11e1-9e8f-0019bb2963f4.html

One of the detectives in Evelyn's case recently celebrated his 100th birthday.Still no answers of course, but good to see Evelyn's name in the paper again...

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Wait that article says Evelyn's dad was at the football game. Is this true? I don't remember hearing this before. That can't be correct.

Also, her blood was in the garage TOO? This according to Sill? That's new. Is the garage attached? My parent's home is a split level from the 50s and has an attached garage. Perhaps that was the exit?

How strange ? maybe Sill has got it wrong. It was reported Evelyn wanted to go to the game, but her father ? surely not.

Yes you are right. I have never read anywhere else Evelyn's father was at the game. I have always read he was home with his wife. Also, there was no garage then at that house. There was a side porch type thing. I think whom ever wrote this article has facts wrong. I think he/she got confused about the fact that Evelyn's blood was on the outside of the NEIGHBOR'S garage...but yes, there was no garage attached to the house then.

I wonder who all might have known the Rasmusens were going to have a babysitter that Saturday night. In my view, the whole operation seems too precise to be random.

Evelyn would have been 74 now.

I tried to read through to see if these questions have been asked, please forgive me if I have missed them.

1) Does anyone know if the underwear with the blood on it has ever been DNA tested?

2) Does anyone know how many days prior to her abduction was she asked to babysit? For instance, was this a last minute thing, or was it well known that she would be there.

3) Is there a remote possibility that the abductor was there for the regular babysitter & didn't know that is would be Evelyn instead?

HockeyGirl said:

I tried to read through to see if these questions have been asked, please forgive me if I have missed them.

1) Does anyone know if the underwear with the blood on it has ever been DNA tested?

2) Does anyone know how many days prior to her abduction was she asked to babysit? For instance, was this a last minute thing, or was it well known that she would be there.

3) Is there a remote possibility that the abductor was there for the regular babysitter & didn't know that is would be Evelyn instead?

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1 - Can't recall someone else might remember
2 - it was a last minute thing, she was a stand-in for someone else
3 - absolutely, one of our theories is the perp was expecting the other girl to be there

Thank you Claudette!

Do you know if the original babysitter had ever expressed uneasiness because of someone or something?

HockeyGirl said:

Thank you Claudette!

Do you know if the original babysitter had ever expressed uneasiness because of someone or something?

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I don't believe we know anything about the babysitter.

Also just remembered something. I don't believe it has been DNA tested, her surviving family members are (understandably) not active with her case and have not entered her or their DNA. But I do believe they still have it in evidence.

So, has there ever been an explanation why the killer went to the trouble of dragging Evelyn down the stairs into the basement and then forcing her up and out the basement window? Why not just force her out of the front or back door?

STANDREID said:

So, has there ever been an explanation why the killer went to the trouble of dragging Evelyn down the stairs into the basement and then forcing her up and out the basement window? Why not just force her out of the front or back door?

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Nope, it's entirely possible that they took a different route out but the general consensus is that they did go out the basement based on how the evidence appears. We've tried to come up with other ways out that fit with the evidence.

Claudette said:

I don't believe we know anything about the babysitter.

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I'd bet she was scared witless wondering if she was the target.

Edited to ask, could the regular babysitter have been black ? I read that an African/negroid hair was found in the tennis shoe disgarded on the highway. With what we know now about profiling could it be possible that she was the target of the attack and Evelyn was just in the wrong place at the time.
I might have a look at black guys arrested in similar circumstances.

Claudette said:

Nope, it's entirely possible that they took a different route out but the general consensus is that they did go out the basement based on how the evidence appears. We've tried to come up with other ways out that fit with the evidence.

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Right, this is one of the issues that we've discussed quite a bit and never could figure out exactly why the basement window was used when it would have been easier to carry her out the door.

I think Evelyn ran to the basement, maybe even tried to get out the window herself. She was subdued in some way, then taken through the basement window. And I think there were at least two people, maybe one standing outside and one in the house. It would have been much easier to get Evelyn through the window if one person were inside pushing and one were outside pulling.

STANDREID said:

I wonder who all might have known the Rasmusens were going to have a babysitter that Saturday night. In my view, the whole operation seems too precise to be random.

Evelyn would have been 74 now.

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I don't know who would have known, other than the girl who couldn't babysit. Unless the Rasmusens themselves mentioned to friends that they were going to the big game but leaving the baby at home with a sitter.

I keep going back and forth between random and premeditated. A good case could be made for both. One thing that makes me think it wasn't premeditated is the use of the basement window - that feels like a spur of the moment action based on necessity, not planning. I think more planning would have been given to getting away, assuming their intention all along was to take Evelyn (or the other babysitter).

This may have been a burglary gone very wrong - someone saw the Rasmusens leave, decided to break into the house and were surprised to find someone there. They might not have known the Rasmusens had a young child at home. This could explain why the baby was left unharmed - they were unaware of the baby.

But, on the other hand, why take Evelyn at all? They could have left her unconscious, or tied up, or locked in a closet. The fact that they didn't makes me wonder if they knew she could identify them.

Marilynilpa said:

I think Evelyn ran to the basement, maybe even tried to get out the window herself. She was subdued in some way, then taken through the basement window. And I think there were at least two people, maybe one standing outside and one in the house. It would have been much easier to get Evelyn through the window if one person were inside pushing and one were outside pulling.

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Yes, that was one scenario that I thought of.

The other was that the perpetrator originally only took Evelyn to the basement with the intent of raping her there but then changed his mind for some reason and decided to abduct her. At that point, it would have probably been about as easy to force her out the window as drag her back up the stairs and out one of the doors.