Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel -- Missing Since August 1976

Details from NamUs**: 

"Francisco enlisted in the Massachusetts Army National Guard. His orders directed him to travel to Fort Dix, New Jersey on August 8, 1976. He went to the AMTRAK train station in Providence, RI accompanied by friends and family. He boarded the train with other recruits and his recruiter but never arrived in Fort Dix, New Jersey. He has not been seen or heard from since."

Missing Person: Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel

Last-contact date: August 8th, 1976
The area where the MP was last seen: Providence, Rhode Island
Link to government source: NamUs #MP78513

VITAL DETAILS

Ethnicity: White/Caucasian
Sex: Male
Age at time of disappearance: 18 years old
Birthdate: between August 9th, 1957 and August 8th, 1958

• I'm not sure of the exact birthdate for Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel but a date range can be calculated using his age at the time of the disappearance.

Hair: Brown
Eyes: Brown
Scar: None listed at NamUs
Height/weight: 5-foot-8 to 5-foot-9 and 128 to 135 pounds
BMI*: 

• Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel was in the normal range for BMI.
• Please, Google-search BMI if you aren't familiar with the phrase. I think it's an important tool to be aware of when working on missing person cases.

Tattoos: Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel did not have any tattoos associated with his profiles. If you know this to be a mistake, then please contact this site.

Francisco Do Nascimento Pimentel was last heard from on August 8th, 1976, when he was 18 years of age. This individual has now been missing for 45 years as of the original publication date of this blog post.

What stands out with this case, is that the NamUs description describes a situation where you would think it would be hard for him to disappear -- at least, without a further lead. It says that he boarded a train with military recruits and his recruiter, yet the last person to report seeing him was his family members. It would seem like the co-recruits, recruiter, and possibly train staff would have something to say on this matter. There definitely appears to be an incomplete story regarding the circumstances. To try and complete it, I did some research on Newspapers.com and Ancestry.com but was not able to find anything additional on this missing person.

I think this case opens up to Websleuths and amateur investigators/hobbyists if someone who knew him on the day he was last seen provides more details. Additionally, any of the co-recruits that remember that day might be able to offer something.

The way he sounds, he boarded the train in Providence bound for New Jersey but never reached it. Did he jump off the train? Did he sneak off at an earlier exit to dodge military duty? This is a difficult case where there's just not enough to conjecture from, meaning that opening up the details is the first duty. However, I think it is fair to say that any destination en route to Fort Dix from Providence is in play. It's not clear what the Amtrack route was but Warwick, New London, Hartford, New Haven, Bridgeport, Stamford, New York City, Newark, Trenton, and Philadelphia could all be points where he disembarked.

Please, take a moment to share this on social media using hashtags relevant to the missing person's area. Also, please include the website hashtag #MPCSL.

Author: Shane Lambert (UncoolNegated on Websleuths)

All articles are subject to editing after the original posting.

Shane Lambert (UncoolNegated on Websleuths) is not a Private Investigator, however, he is currently studying to be one as of March 2021.

Website hashtag: #MPCSL

*For BMI values, I use the UPPER or HIGHER ranges that are given for height and weight.
**Text might be paraphrased. If taken verbatim, then grammar or spelling errors are not necessarily corrected from original sources.
Disclaimer: Whenever possible, government sources are preferred for getting the details of a missing person's case. However, any source that the article writer deems reputable may be used.

Blood Spatter, Blood Volume: Comparing Singapore's Boy on the Tracks with the Murder of Polly Nichols

Author: Shane Lambert
Original Publication Date: January 25th, 2021
Updated Date: April 08th, 2025

Note: This article was originally published on January 25th, 2021, and has been updated on April 08th, 2025, to remove an expired YouTube link and enhance readability.

How Blood Evidence Shapes Crime Scene Investigations

How blood is left at a crime scene or a possible crime scene can be the result of many different processes: blood pooling, blood dripping, blood spattering, or blood spraying are some of the phrases that you will hear when watching forensic television shows.

But whether it drips, pools, sprays, or spatters, analyzing blood at a possible crime scene is part of the forensic sciences. It is in a branch known as forensic serology, which is the study of various body fluids, including blood.

It is important to know that the velocity of blood as it exits a human body can reveal important information as to whether the body was alive or dead at the time of the bleeding. Furthermore, the amount of blood at a possible crime scene can also reveal the same thing.

In this blog post, I'll look at two cases that are similar in one regard: in both cases, the blood at a crime scene was used to support the notion that the decedent at the scene was already dead when he or she bled out. The first case I will look at is the infamous 1888 murder of Polly Nichols in England, assumingly by the unknown serial killer dubbed Jack the Ripper. The second case I will look at is one from Singapore from 1972 where a boy thought to have died on train tracks in a train accident was then reassessed as already dead before being hit by the train.

The Murder of Polly Nichols: A Jack the Ripper Case

Firstly, let's look at the murder of Polly Nichols. She was killed in the Whitechapel area of London on August 31st, 1888. Due to her association with Jack the Ripper, there has never been a shortage of inquest into her death and that has produced expert conjecture pertaining to her murder.

Whoever killed Polly Nichols used a knife for either stabbing or making incisions on her neck, her vagina, her abdomen, and at other points on her body. However, one Forensic Physician, known as Dr. Jason Payne-James, expressed his opinion that Polly Nichols did not necessarily die as a result of these apparent wounds. Instead, there is a suggestion that Polly Nichols was first subjected to "manual strangulation" before her body was mutilated.

Dr. Payne-James shared this perspective in the 2014 Channel Five documentary "Jack the Ripper: The New Evidence." Originally, this article included an embedded clip from that documentary, but the link has since expired.

Strangulation, as the cause of death, has been used to explain why there was no blood spray at the scene of Polly Nichols's murder. There was blood pooling but that has to do with dripping, not spraying or spattering.

The difference between dripping and spraying results from a difference in blood pressure in the arteries. When the heart is beating, the arteries are pressurized. When the heart is not beating (i.e., the body is dead), then the pressures moving the blood are less forceful. If a corpse is pierced or sliced, then the blood might ooze out instead of being sprayed. That oozing would lead to blood pooling, and it’s this process that Dr. Payne-James described in his analysis.

The lack of blood pressure in a corpse has been used to explain how a man named Charles Lechmere, the man who was once thought to have only discovered the body of Polly Nichols, might actually have been her killer despite the fact that he had no blood spray on his clothes on the night of Nichols' murder. If Jack the Ripper (possibly Lechmere) strangled Polly Nichols to death before mutilating her, then he could still have walked the streets of the Whitechapel area without blood on his clothes. In short, that he was clean of blood spray does not clear him of the murder.

The Singapore Train Tracks Mystery: A Forensic Twist

The second case that I will look at is both similar and different. The case of a dead boy found on the Bukit Merah train tracks in Singapore in April of 1972 was covered in a course I took from Nanyang Technological University ("Introduction to Forensic Science" by Professor Roderick Bates).

According to Roderick Bates, the course instructor, in 1972 a train ran over a human body on a set of train tracks in Singapore. At first glance, one might have thought that the death of the boy should be ruled a suicide—that is, maybe he placed himself on the tracks knowing that the train wouldn't be able to stop in time to avoid running him over.

However, when a forensics-medicine specialist known as Chao Tze Cheng examined the scene, he concluded that there was not enough blood at the scene to make one think that the body was alive at the time that the train ran it over. That lack of blood had something to do with the unpressurized arteries that you find in a corpse. To Chao Tze Cheng, who was one of Singapore's top forensic authorities, that meant that the boy was already dead when placed on the tracks and that he may have been previously murdered.

Key Takeaways for Forensic Analysis

Websleuths or amateur investigators should note that blood spatter/spray and blood pooling/dripping could be a clue as to the state of the corpse at the time of any stabbing or incision. With the former, spattering and spraying would suggest that the decedent was alive at the time of the injuries. With pooling and dripping, it would suggest that the decedent was already dead at the time of the 'injuries.'

In both of the cases examined, the relative blood pressure between a living person and a dead person was central to taking an investigation in a certain direction. In the case of Polly Nichols, it showed that a suspect, Charles Lechmere, was not cleared of suspicion simply due to the fact that he had no blood on him. Since the cause of death may have been strangulation, the slicing and stabbing of the corpse would not have resulted in the spraying of blood on the person who wielded the knife. In the case of the boy on the tracks, it refuted the notion of suicide via train and allowed investigators to look for a murderer. According to Professor Roderick Bates, the investigation did conclude with charges.

Sources

• Dr. Roderick Bates, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore; the facts surrounding the case of the boy on the tracks from 1972 were covered in "Introduction to Forensic Science" and were described in a lecture of his that I watched in January 2021; date of lecture recording is not clear
• Chao Tze Cheng: forensics examiner who worked on the case of the boy on the tracks
• 2014's Channel Five documentary "Jack the Ripper: The Missing Evidence"

The Rahway Jane Doe from March 25, 1887 (New Jersey)

By: Shane Lambert

Original time of writing: February 6th, 2017
Updated: February 16th, 2021

The Rahway Jane Doe is an individual who was murdered in the town of Rahway, New Jersey, on March 25th, 1887. The mystery of the murder victim's identity stands out because, at the original time of writing back in 2017, it was the oldest unsolved mystery listed at DoeNetwork.org.

I researched this mystery using online newspaper databases for a good two hours on February 5th, 2017. At the time, I thought that there was very little chance of conclusively solving this mystery, even with modern technology that wasn't available in 1887 (online newspaper databases). The "clews" in this case (that's the 1887 spelling of "clues") are 99% red herrings if you ask me. Perhaps the best chance of identifying her is through DNA and the family-tree method.

Note: I think I generated a lead for investigation with a second look at this topic in 2021. Please visit my other article, suggesting that she might be a missing person named Annie Primroe, last seen in 1887.

Why Investigate the Rahway County Jane Doe Case?

If you are interested in this case, then it's not so much about justice or helping surviving relatives learn where a loved one went, is it? After all, the perpetrator can only be dead at this point and the same could be true of any kid sibling the victim may have had, right?

The matter is a curiosity for many and, for me, a matter of testing out online newspaper databases as a modern technology for finding "clews" in historical crimes. In this case, I wanted to see if anyone nationwide in the United States searched for a missing woman in the years that followed 1887 who was last known to be heading to New Jersey, something that might be revealed in archived newspapers, including in classified advertisements and/or in news pieces.

It may prove a viable way of looking into solving this murder or other murders, or at least generating a lead. In fact, I successfully used this method in the Saskatoon case of the Lady in the Well and managed to generate a tip for the police. But on the night that I devoted to the matter of the Rahway County Jane Doe, I certainly failed. Yet, that doesn't mean I didn't find out a lot of details involving this case.

Discovery by Four Brothers and a Dog’s Role

Four brothers named Frank, Irving, Thomas, and Alfred Worth found the mystery woman dead at 6:30am on Saturday, March 26th, 1887. She may have been a rail passenger the night before, as a woman like her got off the train at about 10pm on the 25th.

According to one J.H. Brunt, an individual who lived near where the deceased was found, his dog named Pete, was behaving strangely between 11pm and midnight on the 25th. Reportedly, his dog would bark to try and get the owner's attention and then run in the direction of where the body was eventually found the next morning. If we draw an inference from this behaviour, then the woman was murdered in the very late hours of the 25th, and perhaps the dog was aware of the commotion or heard her calls for help.

Incidentally, that description of how Pete acted reminded me of dog behavior associated with another unidentified person's case (NamUs UP 7582). I think dogs know when someone is in trouble, and they instinctively try to summon attention from nearby humanoids (see the relevant excerpt from the article immediately below).

Boston Daily GlobeThursday, March 31, 1887, Boston, Massachusetts

Loads of names are associated with this case, but whether they should be is a legitimate question. It stands to reason that only one of them could shed light on the woman's identity, unless she had some aliases.

The woman's throat was slashed, and she was probably robbed (one article I read said one of her pockets had been inspected by a bloody hand). She had no money when found, but the rings that were on her fingers weren't taken. That could be taken as evidence that robbery wasn't the motive. However, it could also be taken to mean it was just a bad and rushed plan.

Whoever killed her may have been a destitute opportunist who only happened upon her by chance. He may have made a haphazard decision to murder her and simply didn't do a complete robbery in panic. If Pete was barking in the distance, this could have scared the fellow into not doing a thorough job, especially if the woman was able to let out a scream.

But one "clew" in this case is that the woman's pocket was inspected with a bloody hand. Knife-wielding criminals often cut themselves when they stab or slash. That can be due to the momentum of the knife coming to a stop when it strikes someone, while the momentum of the hand that holds the knife continues to travel up the blade. Many knife-wielders have been identified or cast into suspicion because of wounds to their hands. The man who looked in the Jane Doe's pockets with bloody hands might have cut himself.

Handkerchief Clue in the Rahway Jane Doe Mystery

Blood was found smeared on a railing 600 yards from the victim after she was found. Near this point, a handkerchief was found with a name that resembled K.M. Noorz, writing that could not be made out clearly. A rubber stamp of some sort was also found with the name Timothy Byrne in the print.

Identifying blood, like the smear on the rail, in 1887 wasn't like it is in modern times. Something 600 yards away from ground zero (think 6 American football fields) cannot be tied to an event conclusively without a serologist. I found nothing on this matter that satisfactorily answered how the secondary scene could be tied to the first with certainty.

"Noorz," which was on the handkerchief, has been suggested to be a Danish name of "Noorse." Other victim names associated with this case are "Mary Cregan," "Mary Craney," "Mary Malthey" (or Maithey), "Kate Jennie Neary," "Mina Noorse," and "Kate M. Noony." None of the names were fruitful for me in terms of finding them in the newspaper databases I searched in hopes of finding missing people with those names. A 'eureka' moment would be if an article appeared anytime and anywhere in the world of newspapers after March 25th, 1887 about a mother, father, or brother looking for a "Kate M. Noony," for example, but no such moment happened in this case.

Did the Reward Lead to False Tips?

The authorities offered a $500 reward, part for finding the murderer and part for finding the woman's name, to anyone who provided a good lead. I actually wonder if the 'leads' and 'tips' in this case are run amok because of the reward. That is, were all the attempts to name her just attempts to make some money? That is a sad thought to think that people would falsely name a dead woman just to try to make money without due concern for justice and preventing the murderer from claiming more victims. However, that seemed to be the case based on how many people tried to name her.

For instance, one postal clerk claimed that he knew of a Timothy Byrne in the company of the so-called Kate M. Noony. The clerk claimed she received general delivery mail at the clerk's place of employment. Seems to me that would be a fantastic lead if true. Seems to me that her mail would keep coming from people far away that would not have known of her death. I wondered if the clerk just got the names from the newspapers, which covered this murder from coast to coast, and then just tried his luck at making a buck with his tip.

July 15th, 1887 - Lebanon Daily News (click to make bigger)

Rahway Jane Doe: Not a Prostitute

Something to note is that in my research I found a report that claimed that the Mayor of Rahway, one Mayor Daly, claimed that the "medical examination" of this Jane Doe "proved beyond all doubt" that she had "never been married." I'm taking that to mean that they inspected her vagina and figured she was a virgin.

The deceased was buried in a grave that called her "An Unknown Woman" according to the picture at DoeNetwork. I read one article that grotesquely misquoted what was actually written on her grave. Furthermore, her grave is actually wrong in reporting that she was found dead on March 25th, which was the day she was murdered according to Pete the dog (she was found the next day).

Apparently, she was buried far away from the deceased snooties of 1887 Rahway out of fear that she wasn't a decent enough woman to merit burial near them. As a late-night murder victim, she was believed to be a possible prostitute. Her virginity, however, attests to the fact that she wasn't one.

Lastly, I found an interesting article somewhere that said there was a picture of her post-mortem in the March 30th, 1887 edition of "New York World." If anyone has access to that I would be interested in the picture. Lastly, please make one comment just so I know someone is out there that also bothers with 130-year-old Jane-Doe mysteries.

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