TX TX - Michelle Garvey, 14, Houston, 1 July 1982

bflocket

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jul 29, 2011
Messages
1,278
Reaction score
1,033
Michelle Garvey has a thread in the UID section (Match! TX - Houston, WhtFem UP4601, 15-20, Red Hair & Freckles, Jul'82 - *Michelle Garvey*)

She was an unidentified murder victim for a long time. She had a long and twisted road to Identification.
DoeNetwork (mistakenly) announced that the victim was identified in 2006.
She was truly identified (as Michelle Garvey) in early-2014.

It's great that she finally has her name back and her family knows what happened to her.

But I have seen little (actually nothing) that alludes to who her killer was. They need to be brought to justice. Or at least named/shamed, posthumously if that is the case.




'Jane Doe' found murdered in Texas 31 years ago identified as missing New London, Connecticut teen Michelle Garvey (Masslive.com, 1/11/2014)
Connecticut State Police report that Michelle Garvey, who was reported missing on June 1, 1982, was identified as the victim of a Houston, Texas homicide that happened on July 1 of that year.


Body Of Connecticut Girl, Missing 31 Years Identified In Texas (CBS Connecticut, 1/10/2014)
Michelle Garvey was 14 when she was last seen on June 1, 1982, and authorities believe she had run away from her home in New London.

The girl’s remains were found on a field in Houston on July 1, 1982, but her identity remained a mystery until DNA from Garvey’s family recently confirmed the match, said Lt. J. Paul Vance, a spokesman for Connecticut State Police.


Missing, now found: Michelle Garvey (Crime Library, 1/13/2014)
Garvey’s murdered remains were found in an open field in Houston, Texas, exactly a month after she disappeared. She was found wearing a brown, long-sleeve button-down shirt and brown corduroy pants. She reportedly had red/auburn hair, a pierced ear, freckles, a scar on her right foot, and an inverted left nipple. Blood type was listed as O positive. She was listed as Harris County case number ML82-4029 and NamUs Case Number: UP # 4601. Eventually she was buried. The body remained unidentified for over 30 years.
 
It's interesting to wonder how she got such expensive cowboy clothes, and how she was able to travel to Texas so relatively quickly... did she run off with someone who had money and a car?
 
it's been months since she's been identified. did they ever find out who killed her? :(
 
sorry to bump this thread again, but there still seems to be no answers on who killed Michelle and no answers to any other questions either.

to start with, why did Michelle run away? Was she having problems at home with her family? was she being bullied in school? was she just really rebellious? or did she just not like her hometown at all and wanted to leave?

Also, what where the circumstances of her disappearance? did her parents walk into her bedroom one day and saw that she was gone? did it seem like she was planning on running away the whole entire time? or did she leave the house after an argument with her parents and never came back? OR did she even run away? and could she have been taken by someone who purposely took her far away from home and killed her?

I saw in one video that Michelle supposedly had a history of running way. Where did she run away to? did she come home by herself or did the police find her? and who did she run away with? Did she runaway with friends or by herself? did she run away with truck drivers? or did she have a relationship with someone her family didn't know of?

also, why did Michelle go to Texas? it never mentioned if she had family or friends there, but you also have to remember that just because her body was found in Texas, doesn't mean she was killed there.

and the embroidered rodeo shirt she was wearing is very suspicious. where did she get it from? Did she always have it? or did the person she ran away with get it for her?

Also, here's the link to her obituary, if anyone wants to see that: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/norwichbulletin/obituary.aspx?pid=169851773
It's actually really sad how much her family missed her :( One comment even mentions that her family kept a candle of hope burning for Michelle.

They obviously love and miss their daughter and they deserve to know the full story of what really happened to her. :(
 
I still think it's most likely that Michelle's murder had a sexual motive in that some guy tried to get her to have sex with him and when she balked, he killed her. The fact that she was strangled and not shot or stabbed also point to a man flying into an incandescent rage. Strangulation is a very personal way of killing someone. Also, just because she was in Texas does not mean she was headed there. California is a more likely end destination.
 
Strangulation is a very personal way of killing someone. Also, just because she was in Texas does not mean she was headed there. California is a more likely end destination.

Unless she knew someone in Texas, that would make sense. If she was just going south because she thought she might be homeless and didn't want to freeze sleeping outside in the winter then Florida would have been the closest option. I would think she must have stayed somewhere because I doubt it would take a young girl more than 3 or 4 days to hitchhike from CT to TX.
 
It's still haunting, seeing those posts from years ago on other sites by Michelle's family and friends searching for her, thinking she might be alive.
 
I still think it's most likely that Michelle's murder had a sexual motive in that some guy tried to get her to have sex with him and when she balked, he killed her. The fact that she was strangled and not shot or stabbed also point to a man flying into an incandescent rage. Strangulation is a very personal way of killing someone. Also, just because she was in Texas does not mean she was headed there. California is a more likely end destination.

never thought of it that way but that's also a definite possibility. i kinda figured that if the motivation for her murder was sexual, her clothing would've been torn or tampered with, but your theory is most likely correct. ans especially the theory of California supposedly being her end destination unless she never planned on going anywhere specifically and just figured that texas would work out as a good place since some person was willing to take her there.

It's still haunting, seeing those posts from years ago on other sites by Michelle's family and friends searching for her, thinking she might be alive.

just wondering, where did her family make these post? i tried searching for them online but i couldn't find them.
 
I can't help but wonder what she was doing for that entire month she was alive and away from home. As I said earlier, she should have been able to hitch there in 3-4 days and if she got really lucky with a series of people, one right after the other, going that direction then she could have possibly made it there in 24 hours. She must have been staying with someone either in Texas or somewhare along the way. There was no internet then but she could have met somene through personal ads in the backs of (romance?) magazines that are aimed towards adults. I assume her parents' records were checked to see if she made any long distance calls but if she was in contact with someone via mail then there would be no record although she would have had to make sure she was the one to collect the mail otherwise her parents would see a letter she might receive.
 
One post i saw was on a genealogy site in the Garvey surname section, asking if anyone might know where Michelle was and that =her brother was searching for her.
 
There was no internet then but she could have met somene through personal ads in the backs of (romance?) magazines that are aimed towards adults.

that's a definite possibility! I never thought of that at all. im not sure if her killing really had much of a 'sexual motive' though, but it definitely is possible. But if she really did meet someone through a personal ad in the back of a romance magazine, she could've been involved in a sexual relationship with someone in texas then (THIS IS ALL JUST A THEORY IM THINKING OF, NOT SAYING IT'S TRUE).

she probably could've easily fallen into it because she probably felt unhappy and alone. (I was the exact same way when I was 14). Some guy probably fooled her into thinking he loved her and told her to come to texas to live with him. She ran away and was living with him, then he realized how young she actually was and was afraid of getting in trouble for having a relationship with her, then he strangled her to death and killed her.

only a psychopath would resort to something like that, but anyone who does this to a young girl IS a psychopath.

I wonder what the killer was thinking when he saw her picture on the news when they found her body and when they where trying to find out who she was :( people are just really heartless.
 
I doubt it made the news widely outside Houston or Texas back in 1982 or Michelle's body would have been identified.
 
I doubt it made the news widely outside Houston or Texas back in 1982 or Michelle's body would have been identified.

well i was assuming her killer was still in Houston Texas when her body was found and when it was on the news, but I now doubt that he was :/
 
and after almost 34 years, it's starting to shrink as to whether he's still alive to be arrested. Just my fear.
 
I wonder if Michelle was a victim of a serial killer. I've been thinking there may have been someone that would murder runaway / transient females every year. Orange Socks (1979) and Walker County Jane Doe (1980) were both found a day shy of a year apart in the same state and died under similar circumstances, as they were both strangled and sexually assaulted.

Michelle was strangled and died in 1982 circa July 1st (WCJD was November 1st). There is a little bit of an inconsistency with Michelle's murder because she was found clothed and no sources state she had been sexually assaulted.

The fact that Ms. Garvey had an inverted nipple and a new article about WCJD states she had one as well is a similarity.
 
a serial killer is possible, but the lack of a sexual assault/rape is strange.
 
Also, even if it was a serial killer, as far as we know, Michelle was only strangled and not raped while Walker County Jane Doe was tortured as well as sexually assaulted and killed, probably by a killer with some experience in murder as he filled her cavities with her panties and pantyhose so her corpse wouldn't bleed when he was transporting her.
 
Getting to the possibility of a serial killer... there are two puzzling things - Michelle was not found nude, and as far as we know she had not been sexually penetrated or sexually assaulted. Of course, it's possible that she *was* sexually assaulted and the killer redressed her for the journey to where he dumped her dead body.
 

Members online

Online statistics

Members online
71
Guests online
843
Total visitors
914

Forum statistics

Threads
589,923
Messages
17,927,712
Members
228,002
Latest member
zipperoni
Back
Top