FL FL - Manatee Co., WhtFem UP1265, 11-20, drowned on the edge of Sarasota Bay, Apr'83

[theshadow45]

Tidy Island Jane Doe has been unidentified for 38 years today.

 

[BigKeyManatee]

Tidy Island Jane Doe has been unidentified for 38 years today.

So terribly sad, so unacceptable.
Authorities can’t even find where this child is buried.

Tidy Island Doe was identified as Hispanic. Could she have been a Cuban refugee?

The Mariel Boat Lift was largely finished by 1981, but the flow of small rickety boats filled with desperate people never really stopped. Most boats and rafts came ashore on the Atlantic Coast ranging from the Florida Keys up to Ft. Lauderdale.

Would it be possible for Tidy Island Doe to have been washed ashore from a boat fleeing Cuba in 1983?

Possible, but not probable. It wasn’t until decades later when traffickers trying to outwit the Miami Coast Guard patrols began making regular landfalls farther West and up to the beaches of the Gulf Coast.
In December 2016 a boat carrying two dozen Cubans managed to come ashore on Sarasota’s tony Longboat Key, just a stone’s throw from Tidy Island.

The sadder reality is that Tidy Island Doe might have been a child of Florida’s hidden shame: tens of thousands of migrant farm workers from Mexico, Guatemala and Haiti living and toiling in substandard conditions.

Manatee County is among Florida’s worst, passing ordinances in 1980 prohibiting the building of adequate housing for the workers. For decades workers and their families slept grouped together on mattresses crammed into uninsulated chicken coops, trailer parks or derelict motels, all without adequate sanitation.

These workers don’t have a voice to complain, and conditions were even more oppressive in the 1980’s. Migrants had always been an exploited population, living, working, and dying in a county with a long history of denying them the even most basic human dignities.

No wonder Tidy Island Doe was lost in Manatee, not once, but over and over again.
(All MOO)
Migrant farmworkers live their lives in the shadows

 

[PayrollNerd]

Unexplained drowning deaths always make me think about the weather at the time. The day she was found, 4/9/1983, there was an F3 tornado a few counties north (Citrus County). Inverness, FL is 2 hours north of Sarasota, FL. If the weather was unexpected, people on the beaches a few hours south would not be aware. She could have been fishing off a bridge and fallen in, bumped into the pilings, floated for a few days and then washed ashore due to the high winds that day.

As mentioned, if she was with family, they would have surely reported her missing. But what if she was a migrant child brought in on an Agriculture Visa to work the fields? Would her family have reported her missing? What if she was a drug mule who was lost at sea and finally floated to shore.

https://www.weather.gov/media/tbw/paig/PresAmTornadoes19830410.pdf

 

[theshadow45]

Tidy Island Jane Doe has been unidentified for 39 years today.

 

[Melt71]

@othram maybe one for your team to look at - according to Doe Network they tried to extract DNA in the "late 2000's" unsuccessfully but maybe they still have material left that could be resampled?

 

[othram]

@othram maybe one for your team to look at - according to Doe Network they tried to extract DNA in the "late 2000's" unsuccessfully but maybe they still have material left that could be resampled?

We will see if we can help. Thanks!

 

[BigKeyManatee]

We will see if we can help. Thanks!

OMG thank you thank you!!

 

[crazyrabbitlady]

Timelines don’t really add up, this girl went missing almost a year prior to Tidy Island Jane Doe….but I think her picture has such a resemblance. Emma Vaughn, was 14 when she went missing in Orlando. The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

 

[Hochman]

Help ID Me Facebook
Post written 1 hour ago as of writing this reply.

 

[Schiellj]

I submitted Tidy Island Jane Doe as a possible match for Barbara Louise Cotton (MP2921) nearly a year ago.
After reading through all the details discussed in this thread, I think that the odds of a match are extremely low. Thought it might be helpful to share the submittal regardless.
I submitted it to the local investigator we communicate with regarding Barb's case. Barb's NamUs Regional Program Specialist as well as the RPS for this Doe.

 

[Romulus]

488UFFL - Unidentified Female​

Reconstruction of the decedent

Date of Discovery: April 9, 1983
Location of Discovery: Tidy Island, Manatee County, Florida
Estimated Date of Death: 1 day prior
State of Remains: Recognizable face
Cause of Death: Drowning under unknown circumstances

Physical Description​

Estimated Age: 11-20 years old
Race: White
Sex: Female
Height: 5'4" to 5'5"
Weight: 100 to 110 lbs.
Hair Color: Brown, medium length
Eye Color: Unknown
Distinguishing Marks/Features: No scars, tattoos or previous injuries; pierced ears

Identifiers​

Dentals: Not available. Natural teeth. Noticeably crooked. Crowding of the upper and lower teeth, most prominent anteriorly. No fillings in place, but the first molars on the right and left in the lower jaw both had cavitary defects which were smooth-walled, deep and slightly discolored brown-black. The wisdom teeth were not erupted.
Fingerprints: Not available
DNA: Not available

Clothing & Personal Items​

Clothing: None
Jewelry: None
Additional Personal Items: None

Circumstances of Discovery​

The female was located by construction workers on the edge of Sarasota Bay, ten feet off Tidy Island, in the Cortez area, on April 9, 1983. She was found floating face down in about a foot of water.

Foul play has not been ruled out, although the medical examiner believed her death was accidental. There was, however, an injury to her head and the sheriff's department is treating the case as suspicious.

The location where the female is buried in the Manatee County Cemetery is unknown, as there were no grave markers put in place for indigent burials until 1986. Efforts were made to locate her body in the late 2000s for DNA testing and additional examination but were unsuccessful.

Investigating Agency(s)​

Agency Name: District 12 Medical Examiner
Agency Contact Person: David Winterhalter, Medical Examiner
Agency Phone Number: 941-361-6909
Agency E-Mail: N/A
Agency Case Number: 1983-MA-04

Agency Name: Manatee County Sheriff's Office
Agency Contact Person: N/A
Agency Phone Number: 1-941-747-3011
Agency E-Mail: N/A
Agency Case Number: 1983-MA-04

NCIC Case Number: U482585691
NamUs Case Number: 1265
NCMEC Case Number: 1184245

Information Source(s)​

NamUs
NCMEC
FLUIDDB
Bradenton Herald - Mar. 7, 2009

488UFFL

 

[Caring1]

I hope they will compare UID to Debra Leigh Newton. I don‘t believe she was mentioned previously.

It was originally reported that Debra had left with her daughter on 4/2/83 from KY but information was updated as listed below. Does that mean she did not take her daughter with her?

Debra was reportedly headed to GA. UID was found in FL one week later. There is some resemblance in the two.

Entry in National Exploited and Missing Children System and Mother's Warrant for
Custodial Interference was recalled on Jan. 2. 2005 due to inaccurate information.

https://www.namus.gov/api/CaseSets/NamUs/MissingPersons/Cases/87608/Images/169037/Original

 

[John/Jane Doe]

@Caring1 Hey could you post the NamUs exclusion list for this Jane Doe?

 

[Caring1]

@Caring1 Hey could you post the NamUs exclusion list for this Jane Doe?

0 Missing Person Exclusions

 

[PayrollNerd]

I’m not surprised there’s no rule outs. They don’t have a marker on her grave, no personal items, no dentals, no fingerprints, & no DNA. I don’t know how they can identify her. Short of finding her and exhuming her remains what can they do?

 

[theshadow45]

Tidy Island Jane Doe has been unidentified for 40 years today.

 

[PatLaurel]

FWIW, the article below states our JD had her "nails chewed to the quick" and the shoe size was about "3 ½ and 4".

UP1265 - Newspapers.com

 

[victoriarobinson642]

That shoe size is very small. Makes me lean towards her being on the younger side. Anecdotally, mine were around that size around 10-12.

 

[pokerowan]

That shoe size is very small. Makes me lean towards her being on the younger side. Anecdotally, mine were around that size around 10-12.

I'm the same size (and height) with a decade on the predicted age. Just happen to be small. Can't rule out anything!

 

[thinair]

I am new to websleuths and this is a huge stretch, but could Jane Doe be Emma Lorene Vaughn? It is theorized she was kidnapped from Orlando, FL, and was known to be a habitual nail-biter. Hoping this will at least bump her case.