251 - The Disappearance of Judy Martins - Trace Evidence

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
The unseasonably chilly downpour that had flooded down in thick
sheets slowly transitioned into a thin mist. The dull orange
glow of the few lampposts scattered across campus hung heavy
in the drizzling condensation, their dusty radiance skipping along the
gathering puddles like the shivering flames of phantom candles, appearing

(00:31):
to almost phase in and out of the deepening darkness.
The spreading veil of night moved from building to building,
thick shadows sweeping across the glistening grass of the commons
as windows illuminated in the dim yellow light of death.
Lamps were snuffed out by tired hands seeking the comfort
and warmth of their beds and a new beginning. With

(00:53):
the sunrise just now hours away. Not everyone was preparing
to turn in, however, as raucous laughter and loud conversations
could still be heard echoing down the waxed and shimmering
corridors of several halls and dormitories. Headlights approaching from the
west split the darkness as an older model car came

(01:13):
to a squeaking stop just in front of the doors
of Prentice Hall, and all girls dormitory. The passenger door
swung open, and outstepped a young woman, her countenance wreathed
by the dangling strands of vibrant red ringlets cascading down
from the silly wig she'd thrown on earlier in the
night sharing a good laugh with her friends. In fact,

(01:35):
it was that wig and part which had brought her
to Prentice Hall at that late hour. Wanting to share
the humor and make the punchline go a little longer.
Drawing the belt of her trench coat tighter around her waist,
the twenty two year old co Edge strode quickly towards
the partially illuminated doors of the hall. Once inside, she
shook the rain out from the red wig and began

(01:58):
moving toward the dorm room of a friend. Each stepped
down the hall, accompanied by the squeaking squish spit out
by the soles of her brown leather boots. After hanging
out for a short period of time and sharing laughs
with a few people, Judy Martin's decided to try and
get a little more mileage out of her over exaggerated
comical appearance. She borrowed a pair of wildly oversized novelty

(02:22):
sunglasses tightened the belt of her trench coat and proceeded
back out into the cold. Judy headed east across the
street and entered Dunbar Hall, a boy's dormitory. There she
planned to visit at least one friend's room. Perhaps a
second stop was also on the schedule, but if so,
that destination has been lost to time, or maybe more accurately,

(02:45):
has been obscured by the growing suspicion and doubt of
what exactly occurred during these late night visits. She walked
out from Dunbar Hall and turned west, heading back toward
her own dorm room in Engelman Hall, less than one
one thousand feet away, and yet she would never arrive.
In fact, nearly five decades later, not a trace of

(03:07):
Judy has ever been found, not a footprint in the mud,
a purse tossed in the bushes, no trace of a
fiery red wig discarded anywhere. Local rumor, legend, and official
reports all coalesced in these last moments, as the night
threw even colder and the witching hour approached. For forty

(03:29):
seven years, it's been reported that Judy Martin's was last
seen walking into that darkness, never to return. But while
the mystery at the heart of this case is Judy's fate.
There are some who believe that even the story we've
been told all these years might by definition not be
entirely true. Did Judy Martin simply vanish into the thin

(03:52):
air from the campus of Kent State University in the
early morning hours of May twenty fourth, nineteen seventy eight.
Or is it possible that this story has a fatal
flaw which may suggest that whatever cruel fate befell the
co ed happened somewhere within Dunbar Hall itself perhaps the
most important question in the entire case, and yet as

(04:15):
obvious and overt as it appears, no one has ever
been able to actually answer it with any real certainty.
This is Trace Evidence, Episode two fifty one, The Disappearance
of Judy Martin's Welcome to Trace Evidence. I'm your host

(04:40):
Stephen Pacheco. Today we relaunched the Trace Evidence podcast with
the story of a missing college student who mysteriously vanished
from the campus of Kent State University in May of
nineteen seventy eight. This is episode two fifty one, The
Disappearance of Judy Martin. Judy Martins was born on Friday,

(05:09):
July fifteenth, nineteen fifty five, in Lorraine County, Ohio, to
parents Arthur and Dolores. Arthur worked maintenance at the city's
water treatment plant, while Dolores was employed as a nurse, who,
at the time of Judy's birth worked out a Fairview
General Hospital in nearby Cleveland. Judy was the Martins's first child,

(05:31):
though she would be followed over the next three years
by a sister, Nancy and a brother, Steve. The three
were raised in Avon Lake, a city located in the
northeastern corner of the county end along the southern shore
of Lake Erie. Approximately twenty six thousand residents populate the
city today, However, when Judy was growing up, there hadn't

(05:53):
yet been so much of a growth, with the census
of nineteen sixty showing a resident count just shy of
ten thousand. Arthur and Dolores were hard working, blue collar
couple who raised their three children to the best of
their abilities. Money wasn't always abundant, but the children never
went without what they needed, and they were a happy
and loving family. The Martinses lived in a quaint three bedroom,

(06:18):
one bathroom thirteen hundred square foot home located at three
three four four three York Street, a stone's throw from
the shore of Lake Erie and a short walk into
the town proper. Judy was described by both friends and
family as a caring, kind, intuitive, and fun loving young
woman who possessed an infectious laugh. Two key traits of

(06:42):
Judy's appearance always seemed to be mentioned when her name
is brought up, those being her thick mane of beautiful
dark brown slash black hair and her bright and inviting
hazel eyes. From a young age, Judy showed an interest
in helping and taking care of others, and this would
play a major role in her academic career. Friends have

(07:02):
often commented about how she was always someone they could
turn to for help or just an ear to listen,
which was something Judy did extremely well. Cheryl Vatruba met
Judy in elementary school and the two became fast friends,
forging a friendship that would last fifteen years until the
night Judy vanished. Cheryl described her as full of life

(07:24):
and laughter, later telling the Chronicle Telegram quote, She's just great.
I don't know anybody that doesn't like her. She was
always laughing and having a good time. Judy was intelligent, compassionate,
and driven. She felt a great pull within herself to
help others, to reach out to provide whatever support possible,

(07:46):
whether it was going out of her way to make
someone's day a little better or simply providing a shoulder
to cry on and a comforting word. She was always
there for those she loved, and that included not just
her family, but close friends and teaching. This appears to
be a key feature of not just her personality, but
also her goals and dreams, which would become entangled with

(08:08):
her innate designs on the world and an undeniably powerful
sense of altruism. In nineteen sixty nine, Judy began attending
Avon Lake High School, located along Avon Belden Road, just
two miles east of the family's York Street home. Judy
performed well academically and developed an expanded and exciting social life.

(08:31):
She was quite popular, not just with her female classmates,
with whom she made some close friends, but also with
the male population of the school. Many boys were suitors
for Judy's attention, drawn not just to her natural beauty
but also her charming personality and that vibrant warmth of
which she was so famous for elucidating through her actions

(08:52):
and words. She was genuine and sincere, and these traits
carried on strongly with her peers, who saw her as
someone direct, honest, and welcoming. Beyond her successful forays into
the social sphere, Judy was also very involved with school
groups and activities. According to her senior listing in the yearbook,

(09:14):
she was noted as having belonged to the school's a
cappella singing group, student council, multiple sports teams, and she
was a part of the student government where she filled
the position of class secretary. Between her schoolwork, sports, and
extracurricular activities, many friends and even some family members noted
how they just couldn't wrap their heads around how she

(09:36):
had the free time to do much of anything, and
yet Judy was skilled at balancing her tasks and responsibilities.
At the end of the day, if something really mattered
to her, she'd find a way to make it fit,
regardless of what kind of adjustments she'd need to make
to her schedule. She was in possession of an ability
that many high school students haven't yet learned, and even

(09:57):
a lot of adults don't excel at me included that
being time management. That skill would serve her exceedingly well.
Judy graduated from Avon Lake High School in the spring
of nineteen seventy three, just four months before she celebrated
her eighteenth birthday. It was an exciting time for the
growing woman who was eager and optimistic about her future,

(10:20):
ready to run out the door and tackle the world
in pursuit of her dreams. The first step in solidifying
that future was enrolling in college, and Judy at her
sits focused on the Athens campus of Ohio University, located
nearly three hundred miles south of the family home in
Avon Lake, Ohio. University was a new adventure for a

(10:41):
woman who loved traveling and seeing the world. Athens would
take her far from home, though she had some experience
with that kind of distance. In fact, during the summer
when she had turned sixteen, Judy had traveled to Arizona. There,
she had picked up a job and still managed to
commit her free time and to what she did best,

(11:01):
helping others. The teen volunteered at a Native American hospital,
and it was during this time that she really put
a lot of thought and consideration into a future in
medicine or perhaps something adjacent to it. Ultimately, she'd find
herself drawn towards psychology, with a desire to become a
counselor or maybe a therapist. Although there were no reports

(11:24):
of anything negative about Judy's time at Ohio University, she
would attend for only two years. In the spring of
nineteen seventy five, after completing her fourth semester at university,
Judy decided not to return and instead move back to
the family home on York Street. She would never return
to college in Athens, instead setting her sites on Kent

(11:47):
State University, and with her stellar academic record, she was
quickly accepted. The university is located in the city of Kent,
approximately sixty miles southeast of Avon Lake. Only as Kent
stayed a more prestigious university, but friends noted that Judy
was happy about being at a school a little closer

(12:07):
to home. The change had dramatically reduced the drive time
for her and for friends and family who might wish
to visit. She hadn't made many trips home, nor had
many visitors during her time in Athens, with the drive
taking nearly four hours, but at Kent State, the drive
was just over an hour long and made both travel

(12:28):
and staying in contact a lot easier regardless of distance.
Though Judy always maintained close contact with her family, with
her mother Dolores later saying quote, she shared her life
with us, the good things as well as the bad.
At Kent State, Judy enrolled with a major in art
with miners in both women's studies and psychology. According to

(12:51):
friends and family, she had decided to pursue a career
either as a counselor or a psychologist. She wasn't quite
sure exactly what path she wanted to take and thought
it was best to dip a toe into multiple pools
or rather than just diving into one head first. As
was always the case for Judy, she put her full
passion into both her classes and extracurricular activities. Though she

(13:15):
would become involved with the student government at Kent State,
her attention had turned more towards volunteer work, specifically when
it came to counseling and offering help to others. By
the spring of nineteen seventy eight, Judy was twenty two
years old, and in addition to a full load of classes,
she was a dedicated volunteer at the campus's Pregnancy Information Center,

(13:37):
where she worked as a paraprofessional counselor, offering advice and
assistants to students who were either pregnant and trying to
make the right decisions, or, in many cases, with students
who were actively looking for birth control advice and solutions.
According to multiple representatives at the school, Judy was well
liked and respected in this role, with several coworkers noting

(13:59):
her debtica cation, punctuality, and generous sincerity. As if that
wasn't enough to keep your average person busy. Beyond belief,
Judy seemed poised to fill every moment of free time
she had. She also served as a resident advisor for
the freshman seventeen and eighteen year old female students who
were then living in dorms at Engelman Hall. She would

(14:22):
provide assistance in a number of different areas, including, but
not limited to relationship problems, academic pressure, classes with roommates,
and even more serious issues such as illness, drug use
and abuse, and even alcoholism. Luckily for us, we're able
to have some insight into what drove Judy to work

(14:43):
as an RA as she was asked to do a
small write up about her role, which was then published
in a university brochure handed out to new students. In
that brochure, Judy wrote quote, if I can lessen stress
and help resolve conflicts yet trigger positive experiences in the dorm,
I feel I've accomplished something. I just hope that people

(15:06):
can understand that I do have limitations and that I
am a student too. While Judy seemed highly focused on
finishing up her degree and of course doing all she
could to help others on campus, she had no way
of knowing that sooner than later she would be the
one in need of help. Nearly five decades later, that

(15:26):
help has never been delivered, nor has any trace of
Judy Martin's ever been found. This brings us to the
month of May, just days before a three day weekend
which would mark Memorial Day nineteen seventy eight. While many
students had left campus early to get a jumpstart on
their extended weekend, Judy had responsibilities not just as ra

(15:48):
but at the pregnancy center. Few details are known about
Judy's final hours, but much of her day leading up
to her mysterious disappearance is well documented. We begin at
approximately noon on the afternoon of Tuesday, May twenty third,
Kevin Greer, a good friend of Judy's, will later report

(16:09):
that he ran into the twenty two year old during
lunch in the school cafeteria. Greer stated that Judy was
crying and appeared depressed and upset. Speaking with her, Judy
reportedly informed Greer that she and her boyfriend had just
broken up the previous day. Before we go any further,
it's important that we take a moment to discuss Judy's

(16:29):
relationship circumstances. As in multiple other podcasts I listened to
in preparation for this episode, no one seemed to quite
get their facts properly lined up. Shortly before or after
graduating high school in the spring of nineteen seventy three,
Judy had begun dating an Avon lakeman named John Young.

(16:49):
The couple stayed together for approximately five years and broke
up in December of nineteen seventy seven, reportedly New Year's Eve.
Different reasons have been offered up, but at the end
of the day, it sounds like the two had somewhat
grown apart over the years, and with Judy away at school,
they weren't seeing each other that much. Either. According to

(17:11):
friends and family, the end of the relationship was a
mutual decision which was handled amicably. In fact, Judy and
Young stayed friends and often spoke on the phone or
met up to grab lunch or dinner when she was
in town. Now, there's been a lot of beating around
the bush here, but reading between the lines suggests that
Judy and Young, even after they are split, would hook

(17:33):
up from time to time. No judgment here, but you
can tell when reading witness statements and interviews about the
subject that between her going missing and it being nineteen
seventy eight, no one wants to say anything that might
reflect negatively on Judy. But I don't think it's that
big of a deal. Frankly, it's not uncommon for two
people who shared so much time and intimacy together to

(17:54):
occasionally revisit those areas, especially when they continue to maintain
a closeness. In fact, Young would later tell investigators that
he visited Judy on campus earlier in the month of May,
approximately three weeks before her disappearance. In addition, Young states
that he spoke to Judy on the phone Tuesday morning,

(18:15):
hours before Greer sees her in the cafeteria. For his part,
Young tells police that Judy sounded happy on the phone
and appeared to be in good spirits. So between his
account and Greers there appear to be some contradictions, but
we'll get more into that later. The next guy Judy
ends up in a relationship with is another Kent State

(18:37):
student named James Kragik, who is two years her junior.
Not a lot, if anything at all, is really known
about their relationship or how long it lasted. However, the
couple reportedly broke up on Monday, May twenty second, and
at least according to Kevin Greer, she was upset enough
to be crying about it during lunch. However, I would

(18:58):
note that at least in all all of the sources
I use for this episode, I couldn't find anyone else
who mentioned cragic the relationship, the breakup, or who even
raised the possibility that Judy was upset the day leading
into her disappearance. This includes at least one close friend
with whom Judy spends a good portion of the evening

(19:19):
of the twenty third Robin Cherniavski, was Judy's boss at
Engelman Hall, with her official position being resident director. The
two quickly became friends and often hung out together. Robin
would be one of the last people to see Judy
the night of her disappearance. According to her, Judy and Robin,
along with several of their friends, made plans to head

(19:42):
off campus and grab dinner downtown in Kent. Ultimately, they
selected the Brown Derby, a chain restaurant which was born
out of the famous original Brown Derby in California. According
to Robin, the dinner went off without a hitch and
everyone had a good time. What point does she mention
Judy seeming upset, depressed, or anything out of the usual.

(20:05):
In fact, she described quite the opposite, later saying, quote,
She's a good student and was feeling good because all
of her work was done and she was supposed to
be going to New York for the weekend with two girlfriends.
After dinner, Judy and Robin returned to their respective rooms
in Engleman Hall. I should note, working as a resident adviser,

(20:28):
Judy had a room all to herself, no roommates. According
to Robin, they continued hanging out together that night and
ended up in Robin's room. While there, Judy commented that
since the semester was nearly over, they should do something
to mark the end of the term, Robin later explained, saying, quote,

(20:48):
when we came back from dinner, Judy wanted to get
pictures of all the staff, so she and I got
our cameras and took some pictures in my room. Several
pictures were taken when suddenly Judy noticed a bright red
wig hanging in Robin's closet. She picked it up and
the two laughed as Judy put the wig on and
then posed for a series of pictures, one of which

(21:11):
would ultimately end up being on Missing Persons flyers put
together by her family days later. Always one for a
good laugh and even more so for a fun prank,
Judy walked out of Robin's room and went down the
hall to another room. There, she met a friend and
borrowed an oversized, novelty pair of sunglasses, which completed her

(21:32):
silly look. After sharing a long laugh and taking more pictures,
Judy decided that she wanted to go to some of
the other buildings on campus to surprise and hang out
with other friends, and she couldn't wait for them to
get a look at her big sunglasses and fiery red wig.
She planned to go and visit friends in Prentice Hall,
an all girls dorm located approximately seven hundred feet southeast

(21:56):
from Engelman, where she lived. It was eleven thirty eight night,
and while it was late May, the weather was ugly
and unseasonably cold. Temperatures were in the high fifties and falling,
while a thick cloud of mist and rain descended upon
the campus. Though Judy had wrapped herself up in a raincoat,
her friends didn't want her to have to walk across

(22:17):
campus in the bad weather, so one of the other
women they'd had dinner with offered to drive her over
to Prentice Hall. Judy arrived at approximately eleven thirty seven pm,
leaned down into the car to thank the driver, and
then stepped into the building, shaking the rain from her
wig as she did so. Little has been reported about

(22:39):
what exactly Judy did at Prentice Hall that night, but
we do know that she didn't stick around for very long.
Around midnight, twenty five or so minutes after arriving, Judy
is reported to have exited from Prentice Hall, where she
then headed east, traveling three hundred feet across midway drive
to arrive at her final stop, Done Bar, Hall. Dunbar

(23:02):
was an all male dorm, and Judy knew a few
guys there that she wanted to show off her new
silly look to. Kevin Greer, the friend who had seen
her crying at lunch, lived in Dunbar, as did her
recent ex boyfriend James Krajeck. Then there were a few
names which haven't come up previously, those being Charles Nevills,

(23:22):
a guy with whom Judy is said to have been
hooking up with at the time, Bernie Caffrey, a friend
Judy knew well, and finally John Bocomi, whose relationship with
Judy has never been addressed. Now, while Judy knew a
handful of guys living in Dunbar, there's never been any
confirmed reporting of her visiting all of them. Greer and Crajeic,

(23:45):
for instance, are not directly mentioned as people she specifically
sought out that night, but given later comments from Greer,
it appears that he at least saw her in Dunbar
that night. When it comes to what we know about
her time in the hall, there are only a few
key details which have been revealed over the years, some
from people who were present, others from within the surviving

(24:08):
investigative files. It's somewhat difficult to sort through the timeline
as there are a lot of contradicting pieces of information,
but it appears that Judy entered Dunbar Hall and her
first stop off was at the room of a friend
named Bernie Caffrey. Caffrey, however, wasn't there at the time,
so after a quick conversation with Kaffy's roommate, Judy moved on.

(24:33):
She then proceeded onto the room of John Becomi, where
she hangs out for a short period of time with
both John and Charles Nevills. It's later reported that it's
during this visit in Becomy's room that Judy takes off
the wig in sunglasses, the joke having played out by then.
According to statements from both Becomy and Nevill's, at approximately midnight,

(24:55):
Judy and Nevills leave the room and head over to
Nevills's room. Sometime after Judy and Neville's go to his room,
we encounter an interesting conflict of information. Investigatory files show
Becomy telling law enforcement that sometime after midnight he decided
to take a drive over to the local seven to eleven.

(25:18):
In this statement, he claims that he stopped by Neville's
room and returned Judy's wig and sunglasses, which she had
left behind in his room. His statement includes claims that
he saw Judy in the room, she was doing well,
was in good spirits, and did not appear intoxicated, upset,
or even tired. The word fine is used to describe

(25:39):
her disposition. However, that story doesn't remain consistent in another discussion,
but Komy tells police that he could no longer correctly
recall how things had gone. He may have gone to
Neville's room to return Judy's items, but it's also possible
that she came back to his room to retrieve the
wig in sunglasses. For the most part, police do not

(26:02):
take the contradiction as necessarily an indication of guilt or
an attempt to conceal information. They chalk it up to
the fact that they were heading towards a three day weekend,
there was some partying going on, and Becomy's recollection may
not be perfect for the evening. Either way, whether he
went to Nevill's room or Judy stopped by his room,

(26:23):
it doesn't change a great deal because Becomy is not
the last person to see her alive. That night. Charles
Nevills later tells investigators that he and Judy were in
his room together alone from around midnight until approximately two
thirty am. According to Nevills's account, he walked Judy to

(26:44):
the door of his room and said good night before
she moved down the hall, disappearing as she descended the stairwell.
This is the last reported sighting of Judy Martin's. I
do not say last confirm sighting because frankly, it doesn't
appear as though police had any way to conclusively verify it.
But we'll get more into that later as well. From

(27:05):
the door of Dunbar Hall, Judy had an eleven hundred
foot slightly uphill walk back to the door of Engelman Hall.
According to people at the time and even Google Maps today,
that walk should have taken no more than ten minutes.
By two point thirty on the morning of Wednesday, May
twenty fourth, campus was for the most part fairly desolate,

(27:26):
between it being late at night, early in the morning
and a lot of students had left early to kick
off their three day weekend. While today we still have
no idea what became of Judy Martin's that night, no
one on campus had any idea anything had gone wrong,
or even that Judy was missing. In fact, the twenty
two year old wouldn't even get officially reported missing until Friday,

(27:49):
May twenty sixth, two full days after she's last seen.
This comes as a result of two key details which
lead to the delay. The fact that it was a
holiday weekend and many people were leaving campus, and Judy
having a room of her own with no roommate to
notice her absence. Unfortunately, this was a case in which

(28:10):
investigators were behind the eight ball almost from Jump Street.
On Wednesday morning, the sun rose at six oh four am,
ushering in another unseasonably cold day beneath the gray, cloudy sky.
The campus, emptier than usual, continued on with classes and
normal events, and no one took notice of Judy's absence.

(28:34):
It wouldn't be until the evening of Thursday, May twenty
fifth that anyone directly became aware that Judy did not
appear to be on campus. Described as a reliable and
punctual person, co workers and other students became concerned when
the twenty two year old missed her shift at the
Pregnancy Information Center later that same night. She also failed

(28:56):
to show up for evening duties at Engelman Hall, where
she was supposed to lock up the building for the night. However,
faculty members elected not to contact authorities at that time
because they were uncertain if Judy had left campus early
for the holiday weekend. Instead, they decided to wait and
see if Judy showed up on Friday. On this same Thursday,

(29:19):
while Judy's absence was being noticed on campus, it was
also being picked up on back in her hometown of
Avon Lake. Judy had apparently made plans with her family
to come home and borrow their car so she could
pack up her dorm as the end of term was approaching,
but when she didn't call home and didn't show up
for the vehicle, her parents got worried. According to Judy's

(29:42):
sister Nancy, their mother, Dolores, instinctually felt something was wrong,
and she made several calls to her daughter's room, but
they all went unanswered. By Friday morning, Dolores was calling
several times an hour, but no one ever picked up.
Like faculty members, Dolores also wondered if perhaps Judy had

(30:03):
made plans for the weekend she was unaware of, and
so she made dozens of calls to friends and family members, classmates,
and coworkers, but none of them had seen Judy since
Tuesday night. It was around midday on Friday, May twenty
sixth when faculty members decided to reach out to Judy's
family in search of the missing woman. They quickly learned

(30:26):
that the family hadn't heard from her and were also
in the process of trying to find her. According to Dolores,
she had last spoken to her daughter on the phone
the weekend before her disappearance. She explained that during the conversation,
Judy had come across as happy and focused, with no
indication of any issues. She would later state quote she

(30:48):
was in a very good frame of mind. She just
finished writing a paper for one of her classes. Socially,
she was meeting some very nice kids. Everything seemed to
be going all round. The school also reached out too,
and was able to make contact with Judy's friend and boss,
Robin Cherniavski, who had left town to attend a wedding

(31:09):
in Connecticut. She explained to staff that she hadn't seen
nor heard from Judy since late Tuesday night. Reportedly, Robin
explained that if Judy hadn't shown up to work and
no one could find her. Something had to be wrong
because this was completely out of her normal behavior. Asked
about Judy later, Robin told the Chronicle Telegram quote, She's

(31:32):
a very responsible person and an excellent resident advisor. She's
a very peaceful person who trusts people and makes friends easily.
She didn't think twice about walking around on campus alone
at night. Once this new information was ascertained, faculty members
quickly contacted the Kent State University Police Department and officially

(31:56):
filed a missing persons report. While staff at the Universe
were doing this, Dolores contacted the Avon Lake Police and
filed a missing person's report with them as well. While
the Avon Lake Police had little if anything to work
off of, they would await the actions of the Kent
State University Police as directed by Chief Robert Malone and

(32:18):
Deputy Chief John Peach. Now I should note this is
an actual, accredited police department which functions entirely on the
campus of Kent State, so we're not talking about rent
to cops or quick hire unlicensed campus security. According to
early press releases, their first action upon receiving the report

(32:39):
was to send a detective over to Engleman hall so
that he could be led into Judy's first floor dorm
room to investigate for any signs of foul play or
indications of where she could be. A thorough search of
the room was conducted, though it was ultimately determined that
there were no signs of a struggle or foul play inside.
In fact, there were no indications that Judy had ever

(33:02):
returned to her room the night of her disappearance. All
of her luggage and clothing was found neatly stored. Several
key items were left behind and they grabbed the attention
of friends and family. Judy's glasses were found inside the room,
and according to her family, she rarely went anywhere without
them unless she wasn't planning to be gone for long.

(33:24):
Her brother Steve would later comment, quote, no way Judy
would have left her glasses behind. Judy did wear contacts,
but found them uncomfortable and prolonged use caused painful headaches.
She also had a medical issue that required the glasses.
Dolores would later explain, saying, quote, she had to wear

(33:45):
eyeglasses a certain number of hours every day because she
had a flattened cornea, but she left her glasses in
her room. Somebody somewhere has to know something about where
she is. All of her makeup was also left behind,
which sent up a red flag for her sister, who
stated that Judy never went anywhere without her makeup. Perhaps

(34:10):
more notable than the items which had been left behind
were the items which were not found. The clothes Judy
had been wearing the night she vanished were not the room,
nor was the bright red wig her coat, or the
oversized Novelty sunglasses. This suggested to investigators that whatever had
happened to Judy, it had to have taken place sometime

(34:31):
between her alleged exit from Dunbar Hall and her planned
returned to Engleman. However, at this point investigators hadn't yet
constructed much in terms of a timeline, which was hampering
their search. The problem was with it being late on
a Friday afternoon prior to a holiday weekend, many of
the people they wanted to speak with had already left,

(34:53):
and they would have to wait days for them to
come back. Police did, however, speak with what people they
could find who knew Judy or had seen her the
night of her disappearance. Unfortunately, not a great deal of
information could be gleaned at that time. With little options
available to them, the Kent State Police contacted the City

(35:15):
of Kent Police department and informed them of the disappearance.
They also issued a statewide bulletin to all Ohio law
enforcement departments to be on the look for Judy Martin's passing,
along her full description, including what she was known to
be wearing. The report detailed Judy is standing five feet
four inches tall and weighing one hundred and twenty pounds,

(35:38):
with long black hair, hazel eyes, and a fair complexion.
Her clothing was described as a bright red wig blue
denim coulottes, a light colored trench coat, brown boots, and
a yellow and brown blouse. The photographs taken that last
night with Judy and her friends would later be included

(35:59):
as a part of Missing Persons flyers. Campus detective Tim
Brandon managed to get in touch with the friends Judy
was supposed to go out of town with that weekend,
but none of them had heard from her and the
trip had gone forward without her. At the time, they
had just assumed she'd changed her mind or made other
plans that she had failed to tell them about. However,

(36:22):
while campus police had started their investigation, they weren't exactly
pulling out all the stops. There was still some internal
debate about whether or not Judy had gone somewhere on
her own without notifying anyone, or if there was a
legitimate safety concern, but to that point they hadn't found
any evidence of a crime. On Sunday, May twenty eighth,

(36:45):
a second detective was assigned to the investigation. On Monday,
the twenty ninth, the investigation really kicked off in earnest
as students returned to campus and detectives were able to
make contact with everyone they had previously sought to interview.
Monday was also when investigators decided to finally go public,

(37:06):
contacting the media and issuing a missing person's bulletin Chief
Robert Malone later explained the delay, saying, quote, we wanted
to be sure she had not just gone somewhere for
the weekend. We didn't want to overreact, but when she
didn't show up by Monday, we did contact the news.
Local media ran with the story, and by the early

(37:28):
evening what few details were known of Judy's disappearance were
being broadcast on television and radio, with the first news
reports hitting the stands on Tuesday the thirtieth. That same day,
it was announced that two more investigators were being assigned
to the case, and that all detectives four in total,
would be working round the clock on that case only

(37:50):
until further notice. Back in Avon Lake Delores, Arthur, Nancy,
and Steve were doing everything they could to try and
raise awareness of the disappearance, while also reaching out to
everyone they could think of to try and track down Judy.
They called classmates and friends all around Ohio, as well
as close and distant relatives in Pennsylvania. Cheryl Vatruba, a

(38:14):
friend of Judy since grade school, learned about her disappearance
on Sunday and immediately went to the campus to try
and help. Cheryl had visited the campus many times and
was eager to get a look in Judy's room so
she could note if anything were out of place or missing,
but police sealed the room and wouldn't let anyone inside.

(38:35):
Cheryl later noted quote, the girls at the dorm told
me her makeup, money, and clothes are all in her room.
I thought, if maybe they would let me in her room,
I would be able to discover something. All I found
out was what the police known now basically where she
went before she disappeared. I'm pretty worried about her. According

(38:58):
to the campus police, they were unable to track down
anyone who had seen or heard anything out of the
ordinary the night of Judy's disappearance. By their report, between
midnight and three am, there were six campus police officers
and several residence hall security aids on patrol, some on foot,
some in marked vehicles. None of them reported seeing Judy

(39:21):
or anyone or anything which seemed out of place. No
unknown visitors or vehicles parked in spots where they shouldn't be.
Their statements appear to corroborate the story that campus was
quite empty by the time Judy went missing. Investigators received
a tip about a sighting of a woman who closely
resembled Judy on Saturday, June third. Nine days had passed

(39:43):
by then, and multiple searches of campus and wooded areas
close by hadn't turned up anything, so investigators were pretty excited.
It was the first potential lead they'd received since the
beginning of the search. Three members of a Kent area
f family identified Judy from a photograph and informed law

(40:03):
enforcement that she had been present on their property. Where
they had held a garage sale on Monday, May twenty ninth,
five days after Judy was last seen. The family reported
that the woman who they believed to be Judy seemed
to be in a good mood and was very polite
and chatty. She purchased fifteen items of clothing from the

(40:24):
garage sale and during conversation mentioned that she was planning
to hitchhike to Mexico, where she looked to pick up
work as a waitress. The family said that this woman
was president at the sale for approximately one hour, and
while campus police took the tip seriously, Chief Malone noted
they would be continuing searches while trying to figure out

(40:45):
if the garage sale patron was in fact Judy Martin's.
While the tip opened up a new avenue, friends and
family were quickly dismissive of it. Dolores Martin's explained, saying, quote,
it would be busy our behavior for her. It doesn't
fit her personality at all. She never went to a

(41:05):
garage sale. The only person she ever shared clothes with
was her sister Nancy, because they shared the same taste.
Delores went on to say that Judy was very fashioned, forward,
had good taste and shopped for all of her clothes
at fashionable shops in the mall, seeking out the latest
styles and trends. While it was not impossible to completely

(41:29):
rule out a yard sale sighting, no one in the
family thought there was any chance of it actually being Judy.
Their doubts would be confirmed days later when this same
woman walked into a photographer's office seeking out a new
passport photo. During this time, law enforcement were able to
make contact with her and confirm that while she bore

(41:50):
a striking resemblance to Judy, she was not the missing.
Twenty two year old. Dolores and her husband Arthur arrived
at ken State University on Thursday, May twenty fifth, but
didn't learn a great deal about what might have happened.
They spent much of their time meeting with campus police
and tracing Judy's last known movements. Unfortunately, they weren't able

(42:14):
to learn much more than police themselves had uncovered, which
to that point was almost nothing. However, this would be
the beginning of a somewhat difficult relationship between the family
and investigators. While Kent State Police said they were doing
everything within their power, the family felt that wasn't necessarily true.
In fact, they were firmly under the impression that campus

(42:36):
police were trying to play down the disappearance as a
whole to avoid the publicity. Eight years earlier, Kent State
was the subject of worldwide headlines when a clash between
the Ohio National Guard and student protesters had led to
four students being shot and killed, while nine others were wounded.

(42:57):
It was a dark stain not just on the campus,
but on American history as a whole. To this day,
Kent State is still linked to this horrible incident, and
the Martinses felt that the school and police were not
publicizing the case in the way they should, in an
attempt to avoid bringing more negative press and attention to
a school that was still in the early years of

(43:20):
repairing its reputation. Though Kent State Police denied this claim.
Over the years, there has been some suggestion that, at
a minimum, the public perception of another incident on campus
may have been considered when making decisions about what to
release publicly and when to do so, but the truth
of those conversations has been lost to time. On Monday,

(43:45):
June fourth, Kent State Police reported that they had increased
the amount of detectives working the case full time from
four to seven. In addition, they launched more searches of
the campus, covering every inch of ground, including wooded area
and places which rarely were used by students. A helicopter
was even sent over campus. Utilizing new infrared cameras, they

(44:09):
searched for any heat signatures or indications of freshly disturbed
earth or decomposition. The cameras captured many animal remains decomposing,
but nothing large enough to be human. Chief Malone noted
that the camera would pick up signs if a body
were out there somewhere, and while to that point they
had no indication that a murder had taken place, it

(44:31):
was generally considered good police procedure to be as thorough
as possible. When searches of campus hadn't turned up results,
investigators began expanding outwards. They started with the dorms, then
moved to campus as a whole. Following the helicopter search,
they turned their attention to specific sections of the city
of Kent, then the entire city itself, and finally they

(44:56):
were going out to wooded and desolate sections of Portage County.
But again they couldn't find anything. Multiple investigators at different
points in time expressed their frustration with being unable to
find any details, noting that it felt as if Judy
had been there one minute and then had completely disappeared
off the face of the earth. It was a difficult

(45:19):
truth to face, but Deputy Chief John Peach acknowledged that
they were running out of options, telling the Chronicle Telegram
quote today it is a very different matter. Remember, there
is no indication of any crime having been committed. Judy
was an adult, and adults may, if they wish, simply disappear.

(45:40):
We may think there was a crime, but without that proof,
what we have is simply a missing adult, and that
fact no crime rules out many possible investigative methods. Saturday,
June twenty fourth marked one full month since Judy had
last been seen, and police still had no indication of

(46:03):
what had happened nor where she might be. They still
didn't even have enough evidence to conclude that a crime
had actually been committed. Deputy Chief Peach described the investigation
as the most extensive in Kent state history. He relayed
that through the first month they had tracked down and
interviewed everyone living in both Dunbar and Angleman Halls. In addition,

(46:28):
they interviewed many students in neighboring dorms who were on
campus that night. Then they moved beyond the student population
and interviewed pete'a delivery people and any visitors who got
parking tickets near to where Judy had gone that night.
All of Judy's close friends and people she was known
to have seen in the hours leading up to her

(46:49):
disappearance were thoroughly questioned. Four people were given polygraph tests
but passed. One person who was quickly identified as a
person of interest was Judy's ex boyfriend, John Young. Young
had previously had a few run ins with the Avon
Lake police related to drinking and the use of firearms,

(47:10):
being charged in nineteen seventy seven for using a gun
while intoxicated and ultimately shooting himself in the leg during
the process. He was also later charged with firing a
rifle out the window of his home while drunk. Though
Dolores and Nancy were distrusting of Young and hadn't approved
of the relationship between he and Judy, neither could say

(47:34):
they thought he was a threat to the missing woman,
and it was noted that Judy had chosen to stay
in touch with him and to keep him as a friend.
For his part, Judy's brother commented that he didn't think
Young was involved at all and was never a threat
to Judy. Young passed his polygraph and voluntarily allowed police

(47:54):
to conduct searches of his home and vehicle. He was
focused on law enforcement noted due to his checkered past
and his former relationship with Judy, but no evidence was
ever found to link him to the disappearance, nor were
police ever able to place him in or around campus
that night. Young was very vocal about the need for

(48:16):
investigators to work harder to try and uncover what had
happened to Judy. Asked about the disappearance, Young had stated, quote,
She's not the kind of girl who would run away.
I'm very worried about her. This just isn't something Judy
would do. We were girlfriend and boyfriend for five years.
Recently we decided to start seeing others, but we're still

(48:39):
very friendly. She's an important person to me. I've talked
to the police and told them everything I know. If
anyone hears anything about her, I'd really like to know.
Judy's most recent ex James Kragik, was polygraphed as well.

(49:00):
Next police polygraph Charles Nevills, the last person to see
her alive. He also passed. It's his account of events
that night which established a timeline for the investigation, so
it is of great importance that police find his information
truthful and informative. Following their interviews and a voluntary submission

(49:21):
to the polygraph, Nevils is essentially ruled out by investigators.
There are two more polygraph examinations given, though records do
not clearly reflect who the subjects of those tests were,
and as always, I think it's important to note that
one's ability to pass or fail a polygraph has little
to do with whether or not someone was directly involved

(49:42):
in a crime. I consider the result of polygraphs about
as reliable as simply asking someone if they're telling the truth.
But I digress. Interestingly, police files show that at least
one person failed to polygraph in reference to this case,
but there's currently no way of knowing who that was,
as the name is redacted in the files. The more

(50:06):
time passed without answers, the greater the number of rumors became,
and along with them a large amount of speculation. One
rumor claimed that Judy was a big time partier and
that she may have gotten in over her head with
a cocaine dealer. However, her sister, ex boyfriend enclose friends
were rather dismissive, stating that while Judy had smoked marijuana previously,

(50:29):
she had quit when it caused her headaches and she
hadn't enjoyed it very much. The claim about cocaine seems
to originate from a friend who claims she heard it
secondhand from Judy's most recent ex James Kragik. However, police
never found any solid basis for the claims and could
not locate anyone who had ever seen or been aware

(50:50):
of Judy using cocaine. When it came to partying. In general,
friends described her as fun and jovial to be around,
but not the type to get sloppy drunk or be
indulging in heavy narcotics. Then there was the so called
undercover operation. Some months after Judy disappeared. An old friend

(51:11):
of the family put up a ten thousand dollars reward
for information, and as you might expect, that was a
lot of money back in nineteen seventy eight, and so
the tipsters came crawling out of the woodwork. A man
calling himself only Webb contacted the Chronicle Telegram and claimed
that he knew where Judy was and he would be

(51:31):
willing to lead a reporter to her for that reward.
According to Webb, Judy was newly working as a prostitute
and he knew a Cleveland area bar where she was
operating out of. He described her accurately and said that
a photo he'd seen of her in the local paper
made her a dead ringer. Webb claimed that the woman

(51:53):
believed to be Judy had been living on the streets
since not long after the disappearance, and while she'd initially
introduced herself as she had recently changed her name to Michelle,
which made him think that she was actively trying to
conceal her identity. The woman had blonde hair, which did
not match Judy, but Webb claimed it was clearly a
dye job, and you could see her dark roots growing in. Ultimately,

(52:17):
they needed someone who could easily identify Judy, not just
by sight but by mannerism and voice. That fell into
the lap of her brother, Steve, who accompanied the reporter
to the bar to meet Webb, at which time the
informant pointed out the woman in question. Steve approached and
struck up a conversation. The woman told him she was

(52:38):
twenty two years old and had been living on the
streets for around two years. She didn't know anything about
Avon Lake or Kent, nor did she know of any
former college girls living on the streets. Steve ruled the
woman out almost instantly, noting that there were many differences
between her and Judy, most notably her chin weight, voyie

(53:00):
and eyes. It was unfortunately a dead end, and for
his part, Webb apologized for any grief or pain he
might have caused a family, stating emphatically that he truly
thought he had located the missing woman. While the story
itself was rather wild from the beginning, there was a
certain air of truth to it, which had come out

(53:22):
of a statement from a Cleveland vice officer. That cop
had previously reached out to the Martin's family informing them
that he had encountered a prostitute in a seedy part
of Cleveland that he thought could possibly be Judy. When
her parents came to try and find the woman, they
never managed to track her down, so they thought maybe

(53:43):
this could have been the same person. It was sadly,
another dead end and another heartbreaking moment for the family,
who by that point in time were growing hesitant to
harbor any hope. One man living near to campus told
police that he knew who he described as a partier
and drug user. Police took a thorough look into the man,

(54:05):
but never did manage to confirm any of his statements,
let alone a connection to Judy, and for the most part,
while he was noted in the files, he was cautiously
filed under the crank category. The same could be said
of a man living then in Akron, fifteen miles away
from campus, who claimed to be a psychic. This so

(54:26):
called psychic told police that he'd had a vision of
Judy being buried in Towner's Woods, located just three miles
northeast of campus. When police arrived to interview the man,
they found him sitting on the sidewalk drinking beer. He
led them to the woods and then produced a homemade compass,
apparently some arrangement of sticks to be used like dowsing rods,

(54:50):
with which he would probe the woods to find hot
or cold spots in relation to the location of the body.
While this search didn't turn up anything, Shockingly. Police were
desperate enough that they returned to the woods later without
that guy and conducted their own more thorough search, but
they never found anything there. Even the Martinses themselves had

(55:12):
their own run ins with the so called psychic, who
made outrageous and heartbreaking claims. According to Dolores, the psychic
asked them to bring an article of Judy's clothing, and
she then proceeded to do a reading off of it.
The psychic told the family that Judy had been abducted
by three young men, and that after killing her, the

(55:33):
men had loaded her onto a plane. They then flew
north at a low altitude and dropped her body from
the plane, where it landed on a heavily wooded, uninhabited
island fifty or so miles northwest of Kent. Reportedly, the
psychic claimed that the island was shaped like the tail
of a turkey. Investigators, when told about this so called vision,

(55:57):
noted that there were a few islands that could fit
that description in Lake Erie, north of Sandusky. They promised
to conduct a thorough search in the area when the
weather cleared up, but ultimately nothing was found. The psychic
claimed that Judy would be found sometime around the month
of April, but that never happened, and so it all
gets filed away once again under the failures of those

(56:20):
super helpful crime solving psychics who never seem to get
anything right except for the amount of money they want
to charge you for information. Funny how that always works out.
In hopes of drumming up more information through tipsters, the
Kent State University Foundation pledged a reward of fifteen hundred dollars,
with the Kent Inter Hall Council adding another five hundred.

(56:43):
While two thousand dollars doesn't sound like much money to
elicit tips and information, adjusted for inflation, this would be
just shy of ten thousand dollars in today's month. Unfortunately,
this is kind of where the investigation came to a
screeching halt. More officers were removed from the case as
additional months passed, and by May of nineteen seventy nine,

(57:08):
one year after the disappearance, the case was only worked
when new information came in, and that was not very often.
According to Chief Robert Malone and Deputy Chief John Peach,
Judy's disappearance was the first and only missing persons report
they received at Kent State that wasn't resolved within hours.
Peach noted that they received on average two missing persons

(57:31):
reports a week, but they always tracked the student down,
which may have been in part why they had enacted
more quickly when they received the report on Judy. She
was and remains the one exception to their rule. Chief
Malone later explained, quote, to my knowledge, this is the
only case we have had at Kent State of a

(57:51):
missing person who could not be accounted for, and I
know it's the only one since nineteen seventy three when
I came here. We get a lot of missing person
reports here, but there always seems to be an explanation.
Over the course of the next few years, Judy's family
did all they could to try and find her. They

(58:11):
operated their own searches, produced flyers, knocked on doors, and
did interviews with the local press to keep the story alive.
Every day, Dolores and Arthur got up early in the
morning and drove the fifty miles to Kent, where they
would pick a new spot or area to focus in on.
When that didn't turn up anything, the search became more grim,

(58:33):
with Dolores later saying, quote, then after you search among
the living, you search among the dead. The couple began
going to the places where a body may have been
left or buried, junk yards, abandoned pieces of overgrown property, woods,
run down buildings in the bad part of town, anywhere

(58:54):
they could think of that police may not have had
the time or the ability to commit to full searches.
In some instances they would be down on their hands
and knees searching through debris, and in other times they
arrived with shovels to dig into the ground in search
of a body. While Dolores couldn't yet come around to
saying out loud that Judy was dead, she did acknowledge

(59:15):
she'd begun searching for a body. Arthur would later comment
about the horror of it all, saying, quote, can you
imagine the deep emotion you have when you were digging
in a compost pile or some newly turned dirt seeking
your daughter's body. When in person searches didn't yield results,

(59:35):
Dolores and Arthur turned their attention anywhere they could. They
called hospitals in coroner's offices around the country, and reached
out to police whenever an unidentified body was found that
might resemble Judy. Dolores was dogged in her searches and
she wasn't going to let anything get in her way.
She would later report, quote, I have found a Greek

(59:56):
Judy Martin's, a Puerto Rican Judy Martin's, a Jewish Judy Martin's,
but not the Judy Martins. Asked about the initial investigation,
Dolores wasn't exactly positive, but acknowledged that there was little
which could be done to correct early mistakes, and as
officers were removed from the case and the investigation grew cold,

(01:00:18):
there was little she could do but take it in stride.
She would later tell the chronicle, quote, some days are
very hard to get through. I would prefer to think
she's alive somewhere, but that's hard to believe now. She
was so family oriented that I know she would have
tried to at least call us life goes on. Yesterday's

(01:00:40):
news is Yesterday's news. Deputy Chief John Peach, for his part,
argued that they had done as thorough of an investigation
as they could, but stated they never could seem to
get anything solid to really work with. They were in
a bad position from the beginning, and they were essentially
on their own. Though they had reached out to the FBI,

(01:01:02):
they did not get involved because there was no evidence
that Judy was abducted and transported across state lines. When
the state police were asked to help with some searches,
they replied that they could only contribute to searches which
were focused on state property or state highways, otherwise it
was beyond their scope. Asked his thoughts about the investigation,

(01:01:23):
years later, Peach had replied, quote, it was the most
comprehensive investigation this department has been involved, and since I've
been here, thousands of man hours and thousands of dollars
were invested. We pursued it more than other police departments
might have. If there are no signs of foul play,

(01:01:44):
departments generally don't have the luxury of devoting a full
time search. The mother made a tremendous effort. We felt
bad for her. It's more than frustrating. Despite their efforts
and dedication, neither Arthur nor Dolores would uncover the truth
of what became of their beloved daughter, taking the pain

(01:02:05):
of loss and unsatisfied grief to the grave with them.
After a battle with cancer, Arthur sadly passed away on
Monday May twenty eighth, nineteen ninety, twelve years and four
days after Judy was last seen alive. He was just
fifty seven years old. Dolores continued to search and live

(01:02:27):
life to the best of her ability until her own
passing on Thursday, January ninth, two thousand and three, at
the age of seventy two. Their daughter Nancy would later
state her belief that all of the grief and pain
they suffered in the aftermath of Judy's disappearance was a
contributing factor to their early deaths, saying that she knew

(01:02:48):
their lives had been cut short by the nightmare from
which they had never been able to fully awaken, and
that tragically brings us to today. Following the loss of
their parents, the search for Judy was picked up by
her sister Nancy and brother Steve, but their efforts would
be cut down before they even had a chance to

(01:03:10):
really get running. In hopes of launching a new investigation
starting at the very beginning, the siblings reached out to
Kent State University requesting copies of the original files. They
were then informed that, in accordance with the university's record
retention policy. All of the files in the possession of
the Kent State University Police had been disposed of in

(01:03:33):
the year two thousand, twenty two years after Judy had
gone missing. With those original files went, for the most part,
any real hope of getting to the bottom of this disappearance. Interviews,
persons of interest, tips and leads were all destroyed, and
no one had even the decency to pick up the

(01:03:55):
phone and contact the family before it was done. Although
they hadn't had a lot of hope that their efforts
could uncover anything police had missed, learning that the files
were gone was, as Nancy later described it, probably the
most painful part. All files which continue to exist are
those which are kept by the Avon Lake Police Department,

(01:04:17):
but unfortunately they were not directly involved with the Kent
State side of the investigation, and so their information is
rather limited. Both siblings have submitted DNA samples to the
Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation for identification purposes. Their DNA
was also placed into a national database as well as

(01:04:38):
in NAMIS, where twenty four unidentified persons have so far
been excluded. In direct comparison to Judy, Many of the
searches focused in and around Ohio, Virginia, and several states
in the northeast. Nearly fifty years later, no trace or
sign of Judy Martin's has ever been found. They never

(01:05:00):
found so much as a scrap of clothing or a
strand of red synthetic wig. When last seen, Judy Martin's
was described as a white female with dark brown or
black hair below her shoulders and hazel eyes, standing five
feet four inches tall and weighing approximately one hundred and

(01:05:21):
twenty pounds, She was last known to be wearing a
brown and yellow plaid gauze blouse, faige trench coat, blue
denim coolots, brown boots, and a brown belt. She was
wearing a curly, bright red wig the night she disappeared
and had a large pair of novelty sunglasses. She also

(01:05:42):
carried a white imitation leather purse and wore a ring
on her right index finger. Judy wears contact lenses, has
pierced ears, and has a small scar on the left
side of her forehead. She was last confirmed seen exiting
Prentice Hall and heading towards Dunbar Hall sometime around midnight

(01:06:04):
on Wednesday May twenty fourth, nineteen seventy eight. The last
reported sightings of her came approximately at two thirty in
the morning, when she was set to leave Dunbar Hall
to make the ten minute walk back to her dorm
in Engelman Hall. Judy was a junior at Kent State
University in nineteen seventy eight and was twenty two years old.

(01:06:25):
If alive today, she would now be seventy. For nearly
fifty years, the mystery of Judy Martin's disappearance has haunted
the investigators who worked her case, the family who continue
to seek her out and to seek justice for her,
and the campus of Kent State, where she remains the

(01:06:46):
only unsolved missing person in the school's history. Her brother
and sister continued to seek out the truth of her fate,
to hopefully, one day bring her home and lay her
to rest beside her parents, who spent the rest of
their lives trying to find her out there, even if
it meant digging up the earth themselves. Surely there is

(01:07:09):
someone out there who holds the answers, someone who knows
the story, someone who could provide just a little piece
of information to grant comfort enclosure to a family that
has suffered so mightily. For Dolores Martin's it wasn't just
the loss of a daughter she had suffered, but a confidant,

(01:07:30):
someone she could rely on, someone she could turn to
in a moment of need. Asked about her daughter many
years later, she simply replied, quote, we had a great rapport.
That was beautiful. She was my friend as well as
my daughter. That's why I miss her so greatly. Even

(01:07:50):
if Judy is dead. I had her for twenty two
wonderful years. I got to share those happy and sometimes
sad things that come with raising a child. You can't
take that away from me.

Speaker 2 (01:08:03):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:08:14):
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(01:08:38):
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Speaker 2 (01:09:20):
If that doesn't show up on my report, then I
was unaware of it that night.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
That's a detail.

Speaker 2 (01:09:25):
I'm sorry that I cannot remember.

Speaker 3 (01:09:27):
Who are we to argue with, you know, Stag's attorneys
and all that stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:09:30):
So fokin of bad about that end of it.

Speaker 2 (01:09:33):
But he said that due to the circumstances, we were
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Speaker 1 (01:10:07):
I remember throwing vic body down the basement, but I.

Speaker 2 (01:10:10):
Do not remember throwing him in a hole, or covering
him over.

Speaker 1 (01:10:13):
Or anything like that. How can I have any feelings
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Once they weren't the ground, they weren't like Powel.

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Speaker 1 (01:10:37):
The disappearance of Judy Martin's is one of those cases
where all you've got is this really solid point by
point information leading up to her last moments, and then nothing.
We know where she was all throughout the twenty four
hours leading up to her disappearance, who she was with,
what she discussed, the mood she was in, and what
her plans were for the future. We can track her

(01:10:59):
to the Brown Derby, back to Engelman Hall, then driven
by a friend to Prentice Hall, and finally she walks
across the street and enters Dunbar Hall. As far as
I'm concerned, that's where the official timeline ends. I know
we have some witnesses who see her in Dunbar Hall,
and at least one witness who reports she was in
the process of leaving the building at two thirty am,

(01:11:22):
but I don't know how reliable any of that information
is to me. At least when someone disappears and there
is only one witness to the last moments they are
known to be alive, and well, it's somewhat debatable how
much certainty we should accept that information with. Now. Don't
get me wrong, I'm not leveling accusations against any particular person.

(01:11:43):
I just don't find uncorroborated information to be generally helpful
or reliable. Surely law enforcement did their due diligence, at
least I'd like to believe so, and asked enough questions
and did enough digging to find that information solid. But
the fact is we have no way of knowing that
the destruction of the original case files in possession of

(01:12:04):
the Kent State University Police didn't just eliminate potential leads
and evidence, it also put the kibosh on the reliability
of specific statements. How exactly are you supposed to believe
any statements without the witness interviews and reports which show
how they explain those things, what gaps they filled in,
and what evidence they supplied to support that information. In

(01:12:27):
a case where a woman seemingly vanished from the face
of the earth in the middle of the night, it
feels very convenient that she was on her way back
to her dorm when it happened by herself with no
one around. According to Charles Neville's statement, he last sees
Judy as she's walking down the stairs heading for the
ground floor of Dunbar Hall. How exactly were police able

(01:12:49):
to come to the conclusion that she ever actually made
it back outside. We have no idea because we don't
have the files. When you've got a case like this,
you're in this weird space where you have absolutely no theories,
or every possibility is a theory all its own. Was
Judy accosted by someone in Dunbar Hall and never got

(01:13:10):
back outside. Did she get outside and then run into
someone she knew and believe she could trust. Was she
the victim of a serial killer who just happened to
be trolling campus looking for a victim in the early
morning hours. Did an ex boyfriend, either on campus or
from her hometown play some role in her disappearance. Was
she somehow involved in drugs and either owed a dealer

(01:13:33):
enough money to make him want to do something to her,
or did it just connect her with dangerous people? All
of these have been presented as possible theories in this
case at one time or another. Frankly, we can't really
go down the list and rule in the likelihood or unlikelihood,
because who is to say what happens to be more

(01:13:54):
likely Under these already frustrating and difficult circumstances, We have
to rely on what we know for sure and what
information that can be proven is corroborated or was run
down by investigators. This is a case where different theories
have been considered, batted around, and then ultimately never fully
ruled in rout because there's no ability to do that.

(01:14:17):
It's all speculative at best, and if your speculation is
based on a flawed timeline or an inaccurate statement, then
all you're really doing is digging a deeper hole. So
in the sake of logic, we'll address a few different
possibilities here, because sadly, that's about all we can do.
While I prefer to remain positive and optimistic about a

(01:14:38):
case being solved eventually, I find myself somewhat in line
with Judy's family, who now believe this case will never
be solved unless someone comes forward or Judy's remains are found.
Let's begin with one of the more prominent theories in
this case, that Judy was the victim of a known
serial killer named William John Posey Junior z was described

(01:15:00):
by the FBI as a schizophrenic with a propensity for
violence against women. He was ultimately convicted for the kidnap
and murder of two women, one in Vermont, another in Illinois.
He was suspected of several other crimes, including one in
North Carolina, where he was later imprisoned. His link to
Judy comes about seemingly because of geography. In nineteen seventy eight,

(01:15:25):
Posey was thirty two years old and living in the
city of Kent, reported by investigators as being approximately ten
minutes away from the campus. This, combined with his crimes
against other women, skyrocketed his name towards the top of
the list of suspects in the first few years after
the disappearance. The problem was law enforcement was never able

(01:15:46):
to place Posey in or around Kent, let alone on
the campus on the day of Judy's disappearance. They did
manage to confirm that he was in Columbus, Ohio, approximately
one hundred and forty miles southwest of Kent State on
Thursday May eleventh, basically two weeks before the crime, but
that's as close as they could get. According to Deputy

(01:16:08):
Chief Peach, they were never able to place Posey in
or around Kent or the school for the entire month
of May. His first victim, twenty seven year old Iris Brown,
disappeared from Burlington, Vermont, in April of nineteen seventy six,
a little over two years before Judy went missing. His
second confirm victim was killed in January of nineteen eighty

(01:16:30):
in Centralia, Illinois, nearly five hundred miles southwest of the university.
Police were able to confirm that Posey lived in Kent
from June of nineteen seventy eight through September of nineteen
seventy nine, but he has never been conclusively linked to
any missing persons or murders during that period. Surely, as

(01:16:50):
possible he was in the area prior to June, but
nothing can be found to verify that, which makes it
hard to connect him to Judy at all. Was on
the FBI's most wanted list from the Vermont crime while
he was living in Kent, and so he used the
pseudonym John T. Scorpione. He worked many different jobs under

(01:17:12):
that name, including at an East Cleveland area motel. He
was arrested in Kent at one point after he was
found hiding in the bedroom closet of a woman who
told police she had no idea who he was nor
how he had gotten into her home. He was processed
by the police and released before they could be notified
of his wonted status. He obviously immediately fled from Kent

(01:17:36):
and seemingly headed west. Then, on Friday, January twenty fifth,
nineteen eighty, he abducted and murdered Alice Bishop, a crime
he would later confess to. While he was convicted of
kidnapping his first victim, Iris Brown, he did not confess
to her murder until more than thirty years later, when
his health began failing. So surely Posey becomes a probable

(01:18:00):
person of interest based on his alleged proximity to the
campus and his proclivity for targeting lone women. Makes sense,
and it would fit perfectly if not for the fact
that there's no evidence whatsoever to put him in Kent,
on campus, or anywhere near Judy. I'm not ruling it out, obviously,
you can't, and stranger things have surely happened, but it

(01:18:21):
feels like a reach to imagine that he just happened
to be on a nearly desolate campus at two point
thirty in the morning on a random Wednesday, looking for
a victim. Maybe that is the answer, and maybe that's
why nothing was found and he was able to move
on and off the campus without being spotted. But if
we're talking about solid evidence, I would argue this guy

(01:18:42):
has talked about in connection to Judy for no real
reason other than the fact that he was a known
killer who lived in the area at some point. It
is intriguing, but a lot more investigating would need to
be done before you could make any real links. The
next most talked about person of interest was John Young,

(01:19:03):
Judy's ex boyfriend of five years with whom she'd broken
up six months before she vanished. This is somewhat of
an interesting one, but not necessarily because of anything linking
him to the crime. At the time. Young had a
rather colorful history with law enforcement, and both of his
arrests involved firearms. He fired a rifle out the window

(01:19:24):
of his home at some point, and later, when highly
drunken in a local bar, he apparently discharged a handgun,
hitting himself in the knee. While both of these instances
show a wanton disregard for public safety, and perhaps an
inability to handle his alcohol. They are a far leap
from abduction and murder being her ex boyfriend, especially for

(01:19:46):
the length of time they were together. I think it's
only natural that he would fall under some scrutiny, especially
in a case where they don't know where to look.
At the same time, it looks like police really dug
into this guy sense. I suppose they didn't have much
to work with, and he was probably the lead with
the most meat on the bone. According to what we

(01:20:08):
do know and what was said by investigators at the time,
he was questioned multiple times, voluntarily took a polygraph which
he passed, and allowed the police to search both his
home and vehicle without the need of a warrant. Now
that's more cooperation than we've seen in other cases where
police had a hell of a lot more information to
make them suspicious of someone. From what we can tell,

(01:20:30):
police could never place Young at the school that night,
They never found any evidence to link him to the crime,
and he was dismissed as a person of interest rather quickly. Sadly,
he was later involved in a traumatic accident sometime after this,
and he suffered a head injury which destroyed much of
his memory, so anything he may have known, if in

(01:20:51):
any way involved, can no longer be ascertained, at least
not directly from him. Then there was the more recent
x James Craigek, who Judy allegedly broke up with the
day before her disappearance. To me, that sounds like much
more of a fresh wound than the six months earlier
breakup with Young, a man that Judy and her family

(01:21:13):
both acknowledged she had chosen to remain friends with until
the time of her disappearance. We know little, if anything
about Cragic, his relationship with Judy, or his movements on
the night in question. All we can really say for
sure is that, like Charles Nevills, he also lived in
Dunbar Hall. So while I've never seen anything to suggest

(01:21:34):
Cragic was involved in any way when it comes to
the ex boyfriends, he was the only one who was
actually on campus that night that we can prove, and
not just that, but lived in the building Judy was
last seen alive. And it's also worth noting that while
I don't consider polygraphs very reliable, Young and Nevill's passed

(01:21:55):
their tests. Two other people were tested and one of
them failed was cragic that person or was it someone else? Well,
we simply have no way of knowing. The name is
redacted in the surviving police files, and if anyone knows
who it is, they've never shared that information publicly. There
were a couple of other people in Dunbar who Judy

(01:22:18):
either knew or claimed to see her in the building
that night. There's a guy named John who lives in
Dunbar and who says that Judy stopped by to visit,
leaving behind her wig and sunglasses, but he gives two
different accounts. In one, he goes back to Charles Neville's
room to return the items to Judy, and in the other,
she comes to his room to get them. This discrepancy

(01:22:39):
certainly captures attention, but it's hard to know if it's
indicative of someone trying to conceal the truth or simply
a failure to accurately remember what happened. In addition to him,
there's Kevin Greer, the guy who says he saw Judy
in the cafeteria crying the afternoon before her disappearance. He
later says that he saw Judy in Dunbar that night,

(01:23:00):
and in his opinion, she was clearly upset about the breakup,
but was trying hard not to show it. What exactly
causes him to say that is difficult to know. There's
no further follow up, but I find it odd because
absolutely no one else who sees her that night thinks
anything is wrong. They all describe her as appearing happy,
joking around and having a good time. So, yeah, you

(01:23:24):
have to wonder about what exactly happened in Dunbar Hall
that night. Judy visits several people, but spends the bulk
of her time in Charles Nevills's room. Could there have
been some jealousy about this, or hurt feelings about her
moving on so quickly, or maybe moving on with the
wrong person. That's difficult to say without knowing more about
the relationship and feelings everyone was dealing with at the time.

(01:23:47):
For me, at least, I cannot in good faith just
accept at face value that Judy left Dunbar alive that night.
Neviles' is may have seen her moving down the stairs
after leaving his room, but that doesn't make it impossible
that someone else in the building grabbed her after that. Unfortunately,
we have no real way of knowing if anything this

(01:24:09):
case reminds me a lot of the disappearance of Lauren Spier,
another young woman who vanishes from a college campus after
hanging out with some friends without anyone seeing or hearing anything.
Outside of these theories, there's always the theory that this
was a completely random crime committed by someone who either
knew Judy, knew of Judy, or merely stumbled upon her

(01:24:31):
while looking for a victim. That's such a broad set
of circumstances that it's difficult to rule that out. Either
another student, maybe one with an interest or obsession, a
member of the faculty who developed inappropriate feelings, a campus
security guard or police officer who had the means and
opportunity to not only commit the crime but cover it

(01:24:52):
up as well. These are all legitimate possibilities that we
simply can't rule in or out, and that basicly puts
us back to square one. All we really know is
that Judy Martin's vanished, and there's never been even the
remote answer as to how or why or who was involved.
It's the search for a needle in a stack of needles,

(01:25:15):
and without the original files, even cold case investigators have
struggled to put much of anything together. This past May
marked forty seven years since Judy Martin's was last seen alive,
and for the most part, her case and the investigation
into it has been swept under the rug of time.
The files, once described as being thicker than an encyclopedia,

(01:25:38):
are gone, Many of the original investigators are no longer around,
and sadly, Judy's own parents have passed away, never learning
the truth and never being able to bring their daughter
back home. For nearly five decades, a family has been
denied the ability to properly grieve, to lay their daughter

(01:25:58):
and sister to rest, and to see justice done for
this horrible crime. Sadly, unless new evidence is found or
someone comes forward to confess and share what they know,
the disappearance of Judy Martin's will remain open, unsolved, and
very cold. If you're looking for more information about the

(01:26:30):
disappearance of Judy Martin's, there are many websites and forums
discussing her case. Local media performed exceptional journalism in this
case in the early years, and for this episode, the Chronicle, Telegram,
Plane Dealer, and the Akron Beacon Journal were the most helpful.
I'd also like to give a major shout out to

(01:26:50):
Dave O'Brien of The Chronicle Telegram for his fantastic work.
If you have any information about the disappearance of Judy
Martin's please contact the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation tip
line at one eight five five Bceiohio. That is one

(01:27:13):
eight five five two two four six four four six.
You can also submit tips on their website by visiting
Ohio Attorney General dot gov and hitting the contact option.
Judy's case number is seven eight dash four five six seven.

(01:27:35):
What do you believe happened? Tweet me at Traysevpod, email
me at trace Evidencepod at gmail dot com, or contact
me via social media on any platform by visiting follow
tepod dot com. Now it's time to give a massive

(01:27:57):
shout out to our amazing Patreon producers, without whom the
show would not be possible. So a very special thank
you to Ann m Bertram, Christine Greco, Crystal Jay Dierti,
Denise Dingsdale, Deanni Dyson, Jennifer Winkler, Justin Snyder, Karen Morland,

(01:28:21):
leslie B, Lisa Hopson, Nick Mohar, Shers, Roberta Jansen, Stacy Finnegan,
Tom Radford, and Whitney welp. You're all amazing people and
your support is truly appreciated. If you're interested in supporting
the show, visit Patreon dot com, slash trace Evidence, or

(01:28:43):
you can find other options by visiting our website at
trace dash evidence dot com. I want to thank you
all for listening and for being here for the soft
relaunch of Trace Evidence. Now that life has finally settled
down a bit, I'm really excited to dig into more
cases and produce episodes on a weekly basis. Once again,

(01:29:05):
I sincerely want to thank all of you who have
reached out, offered assistance or just gave me some supportive words.
It has meant the world to me, so once again,
thank you all for listening, and I hope you'll join
me next week for another unsolved case on the next
episode of Trace Evidence.

Speaker 2 (01:30:07):
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251 - The Disappearance of Judy Martins

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}251 - The Disappearance of Judy Martins