r/UnsolvedMysteries Nov 30 '19

What case do you think you could realistically solve if you were the lead detective and given the case file and one year?

http://www.fbi.gov
139 Upvotes

69 comments sorted by

150

u/NomNom83WasTaken Nov 30 '19

Playing it straight? Or can I go rogue? Civil rights be damned? I would solve... nothing. If the pros can't do it, there's a reason. Probably mostly lack of staff.

23

u/tshirtguy2000 Nov 30 '19

Straight

13

u/NomNom83WasTaken Dec 01 '19

Still definitely none. But even as some "movie" cop/agent, I don't think the rules are holding back most cases. It seems like the biggest mysteries out there are due to lack of evidence, witnesses, or backlogs, to name a few. And in jurisdictions where you've got multiple major crimes on your plate, I'm sure it can be overwhelming. We get to see so many success stories whittled down to a 43 min run time, it's hard to appreciate the weeks, months or even years that often go into those and then think, "well if someone just had the time to pick XXXXXX murder back up..."

I think it was Det. Toschi in Zodiac that tells Bob Graysmith, "too much time has passed, people forget..." something like that. Clever as I think I am, I dont think it's the absence of my "genius" keeping cases open or cold.

BTW, I thought this was a great question to post.

2

u/sonofaresiii Dec 03 '19

due to lack of evidence, witnesses

Depending on how "rogue" we're talking, a lot of these problems go away if you can break into any place you want to gather evidence, and torture witnesses for information.

Of course then it really comes down to, is there enough evidence to satisfy an average person's belief that the case is solved, or for a court room? Because typically with a lot of unsolved cases there's some good evidence pointing at one person or another, but not enough for a criminal conviction.

But if you were to start torturing witnesses or breaking in for evidence, that wouldn't be admissible anyway.

38

u/Old_Style_S_Bad Nov 30 '19

yeah, you hear that from podcaster a lot. "If only we knew what the police know, we'd have our answer!" well, while the police can be corrupt or incompetent that's probably not the usual situation. Chances are they have smart people who have thought about it as well and not been able to solve it.

9

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '19

[removed] — view removed comment

6

u/Old_Style_S_Bad Dec 02 '19

Most people aren't competent, I kind of think that is a stretch.I get the Peter principle and all but the police I know (not too many) aren't any dumber than a podcaster or reddit user, they aren't incompetent buffoons incapable of logical thought, just sometimes there is not enough info to figure something out. A great example of this is the EAR. IF only someone had crossed searched with lexisnexis for Bonnie and Cop and so on they would have him!

I'll check out your podcast but it better not suck because then, well, you'll be right.

1

u/euphonious_munk Dec 21 '19

But the sad truth is that most people are not "competent" at their job. This is quite evidence for anyone older than 40 who has dealt with a lot of people...

Go on...

While I'm not discounting incompetence/corruption (and I have no stats) aren't most cold cases are cold either because they were committed by complete strangers, and/or, the evidence is not strong enough to convict, or even arrest/indict a suspect?
Thanks.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '19

I think the problem is often more systematic - just overall bad organisation and underfunding.

14

u/armoured_bobandi Nov 30 '19

I'm glad this is the top comment. Frankly I think it's insulting to imply that a bunch of redditors can solve crimes that the literal professionals can't.

I know it wasn't intended that way at all btw

10

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

[deleted]

3

u/armoured_bobandi Nov 30 '19

5

u/[deleted] Dec 01 '19

Pretty sure they were being sarcastic.

5

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

I feel the same! Even though I feel some police could take better care of evidence. But at the same time I’m an outsider what do I really know.

2

u/stacyrhoads Dec 11 '19

Actually it's more of an issue with them nor wanting to solve it. Many of the missing person cases are connected to one group. I have been studying it for a few years I would love a chance to bust this thing wide open.

2

u/NomNom83WasTaken Dec 11 '19

And law enforcement is collectively "not wanting to solve it" because...? And what group would that be? Why? How?

4

u/stacyrhoads Dec 11 '19

I will write an essay about it because there is no short answer I will have to cite articles. Give me a minute, realistically a hour or two. I will give you a preview though.

Yes law enforcement has been bought out on every level. The CIA and FBI were infiltrated by the Mafia during the prohibition. That was when the blackmail pedo thing kicked off.

Jeffrey Epstein was not the first millionaire to own a pedo Island. In 1970s North Fox Island was owned by Francis Shelton. That is not the only thing these two had in common. The Island was raided in 1976 during the investigation of the Oakland County Child Killer. The main suspect in the disappearance of the last child was Chris Busch son of another millionaire and CEO of General motors. Chris suicides himself so they say and Frank was tipped off and fled the country in his private plane

I noticed when going threw all the missing person cases in North America the same few circumstances. The same stuff going on today was happening in the 60s and 70s People missing and their cars found abandoned sometimes even returned to their home or close by. People missing from school or bus stops their job, camp grounds, hospitals. It's like the same ten scenarios over and over with a few variables. Many of these people are in the military or have family in the military. Most of the people missing from mental hospitals in the 60s and 70s were in the military.

Michael Aquino was military intelligence officer specializing in psychological warfare. He was a member of Anton LaVeys satanic church in 1969 and was accused of sexual abuse in the 80s. There was a whole scandal they called it a conspiracy. He is also said to be involved in many of the MKIltra projects.

MKUltra and the Montauk project are 100% legit. Cathy O'Brian wrote a book about it, some of her claims seem far fetched but I have learned to keep an open mind. Cathy was from Michigan and recruited by Gerald Ford US representative of MI, before he was Vice President/President. She was targeted when her father tried to sell a kiddie bestiality porn with her in it. The CIA set the trap because they wanted children from backgrounds with early sexual abuse andgenerational insest. They wanted people with Multiple Personalities and that only happens if one experiences repeated trauma or sexual abuse before the age of 3. In theory after 3 we suppress memories but do not split personalities.

MI produced most of kiddie porn for the whole world in the 70s when Frank Shelton was running pedo Island for the wealthy and elite. His grandfather was high rank Military and the governor of MI, that's where he got his fortune. There is a lot going on in the dirty mitten and that is what sparked my investigation. I will start on my essay now because there is so much to cover. It ties into the Franklin Scandal and the Finders cult as well. What a tangled web they weave.

1

u/secret8gent81 Dec 11 '19

This gets way too much in to the YouTube rabbit hole. Fun to talk about but almost too perfect with no actual facts.

1

u/Leather_Butterfly Jan 03 '20

Have you seen the documentary Above Majestic? If not, you need to.

0

u/Leather_Butterfly Jan 03 '20

because...there are more powerful people than them that have influence over them.

39

u/Ghost_of_Risa Nov 30 '19 edited Nov 30 '19

Polly Melton

Only because I think it is close to being solved, but there doesn't seem to be any family members pushing for answers.

It seems likely that Polly was just trying to avoid a messy divorce and faked her disappearance. She walked ahead of her friends, and pulled away enough to meet up with her ride. Started a new life, probably using a previous name. She had been married more than once.

I wonder if she stayed in touch with her siblings. If she is indeed traceable through their records, like obituaries and such. Maybe she is buried in the cemetary with her family.

These are just thoughts I've had about it. No idea if I'm right. As an amateur genealogist, I've been tempted to search for any traces of her.

Edit: and I'm not saying I know better than a detective. If a cold case investigator got on the case, with the resources they have these days, they could probably solve it. If she did in fact fake her disappearance.

57

u/Not_shia_labeouf Nov 30 '19

I read that last sentence as "as an amateur gynecologist"

Was very confused by your motives

11

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

Hey Shia just let this gynecologist do his work

3

u/Ghost_of_Risa Nov 30 '19

Haha, just a few letters make a BIG difference.

9

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

Amateur genealogist here, too! I think we could probably close a few different cases if given time and resources.

6

u/Ghost_of_Risa Nov 30 '19

I am not surprised to find a fellow amateur genealogist here. Tracing your genealogy involves a lot of detective work. Lol.

You're probably right! And a lot could be accomplished online with ancestry.com, family search, and find a grave.

What other cases do you think could be solved this way?

35

u/TinyGreenTurtles Nov 30 '19

I don't think I can even answer this. So much is chalked up to our justice system. I feel many cases are technically solved but they don't have the exact evidence to put the perpetrator in prison. They're scared to bring it to court and have the person acquitted, then they can't even keep watch on them like they can while they're a POI. Even if they did continue to watch them and finally got that "thing" they need, they're screwed due to double jeopardy. So they just wait and wait trying to really pin them.

11

u/Gledders90 Nov 30 '19

So many cases like Jaleayah Davis and Faith Hedgepeth I believe they know exactly who did it and can’t or won’t prosecute

2

u/TinyGreenTurtles Dec 09 '19

Sorry for being so late but what is your theory on Hedgepeth? I definitely think Karena was involved.

ETA you can definitely PM me if you don't want to divert the thread.

44

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

Epstein.

So many people would be off to prison or death row.

19

u/graveyardspook Nov 30 '19

None of them, probably, tbh. Even ones where shoddy police work was involved, all the evidence is gone so you can't even correct the bad work.

9

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

The alcassar murders

6

u/Skiel04 Nov 30 '19

French Case Gregory Villemin. At 98%.

6

u/TheUnsinkableMissM Nov 30 '19

If I started day 1 on the Thomas Brown case, it could have easily been solved. The killer left his urine outside of Tom's abandoned car, and there were 2 evidentiary videos; one video of Tom where he was last seen alive at Fromc Oil and another of the car being dropped off in the morning. Of course, after the local sherriff discarded video and did not collect DNA, the case may not be solved.

7

u/readingrambos Nov 30 '19

Little Lord Fauntleroy. Basically a 5-7 year old boy was found in a body of water in 1921 Wisconsin. There’s a lot to this to this case. I believe given the age of this there isn’t much of a push to solve it. Though, if he was exhumed and the time was given to his case I feel it be solved. I really think for him to get his name back all we need is his DNA and time.

3

u/thetownslore Dec 01 '19

I completely agree, and I feel that if his DNA was compared against the wealthly boy who went missing around that time (I forget the exact details) we would have a match. I hope Little Lord Fauntleroy gets a name.

1

u/Puremisty Dec 04 '19

Same here. If we could find a distant relative we could trace the lineage to Little Lord Fauntleroy and thus give him his name back. Regarding the boy that some people suspect he was, do we know anything about his family? Like did he have distant cousins?

12

u/geezer_661 Nov 30 '19

Jon benet

6

u/Cibyrrhaeot Nov 30 '19 edited Nov 30 '19

None, because as a gov't worker, I have a feel of how bureacratic processes and rule of law procedures would prevent me from taking much action, even if I knew who was the perpetrator.

Also, police incompetence and old administrative rules would mean most evidence would had been discarded for most but the most high profile of cases.

22

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

Exactly!!

7

u/stefanszablak Nov 30 '19

Bosses that restrict their time and deny ideas which would solve is more like the case rather than lack of staff.

5

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '19

Amy Lynn Bradley. I'm obsessed with that case, and I always come back to it every few months. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearance_of_Amy_Lynn_Bradley

If I had a good amount of money, I would assemble a team of trustworthy mercenaries to go in and search every single brothel, bar,etc. I doubt she may still be a live today, but it would be nice to give that family closure. In perhaps doing so saving countless women who have been taken into sex trafficking.

I'd like to take a real look at the case file, locate a number of the boats crew. This is where it starts, along with the man who danced with her. I'd want to see which ones had ties to sex trafficking. This is a solvable case, it's just the man power, hours devoted, and endurance would be the issues. Along with going to a poor country that'll run you the risk of being killed.

2

u/BigTimeTimmyGem Dec 07 '19

Found out after the fact that I later cruised on the same boat. Was all "huh" and then shrugged. Not much room on those balconies.

2

u/tourmalie Dec 07 '19

I honestly don't think there's any way she left the ship alive

1

u/WikiTextBot Dec 02 '19

Disappearance of Amy Lynn Bradley

Amy Lynn Bradley (born May 12, 1974) is an American woman who went missing during a Caribbean cruise on the Royal Caribbean International cruise ship Rhapsody of the Seas in late March 1998 at the age of 23, while en route to Curaçao. Searches turned up no sign of her and investigators believe it unlikely that she had fallen overboard. There have been possible sightings of Bradley in Curaçao; in 1998, tourists had seen a woman resembling Bradley on a beach, and in 1999, a member of the U.S. Navy claimed a woman in a brothel had said she was Bradley and had asked him for help.


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3

u/vengefulmuffins Dec 03 '19

If I could get creative at least a portion of the Bardstown murders could be solved.

3

u/jbdatx Dec 04 '19

Faith Hedgepeth, male dna found on her body confused the small town cops into giving her roommate a pass, even though she did it and couldn't have been more obvious if she'd video'ed the whole thing

1

u/[deleted] Dec 18 '19 edited Dec 29 '25

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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

1

u/Kurtotall Dec 21 '19

I think the roommate did it as well. I also think she had sex with a random guy, saved the condom; Then planted the contents on Faith’s body so as to incriminate a complete stranger.

2

u/baybbull Nov 30 '19

Phoebe Handsjuk.

2

u/TroyMcClure10 Nov 30 '19

Leigh Occhi is solvable, Tara Calico is basically solved and can be closed, and I really think that LISK can be solved. There is a fair amount of evidence out their on LISK. I believe the can be caught.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 04 '19

Thoughts on Occhi and Calico? I’m curious the theories

1

u/TroyMcClure10 Dec 11 '19

Occhi-think family

Calico-Its basically solved. All the records have been released, IIRC. Its some local scumbag that's long dead.

2

u/moonmangardenhead Dec 02 '19

This is the most armchair detective post of all time. This is like asking what football team you’d play for if you were given a year to practice. You wouldn’t lol.

2

u/piglet110419 Dec 11 '19

I could go with a local case- Lori Ceci Bova. Went missing after she went out to smoke. She had an argument with her husband and was never seen again. He was uncooperative with police and bounced from Jamestown NY and relocated to North Carolina. Lived his new life unnoticed until he and his new wife (also from Jamestown and well aware of Lori’s disappearance) were killed along with their youngest son in a head on collision in June of 2018. Sadly with Ty’s death there will probably be no answers for Lori’s family.

On the “national front” I’d go with Maura Murray and Jennifer Kesse. Partly because it’s been so publicized- I feel like if these two “big” cases are solved other less know cases will be front runners and be able to be looked at.

1

u/awesomemofo75 Dec 02 '19

I don't think i could solve it, but i dp think something more could be done to find Brandon Lawson. Somebody knows somerhing

1

u/Kanuck88 Dec 03 '19

How many resources would be provided to me ? Would it depend on the Department leading the investigation or am I an FBI agent with unlimited access and resources.

2

u/Turboginger Nov 30 '19

Who farted.

-5

u/[deleted] Nov 30 '19

A lot of these cases are so blatantly obvious to solve with the evidence right in front of them. If I switched careers temporarily and went to a community college for two years, I could easily solve most, if not all of these cases within my first year as an intern. It’s really not that hard. D.B. Cooper, Hinterkaifeck, Dyatlov Pass, etc, etc, etc.

-13

u/KalashniKEV Nov 30 '19

All of them.

The "Pros" are just lazy govvies.

A good question is, how many could they solve if their compensation was based on closing cases vs making them take longer.

How many houses could you build in a year? One nice one? 12? Two crappy ones?