On September 19th, 1990, an inmate work crew picking up garbage alongside Interstate 40 in Hillsborough, North Carolina discovered the decomposed body of a young woman down an embankment just off the highway.
The victim, eventually dubbed Hillsborough Jane Doe or “Hope,” was white, aged between fourteen and twenty-five, standing around five-foot-four and weighing approximately one-hundred-eight pounds. She had light brown or strawberry blonde hair that was frosted with blond highlights, and was cut in a layered style that fell to her shoulders. She had three fillings in her teeth, and a three-inch appendectomy scar on her abdomen.
When found, Jane Doe was clad in a bright pink sweatshirt with three cartoon rabbits, two of them on bicycles and one on a unicycle, printed on the front. She also wore a white bra and clean white ankle socks, though her shoes were missing, indicating that perhaps her killer had taken them as a souvenir. Her jewelry included a handmade yellow metal ring on her left ring finger, and a similar bracelet made of thin, twisted metal on her left wrist.
After an autopsy, it was determined that Jane Doe had been murdered by strangulation, probably between four to six days prior to her remains being recovered.
Once the homicide was made public, a few witnesses came forward and stated that they had seen a girl matching the victim’s description walking near a Ramada Inn on Interstate 85, and that she may have been a hitchhiker. Another witness thought they had seen her at a truck stop in Alamance County.
There are few leads in the case of Hillsborough County Jane Doe. Authorities have theorized that she may have been a victim of a taxi driver who was arrested in Guilford County not long after the murder; this individual was a suspect in several other similar homicides in the area, but he committed suicide before he could be further investigated.
As of this writing, nearly fifty missing persons have been ruled out as the Hillsborough Jane Doe, but the case is still cold, and the victim has yet to have her identity restored.
Crime Immemorial 