Crime & Safety
Victim's Brother Finds 'Personal Contact' in Discovery
The brother of murder victim Lou Ellen Burleigh, whose remains were recently found near Napa County's Lake Berryessa by Sheriff Deputy Bartlett, opens up.
The brother of a woman killed in 1977 by a man known as the I-5 Strangler said today that having his sister's remains, which were found earlier this year and positively identified last month, provided "personal contact" to his sister for the first time in more than 30 years.
"It made us feel more in touch with her," said Carl Burleigh, whose sister Lou Ellen Burleigh was 21 when she left her Walnut Creek home for a job interview and never returned. "It brought her back with us somehow," he said.
Earlier searches for Lou Ellen Burleigh's remains had not been successful. But this spring , after re-examinining the records, went back to search for Burleigh's remains, according to the sheriff's department.
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He found a piece of her pelvic bone in a small creek on March 10, and .
Carl Burleigh said the Walnut Creek Police Department contacted his mother on Wednesday, June 22, and said officers were coming to her home outside Seattle on Friday to give her an update on the case.
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It was not until the investigators arrived that they revealed to Carl Burleigh, his younger brother and their mother that Lou Ellen Burleigh's remains had been found.
"They did a tremendous job," Carl Burleigh said.
He said learning about the remains provided some relief but did not have the same emotional impact as some of the other milestones in the case, including finally learning in 2004 that his sister had been murdered.
"Until then she'd always been a missing person, and then all of a sudden, boom, she was a murder victim," he said.
Carl Burleigh, who was about 18 months older than his sister, said the conviction of Richard Kibbe in 2009 of six murders marked a turning point for him.
"You kind of gradually come to terms with it," he said. "I still miss her so much. For the contribution she would have made to our family and the world."
Burleigh said the family was grateful the remains were found and would take them to Oregon for interment.
Article provided by the Bay City News.
