Going West: True Crime - Jeannette DePalma // 339

Starting point is 00:00:00 What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host Tee. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody, hope you're having a good day. I stumbled upon this case a while ago and I'm so surprised that nobody has recommended it in our email because the details are so odd. If you recommended it somewhere else, though, thank you very much. We only look at our email suggestions. So if you have a case that you want us to cover on the show, we have a massive list, but we're always accepting new ones. Just email us going west podcast at gmail.com. Yeah, this is one of those cases that it's it's coming up on Halloween season and it kind of has a little bit of reminiscence to the spooky season. So you guys will see but yeah

Starting point is 00:00:57 really excited to dive into this one today. So let's talk about it, huh? Let's do it! Alright guys, this is episode 339 of Going West. So let's get into it! ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ In August of 1972, a 16-year-old girl went missing in New Jersey. Although police initially insisted she had run away, her body was found six weeks later at the top of a cliff near an abandoned quarry. Due to the disturbing and controversial scene in which her body was discovered, her death was quickly ruled as suspicious and many began to suspect that she was actually a ritual sacrifice for demonic activity. This is the story of Jeanette de DiPama was born on August 3, 1956 in Jersey City, New Jersey.

Starting point is 00:02:57 She joined a large Italian family of five brothers, three sisters and parents Florence and Salvatore Depama. As a child, her family moved from Jersey City, which is across the Hudson River from Manhattan to Springfield, New Jersey, which is just about 30 minutes west of Jersey City, so they didn't go far. But her family fit right into the idyllic New York suburb and quickly became members of a local church. Jeanette's parents described her as a, quote, sweet, loving person, and remember her as forever devoted

Starting point is 00:03:30 to helping those in need in her community. In addition to attending services regularly with her family, Jeanette was an active member in the youth program at their Evangel Church in nearby Elizabeth, New Jersey. And after graduating from Jonathan Dayton High School, Jeanette planned to attend Trinity Bible Institute in North Dakota. She also volunteered at the community office at her church, called His Place, which helped

Starting point is 00:03:56 mentor troubled youth and tried to get them back on their feet, and Jeanette was one of those people to help. In the summer of 1972, Jeanette was heading into her junior year of high school, and in addition to school and her volunteer efforts, she worked a part-time job. On Monday, August 7, 1972, just four days after her 16th birthday, Jeanette headed out for the afternoon, promising her family that she would be back in a few hours. She was going over to a girlfriend's house in Berkeley Heights, so she left her house at about 1.30pm to catch a train to the neighboring small city of Sumit, which is actually

Starting point is 00:04:33 where she worked. Springfield is only about 15 minutes away from her friend's house in Berkeley Heights, but Jeanette couldn't drive yet, so obviously she had to take the train. So she planned on catching a train in Sum Summit, New Jersey, again the neighboring community, and riding the train a stopper to until she could walk to reach her friend in Berkeley Heights. And then after spending some time with her friend that afternoon, she would head back to Summit for her shift at work before going home for the day. Now, it's not clear whether or not she was planning on walking from her home to the train station

Starting point is 00:05:06 or if you know someone was going to take her there, but there's some speculation that she may have hitchhiked. But either way, she never made it to her friend's house. When the hours ticked by and Jeanette didn't call or come home, her parents grew really concerned. Jeanette was mature and responsible, and she took her commitments really seriously, like she wasn't one to miss a curfew or a deadline, and she certainly wouldn't disappear without warning. So by the next morning, which was Tuesday, August 8, 1972, her parents reported her missing.

Starting point is 00:05:42 Because Jeanette was just 16 years old, police obviously kind of downplayed her disappearance and attempted to kind of ease her parents with promises that she had simply run away and would likely be back soon. And it's kind of interesting how we see this on both ends. Like, typically I would say if somebody's under the age of 18, police take a very seriously and they really jump in because this person's a minor. Whereas if they're over 18,

Starting point is 00:06:05 police are usually like, oh, well, they can do whatever they want. They're an illegal adult. They're an adult, so they can do whatever. Exactly, but sometimes, I guess it depends on the department, the area, whatever,

Starting point is 00:06:15 but sometimes police will look at minors and come up with this random conclusion that they've run away. Or just say, you know, they're probably staying at a friend's house for a couple of days. Don't worry. She'll eventually call and she'll be back.

Starting point is 00:06:28 I mean, we see that all the time. But to be fair, so many people are reported missing. And most of those people are not met with foul play or anything nefarious. But still, with the police saying that they thought that she probably just ran away, her parents just still had this sinking feeling that that was not the case.

Starting point is 00:06:49 DeValtley religious and very sensible, Jeanette was unlike a lot of her peers. So when police posed this random, like I said, theory that she had run off with a boyfriend, her parents practically found the idea laughable. They were like, there's no way, you don't know Jeanette, she would not do that. Florence, who is her mom, said sadly

Starting point is 00:07:08 that she began to prepare herself for the worst case scenario and that she had come to terms with her daughter's death long before a body was even found. And as the weeks passed and there was still no Jeanette, her parents and siblings became more and more certain that their devastating theory would turn out to be true. Then almost six weeks after Jeanette's sudden disappearance, their fears came to fruition when her remains were found. On September 19, 1972, a dog came across the badly decomposed remains of a female near an apartment building

Starting point is 00:07:47 just three miles or 4.8 kilometers from the department's home. That day, a resident of the Baldest Roll apartment in Springfield, New Jersey noticed her dog return from a jaunt in the nearby woods with something that looked like an animal bone in its mouth. That's always the most eerie thing when we talk. It's always a dog. Yeah, when we talk about cases that involve like a dog finding remains. It's like they always pick up a bone and the owner is like,

Starting point is 00:08:16 oh, it's probably an animal bone and then sometimes it turns out to be human remains. Well, that's exactly what happened because she was thinking that, oh, this is probably just an animal bone we are in the woods after all, you know, so scary But then the owner just kind of started to inspect the bone a little more closely Obviously, this is something random that's in their dog's mouth and she was Horrified to find that it was a human arm with remnants of this whitish pink nail polish still visible on the fingertips. Like, could you imagine what that would feel like? You think from a distance, it's a bone and it comes closer and it is a young woman's human

Starting point is 00:08:53 arm in your dog's mouth. Yeah, so not only, not only just a bone, but there was still like flesh and fingernails. Yeah, just horrifying. So of course, she called the police immediately and turned over what was eventually identified as the lower left portion of a human female arm. So police tracked the arm back to the wooded area where the dog had been playing, which was the who died quarry, which the apartments backed on to. Now, what was once a prime destination for rock and crystal, the quarry is now defunct, but because of its rugged terrain, it's presented as an ideal location to probably conceal a

Starting point is 00:09:34 body. Investigators descended upon the area, just scouring the grounds for any trace of the rest of the remains, and after an extensive six-hour search with bloodhounds, police stumbled upon an upper-arm bone before finding the rest of the body that the fragments belonged to. There, face down and still wearing her navy-blue top, tan pants and sandals, was the badly decomposed body of 16-year-old Jeanette de Palma. She was found along a rocky ridge in the quarry, mysteriously nicknamed the Devil's Teeth,

Starting point is 00:10:14 which sits about 440 yards from Shun Pike Road. One of the responding officers named Donald Schwert noted in the report, quote, "'Around the body were logs, across the head, down the right side, and a small branch under both feet." One of her arms was slung over a log, and the medical examiner noted that she had been surrounded by rocks and branches. Her remains were taken in for examination and through dental records were confirmed to belong to Jeanette. So let's talk about this scene real fast. The fact that there are these branches and logs

Starting point is 00:10:56 and rocks surrounding her body, some of it's on top of her body, now is this an attempt for a killer to possibly cover up these remains, or was it something more nefarious? And we're gonna get into it, but a lot of people think that there's something more going on there. I mean, it is interesting. I don't really think that it was used to cover her body only because the logs were under her.

Starting point is 00:11:19 Like her arm was on top of the log. And then the rocks and the branches were scattered around her body, which just feels very Blair Witch, which is why people have the theories that they do, which, like you said, we're going to get into here soon. So sadly, because of the level of decomposition and also animal activity, it was very difficult to determine much else about the circumstances surrounding Jeanette's death. And because it caused a death couldn't be established, her death was considered merely suspicious instead of being labeled a homicide.

Starting point is 00:11:52 But it was noted in her autopsy that there was no bullet holes or stab wounds in her clothing, so we can kind of rule that out. Now in the original assessment from Donald, again the responding officer, he included that she had overdosed on drugs, although the medical examiner found no evidence of this whatsoever. But regardless, Donald maintained that someone else had been there that day, or left her body there, because that particular area of the quarry was so difficult to access. Now Donald reported quote, somebody had to be with her because she had flip flops

Starting point is 00:12:29 and I had hiking boots on and I had trouble getting up that little hill, up to where she was lying because with flip flops, she would have had a hell of a time getting up that hill. Which just makes it hard to picture the scene anyway though because if he's saying somebody had to be with her like is somebody carrying her with somebody holding her, because that you would imagine would have been very difficult to accomplish as well.

Starting point is 00:12:50 Or did somebody possibly force her up that hill in flip flops? I mean, who knows? There's a lot of possibilities. So scattered near her body were a few of her personal items, including her lipstick and compact, her keys, a comb, an inhaler, and clear vial with an unknown substance inside of it, which was apparently never tested. Which obviously makes you wonder what was in that vial, and possibly this is where police had come to the conclusion that maybe she had overdosed on something, but again, this

Starting point is 00:13:22 was never tested. Right, it was never tested, so we'll never know. But her purse, wallet, and the cross necklace that she had been wearing that day were never recovered. An examination of her skeleton didn't turn up bullets or gunshot wounds, nor evidence of broken bones, stab wounds, or strangulation. But in such an advanced state of decay, it was hard to determine what could have happened. They also couldn't figure out whether or not sexual assault had taken place

Starting point is 00:13:51 here. Police maintained that it was possible that Jeanette had overdosed with friends in the park and that she had been left there after they panicked, or that perhaps she had wandered off on her own after getting high and then died by accident. But then where's her purse? Where's her wallet? Where's her necklace? Right, why are these items missing? Other than the theory that she had possibly died by an overdose, they thought that it may be possible that she had taken her own life. Now at the time, there did not appear to be any drugs, alcohol, or poison in her system

Starting point is 00:14:24 when she died. However, a later examination of the Medical Examiner's report revealed that they may not have done as extensive of tests as they had promised. And according to the Medical Examiner's file, the only test requested on her remains was for alcohol, leaving out the possibility of the presence of barbituates and narcotics. Which is frustrating because if they are going out on this limb and saying, their first thought was that, oh, maybe she died from an overdose and you have nothing to back that up and you're not even testing for it.

Starting point is 00:14:56 Like, can you even say that? Then how can we find the facts? It's ridiculous. So just as her family denied the implication from police that she had run away, they told police that she never would have let herself get caught up in the recreational use of illegal drugs, especially not after the horror stories that she had seen and heard from her volunteer work with teen suffering from addiction. However, some rumors swirled around Springfield that Jeanette had experimented

Starting point is 00:15:26 with Pot, which came as this great shock to her family at the time. And when asked about this theory, her nephew Ray, who's the son of her sister Gwendolyn, later remarked quote, It was the 70s. A lot of people smoked Pot. It was normal, but no, it wasn't drugs. No way. Jeanette's parents also disputed claims that their daughter had anything to do with the local drug scene, with her dad's salvator stating, quote, She has always been a good girl, a straight girl, she was never on any kind of drugs. Which, you know, to be fair, parents don't always know what their kids are doing, and

Starting point is 00:16:04 especially since her parents were so religious, maybe they didn't want to believe that she may be doing things that they didn't approve of. I mean, that's definitely a possibility, like no parent really wants to think about the fact that their kid could be doing drugs. But I think either way, it's clear at this point that what happened to her didn't have anything to do with drugs as you guys are going to see. Exactly, yeah, that just doesn't seem like a viable theory here. So when combing her clothing, there appeared to be no foreign hairs, making the scene

Starting point is 00:16:31 very difficult to forensically process. However, there were stains found in Jeanette's underwear, shirt, bra and pants, but sadly, the samples were not large enough to test for either blood or semen. So her case remained open, but rife with unanswered questions and not even labeled a homicide. The most plausible theory at this point seemed to be that instead of walking to the train station that day to get herself to summit New Jersey from Springfield, she had hitchhiked hoping to be dropped off at the station.

Starting point is 00:17:08 But instead, someone had taken advantage of her willingness to get into the car with them and taken Jeanette's life likely on the same day she disappeared. And this also made sense as to why she hadn't made it far from her home that day. Because like I said earlier, she was only found about three miles from her house. But the media, the community, and of course, the rumor mill had different ideas about why Jeanette DePamma had likely been murdered. About two weeks after the discovery of her body, Local papers begin running a story that would shape the investigation into Jeanette's death for the next 50 years and counting.

Starting point is 00:17:51 According to some accounts of the crime scene, potentially the medical examiners, and a few of the responding officers, there was evidence of the involvement of a satanic cult, a ritual sacrifice, or a cavan of witches. At Public Mobile, we do things differently. From our subscription phone plans to throwing a big sale right now when no one else is. things differently. for anyone who could use some savings right now. Subscribe today at publicmobile.ca. Different is calling. So, Jeanette's case has now been forever linked to the mentions of the earliest notions of Satanic panic, which set in the 1980s.

Starting point is 00:19:09 But were these baseless? Was it possible that they really wore to blame for her death? Well, just over a week after her body was recovered, a newspaper reported that local authorities were investigating the possibility that Black witchcraft and Satan worship were involved in the death of Jeanette. This article even cited that surrounding her body, investigators recovered pieces of wood that were laid in crosses on the ground over her head, and wood pieces that framed her body like a coffin.

Starting point is 00:19:43 Because of the way that the rocks and sticks were arranged around Jeanette's body, the media apparently latched onto the theory that Jeanette's murder was sacrificial and that it may have been a warning, which just sent waves of shock and fear throughout the community. Especially since her discovery came shortly before Halloween. And actually, many local families wouldn't allow their children to trick or treat that year for fear of encountering more satanic activity.

Starting point is 00:20:10 Well, one of those families included a boy named Edward Salzano, who was just 10 years old at the time of Jeanette's murder, and he grew up to be one of the few people still advocating for Jeanette's case to be solved today. Jeanette was becoming a media sensation, but sadly, mostly for the purpose of fear mongering and selling newspapers. For example, one New York paper printed an article on Halloween that year detailing the discovery of her body entitled, quote, Beware, Goblinsins of human witches. Officer Donald Schwart, who came across her body during the initial sweep of the quarry,

Starting point is 00:20:49 didn't believe any of the media hype. He was basically like, this is all bullshit. It's all just propaganda. So when asked where he thought the rumors of Satanic ritual involvement originated, he remembered quote, one guy noticed some rock or little stones around her head and all that, and he made a remark that it looked like Satan's stuff. There was nothing to that. I don't know what happened.

Starting point is 00:21:12 There's a lot of theories out there, a lot of people speculating this and that, I don't buy it. But even with most of the people at the actual scene of the discovery of her body, a testing that she was surrounded simply by rocks and sticks place there by happenstance the possibility of connection to the occult was really engaging the public and genets parents even said that they entertain the possibility stating in an interview that their daughter quote could have been the victim of black witchcraft and satan is on

Starting point is 00:21:41 and remember this this family is highly religious. Yes. So seeing your 16-year-old daughter being the subject of a murder or the victim of a murder, it would be easy for their brains to go there, especially in 1972. Oh, 100%. Her dad, Salvatore also said, quote, I believe Satanist may have killed her. It's a possibility I can't rule out. Jeanette knew some of them from Springfield High School.

Starting point is 00:22:08 They're all around this area. So this claim was only reinforced in interviews with the department's pastor, Reverend James Tate, who confirmed the theory that one officer had suspected that the wooden pieces found around Jeanette were in fact crude wooden crosses fashioned from branches. Reverend Tate said quote, those signs could mean she was a human sacrifice. He also used that it was entirely possible that Jeanette had unwittingly become involved with a group of Satanists, but in order to help them

Starting point is 00:22:46 not to join them. He claimed that this was just the kind of person Jeanette was, and in an article entitled Priest Theory, Devil Disciples Killed Girl, Reventate stated, quote, �It�s just a personal theory, but knowing Jeanette it�s possible. She was extremely religious and a very devout parishioner. She may have been picked up by someone or by a group. She was so religious that she would often talk to friends and acquaintances about God. To lecture them about Jesus, the person these people detest, their fascination arose,

Starting point is 00:23:23 and they killed her. Her super religious attitude was scorned by this type of people. Witchcraft has become very popular recently because organized religion cannot hold its people. Young people especially have fallen away from the church. Jeanette may have been a symbol of Christ to these devil worshipers, and that's why they killed her. Such a bold statement. I honestly think it's a little silly to go out and claim these things that Jeanette, she was only taken advantage of because she was a child of Christ, and these people were

Starting point is 00:24:04 really wanted to get people away from the church, Christ and these people were really wanted to, you know, get people away from the church and all these people are falling away. It almost seems like that in itself, that quote was propaganda like, oh, like see what can happen if you fall away from the church. Like, you can get murdered. Well, that's why police were saying, no, this is not the truth. It didn't seem like this was the case and there's no real evidence to back it up.

Starting point is 00:24:27 It's not like, oh, we have this group of suspects who are known, Satanists, or who we know, hate the church, and this was an act of revenge. Like, there's no other evidence other than the sticks and branches, which obviously, I mean, I haven't seen a picture of it, so it's hard for us to speculate on the origins of these branches. If they were put together to form crosses or whatever, or if they just happen to be bundled

Starting point is 00:24:53 up in that way from animals running around, like we just don't know. I also think it's very interesting that the pastor would be making a public statement in the first place because it's not like he's not an investigator. He's not a part of the family like, but he's kind of acting as like a spokesperson for this case, which is very interesting to me. And I guess a little weird. Oh, yeah, but, but that's why this was so crazy that this theory was just running rampant and people were taking it so seriously.

Starting point is 00:25:26 Well, a little bit more on Reverend Tate, so he also reported that a witch was brought to the site of the body to see if they could trace her murder back to what they described as black magic, or a coven of local witches that Jeanette had fallen victim to, either as a sacrifice, or while she was possibly trying to help them as we mentioned earlier. But what's really interesting is that there actually were reports from early on in the investigation that a witch was aiding the police in their investigation. Though, like the discovery of the crosses around Jeanette's body, the source of these rumors

Starting point is 00:25:59 were just kind of baseless and unknown. But this really scared Jeanette's family, like Florence said that she even feared that the witch was trying to like summon Jeanette from the dead. And like much of the media friends he's surrounding her death, this may have been rooted in speculation,

Starting point is 00:26:17 but multiple people have discussed it on record. The police chief at the time even addressed it in the press, saying, quote, I heard that some people from the department even addressed it in the press, saying, quote, I heard that some people from the department supposedly brought a witch out there, but I know nothing about it. Exacerbating these claims were the rumors of ritualistic sacrifice and a nearby nature reserve called Wachung Reservation. Just two miles or 3.2 kilometers from the side of the discovery of Jeanette's body, it

Starting point is 00:26:46 was rumored that police had responded to reports of what they described as, quote, a number of sacrifices involving dead animals, including, quote, burning candles, a bowl of blood in feathers, and pigeons with their next snapped. Like much of Jeanette's story, this account has been widely disputed, but they're now linked online. Sadly, 51 years have now passed since Jeanette's disappearance, and we seem to be no closer to finding answers for her than we were before the rumors of a cult activity made their way into the headlines.

Starting point is 00:27:24 In fact, it may have distracted from catching the person actually responsible for her death. In 2015, writers Mark Moran and Jesse Pollock penned a book about this case entitled Death on the Devil's Teeth. Mark and Jesse considered themselves experts in the case since having written about it for the publication Weird New Jersey. And in their research, they consulted a history professor who is also an expert in witchcraft and superstition named Jason Coey. Jason remarked that he found no sign of symbolism that would denote anything sinister and believes that, as police retold their experience of finding the body that day, their memory played tricks on them and they started to exaggerate their version of the story. After nearly 10 years of conducting research on the case, continuing even after the book was

Starting point is 00:28:19 published, Jesse Pollock teamed up with Jeanette's nephew Ray and consulted the Union County Police Department, who were in charge of all documents related to her case, just hoping to view the crime scene photos for themselves and put the debate to rest once and for all. Finally, in 2021, they were able to obtain these photos, including some that police had previously reported were missing from Jeanette's file. As they expected, they viewed no overt indications that there was any sign of occult activity at the scene of Jeanette's body. There were no dead animals, no tree carvings, or arrows, and no altar. Any rock or branch formations found in her vicinity seemed purely coincidental.

Starting point is 00:29:07 Again, I mean, they were in the woods. And just by the way, so obviously, Heath and I had said a minute ago that we haven't seen the photos. And there are photos online, but I still feel like we haven't really seen the photos because the photos that are online have her body blocked out of them like they're blacked out scribbled But they're also photos that are in black and white and it's so hard to decipher anything that is around her because again She's in the woods there is Branches or there are branches and rocks and trees and everything around her anyway. It's also in

Starting point is 00:29:40 1972 so the quality of photos You know not that great exactly so we're gonna post the photos so you know, not that great. Exactly. So we're going to post the photos so you can see, but it still feels like we don't have a clear view of what the scene actually looked like. Now there are some sketches online as well, and there's a sketch in particular that was depicted by a newspaper based on rumors of what the scene looked like. And we had said earlier, it was like there was a coffin around her and the logs and the crosses. So we're gonna post that, but that is not what it looked like.

Starting point is 00:30:11 That is what the rumors said that it looked like. Yeah, and then the newspaper just took that and they said, oh, we'll just publish this because we don't give a fuck. Yeah, and this is what everybody's saying that it looked like. So they're trying to give a visual for something that apparently isn't real. And in the photos from what very little we can see,

Starting point is 00:30:31 that sketch is so off, right? Like nothing like that. Yeah, it doesn't look anything like that. But we will post them. So if you want to check them out, head on over to our Instagram at going West podcast, Twitter, at going West pod, or we're also on Facebook, or honestly, you can just Google them. So after viewing the photos himself, Jason Koi reported, quote,

Starting point is 00:30:52 everything in that sketch that was marked out as a cross in these crime scene photos just looks like a pile of underbrush that happened to be in a kind of pattern. I think it's a perfect example of how sometimes in someone's memory, if they're influenced by the idea that something could be occult, they remember things that way. One person who was at the scene reported, quote, I guess if you were looking for signs, they were there. All this noise drowned out a very plausible theory that Jeanette, picked up as a hitchhiker on the day of her disappearance, was actually slain by a serial killer.

Starting point is 00:31:31 Richard Coddingham was a prolific and sadistic serial killer in the area at the time and was known to have ties to New Jersey. After being born and raised in the Bronx, his family relocated to River Vale, New Jersey, which is about 30 miles or 48 kilometers north of Springfield. Again, that is where Jeanette and her family were from. His convicted murders began in the 1970s, but he claimed in his trial that he had been killing since he was a teen in the 1950s and 60s, and boasted that he had as many as 100 female victims.

Starting point is 00:32:08 He usually focused his attention on women in vulnerable positions, such as someone walking to her car late at night, a hitchhiker or sex workers whom he knew he could hire and trap. As far as police are aware, his first victim was Nancy Vogel in 1969, who was a married mother of two living in Little Fairy, New Jersey, which is where Richard Coddingham also resided. Now, Little Fairy is situated just 24 miles or 38 kilometers from where Jeanette lived. Richard approached her on an outing to play Bingo with her friends and she never returned. He was known to torture his victims, holding some of them for days

Starting point is 00:32:52 at a time before their deaths. While he engaged in horrible, depraved practices, including stealing the body parts of some of his victims as trophies, his usual MO was to abduct, rape, and strangle them. Some even escaped and lived to tell the tale, but it would take 13 years between the death of Nancy, his first documented victim, and his apprehension in 1980. He had a decades-long rap sheet by then, which included drunk driving, robbery, sawdemy, unlawful imprisonment, and sexual abuse, on top of his charges of kidnapping, rape, torture, and murder. Two weeks to the day after Jeanette's disappearance, Richard was arrested for shoplifting inside

Starting point is 00:33:41 a New Jersey department store. Two years after Jeanette vanished, two more teen girls disappeared while hitchhiking on the side of the road in Ridgefield, New Jersey. And that story goes, 16-year-old Lorraine Kelly and 17-year-old Mary Ann prior got into a vehicle with an unknown white male and were never seen again. Five days later, their bodies were discovered and tragically both had been raped and drowned in a hotel bathtub. Due to the amount of decay incurred by Jeanette's remains, it would have been impossible to

Starting point is 00:34:18 tell if she had shared the same fate, but Richard Cunningham seems like a likely candidate. Richard is now 76 years old and is serving multiple life sentences at a prison in Bridgeton, New Jersey. So far, he is confessed to the murders of 16 victims, but they are believed to be many more. Sadly, Jeanette's father, Salvatore, did die in 1980, and her mother Florence passed away in 2008. On the 50th anniversary of her disappearance, the pastor from the DiPamas beloved Evangel Church, Reverend Kevin Brennan, spoke of one of his final conversations with Florence, saying, quote, Florence came to me one day and shoved an envelope in my hands. It was all the newspaper clippings about her daughter's death. She asked me to keep the cause alive so that Jeanette de Palmas

Starting point is 00:35:09 killing would be solved. She said, I don't know how much longer I'm going to be on this earth. Don't let them forget about my daughter, Jeanette. Now three years later when Florence did die, Reverend Brennan kept his promise, publishing an open letter in the local paper, pleading with the community to come forward with any information. On August 7th, 2022, he also held a 50-year anniversary prayer vigil for Jeanette, inspiring the community and her loved ones not to lose hope, and that answers could still be coming. Since the death of her parents, Jinnat siblings and now her siblings' children

Starting point is 00:35:47 have taken over the role of advocating for justice for Jinnat. Jinnat's nephew, John Bansi, who was the son of Jinnat's sister, Darleen, took it upon himself to carry on after his parents and grandparents no longer could. John teamed up with Edward Salzano, the local boy who was kept home on Halloween after Jeanette's death, and had been haunted for decades by the mystery. John and Ed, along with actress Holly Zuel, founded Justice for Jeanette, and currently manage a website, Instagram and Facebook profiles, and have also started a change.org petition urging the police to reopen

Starting point is 00:36:25 Jnets case, and also test her clothing for DNA, which I don't know why they didn't do prior to this. Well we have the link in the description of this episode if you want to take literally 10 seconds and go sign it. Absolutely please go sign that petition, and in the description for their petition they write quote. The major reason her murder can't be investigated and solved is there's no determined cause of death, so her case is still ruled a suspicious death.

Starting point is 00:36:53 This horrible murder will never be solved until this first step is taken. Please help us get this administrative roadblock out of the way so we can bring the murderers to justice. Sadly, John has since passed away as well, but Ed and Holly have continued their crusade for justice. Ed even filed a lawsuit urging the Union County Prosecutors Office to test her clothing for DNA. But the lawsuit was sadly dismissed in September of 2019. According to

Starting point is 00:37:27 the judge, Ed Salzano has no legal relationship with Jeanette or her estate, and therefore, no right to influence the outcome of her story. Obviously frustrated, Ed said, quote, Jeanette has no voice now, no one to stick up for her. As far back as the occult involvement goes, it is now widely believed that this theory was born purely out of media speculation and sensationalism. Jeanette's nephew Ray later said, quote, I don't think that's true, not at all. Unfortunately for Jeanette, she's now forever linked to the rumors about her case instead of the truth.

Starting point is 00:38:07 But those who knew her still mourn her loss all these years later. She was memorialized in her high school yearbook with the passage, quote, "'Loveliest of lovely things are they, on earth that soonest pass away. The rose that lives its little hour is prized beyond the sculpted flower. Ray said, quote, I didn't know my aunt, but I feel sad for my family. I know what it did to them. My mom and her sisters, that was their little sister, and it affected them the most. No one has ever been arrested in connection to Jeanette dePamas death 51 years ago. If you have any information about the murder of Jeanette DiPamas, please call the Springfield

Starting point is 00:38:52 Police Department at 609-723-8300. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Friday we'll have an all new case for you guys to dive into. Yes, make sure that you share this story. It really helps when you guys do that. I notice I feel like we see a lot of shares and I don't really see any anymore. So if you guys do listen to the show,

Starting point is 00:39:29 especially if it's an unsolved case, please just share it on your Instagram story or wherever, on your Twitter, on your Facebook. It can really help these families and also just spread the stories even more. Again, especially the ones that need it, which is why we do cover so many unsolved cases because they desperately need our attention.

Starting point is 00:39:48 So thank you guys so much in advance. Yeah, and also the more pressure that's put on police departments to reopen cases and investigate further the better because a lot of the time, that's really the only thing that it takes is just a little bit of public attention and a little bit of push.

Starting point is 00:40:04 Exactly. Somebody knows something. So thank you guys so much for tuning in today. I'm pretty much all we have for you, but we'll see you again on Friday. Alright guys, so for everybody out there in the world, don't be a stranger. 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5%

Starting point is 00:40:32 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% You you

Going West: True Crime - Jeannette DePalma // 339

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