Police in Oregon say that they have recovered the partial remains of “Oak Grove Jane Doe,” evidence that had once been in police hands, in the state’s oldest unidentified-person case, after she was killed nearly 80 years ago.
The remains of the unidentified woman were exhumed at Mountain View Cemetery in Oregon City, Oregon, nearly 80 years after the partial remains of a woman were discovered on April 12, 1946, in a burlap sack in the Willamette River south of Portland in Clackamas County, according to the Oregon State Police.
Additional remains were found at several other locations in July and October of that same year near Willamette Falls, the McLoughlin Bridge and again near the original site, police said. Clothing believed to belong to the victim was also recovered from the Clackamas River.
“An examination revealed the victim was a middle-aged white woman, likely between 30 and 50 years old, and petite in stature. The cause of death was blunt-force trauma to the head,” Oregon State Police said. “Following her death, the body was dismembered. The remains were placed in several burlap sacks before being discarded in the river.”
Police said that the case drew national attention at the time but that the identity of the victim was never confirmed.
“In the 1950s, critical evidence, including the victim’s remains, went missing from law enforcement custody, with no documentation of their disposition,” police said. “This halted further progress in the case.”
In 2008, the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office reviewed the case in again but investigators made little progress due to the limited physical evidence that remained.
However, the Oregon State Police Medical Examiner’s Office Human Identification Program learned the unidentified remains were likely interred at Mountain View Cemetery in Oregon City during a subsequent investigation.
“Although the recovered remains are degraded, they will undergo advanced forensic testing and analysis in the hope that modern science can accomplish what was not possible in the 1940s — identifying the woman known for generations only as ‘Oak Grove Jane Doe,’” police said.
“For decades, this case was presumed impossible to resolve, and now, after nearly 80 years, we are hopeful we can restore this victim’s name and return her identity to history,” said State Forensic Anthropologist Hailey Collord-Stalder.
Collord-Stalder also thanked Mountain View Cemetery staff, saying, “Cemetery staff have been instrumental in assisting with this process. They have moved quickly and professionally in support of this important effort. We appreciate their commitment to assisting us as we work to resolve this case.”
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