"Killing Field" in League City, Texas- Calder Rd Cold Cases

Ikoihil:

Are these articles about your mother's death? Two (2) articles are dated 9/17/1989 and the other 9/19/1989.

http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1989_650630
http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1989_650958
http://www.newspaperarchive.com/SiteMap/FreePdfPreview.aspx?img=110190019

Linnis A. Gibbons:

This is an article dated 2/6/1995. It includes a list of names that were in the obituary that day. The full text can be found in microfilm.

http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1995_1254778

This article is dated 09/20/1986. It refers to a Linnis Gibbons Jr. I was wondering if this is a relative of Linnis Gibbons Sr. maybe?

http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1986_267408

Is it possible to contact relatives or friends of Gibbons? Maybe if we dig deep enough, it will lead to new information that could reopen the case. I was also wondering if you had any pictures of your mom, Gibbons, or the other two women? If so could you upload them?

Thank you!

Yes, those are about my mother. JeannieC is correct in saying they were father and son. The obituary is for the father; the son has had numerous run-ins with the law.

I am not jumping at the opportunity to contact any of them personally, as that is dangerous for me, and I would prefer to not end up dead in a field somewhere. I've tried to find pictures of Gibbons and the other woman, and have gone through every photo in my home (which, I might add to anyone reading, is very secure and armed; additionally I am a sharpshooter). I will keep looking though.
 
I grew up in League City and still live in the Clear Lake area. I was a senior in high school when the Corvette Concepts murders took place. I remember rumors at the high school once the story broke that it was a drug deal gone bad and then I also heard it was a mob hit. There was also a rumor about a "strange" person wandering around the nearby graveyard that morning of the murders (along 45S near 518)..We never really did find out the details but for League City at that time, this was huge. League City was a tiny town back then...I worked at a drug store along 45 S at 518 about one block away from the Hobbs Road convienence store and about 1/2 mile from Corvette Concepts and Calder Road was one exit South... No one really knew about the Killing Fields (circa 1983/84)....It wasn't until Shelley Sikes was abducted that the media latched onto the mysterious disappearances along 45. Around the same time as girls began to go missing, up the road in Clear Lake City along the old (now gone) golf course, there was a series of rapes of young girls who lived along the course who were abducted and then raped on the greens. This was dubbed "The Clear Lake Rapist"...This area was near Clear Lake High School along Bay Area Blvd which is about 5 miles E of 45.
The "Killing Fields" of the 80's is no longer a lonely stretch of fields but home to subdivisions. shopping centers and a huge softball complex. Hobbs Road connects to Calder now...not sure if it did back then because I never had much reason to go down Hobbs all those years ago.....
What is really spooky is the fact that I lived, hung out and worked in the very area these girls went missing and were found dead...and I was blissfully unaware of the tragedy that was right under my nose.....
 
I grew up in League City and still live in the Clear Lake area. I was a senior in high school when the Corvette Concepts murders took place. I remember rumors at the high school once the story broke that it was a drug deal gone bad and then I also heard it was a mob hit. There was also a rumor about a "strange" person wandering around the nearby graveyard that morning of the murders (along 45S near 518)..We never really did find out the details but for League City at that time, this was huge. League City was a tiny town back then...I worked at a drug store along 45 S at 518 about one block away from the Hobbs Road convienence store and about 1/2 mile from Corvette Concepts and Calder Road was one exit South... No one really knew about the Killing Fields (circa 1983/84)....It wasn't until Shelley Sikes was abducted that the media latched onto the mysterious disappearances along 45. Around the same time as girls began to go missing, up the road in Clear Lake City along the old (now gone) golf course, there was a series of rapes of young girls who lived along the course who were abducted and then raped on the greens. This was dubbed "The Clear Lake Rapist"...This area was near Clear Lake High School along Bay Area Blvd which is about 5 miles E of 45.
The "Killing Fields" of the 80's is no longer a lonely stretch of fields but home to subdivisions. shopping centers and a huge softball complex. Hobbs Road connects to Calder now...not sure if it did back then because I never had much reason to go down Hobbs all those years ago.....
What is really spooky is the fact that I lived, hung out and worked in the very area these girls went missing and were found dead...and I was blissfully unaware of the tragedy that was right under my nose.....

You're one of the lucky ones! It seems not too many people were aware of what was going on. Even now, people don't realize the magnitude. We're still finding victims!

Thanks for posting this information. Everything helps!
 
FBI Takes on Triple Murder in LEAGUE CITY
In continuing the investigation, the League City Police
have already enlisted a prominent profiler who noted that there
was most likely a relationship with the suspect and co-owner of
Corvette Concepts, Beth Yevette Wilburn, 25, at the time of the macabre murders that took place Nov. 2, 1983.

League City Detective Robert Webb said Wilburn was stabbed over 100 times, possibly with a screwdriver, and then was shot multiple times with a pistol.

Beth’s boyfriend Thomas Earl McGraw Jr., 27, had been
stabbed several times with what detectives believe was the same
weapon used on Beth Wilburn; he was then shot several times after
a screw driver became impaled in his spine. Burch’s husband, electrician
James Craig Oatis, 22, who had been hanging chains for lighting fixtures
in the mechanic’s bay of the facility had also been shot multiple times.


http://thepolicenews.net/html/gcpnmar06final.pdf
 
If you happen to come across this description for an uid.

Clothing: She was last seen wearing a rabbit fur jacket and Calvin Klein jeans.

Let me know. I thought i seen that somewhere already. About remains found with a fur jacket?

Just checked the uid thread and its not there.

It belongs to this person.

The Doe Network:
Case File 1186DFTX
KMurphy.jpg


Kathleen Murphy
Missing since March 7, 1976 from Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas.
Classification: Involuntary

 
If you happen to come across this description for an uid.

Clothing: She was last seen wearing a rabbit fur jacket and Calvin Klein jeans.

Let me know. I thought i seen that somewhere already. About remains found with a fur jacket?

Just checked the uid thread and its not there.

It belongs to this person.

The Doe Network:
Case File 1186DFTX
KMurphy.jpg


Kathleen Murphy
Missing since March 7, 1976 from Fort Worth, Tarrant County, Texas.
Classification: Involuntary


I didn't find one with a rabbit fur coat. I have one with a fringed leather coat and that's it. Sorry.
 
When you search for media links, the original listings in the 1970's were probably the "I-45 killings". They begain calling them the Texas Killing Fields later.

The "Killing Field" murders did not start in the 70's, they happened between 1983 - 1991. It was never, until recently, called the Killing Fields. The "Killing Field" is a 25 acre oil field in League Cirty, Texas - and there were four murders. Tim Miller's daughter, Laura Smithers, was one of the four. I'm from Houston, born and raised and I actually remember when this all started, I was in my early 20's. I remember because I was scared to use pay phones in front of convenience stores - two of the victims were picked up from the same convenience store. Originally it was believed to be a truck driver because of the easy off and on access to I-45 from both the field and the convenience store, a lot of truckers stopped there.

The many unsolved murders along the I-45 corridor are known as the I-45 corridor murders and have been going on since before the Killing Field murders. The I-45 corridor runs from South Houston to Galveston. How this has traveled so far North is lost on me. The Woodlands, Spring, and Conroe are nowhere near the corridor. I've lived in all these suburbs except Conroe - and going to Galveston from any of them is like going out of town!

It seems like this new movie has stretched the fields far and away from the original isolated oil field. I read a bit about the movie and they are saying up to 60 victims?? Not so much.. There have been no other murders with the same MO - no other bodies found laid out the way these four bodies were found. IMO, same guy...four trips through town - a truck driver, and we will never know who he is. He's either in prison, dead, or his route was changed in 1991.

What I do think is plausible, as far as the I-45 corridor murders, is other truck drivers picking up young women on their way into Houston from the North, killing them and dropping them off on their way out of town.
 
You are exactly right.

Ali - Alexander Joy Lowitzer Missing since April 26, 2010 from Spring, Tx

lowitzer_alexandria6.jpg

Alexandria "Ali" Lowitzer - I have first hand knowledge of this case and the story is crazy. I lost a lot of faith in the missing person's units, and even in the Laura Recovery Center. I have to go to bed now though, so I'll write it all out tomorrow. :seeya:
 
The "Killing Field" murders did not start in the 70's, they happened between 1983 - 1991. It was never, until recently, called the Killing Fields. The "Killing Field" is a 25 acre oil field in League Cirty, Texas - and there were four murders. Tim Miller's daughter, Laura Smithers, was one of the four. I'm from Houston, born and raised and I actually remember when this all started, I was in my early 20's. I remember because I was scared to use pay phones in front of convenience stores - two of the victims were picked up from the same convenience store. Originally it was believed to be a truck driver because of the easy off and on access to I-45 from both the field and the convenience store, a lot of truckers stopped there.

The many unsolved murders along the I-45 corridor are known as the I-45 corridor murders and have been going on since before the Killing Field murders. The I-45 corridor runs from South Houston to Galveston. How this has traveled so far North is lost on me. The Woodlands, Spring, and Conroe are nowhere near the corridor. I've lived in all these suburbs except Conroe - and going to Galveston from any of them is like going out of town!

It seems like this new movie has stretched the fields far and away from the original isolated oil field. I read a bit about the movie and they are saying up to 60 victims?? Not so much.. There have been no other murders with the same MO - no other bodies found laid out the way these four bodies were found. IMO, same guy...four trips through town - a truck driver, and we will never know who he is. He's either in prison, dead, or his route was changed in 1991.

What I do think is plausible, as far as the I-45 corridor murders, is other truck drivers picking up young women on their way into Houston from the North, killing them and dropping them off on their way out of town.


Your pessimism about finding links to other murders and victims just makes me work harder to find positive identification for those women - (and men!), so I'd like to thank you for your feedback about the work we've done in this newly organized forum. :thumb:

I don't think the movie has stretched the fields far away from the site at 3000 Calder Road, as much as the fact that victims (including those found, unidentified, and abducted) have similar traits of the unfortunate dénouement of those four found in the Killing Field, proper. Let me translate that for you: Laura Smithers' abduction and murder is similar to others in Conroe, Galveston, Houston, etc. Laura Miller's abduction and murder demonstrate similarities to other murders that have taken place in cities, towns and counties within the area. The murders of the other two unidentified women mirror details of those found within the southeastern region of Texas, as well. Those are the reasons our information includes data from neighboring cities and counties.

While you are correct about the quantity of bodies found within that one location, when you allocate the time to read material further than simply the review of a movie, you will find that there are more than 100 victims within a relatively minimal radius.

I feel the need to respond to your post within this public thread, so that future guests of this site will not be discouraged from joining the discussions <Mod Snip>
.
-ikoihil
 
Alexandria "Ali" Lowitzer - I have first hand knowledge of this case and the story is crazy. I lost a lot of faith in the missing person's units, and even in the Laura Recovery Center. I have to go to bed now though, so I'll write it all out tomorrow. :seeya:

:welcome5: :welcome4:

Hi Vlpate. Welcome to the forum.

Hope you'll share your information about Ali with us. Always nice to have locals who knew the victim and have more information on these cases and on these victims.

:crazy:
 
Your pessimism about finding links to other murders and victims just makes me work harder to find positive identification for those women - (and men!), so I'd like to thank you for your feedback about the work we've done in this newly organized forum. :thumb:

I don't think the movie has stretched the fields far away from the site at 3000 Calder Road, as much as the fact that victims (including those found, unidentified, and abducted) have similar traits of the unfortunate dénouement of those four found in the Killing Field, proper. Let me translate that for you: Laura Smithers' abduction and murder is similar to others in Conroe, Galveston, Houston, etc. Laura Miller's abduction and murder demonstrate similarities to other murders that have taken place in cities, towns and counties within the area. The murders of the other two unidentified women mirror details of those found within the southeastern region of Texas, as well. Those are the reasons our information includes data from neighboring cities and counties.

While you are correct about the quantity of bodies found within that one location, when you allocate the time to read material further than simply the review of a movie, you will find that there are more than 100 victims within a relatively minimal radius.

I feel the need to respond to your post within this public thread, so that future guests of this site will not be discouraged from joining the discussions <Mod Snip>
.
-ikoihil
:takeabow::loveyou::goodpost:
Sorry for the intrusion .... please, keep up the good job!
 
:welcome5: :welcome4:

Hi Vlpate. Welcome to the forum.

Hope you'll share your information about Ali with us. Always nice to have locals who knew the victim and have more information on these cases and on these victims.

:crazy:

I didn't know her, but I was handed a flyer from a relative of hers who became a very suspicious character. I need to find out from the mods if I'm even allowed to give details. I will tell you that when I had compelling evidence, in the form of black tennis shoes, exactly the same as the ones she was wearing in her missing poster, and left in her relative's apartment after the relative split town, LE never even came out to investigate...I kept the apartment exactly the same, no one was allowed to touch it for 3 months....and no one came....no one.
 
:welcome5: :welcome4:

Hi Vlpate. Welcome to the forum.

Hope you'll share your information about Ali with us. Always nice to have locals who knew the victim and have more information on these cases and on these victims.

:crazy:

And thank you! :blushing:
 
The "Killing Field" murders did not start in the 70's, they happened between 1983 - 1991. It was never, until recently, called the Killing Fields. The "Killing Field" is a 25 acre oil field in League Cirty, Texas - and there were four murders. Tim Miller's daughter, Laura Smithers, was one of the four. I'm from Houston, born and raised and I actually remember when this all started, I was in my early 20's. I remember because I was scared to use pay phones in front of convenience stores - two of the victims were picked up from the same convenience store. Originally it was believed to be a truck driver because of the easy off and on access to I-45 from both the field and the convenience store, a lot of truckers stopped there.

The many unsolved murders along the I-45 corridor are known as the I-45 corridor murders and have been going on since before the Killing Field murders. The I-45 corridor runs from South Houston to Galveston. How this has traveled so far North is lost on me. The Woodlands, Spring, and Conroe are nowhere near the corridor. I've lived in all these suburbs except Conroe - and going to Galveston from any of them is like going out of town!

It seems like this new movie has stretched the fields far and away from the original isolated oil field. I read a bit about the movie and they are saying up to 60 victims?? Not so much.. There have been no other murders with the same MO - no other bodies found laid out the way these four bodies were found. IMO, same guy...four trips through town - a truck driver, and we will never know who he is. He's either in prison, dead, or his route was changed in 1991.

What I do think is plausible, as far as the I-45 corridor murders, is other truck drivers picking up young women on their way into Houston from the North, killing them and dropping them off on their way out of town.

I meant Laura Miller, not Smithers above in red .. always mix the names of those two up.
 
Vlpate, you addressed me, but you were responding to Ikoihil's post. But since you did...:)

Believe it or not, I'm pretty familiar with the Galveston/Pasadena/Baytown area and the towns you listed. I've visited there many times since I was a teenager in the 1960's-70's. In fact, I was there just a few months ago. So I understand what you're saying about the geography. The truth is the oil fields around Conroe off of I-45 form their own killing field. Whether or not the bodies found on those roads were victims of the same killer, the Killing Fields killer, or each a unique killer, if members have the time and ability to post the information and analyze the data, why discourage them? Those victims deserve justice, too, and the Doe's deserve a name.
 
Vlpate, you addressed me, but you were responding to Ikoihil's post. but since you did...:)

Believe it or not, I'm pretty familiar with the Galveston/Pasadena/Baytown area and the towns you listed. I've visited there many times since I was a teenager in the 1960's-70's. In fact, I was there just a few months ago. So I understand what you're saying about the geography. The truth is the oil fields around Conroe off of I-45 form their own killing field. Whether or not the bodies found on those roads were victims of the same killer, the Killing Fields killer, or each a unique killer, if members have the time and ability to post the information and analyze the data, why discourage them? Those victims deserve justice, too, and the Doe's deserve a name.

BBE Exactly
 

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