Post by Scumhunter on Nov 23, 2018 2:35:01 GMT -5
(Above photo credit: Fort Worth Police Department website)
From Fort Worth magazine: (2016 article):
"It was a blistering hot day that Sunday in July 1998. Temperatures were expected to be in triple digits, but volunteers and police were out in force searching for 8-year-old Edna Rodriguez. The child had disappeared only hours earlier from the family’s home in the 3500 block of Travis Avenue, just a couple hours after midnight. Neighbors, friends and family milled about as police and volunteers scoured the area. Everyone hoped Edna would be found.
Diane Crump, a teacher at nearby George C. Clark Elementary, taught Edna in her pre-kindergarten class a few years earlier and would be teaching her younger sister that fall. Crump and her teaching assistant heard about the disappearance on Saturday and were bringing the family a meal that Sunday. About 1 p.m., Crump parked her car in the busy neighborhood about a block away from the Rodriguez home. She noticed a police crime van nearby. And then everyone ran.
“I just started running when everybody else started running,” Crump says. “Someone had dumped the body about two doors down on the other side of the street from where she lived. The police were there and not anybody was allowed around the body.”
As police cordoned off the area, family and friends broke into tears as TV cameras rolled. The sweet little girl who loved to play the tambourine in church and was remembered for her bright smile had been found. The search was over only 35 hours after it commenced – and was now a murder investigation.
GONE GIRL Like many immigrants from Mexico, friends say Fidencio and Juana Rodriguez moved their young family to Texas to offer their children a better life. Fidencio’s older brother had helped with U.S. immigration so that he could make the move, according to friends. The girls were in English as a Second Language classes, and the family lived in a small house in south Fort Worth’s Rosemont area.
Friends say Juana was a good mother and focused on the family, which also included three sons. Her husband, 27 at the time, was a hard worker. Amanda Serrano, a friend of the family who also served as their spokesperson at the time, says Fidencio was friendly and a bit of a joker. Serrano worked with him at a mobile home manufacturing company.
Residents who lived in the area in the 1990s describe it as a neighborhood with some crime problems but also as a close-knit group of families where children and teenagers could play. Edna was said to be regularly seen playing on Travis and Lipscomb with friends and family that lived in the area. For a family seeking a better life in the U.S., things were going well in Fort Worth.
“Everything was going really well until the murder happened,” Serrano says.
In July 1998, Juana was in Mexico caring for her father, who had been in poor health, and her husband was at home watching the children. The Friday before Edna disappeared, neighbors say she was at home and had been seen playing with a dog in the front yard. Details aren’t certain as to what happened later that night as Saturday came – but life in the Rodriguez family would never be the same.
At 2 a.m. that Saturday morning, Fidencio called police. His daughter was missing, he said. According to media reports, he said Edna had been sleeping with him and another younger daughter. Before contacting law enforcement and relatives, the father told police he discovered a front window open and searched his home, yard and neighborhood for the girl.
“The first 48 hours following the disappearance of a child are the most critical in terms of finding and returning that child safely home, but they also can be the most troublesome and chaotic,” the U.S. Justice Department notes in its online checklist for what to do in cases of missing children.
Police were hopeful the girl was safe, but the more time that went by reduced the chances that Edna would be found alive.
ON THE CASE In the next day and a half after Edna was reported missing, law enforcement flooded the neighborhood – conducting a search with 40 officers and more than 130 volunteers. A police helicopter hovered overhead, and search dogs sniffed through streets and in yards, tails wagging as they surveyed the scene. Four police officers were assigned to work the case full time. But as the searched dragged on into Sunday evening, no signs of Edna were found.
And then as the day’s summer temperatures continued to rise and frustrations grew, a neighbor just a block away noticed Edna’s partially-clothed body in the front driveway of a vacant home in the 3600 block of Lipscomb Street – only 35 hours after the child was reported missing. One arm covered the child’s face, and the body was found inside a locked fence gate about 25 feet from the sidewalk.
Neighbors say police had searched the area thoroughly. One said she believes the body had to be placed there after police had previously searched and that she and neighbors would have seen the child’s body either Saturday or Sunday. Police came to the same conclusion and said the house had been thoroughly searched. They believed the body had to be placed there sometime on Sunday, and a neighbor helped investigators narrow down the time frame by noting that the body had to be placed there in the afternoon because it had not been seen there as late as 12:30 p.m., according to a report in the Star-Telegram.
A murder in one’s neighborhood is certainly rare for most and can understandably be quite shocking. “Gerald,” grew up on Travis and was about 14 when the crime took place. He asked that his real name not be used and now lives in the same home he was raised in by his grandmother. A sense of fear gripped the neighborhood.
“My grandma would make sure I was inside. People were more child conscious,” he says. “It was one of those weird moments as a child where you kind of grew up quickly.”
Today the house on Lipscomb where Edna’s body was found is occupied. Not too many residents remain who lived on the street at the time of the murder. Those who are new are shocked at the story.
Media reports at the time say that the girl was strangled but not sexually assaulted. A request by Fort Worth, Texas magazine for an autopsy report from the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office was denied on grounds that it is still part of an ongoing investigation and could not be released as it may jeopardize facts that only the child’s killer would know. Throughout the next few days, police continued to speak with neighbors and search for clues.
In the days that followed, the spotlight would shine on Fidencio Rodriguez as the last person to see his daughter. She had been sleeping in his bed at the time she disappeared. Police questioned him and conducted two polygraphs tests. The results of his polygraphs (administered in Spanish by an operator recommended by the FBI) were never made public. Rumors began to swirl in the area as the investigation continued.
Neighbors and some who knew the family at the time say that many friends and family would hang out at the home on the weekends, and drinking could be a big part of that.
“People would come and drink,” said Alejandrina Miranda, who has lived next door for 27 years, while tending to her well-manicured backyard garden. “There were a lot of people coming in and out of the house drinking. I did not know the family well though.”
Serrano believes that Friday may have been like many – with friends and family hanging out, drinking and having a good time. She stands by Fidencio, and believes he had nothing to do with the murder.
“He had many people in the house on the weekends,” she says, “We used to drink a lot on the weekends. I really think that he got drunk, and he fell asleep. And he doesn’t know what happened. I really think it was somebody at the house or somebody he invited. I wasn’t there, and I really regretted later on that I wasn’t there … when I was there, I watched the little kids and made sure they were okay, except that weekend.
“Maybe it was someone he invited that weekend, or he got drunk and maybe left the door open. I’m not sure, but I know he didn’t do anything.”
In days following the murder, police continued the investigation and announced that as many as 20 people would take polygraph tests to help gather more evidence and eliminate possible suspects. A $15,000 reward is offered to anyone with information leading to an arrest of the suspect. However, police report that calls to the department with information began to dry up. Police obtained a warrant and searched the Rodriguez home for the second time. Police recovered some items from the home but did not release details on what was taken. An affidavit for the search warrant was sealed to prevent the release of lab reports in the case that may jeopardize the investigation. Police said that Fidencio and his family cooperated with investigators throughout the process and that Fidencio never asked for an attorney when speaking with police.
On Thursday, July 15, 350 mourners gathered for Edna’s funeral at Travis Avenue Baptist Church. Numerous flowers, balloons and stuffed animals were placed at the location where the child’s body was found. At the funeral, along with an emotional outpouring of sympathy for the family, many in attendance also expressed support for Fidencio and his innocence.
“This is extremely painful for the family,” friend Sadrach Alfaro said while delivering a eulogy for the child, according to the Star-Telegram. “It’s torture not being able to find the person who did this.”
CASE GONE COLD It has been more than 18 years since Edna Rodriguez’s body was found. Those who remember the crime, the fear it caused the neighborhood and little Edna hope there is a resolution to the case one day.
“Everybody was scared,” says Miranda. “I had a little girl at the time and did not want to leave her alone. Hopefully someone will come forward and say who did it.”
Only three months after the murder, Serrano says the Rodriguez family moved back to Mexico. Fidencio and Juana Rodriguez could not be reached, and family and friends have maintained the father’s innocence. Many who remember the murder believe it is solvable if someone would just come forward with more information or evidence.
In the intervening years, however, no arrests have been made in the case, and it is sent to the Fort Worth police cold case unit. And justice for Edna remains out of reach.
“As in most of these cases, there was tremendous interest in the media and public when it was happening,” Sgt. Paul Kratz told the Star-Telegram during the investigation. Katz was the homicide detective leading the police unit looking into the crime. “Once that slacks off, people may not realize how large of an investigation this is. It is ongoing and will go on for the foreseeable future.”
Fort Worth police maintain that the case is still active but declined to release many details about where it stands due to it being part of an ongoing investigation.
“All I can say about this case is that it is still being investigated, there are several suspects, and there is evidence being tested,” Detective Michael McCormack says. “I can’t release more than that because of the integrity of the case.”
In early October, a scene similar to that 18 years ago was played out again. Police responded to an abduction of a 6-year-old Fort Worth girl in the early morning hours of Saturday, Oct. 8. Forty officers converged on the Polytechnic area and found the girl about a mile from her home that afternoon. Edis L. Moya Alas, 35, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, has been charged with kidnapping and sexual assault.
For Amanda Serrano and her family, news of the kidnapping brought back a flood of thoughts about the 8-year-old girl with the cute smile."
www.fwtx.com/articles/fwtxmag/features/tarrant-county-cold-cases-await-evidence-witnesses
Thoughts? While it should be noted that the above article is from two years ago, as of this posting date (November 23rd, 2018), Edna's case is still unfortunately listed as an unsolved cold case on the Fort Worth Poloce Department website: police.fortworthtexas.gov/
Admin Note #1: According to the Fort Worth Police Department website, anyone with information on this case should email the FWPD cold case unit at coldcase@fortworthpd.com
Admin Note #2: If you have any (news-related) updates on this case, please contact us here: amwfans.com/thread/1662/website-contact-form
