Evelyn Colon (Beth Doe): Solved 1976 Suitcase Case

On Monday, December 20, 1976, along the snow-covered banks of the Lehigh River beneath an Interstate 80 overpass in East Side Borough near White Haven, Pennsylvania, a teenage boy spotted three vinyl travel suitcases. Inside the cases—and scattered near the riverbank—were the dismembered remains of a heavily pregnant teenage girl and her near-term, nine-month-old female fetus. For over forty-four years, she was known throughout the Mid-Atlantic as "Beth Doe."

Crime Scene Forensics & Dismemberment Evidence

The victim had been shot in the neck, strangled, sexually assaulted, and systematically dismembered with a serrated bladed instrument. Her ears and nose had been severed postmortem, and her hands and feet were removed in an apparent attempt to prevent fingerprint matching. The dismembered parts were packed into three matching blue-and-green vinyl American Tourister suitcases and tossed from the I-80 bridge deck 300 feet above the river gorge.

Forensic anthropologists determined that the victim was approximately 14 to 18 years old, of Puerto Rican or Mediterranean ancestry, standing 5 feet 1 inch tall. Her unborn baby girl was fully developed and would have survived if delivered at term. An autopsy revealed that parts of her torso were wrapped in local newspapers, including a section of the New York Sunday News dated September 26, 1976.

Chronological Case Timeline