WHO WAS HUNTING YOUNG GIRLS AND COEDS IN SONOMA COUNTY IN THE 1970S?
Investigative journalist Grace Kahng unravels the 40-year-old mystery of “THE HITCHHIKER KILLINGS”
The Hitchhiker Killings began in 1972 with the disappearance of 12-year-old Maureen Sterling and 13-year-old Yvonne Weber who disappeared from an ice rink around 9 pm on February 4, 1972. Both girls, like other young people in that era, often hitchhiked. Their nude bodies were found down a steep embankment shortly after Christmas in December. A dozen other young women including Santa Rosa college co-eds Kim Wendi Allen and Jeannette Kamahele vanished hitchhiking in the same area. For over 40 years, their homicides and disappearances have never been solved. No suspect was ever charged or identified in a series of unsolved murders of young women that continued through the 1990s.
Is the violent San Francisco serial rapist Jack Bokin the Hitchhiker Killer?
BREAKING NEWS
GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN
After decades, cold-case detectives working a string of brutal murders and disappearances link a serial rapist to the violent murder of a loving mother of three young girls. Is Jack Bokin the infamous Sonoma County “Hitchhiker Killer”?
A survey engineer setting up stakes in the sweltering 80-degree California sun, spotted a female body: dumped like a limp ragdoll in the brush alongside a barbed wire fence a dozen feet off a rural road. Frantic, he dials 911 on his cell phone. A Sheriff’s deputy arrives to find 32-year-old Michelle Veal lying face up, with blood and lacerations visible on her head. In a final act of humiliation, her killer not only inflicted great bodily harm but stripped the clothes from the single mother’s body.
It was July 15, 1996, which was also Veal’s youngest child’s seventh birthday. The Santa Rosa medical examiner determined Michelle forcefully fought her attacker. She suffering grave injuries in the process including a broken neck. The devoted mother and former interior designer had likely been killed two days earlier which explains why she failed to show up for her daughter’s birthday party in Union City. “My mom always, always celebrated our birthdays. She never missed a single birthday until that one,” recalls Brittany who was nearly eight years old at the time.
Veal’s brutal death and the unceremonious dumping of her lifeless body shocked the affluent community of Santa Rosa. It recalled a haunting string of unsolved murders known as the “Hitchhiker Killings” that began in… READ MORE.
Our family would like to share about our beloved daughter/mother/sister Michelle Marie Veal (maiden name Michelle Hinojos). In 1996 she was taken from us, leaving her family and large network of friends who all loved and adored her dearly, deeply grieving. Though she has been gone, memories of her beautiful smile, impeccable style, generous spirit, and enthusiasm for life live on forever in the hearts of the many people whose lives she touched.
Our dear Michelle was… READ MORE.