The toddler peddled a small trike across the couple's driveway and out of view of the camera as Mesaa . >> reporter: what you have in dan valdez's case is a search you do yourself. and she's alive. According to the Albuquerque Journal, Blea was no stranger to the parts of the city where sex work is known to take place. Call the 118th Street Task Force at 1-877-765-8273 or (505) 768-2450. flo has it, i want it, it's a whole thing, and she's right there. >> possibly the killer? >> no. ", "Accused serial rapist, West Mesa murder suspect sentenced to 36 years in rape case", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=West_Mesa_murders&oldid=1140315217, This page was last edited on 19 February 2023, at 14:32. and for them. and sure enough, they too were names on ida lopez's list of missing women. remember, 2004 is when almost all of the women found on the west mesa disappeared. >> university of north texas identified jamie barela through dna. "he later navigated northward, leaving progressive can't protect you from becoming your parents. Ross wasnt sure the bone was human, but knew it could be. Dirk Gibson has no faith that will change, because police lack the necessary incentive. By 2016, only one detective remained full-time on the case: Mark Marany. One of those suspects was Joseph Blea. It is unknown, however, if she traveled on her own or was trafficked there. Dateline Full Episodes. >> i don't believe so. >> i did. >> right. soon could be months. she said, "no, don't tell me that. Search the history of over 797 billion [ chuckles ] i'm done with this class. The graves held the remains of two teens and nine adults, one of whom, 22-year-old Gina Michelle Valdez, was four months pregnant when she died. just desert and sage brush with a dry stream bed running through it. >> reporter: they call it tough love. Afterwards, Wozniak dismembered Herrs body by removing his limbs and head. Detectives were left with the fact that serial killers move with ease, often vanishing long before their victims are ever found. there's a better choice. here, hello! and thoughts of rare moments together before she went missing. where did she come from? Or contact APD at 1-877-765-8273 or (505) 768-2450. read more >> what did doctors tell you? that was not the track michelle valdez was on.ra though dan continued to tape all the usual family functions. on July 20, 2019. thank you for being here with us. then august 2008 we have -- we had a really bad rainstorm. She released her statement through Young Women United, a nonprofit where she helps with programs geared toward assisting women in need. Police suspect that the bodies were all buried by the same person or persons, and may be the work of a serial killer, who has since come to be referred to as the West Mesa Bone Collector. >> reporter: it was in denver, another city on the circuit, that detective todd babcock hit paydirt. The West Mesa killings occurred from 2001 - 2005, and the serial killer responsible has never been caught. it was tough. >> i would tell them we're one day closer to finding your daughter. MESA, Ariz. - Thirteen days after the shooting death of a 24-year-old Mesa woman, the man suspected of killing her was arrested in Texas, said the Mesa Police Department in a news release on. it's a quote familiar to detectives everywhere. >> there's a dad who had a calendar. One of the suspects, Joseph Blea, was arrested on Albuquerques Central Avenue for exposing himself to a woman. it was my gateway to making contact with her and seeing her in person. Where to Watch Dateline Mystery Dateline Mystery is available for streaming on the NBC News website, both individual episodes and full seasons. >> when was the last time you saw her? along with practically every other member of the albuquerque police department and forensic experts from the fbi. Her skeletal remains were found at a construction site in the West Mesa area of Albuquerque in February, along with the bodies of many other victims. with uncontrolled moderate-to-severe eczema, or atopic dermatitis, you feel like you're itching all the time. When the police confronted the boy, they were told by the boy that Wozniak had asked him to withdraw the money for him. it's the city's annual balloon fiesta. Where were the males that make up their community? >> there's nothing to connect lorenzo montoya to those 11 bodies? now between the bulldozers and ida's prayers the department was moving heaven and earth to find out if there were more women from ida's list out there. Syllania Edwards, a 15-year-old runaway from Lawton, Oklahoma, was the only African American, and the only victim from out of state. had been booked. >> what about those last seven girls? Barela is the only victim who police say wasn't known to have been subjected to sex trafficking. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. so they'll move from albuquerque to phoenix to las vegas to los angeles and maybe not return on that circuit for several years. >> that's correct. Dateline - NBC.com Compelling mysteries, powerful documentaries, in-depth investigations. -what a sign, huh? but guess what? For example, the case of serial killer Ted Bundy, who killed 36 women in Washington state in the 1970s, received loads of media attention, and Bundy's name is well-known. [9] The following day the police released an additional photograph of another woman; this woman was subsequently identified by family members, who reported that she had died of natural causes several years earlier. they came up with their profile of who they thought we were looking for, including that profile was a white male. On february 2, 2009, a woman walking a dog found a human bone on the west mesa of albuquerque, new mexico. n.d then there was the service part, the helping people part of police work. New Mexico State University", "Fair prostitutes help West Mesa murders", "The Untold Truth Of The West Mesa Murders", "APD Talks 10-Year Investigation Into West Mesa Murders", "The West Mesa Murders And The Bone Collector Behind Them", "Updated: Seven years later, one detective remains on West Mesa killings", "AMW Fugitives West Mesa Bone Collector Case", "Women's photos may link to mesa murders", "West Mesa Serial Killer--$100,000 Reward", "Lawton girl was only teen in mass grave", "Albuquerque police release photos in West Mesa murders investigation (warning: content may be disturbing for some people)", "Police identify 2 women from photos, both alive", "Dateline To Air Story on West Mesa Deaths", "West Mesa Bone Collector Albuquerque NM", "Police Pursue Possible Leads In West Mesa Cases", "Albuquerque police release photos in West Mesa murders investigation", "Joplin man says he has been cleared of suspicion in serial murders", "Colorado killer quizzed in mesa murders", "Does APD have a suspect in the West Mesa Murders? ), First published on February 2, 2019 / 12:05 PM. >> no. a thigh bone had been found out on albuquerque's west mesa. The police are asking for the public's help to identify the women. Paige Birgfeld, 34, was a well-liked . >> reporter: of course all that changed once bones started. do you think you'll ever find them? >> did you know michelle was pregnant when she disappeared? >> she ran up ahead of me, and she was messing with something on the ground. -or maybe he didn't know. he wouldn't say what the plans were because the only, you know, close person i knew had cancer and died. the gruesome cult sacrifice of Mark Kilroy. >> reporter: the target of the search warrant was a local joplin, missouri photographer who had allegedly been in albuquerque to take pictures during the city's 2004 balloon fiesta. but that's not what she told the families when they called in, looking to hear something encouraging. she struggled to hold it all together. sure is. This material may be protected by copyright law (Title 17 U.S. Code). >> all the stars aligned. ", "Controversial Show Starring Accused Los Alamitos Killer to Air", "NBC Dateline | FULL EPISODE: Plot Twist", "Daniel Wozniak, Rachel Buffett: 'Dateline' NBC Follows Plot Twists Of Actor In Bizarre Costa Mesa, California Murder Case", "Dateline: Secrets Uncovered season 7 episode 10 ("Plot Twist")", "20/20: 'Mystery in Apartment 410' Watch Full Episode", "Daniel Wozniak case: Full story of California double murder investigated on '20/20", "Community actor kills veteran, student for money to bankroll honeymoon", "The Perfect Murder | Watch Full Episodes & More! it was when the company returned to the site to fix the runoff problem that they inadvertently brought some bones to the surface, where five months later those bones were discovered by christine ross and her dog ruca. >> reporter: it would become a close working relationship based on frequent phone calls and mutual admiration. >> i thought maybe she'd turn up a few days later, a few weeks, or we'd -- you know, she'd call us. actually, it was my grandfather raised me.ctdehiizedis s co enowas ait wde.lo he was about in his 80s. (NBC) "Dateline NBC" will air a two-hour special Friday on the latest in the investigation into the murders of the University of Idaho students Ethan . one woman determined to find them. >> when they found the second, third, and fourth sets i said to myself i have to realistically look at this, that michelle i'm sure probably is out there. >> reporter: soon there were five missing women with eerily similar profiles on ida's list. gave her 20 bucks. [9] Some of the women appear to be unconscious, and many share the same physical characteristics as the original 11 victims. Theres a sense of physical remoteness this place was very removed, said University of New Mexico professor Dirk Gibson, who has written two books on serial killers. >> somebody was trying to send a message at some point. help heal your skin from within. "It's really a sad and horrible anniversary," said Christine Barber, executive director of Street Safe New Mexico, a nonprofit that seeks to boost safety for women who live and work on Albuquerque streets. >> yeah, because based on our experience with crimes of this nature, homicide crimes, when you have multiple offenders, more than one of them, someone's going to talk. i wasn't done. >> reporter: and so in july 2005, after a few months of recuperation as a reserve officer, the department offered ida a 20-hour-a-week desk job working missing persons. you need to stop and smell the roses of savings. -i know. They think theyre just a bunch of hookers and drug addicts, he said. we don't know. >> reporter: that he once had a daughter named michelle who was the light of his life. According to the Albuquerque Journal, it all began when a woman out for a walk with her dog in a part of the city known as the West Mesa made a grisly discovery in February 2009. Being a registered nurse, she was able to tell Christine that the bone looked like a human femur, so Christine contacted the police. Awesome. had spots on her face. >> reporter: sticking up for victims comes naturally to ida lopez. >> for a long time the news would be full of stories about girls who were missing and everybody's looking for them. he has pics of you on his phone. >> and sometimes they make the i wrong turn or a mistake.ke >> reporter: shortly after her . yes, i pray that they're okay. >> yeah. >> i thought ida being a police officer was awfully small. ten. Although they have had several suspects, two of whom seemed to fit the description quite well, they have yet to find compelling evidence to close the case. 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. so, let's make this the summer of loving your gut. (vo) automatically sort your expenses and save over 40 hours a month. you're lying to me. Skip to main content Due to a planned power outage on Friday, 1/14, between 8am-1pm PST, some services may be impacted. >> the vice unit was watching a particular prostitute. Photos, information and videos from Dateline here. she said, michelle. >> when they told us that they had a young black girl, i thought, i didn't have a young black girl on my list. that's all we really wanted, just to flash her picture real quick. this bone belonged to someone who had died in the not too distant past. so it's a matter of time before they go back out. >> i needed to know where they were all the time. >> the company kind of left town and just kind of left the land the way it was. in albuquerque, where the old highway becomes central avenue, the city's decidedly down-scaled drug and prostitution trade flourishes. the first words out of this girl's mouth was that he was trying to kill her. it's fast itch relief. Where do those women congregate. Dateline NBC also promises to reveal new details about the death of Stephen Smith, whose 2015 death investigation was reopened two weeks after the murders of Paul and Maggie Murdaugh.Smith's . nexium 24hr stops acid before it starts for all-day, all-night protection. Who are the dominate males, and lesbians in their Tribe? so come ask, shop, discover at your xfinity store today. >> if those houses had been built, they would have been built right on top of that graveyard. geico could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. >> did you know who cinnamon was? Apparently he had made numerous comments about abducting prostitutes from the New Mexico state fair and taking them to his mother's property on the outskirts of ABQ. possibly two prior times. According to the Albuquerque Journal, it all began when a woman out for a walk with her dog in a part of the city known as the West Mesa made a grisly discovery in February 2009. -oh. >> you can't. Looking back what has changed for women on the streets?". The mysteries surrounding the West Mesa Murders, an unsolved case of 11 female bodies discovered in a desert graveyard near Albuquerque in 2009. who was responsible for turning the west mesa into an unmarked cemetery? i think because for the first time we had started to put faces on these women and we had explained to the citizens of albuquerque that there weren't just two women that were missing. i have no idea how she got here. protection. and then i'm thinking, okay, is it somebody that's nice at picking them up? some of it didn't. >> because this guy had complete, freedom or he thought nobody's going to come out here? One bears a. aleve pm. spots that weren't there before. >> reporter: a few days later lab work confirmed ida's hunch. ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) The notes are written on paper tags, tributes to the nine women, two teenage girls and unborn child found buried 10 years ago atop a New Mexico mesa. >> reporter: and for albuquerque's homicide detectives there was the most pressing question of all. we came upon it, and it appeared to be a bone. that the chin was specific for me. Wozniak lured Kibuishi to Herr's apartment, where he shot and killed her. Several suspects have been named, but none were arrested or charged. (danny) every day you're nearly fried to a crisp, professionally! However, in the proceeding decades, a man named Gary Ridgway killed almost 50 women, most of them sex workers, but the case of the "Green River Killer" received much less attention. [20], Lorenzo Montoya lived less than three miles from the burial site. (vo) you earned it, we're here to make sure you get it. Dateline: Secrets Uncovered Snapped Murdered by Morning An Unexpected Killer Snapped: Killer Couples Final Moments Living with a Serial Killer Buried in the Backyard Killer Relationship with. >> was it possible ida lopez's list was just the tip of the iceberg? it was a bit of frontier justice for montoya, who was about to literally get away with murder. and i remember telling him no. the hard part was that many of them had already been missing for more than a year before ida even had a chance to start looking. According to A&E, Jaramillo and a woman named Christine Barber founded an organization to protect sex workers in New Mexico after the discovery of the West Mesa victims in 2009. but her presence in the west mesa bone yard raised a troubling prospect. ida went by the book. >> if these women had been blond, white, and from the right part of town would you guys have sounded the alarm sooner? Eleanor Griego, one of the victims' mothers, had previously mentioned while commenting on the case: APD Detective Mark Manary, who continued working on the disappearances after Ida's retirement, also deserves a special mention. >> there used to be a motel here. >> yes. >> reporter: at 14 most kids rightfully think their best years are ahead of them. Another expresses hope that authorities will find the killer. cinnamon was a name on ida's list. it was a time when a sinister force seemed to be snatching women off the streets of new mexico's largest city. Neither woman was. she hunted the guilty. because, they suppose, all those earlier rumors about the women being abducted, killed, and dumped in the desert had to have started somewhere. Christine felt that the bone didn't look normal. short lady. i wouldn't say he's a suspect. >> your typical profile. don't wait. they can be. With Safe Streets New Mexico, Jaramillo and Barber aim to give women from this vulnerable sector the protection society fails to provide them. [17] In June 2018, more bones were found near the site of the burials, but these were later determined to be ancient and not related to the West Mesa murders. All of the women, except 15-year-old Jamie Barela, had one thing in common: They were all involved in drugs and sex work. looking for michelle. so she did what every good detective does. but at the time it was routine low priority policework. Ive been looking for a cast on yhis case. >> reporter: dan knew about the drugs and twice got her to agree to enter rehab.ug but michelle never showed up.nt increasingly there were run-ins with the law. The fact that all but one of the victims had links to sex work initially helped guide the police investigation for the serial killer they dubbed the West Mesa Bone Collector. But not even FBI profilers were able to find the killer. >> well, they were shocked. 14th birthday michelle valdez gave birth to a baby girl she named angelica. Although the murders stopped after that, police have unfortunately not been able to say without a doubt that Montoya was the serial killer known as the West Mesa Bone Collector. eventually, ida and the cold case detective were able to persuade the department to let them form an unofficial task force, where once a month they met with other agencies, including the fbi. They founded Safe Streets New Mexico in response to the threats sex workers face in the state and the lack of attention paid to violent crimes against them. [2] He was found guilty and sentenced to death in September 2016. >> reporter: this killer had seemingly left nothing behind but a pile of dry bones. The case has had special interest to the Joplin area since Albuquerque police, FBI, and Joplin police conducted searches on properties owned by Joplin businessman Ron Erwin in August. what if the west mesa grave digger was a prolific transient? >> okay. lending tree made lenders compete for my business and i ended up with a loan that saved me over $9000 and no more credit card debt. starts help healwith -hi!mplewithin. The West Mesa Murders City of Albuquerque The 11 victims whose remains were discovered at the West Mesa site in 2009. i just could feel all the strength in my body just kind of just drain all of a sudden. sunrise would bring news of his daughter michelle. >> i'm freeding. >> i took it upon myself to tape them, tape every event. >> where was i the night before? but occasionally she was able to do some pruning. i said no. >> he was going to let her stay with us. the position was there. >> no. did you know her? The crime episode will also show how the murder of another man named Ilan Nissim is connected to this case. Due to a planned power outage on Friday, 1/14, between 8am-1pm PST, some services may be impacted. Satellite imagery taken between 2003 and 2005 shows tire marks and patches of disturbed soils in the area where the remains were recovered. but you know what? but we don't know if it's him or not. Police were at a loss. >> you're finding this, and you're just going, i wonder if it's going to be the rest of the girls. >> on the way back from arizona to here she promised, i'm not going to hang out with the same people, i'm going to do things different and you're going to be proud of me again, and then she bails two hours after she's home. and i guess i just kind of wonder whether police and everybody else would have start of stepped up their game a little bit if that had been the case here. >> we had gotten a call from a family friend of ours that i grew up with, and you know, i pick up the phone and she's like, oh, my gosh, i'm sorry about your sister. he killed her, wrapped her body. you know, maybe we ought to run that list. >> investigators are looking for connections. ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. . and the newly organized families, which included everyone with a daughter on ida's list, began holding monthly vigils to keep public attention focused on finding all of the missing women. i was so tired of it. Edwards was from Oklahoma, but was known to have been in Texas and Colorado before ending up in Albuquerque. After learning about the West Mesa murders, read about the gruesome cult sacrifice of Mark Kilroy. In 2006 there were reportedly dirt trails leading from his trailer park to the site. click, call, or visit a store today. Starting tonight at 8 p.m., NBC will air a special two-hour "Dateline" episode dealing with the notorious West Mesa Murder Mystery. i love you, hon. and she wanted to be able to provide them with some answers. >> i would tell them every single day we're one day closer to finding your daughter. All Rights Reserved. If you have any information about the West Mesa murders, or about other missing women related to this case, Albuquerque Police have a dedicated hotline. Are there any other episodes or podcasts you'd recommend that discuss this further? >> you know, i just didn't know. Genres All but one had fallen into prostitution and struggled with drug abuse, according to police. her future seemed assured. Hosted by NBC News' Craig Melvin, each episode of Dateline: Secrets Uncovered incorporates the classic elements of drama and great . born to move. The Disturbing Story Of The West Mesa Murders And The Serial Killer Who Remains Uncaught. >> are truckers a particular problem? >> reporter: that felony assault charge against lorenzo montoya went nowhere because the victim later refused to testify. but is it true?

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