50/60 year old Amnesia Victim Savannah, GA Thread #5

New Posts

Status
Not open for further replies.
dreamweaver said:
========================

What is behind the dumpster area? Is it a vacant lot? Does it cut through to another fast food complex?

Again, thank you.
Click to expand...

Dreamweaver,

Just added that picture for you. It is Image #15 in photo album.
 
Kentjbkent said:
No, it is surrounded by a grassy area that and scrub brush, bushes, etc. I have a pic here that I did not include. I will go add it now. (This pic will also show the closest nearby restaurant McDonald so you can see just how far away the next business was.

I was alone or I would have taken a pic with a person standing next to this cinderblock corral. It is quite tall (much taller than me!)

What I don't know as of today (2009) is whether the wooden doors of that corral were always in an open position (one side) back when the restaurant was in business (and just never paid attention when I used to go there) or whether or not they were kept locked, but I am going to suspect that they were NOT locked. I plan on adding this question to my list for Mike....where exactly was BK located....inside the corral or outside the wooden doors.

Still catching up reading on this forum and just found the pics from Enquirer with BK standing by the dumpster and am curious as to whether anyone knows when that pic was taken. I noticed the "backside wall" looks to be metal, but this corral is made of cinderblocks? I am also going to assume that the Enquirer photo was taken a long time ago if you compare what the inside ground area around green dumpster (which is no longer there) looked like then and what it looks like now!
Click to expand...
-------------------------------------------------------

National Enquirer article/pics Nov. 2007.
 
Kentjbkent, it seems that the dumpster area is about 100 feet from the drive thru. Is that about correct?
So, I assume if your making an order at the speaker, you will not be able to see inside the dumpster area.
What about if you are waiting in line for the speaker, do you believe if the doors were open, you could see inside?
 
carolwood said:
Kentjbkent, it seems that the dumpster area is about 100 feet from the drive thru. Is that about correct?
So, I assume if your making an order at the speaker, you will not be able to see inside the dumpster area.
What about if you are waiting in line for the speaker, do you believe if the doors were open, you could see inside?
Click to expand...


Of course, whether the doors remained open all the time (in 2004 and while in business) would determine how much you could see...and whether the doors were thrown completely open or only one side open. But you are correct that it is about 100 feet from the drive thru speaker. I also walked to the back door of the restaurant (employee entrance where they unload the trucks, take trash out, etc.)

If both doors were in a completely open position, it would not be hard for an employee to see someone lying alongside one of the dumpsters (this area is quite large so I believe there was more than one dumpster inside...it also appears the Enquirer pic shows at least two since beind BK in the picture is "metal" and the corral is completely cinderblock.) However, if only the right side remained open, you would not be able to see in to the left (where I believe one possibly two other dumpster units sat)

I am compiling a detailed question list for M Albritton and D Strickland and this is one of the details I want to question them about. Did the employee go INSIDE to dump and found the body, were the doors already open or closed (partially?) when the employee found BK, etc.

I am also going to ask my daughters if they remember any of the friends who may have worked at BK (and will ask others) to see if I can find out whether it was standard practice for the doors to remain closed, open, etc. I am also curious to know what Burger King's policy was for taking trash out at closing time (I believe midnight) for security reasons.

Keep in mind, there were at least four high beam security light poles lighting up that parking lot, with one about 100 ft away, but one of the two bulbs were directed straight at the dumpster area.

I also stayed at the Holiday Inn one night (closed on old home, two day delay til closing on new home) and that parking lot was SO WELL LIT, as was/is Holiday Inn. For this reason, I am suspecting that BK was found INSIDE the corral area as opposed to outside the corral.
 
Kentjbkent:
Is there 2 sets of wooden doors on the dumpster corral?
 
carolwood said:
Kentjbkent:
Is there 2 sets of wooden doors on the dumpster corral?
Click to expand...

Yes, there are two wooden doors on the front of the corral area (I referred to them as wooden "barn door" like.)

There is a close up photo of the two doors, one open, one in the closed position in the photo album.

There is also a photo I referred to as "closer view" of inside of corral. That photo is of the inside corral area immediately behind the closed wooden door. (I stepped just inside the opened door, turned to the left and took the photo of all the growth, etc behind that closed door.)

I am going to go back out there to take more photos of beind the corral (didn't yesterday). I will also open both doors and then take photos from drivethru speaker area and back door area to show what would have been easily visible (distance) and will add these new photos to album.
 
The caption on the pic of Benjaman standing beside a dumpster says it was taken at a BK in Savannah so it is not the same location where he was found.
 
Kentjbkent said:
I am compiling a detailed question list for M Albritton and D Strickland and this is one of the details I want to question them about. Did the employee go INSIDE to dump and found the body, were the doors already open or closed (partially?) when the employee found BK, etc.

I am also going to ask my daughters if they remember any of the friends who may have worked at BK (and will ask others) to see if I can find out whether it was standard practice for the doors to remain closed, open, etc. I am also curious to know what Burger King's policy was for taking trash out at closing time (I believe midnight) for security reasons.

Keep in mind, there were at least four high beam security light poles lighting up that parking lot, with one about 100 ft away, but one of the two bulbs were directed straight at the dumpster area.
Click to expand...

respectfully snipped...

If your daughters find any friends who worked there, would you ask them about incidents of dumpster diving? Like was it common for indigents to look through dumpsters...I mean what if someone was in that area the same time BK was? Maybe they witnessed what happened??
 
justthinkin said:
The caption on the pic of Benjaman standing beside a dumpster says it was taken at a BK in Savannah so it is not the same location where he was found.
Click to expand...
===================================

justthinkin:
Am glad you caught that. I had never noticed it before.
 
justthinkin said:
The caption on the pic of Benjaman standing beside a dumpster says it was taken at a BK in Savannah so it is not the same location where he was found.
Click to expand...

Thank you for clearing that up! That Enquirer pic really threw me for a loop, especially since I was physically AT the RH dumpster site yesterday. Last night, I sat and stared at that Enquirer photo, comparing it to all the photos I took yesterday (have hard printed copies here) trying to distinguish where in the RH dumpster he was actually standing as it didn't "add up" and the pole (inside corral) displayed in Enquirer photo did not appear the same as the poles in my photos.

I was also confused by the back wall appearing to be some type of metal (behind BK in picture) whereas the corral in RH is solid white cinderblock.

So wonder why they (Enquirer) didn't drive the extra 15 minutes (from Savannah) to take a photo with BK in front of the ACTUAL dumpster he was found near???
 
Kentjbkent said:
Thank you for clearing that up! That Enquirer pic really threw me for a loop, especially since I was physically AT the RH dumpster site yesterday. Last night, I sat and stared at that Enquirer photo, comparing it to all the photos I took yesterday (have hard printed copies here) trying to distinguish where in the RH dumpster he was actually standing as it didn't "add up" and the pole (inside corral) displayed in Enquirer photo did not appear the same as the poles in my photos.

I was also confused by the back wall appearing to be some type of metal (behind BK in picture) whereas the corral in RH is solid white cinderblock.

So wonder why they (Enquirer) didn't drive the extra 15 minutes (from Savannah) to take a photo with BK in front of the ACTUAL dumpster he was found near???
Click to expand...

Media types. They probably thought their time was too valuable or that no one would ever notice.
 
believe09 said:
respectfully snipped...

If your daughters find any friends who worked there, would you ask them about incidents of dumpster diving? Like was it common for indigents to look through dumpsters...I mean what if someone was in that area the same time BK was? Maybe they witnessed what happened??
Click to expand...

I am also going to see if I can find someone who works for the McDonald's that is nearby and here is why.

Back in the late 70s/early 80s when I was in high school, I worked at a McDonalds (only teen employment in town!).

In the back area were two large plastic garbage cans that were the "waste recepticles". Throughout the day, from open to close, any "waste" was thrown in these garbage cans. One was for paper products (such as cups, straws, etc that fell on floor, etc). The OTHER was for food product waste such as burgers that "timed out", fries that had been under heat lamp too long, subpar raw product, etc.

One of the closing duties was to sit back in the breakroom and physically remove each item and account for each on a log to get a total "waste count" for the day. This was done for inventory control.

After this was completed, THEN it would go to the garbage dumpster, all packaged in one trash bag.

I am assuming that this method is being used by restaurants to this day to help control costs. I thought about this yesterday while I was at the dumpster, and I think the information could definitely tie in one way or another.
 
dreamweaver said:
========================

Kentjbkent: I just took a look at the pics. Excellent job.
I have not seen Burger King from that angle and the longer
view shots.
It certainly does show how far back in the lot that dumpster area
was.
And that the dumpster area is away from the employee's back entrance.

I remember when I saw a pic of the dumpster, it was quite tall. I thought maybe the
persons who did this, tried to get him into the dumpster, they failed and left him beside the dumpster.

What is behind the dumpster area? Is it a vacant lot? Does it cut through to another fast food complex?
Again, thank you.
Click to expand...

Just to follow up, I went back out to Burger King tonight to see if the security lights are still operable. They are not but the area was still pretty lit up due to all the business area lighting (tall lit up billboard signs, etc).

Recalling your question yesterday, I looked closer at the area behind the dumpster corral. The bushes/shrubbery have now grown as tall as the corral but assume that area would have been kept landscaped in 2004 when business was operational.

Beyond the row of bushes up against corral (again, back wall of corral), is now an empty lot. It wasn't until I was leaving tonight and looking that I recalled that a large convenience store/gas station used to sit on that lot. The gas station had about 10 pumps so large station. The station was severly damaged about 2 years after a bad storm (metal canopy over gas pumps collapsed down and store roof caved in) and the store never reopened and sat damaged until about 6 months when property was sold. The area was bulldozed and is now just a large concrete slab and empty lot.

But in 2004, the backside of dumpster corral would have been facing the back parking area of this store so I assume lighting would have been pretty heavy. Keep in mind....we don't really have much crime here but this area around the truckstop is where all the police calls come from.
 
carolwood said:
Kentjbkent, it seems that the dumpster area is about 100 feet from the drive thru. Is that about correct?
So, I assume if your making an order at the speaker, you will not be able to see inside the dumpster area.
What about if you are waiting in line for the speaker, do you believe if the doors were open, you could see inside?
Click to expand...

Keeping your questions in mind, I paid more attention to these details tonight when I went out there.

Yes, if at least one of the corral doors were open, you could see inside that portion of the corral as you were driving up and around to the drivethru speaker. You can also clearly see pretty close up inside from the speaker area (one door is standing open....I plan to go by tomorrow and try to open the other side as well but I really don't think both stood wide open when restaurant was operational).

It was difficult, however, to see much if you were standing at the back door (employee/delivery entrance) and it was impossible to see inside the open door from either of the drive up windows (there are two).

Something else just occurred to me. I do recall that when open, the employee parking was on the side that faced the driveup windows. If that was the case, and at least one door of the corral was always left open (or at least on the night in question after the perp fled), why didn't an employee see Benjaman when they pulled into the parking lot when arriving for work that morning? There is really one way in. Would be difficult maneuvering to drive in the "out way". I would have assumed that as they pulled into the parking lot and circled around to park, passing the dumpster corral, wouldn't their headlights have immediately shone into the corral as they made that U-turn around the drivethru speaker? Mine did this evening.....hmmmm....
 
Kentjbkent said:
Keeping your questions in mind, I paid more attention to these details tonight when I went out there.

Yes, if at least one of the corral doors were open, you could see inside that portion of the corral as you were driving up and around to the drivethru speaker. You can also clearly see pretty close up inside from the speaker area (one door is standing open....I plan to go by tomorrow and try to open the other side as well but I really don't think both stood wide open when restaurant was operational).

It was difficult, however, to see much if you were standing at the back door (employee/delivery entrance) and it was impossible to see inside the open door from either of the drive up windows (there are two).

Something else just occurred to me. I do recall that when open, the employee parking was on the side that faced the driveup windows. If that was the case, and at least one door of the corral was always left open (or at least on the night in question after the perp fled), why didn't an employee see Benjaman when they pulled into the parking lot when arriving for work that morning? There is really one way in. Would be difficult maneuvering to drive in the "out way". I would have assumed that as they pulled into the parking lot and circled around to park, passing the dumpster corral, wouldn't their headlights have immediately shone into the corral as they made that U-turn around the drivethru speaker? Mine did this evening.....hmmmm....
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure we have answers in one of the posts on exactly where he was located in relation to the dumpster.

The BK's here in NJ, the doors are supposed to be kept closed.

Thank you for going out there & taking pics.
 
I was reading In Touch magazine (yes, guilty pleasure)

In the issue I have, there was an article about 4 kids that were adopted & that just found each other. I wonder if they'd be interested in writing a story on Benjaman?
 
Roselvr said:
I was reading In Touch magazine (yes, guilty pleasure)

In the issue I have, there was an article about 4 kids that were adopted & that just found each other. I wonder if they'd be interested in writing a story on Benjaman?
Click to expand...
---------------------

Good idea. Submit the story, the more media, the better, I think.
 
If someone else wants to try getting in touch with them, that's fine.

As time allows I can also try.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

DNASolves

Who is Escambia County John Doe (1989)?

Members online

... and 160 more.
Total: 3,466 (members: 161, guests: 3,305)

Online statistics

Members online
161
Guests online
3,305
Total visitors
3,466
Totals may include hidden visitors.

Forum statistics

Threads
591,852
Messages
17,960,027
Members
228,624
Latest member
Laayla
Back
Top