CA CA - Johnnie Herrera, 20, Oxnard, 27 Aug 1971

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Kat said:
Bobby I did read about Randy Kraft and I agree it's possible that Johnnie may have been one of his victims.

I checked NamUs for Johnnie.

https://www.findthemissing.org/cases/7056/2/
Dental: NA
DNA: Sample available-not yet submitted
Fingerprints: NA

I wish they would submit his sample already, that's a long time for his family to wait.

I still wonder, if Johnnie was a victim of Kraft or another killer, where is his car? JMHO.
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I also just checked the Namus page again and in the section marked Police information, it says that he was apparently repoted missing on Septempber 1, 1971. It also gives the name of who I assume to be the detective assigned to the case from the Oxnard Police Dept.
 
Also, I read that Kraft's first victim, Wayne Dukette, wasn't found until October of 1971 and it made me wonder if the timing Kraft killings and Herrera's disappearance was just a coincidence. However, I've also read that Dukette is believed to be the first known Kraft victim. So, there could still be a link with Kraft in the Herrera case since Kraft was known to have raped and drugged a 13-yr-old runaway as early as March 1970.
 
The more I think about this case, the less I'm inclined to believe that Johnnie simply chose to vanish or had simply gotten into a car accident. Kat and I were discussing this the other day and think Johnnie was more than likely abducted and murdered. The questions are who could have done, why, and where Johnnie's body and car are located.

The fact that they can't locate his car bothers me. It almost makes me wonder if someone killed him for his car and dumped his corpse somewhere. It seems absurd, but people have been known to be killed for hell of a lot less.
 
It doesn't have a year, and it may not even be the same Johnnie, but I happened to find this while searching possible high schools he could've graduated from:

http://www.classfinders.com/people/c...hnnie/herrera/

I have a feeling that this could be him. If it is, it still doesn't tell us where he (or more than likely, his remains) could be today.
 
Keep up the good work Bobby. Don't be shy about contacting the lead detective about Johnnie. What's the worst they can do? Tell you to mind your own business? Ignore you?

You're doing good!


This is your pet case hun, track it down like blood hound! JMHO.
 
Kat said:
Keep up the good work Bobby. Don't be shy about contacting the lead detective about Johnnie. What's the worst they can do? Tell you to mind your own business? Ignore you?

You're doing good!


This is your pet case hun, track it down like blood hound! JMHO.
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Thanks.

I sent you some PM's for the past few days. The last one is just the info I posted about finding his name on the classmates site.
 
I sent an email to Lynette Fenton, the Oxnard police detective handling Johnnie's case. With any luck, she'll have more information on Johnnie and/or the circumstances of his disappearance. If not, she may be able to give me the name of someone who can.
 
I've just received an e-mail from Lynette Fenton and she gave me a great deal of information about Johnnie.

First, Johnnie was an identical twin. His twin brother was the one who reported him missing. DNA was collected from the brother and is still waiting to be tested.

Secondly, several of the people at the bachelor party were contacted, questioned, and presumably cleared of any involvement.

At the time of his disappearance, Johnnie was married and had a baby son. According to Lynette, there were indications that Johnnie and his wife (who has since died) were having relationshipand money problem. She also said that people have suggested that Johnnie had only agreed to marry this woman because he got her pregnant. Several years after he vanished, his wife had him declared legally dead and a death certificate was issued, although his remains have never been found. The car was also never found.

His twin brother said that he and Johnnie was extremely close and that it was extremely out of character for his brother never to have contacted him at some point over the years he's been missing.

That was a lot more info than I ever expected to get on this case!
 
Bobby88 said:
Also, I read that Kraft's first victim, Wayne Dukette, wasn't found until October of 1971 and it made me wonder if the timing Kraft killings and Herrera's disappearance was just a coincidence. However, I've also read that Dukette is believed to be the first known Kraft victim. So, there could still be a link with Kraft in the Herrera case since Kraft was known to have raped and drugged a 13-yr-old runaway as early as March 1970.
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Hi! Long-time lurker, first time poster here...hope you don't mind if I chime in :)? I read about Randy Kraft a while ago and his "scorecard" really got me intrigued. One of the entries that had not been connected to any unsolved case by the investigators was 'Oxnard'. You have probably also read this article, where it was mentioned, but I'm putting the link here in case others want to look. It gave me chills when I found out about Johnnie Herrera!

http://articles.latimes.com/1988-10-02/local/me-4891_1_kraft-case-randy

I'm with you in wondering where his car is, if Kraft (or anyone else) got him, though :waitasec: .

OT: I tried to connect some other dots, namely UID's and missing persons with the scorecard, but the forum search tool didn't work for me, so I'd appreciate a lot if someone could point me to a thread about Kraft's case in general (if there is one). Thank you in advance!
 
Milyandel said:
Hi! Long-time lurker, first time poster here...hope you don't mind if I chime in :)? I read about Randy Kraft a while ago and his "scorecard" really got me intrigued. One of the entries that had not been connected to any unsolved case by the investigators was 'Oxnard'. You have probably also read this article, where it was mentioned, but I'm putting the link here in case others want to look. It gave me chills when I found out about Johnnie Herrera!

http://articles.latimes.com/1988-10-02/local/me-4891_1_kraft-case-randy

I'm with you in wondering where his car is, if Kraft (or anyone else) got him, though :waitasec: .

OT: I tried to connect some other dots, namely UID's and missing persons with the scorecard, but the forum search tool didn't work for me, so I'd appreciate a lot if someone could point me to a thread about Kraft's case in general (if there is one). Thank you in advance!
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Thanks a lot. That really is eerie that Randy Kraft had Oxnard listed on his scorecard and that it's never actually been linked to any known unsolved murders.

I'm starting to wonder if there really could be a link between Johnnie Herrera and Kraft. After I found out that Johnnie had a wife and child, I was almost ready to rule out the Kraft angle because I figured that all of his victims were gay. But after reading that article and finding out that that wasn't always the case, maybe the possibility of Johnnie being an undiscovered victim of Randy Kraft isn't so far-fetched after all. :waitasec:
 
Not that I think this has anything to do with our missing person, but I thought I ought to point out that being married with a kid isn't a guarantee of heterosexuality -- anybody might be putting up a front, swinging both ways, looking for something on the side, etc.
 
carbuff said:
Not that I think this has anything to do with our missing person, but I thought I ought to point out that being married with a kid isn't a guarantee of heterosexuality -- anybody might be putting up a front, swinging both ways, looking for something on the side, etc.
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True. Especially considering that Kraft was particularly active during a time when homosexuality was still considered a form of mental illness or disturbance by not only much of the country, but by many psychologists as well.

So, carbuff, Kat, Milyandel, or anyone really, do you think I should send another e-mail to Lynette Fenton about the mysterious Oxnard notation on Kraft's scorecard? Or do you think it's just a coincidence? Personally, I'm sort of on the fence and need help to decide either way.
 
Hi Bobby! I don't see any harm in informing Ms. Fenton about the scorecard entry. She may be aware of it already, but it is also possible that she hasn't thought about Kraft in connection of Johnnie. It may very well be a coincidence, but I personally believe that the "unsolved" entries in Kraft's scorecard sadly mean there are some unfortunate, lost young men still out there somewhere. If the Oxnard entry isn't Johnnie, it's someone else :(.

I'm not at all an expert in US legal, law enforcement or punishment system (I'm a complete outsider, a Finn, actually :)), and I'm not sure what Ms. Fenton could use the information for - there's no body and the connection would probably be very hard to prove, especially after all this time. Is Kraft still alive? If he is, he'd be the only one perhaps able to give some answers, but I doubt if he would.
 
I've just e-mailed Ms. Fenton about the entry on Kraft's score card. I also sent her the link to that article about the score card. Even if it's not Johnnie, it might help solve another murder and bring peace to that victim's family.
 
I just got an e-mail from Ms. Fenton today. She said she found the article on Kraft's score card interesting and that she would definitely look into the Oxnard notation to see if there's any connection. The e-mail was short, but based on the tone of it, I got the impression that she was thrilled by the fact that someone was still interested in this cold case.
 
I e-mailed the people who run the blog called "Can You Identify Me?" about adding Johnnie's case to their 1971 section (despite the blog's name, they do have some missing persons cases on there as well).

http://canyouidentifyme.blogspot.com/

If you notice, the posts on each victim have an account of what happened through the "victim's" point of view. I asked them in my e-mail if I could personally write "Johnnie's" account of his disappearance using the info that Ms. Fenton gave me.
 
I just noticed something in Johnnie's teeth in his graduation picture when I magnified it. I know that he has a chipped upper right front tooth (it's so slight, I had to study both pictures several times before I noticed it), but I just now noticed something else.

If you expand his graduation picture and really look at a what little you can see of his bottom teeth, it looks like he has one tooth on the lower left (it looks like his lower left canine tooth) that seems to protrude noticeably outward from the rest of his teeth.

Maybe it's just my eyes or just the angle at which his head is turned. If anyone else wants to look at the picture and give me a second opinion, feel free.

If it is a protruding tooth, it looks like it would be distinctive enough for someone who may have come in contact with Johnnie when he disappeared to remember, although I have a feeling Johnnie didn't live very long after he left that bachelor party. Most likely, the tooth would be good to rule in/out Johnnie as a match to any John Does' remains.
 
Bumping for Johnnie. This is the 39th holiday season his friends and relatives have spent without him.
 
This really has nothing to do with the case per se, but I'm currently reading some novels from Sue Grafton's alphabet series.

Last night, I started thinking about Johnnie's case as I was reading one of these novels. I had a dream that there was a Sue Grafton book about Johnnie's case with Johnnie's picture on the cover (the younger pic of him) entitled "E is for Enjoyable" (don't ask me why that was the name of the book; it just was). In the dream, I remember being upset and thinking 'There's been a book about the Johnnie Herrera disapperanceand NO ONE at Websleuths bothered to tell me about it?!?' :floorlaugh:

Just thought you'd get a kick out of that. I certainly did.
 
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