IL IL - Cook Co., WhtFem UP15494, 71-80, nursing home patient with dementia, Nov'15 - Reba Bailey

[HmmMysterious]

Any graphic images at link before I click?

No it's just a photo of Reba from the 80's

 

[StarrChance]

Chicago Tribune 1950
If this is her family could explain a disability from the accident?

 

[StarrChance]

There is a Ancestry site and it seems she is one of Seven children!
Five of the six are listed as deceased, one is private, so unknown. I.. look a little more.

 

[Laughing]

Great finds, you two!

RIP, Reba Bailey!

 

[SimsGuy67]

I found a photo of a Reba Bailey in Chicago in the 60s, but the only issue is that it would mean Reba would have been in her early 60s at the time of her death, not in her 70s or 80s. This also means that if this photo is of the Reba we're looking for, she wasn't the Reba in the car crash or the one in the Ancestry tree.

She's the only Reba Bailey who went to a Chicago High School to my knowledge. I also do see a resemblance with the photos of her in the 80s.

Join Ancestry®

Begin your discovery today by exploring the world's largest online family history resource!

www.ancestry.com

The age isn't an issue for me. Sometimes people just look old for their age. Also, age ranges are known to be very off, especially the older the person is.

I don't see the age as a big issue though.

 

[StarrChance]

Just to add few extras from article which are relevant:

Since at least 1976, the woman who calls herself Seven has lived without a formal identity.

She says she's 71 years old and a lifelong Cubs fan. She has fleeting childhood memories of visiting the Indiana Dunes but can recall little else and suffers from dementia. Her fingerprints are deformed and unreadable, according to Chicago police, who issued a found person report in 2003. Nobody has come for her.

Just relooking at the family tree I found, it’s interesting that her father died in 1976, the same year she went into the Catholic home. All siblings are now deceased.

 

[dotr]

By Sophia Tareen, January 2, 2024
A missing person with no memory: How investigators solved the cold case of Seven Doe | CityNews Toronto
''Now police specializing in missing people and cold cases have discovered Seven’s identity in one of the most unusual investigations the Cook County sheriff’s office has pursued and one that could change state law. Using post-mortem fingerprints, investigators identified Seven as 75-year-old Reba C. Bailey, an Illinois veteran missing since the 1970s.''

''The case could also change Illinois law.

The sheriff’s office wants to amend the state’s Missing Persons Identification Act to require postmortem fingerprints be checked against all available state and federal databases. The idea is a fuller search at the time of death could help identify people sooner''.

 

[HmmMysterious]

By Sophia Tareen, January 2, 2024
A missing person with no memory: How investigators solved the cold case of Seven Doe | CityNews Toronto
''Now police specializing in missing people and cold cases have discovered Seven’s identity in one of the most unusual investigations the Cook County sheriff’s office has pursued and one that could change state law. Using post-mortem fingerprints, investigators identified Seven as 75-year-old Reba C. Bailey, an Illinois veteran missing since the 1970s.''

''The case could also change Illinois law.

The sheriff’s office wants to amend the state’s Missing Persons Identification Act to require postmortem fingerprints be checked against all available state and federal databases. The idea is a fuller search at the time of death could help identify people sooner''.

Very interesting excerpt. I can't believe Reba was a U.S veteran.

"Investigators were able to piece together parts of Reba’s life.

She was born in 1940, the daughter of a carpenter who often moved for work. Tragedy hit Reba’s life at age 10 when she lost her mother in a car wreck that also left her, her father and her brother injured.

About a decade after the accident, she joined the military, serving in Alabama, Texas and California. Investigators found she was briefly married to a fellow veteran, John H. Bilberry, who passed in 1989.

Military records show she was honorably discharged in 1962 “due to marriage.”

What happened to Reba between returning from the military and showing up at a Chicago worker house with no memory remains a mystery.

Relatives heard stories about a fight between Reba and her father, but there are different versions on what it was about. Some say it was about the decision to join the military. Others heard it was about sexual orientation.

They also don’t know what prompted the memory loss, the change in gender identity or the name Seven.

Many people who might have had insight have died or knew Reba as Seven, a person with no past memories."

 

[MarziPanda]

I'm a bit confused as to how Reba was identified with fingerprints but the fingerprints have been described this whole time as 'unreadable' due to deformity. They must have taken prints before Reba died or at the time of death for them to have been used now, so it's not like better technology meant they could get better prints. The article says the prints were run at the time against police database with no match. It was only when the case was passed on that the prints were compared to wider databases, leading to the match on the military database. Sounds like the whole unreadable prints thing was misinformation, maybe a communication error somewhere. 'Prints got no hits' turning into 'prints weren't useful' turning into 'prints were unreadable'. Maybe some of Reba's prints were unreadable (my elderly granddad's finger pads got weirdly smooth as he got older) but others were readable enough.

I think this is also the first time we've heard that this person referred to themselves as a man. Maybe the memory loss in some way came from the trauma of identity crisis/not being accepted etc. Not many trans men around in the 70s so they might not have understood the way they felt and it led to mental health issues. RIP Seven/Reba.

 

[iamshadow21]

I'm a bit confused as to how Reba was identified with fingerprints but the fingerprints have been described this whole time as 'unreadable' due to deformity. They must have taken prints before Reba died or at the time of death for them to have been used now, so it's not like better technology meant they could get better prints. The article says the prints were run at the time against police database with no match. It was only when the case was passed on that the prints were compared to wider databases, leading to the match on the military database. Sounds like the whole unreadable prints thing was misinformation, maybe a communication error somewhere. 'Prints got no hits' turning into 'prints weren't useful' turning into 'prints were unreadable'. Maybe some of Reba's prints were unreadable (my elderly granddad's finger pads got weirdly smooth as he got older) but others were readable enough.

I think this is also the first time we've heard that this person referred to themselves as a man. Maybe the memory loss in some way came from the trauma of identity crisis/not being accepted etc. Not many trans men around in the 70s so they might not have understood the way they felt and it led to mental health issues. RIP Seven/Reba.

I do wonder if my partner's fingerprints would be readable, either digitally or with traditional inking. Her skin is very elastic and smooth because of a connective tissue disorder, and she has trouble even making out her ridge detail looking at them in good light. She also has creases through them where her pads flex and fold more than most people's.

Maybe Reba had a condition that affected the texture of the skin, and so the fingerprints, making it impossible to get a clear print with older techniques.

MOO

 

[MarziPanda]

I do wonder if my partner's fingerprints would be readable, either digitally or with traditional inking. Her skin is very elastic and smooth because of a connective tissue disorder, and she has trouble even making out her ridge detail looking at them in good light. She also has creases through them where her pads flex and fold more than most people's.

Maybe Reba had a condition that affected the texture of the skin, and so the fingerprints, making it impossible to get a clear print with older techniques.

MOO

That might be the case for sure. They wouldn't be able to get a clearer print now though I don't think as Reba has been deceased for some time. Maybe they could clear up the prints they already got. That they apparently compared the prints at the time with the police database does imply to me that they had usable prints before I think.

 

[Sonny Crockett]

Just heard about this case re: the recent article(s). Fascinating story, but also extremely sad. RB is one of many examples of people in our society who fall through the cracks.

I find it amazing that her identity was eventually discovered - especially because there was very little to go on here. The meticulous research/time/effort that was spent here is truly commendable. Though RB obviously wasn't close to her family for years before her passing, at least they did get closure by finding out what happened to her.

Just speculating here, but the car accident in 1950 (when she was a kid) that resulted in she & her family being injured & her mother's tragic death almost certainly resulted in physical & possibly mental trauma.

For reference, here's the Yahoo article:

A missing person with no memory: How investigators solved the cold case of Seven Doe

Buried at the edge of a Chicago Catholic cemetery are an elderly person’s remains marked only by a cement cylinder deep in the ground labeled with the numbers 04985. The person died in 2015 at a nursing home not remembering much, including their own name. Now police specializing in missing...

www.yahoo.com