Friday, February 26, 2010

Remains of Woman Missing (Christine Sheddy) Two Years Found in Snow Hill Maryland

(Feb. 26) -- It has been more than two years since Lynn Dodenhoff has looked into the face of her blond-haired, blue-eyed daughter, Christine Marie Sheddy. The 26-year-old's sudden disappearance in late 2007 remained a mystery until today, when police announced that human remains found last week have been positively identified as Sheddy's.

"We were holding out hope that was her," Dodenhoff told AOL News. "We wanted her children, my grandchildren, to know that their mother did not abandon them."

Sheddy was living with her mother in Bowers Beach, Del., with her three children -- two boys and a girl, ages 2, 4 and 8 -- when she traveled to Pocomoke City, Md., in November 2007, to stay with Clarence Jackson, his girlfriend, Tia Johnson, and their friend, Justin Hadel. Sheddy knew Jackson and his girlfriend through her boyfriend, Levi Hall.

"Christine and I had a fight prior to her trip," Dodenhoff said. "At the time, milk was three dollars and something a gallon, and her youngest son loved milk. He could go through a gallon of milk a day. I mean, this was the dumbest fight on the planet. She was also very stressed out about problems she was having with Levi, so when this milk thing came about, she just exploded and I reacted. She then left with the two boys for Clarence Jackson's Byrd Road farm in Pocomoke City."

Roughly one week after arriving at the farm, Sheddy was ready to return to Bowers Beach. Things were not going well, and an accidental chimney fire that had burned a hole in the roof of the farmhouse only added to her discomfort. As a result, Sheddy was desperate to go home, but she was hesitant to call her mom, because of their argument.

"Christine was a very stubborn and proud girl," Dodenhoff said. "Rather than give in and call me, she reached out to her best friend, Jimmy 'Q' Quail. Following that conversation, Q called me and said, 'Christine wants to come home. Why don't you give her a call?' So I did, and I said, 'Won't you please come home?' She wanted to know why, and I told her, 'You have no heat there. I want you and the boys here.' "

In the end, Sheddy and her mother reached a compromise. She would leave the farm and travel to Philadelphia to stay with her sister, Jennifer.

"Jennifer had already said Christine could stay there," Dodenhoff said. "There are more job opportunities, people, places and things there. From my understanding, Levi was supposed to pick Christine up after work on Nov. 13, but she called Q and made a backup plan because she felt she could not rely on Levi. The last time I spoke with her I told her I loved her and she said the same back."

Unfortunately, something went terribly wrong between Sheddy's Nov. 10 call and Nov. 13, the date she was set to leave the farm.

"On Nov. 13, Jennifer received a phone call from Jackson, saying they had gone to run some errands, and when they got home, Christine was gone and the boys were there alone," Dodenhoff said.

According to Dodenhoff, Jackson told her there were no signs of forced entry. In addition to her two children, Sheddy's belongings were left untouched.

"Jackson called me back later that day and said he had a fight with Christine prior to her disappearance. Apparently, he had concerns that she was not pulling her weight," Dodenhoff said. "He then said, 'I found a letter she wrote, and it was a letter stating thank you for letting me stay.' He called back again a little later and said, 'We had a fifth of vodka and half of it is gone,' and then he called me back yet again and said, 'We had $30 in change and that is gone.'

"He just kept calling and calling and calling. In the end, there were at least three different stories," Dodenhoff continued. "When I confronted him about that, he started screaming at me, and I screamed at him. I said, 'Look, I am just trying to find my daughter.' He then said, 'If you want to talk to me, you will have to do it through my lawyer -- don't ever call here again.' That was the last time I spoke with him."

Concerned about her daughter's safety, Dodenhoff contacted the Pocomoke City Police Department to file a missing-person report.

"I called Pocomoke police because she was in Pocomoke City when she went missing," Dodenhoff said. "They told me to call the police in Delaware because Christine was from Delaware. So I did, and Delaware police said that since she went missing from down there, I would need to call them. So after getting the runaround from everyone the first day, I was finally put in touch with the Worcester County Sheriff's Office and the Worcester County Bureau of Investigation on Nov. 14."

Dodenhoff says a sheriff's deputy went to the Byrd Road farm and spoke with Jackson and Johnson, but nothing relevant was learned during the conversation.

"We still don't know where she is," Detective Robert Trautman of the Worcester County Bureau of Investigation said in a November 2007 interview with The (Salisbury, Md.) Daily Times. "We've expanded our search to Delaware and Virginia."

Trautman also said he did not suspect any foul play in Sheddy's disappearance.

Investigators conducted a search at the Byrd Road farm but came up empty. According to Dodenhoff, police treated her daughter's case as a runaway investigation and ultimately issued a warrant for Sheddy's arrest for child abandonment.

"I was angry with the way the case was being handled, so I took it into my own hands," Dodenhoff said. "I posted fliers and spent a lot of time online trying to track down leads. I made contact with some people who had been at the farm during the time Christine went missing, and they were telling me stuff I was forwarding back to law enforcement. I angered a lot of people, but I didn't care. I wanted answers."

One of the people Dodenhoff reached out to was Mandy Albritton, co-founder of the nonprofit missing-person search and recovery group 3View Search Services.

"I can tell you, after working with Lynn for 10 months, there have been times she has called me and said, 'I am about to do this,' and I go, 'Oh crap,' " Albritton told AOL News. "I tried to tell her, 'Lynn, I think we need to stay calm and quiet on this,' but she would do it anyway. I did not always approve of her tactics, but each time she seemed to uncover another piece of information in the case."

Albritton said she was also concerned with Dodenhoff's unwillingness to accept the reality that she might never find her daughter.

"I was worried about that position she took, because in this business less than 10 percent of missing persons are ever located," Albritton said. "The odds are stacked against you, so I wanted to prepare her for the likelihood that she would not be found, but she just kept telling me, 'I am gonna find her, I will find her.' "

In January 2008, Dodenhoff thought the search for her daughter was over when she learned that human remains had been found in Westminster, Md. The find, however, proved to be a false alarm, when authorities later determined they did not belong to Sheddy.

"It was difficult," Dodenhoff said. "You don't ever want to hope your child is found dead, but at the same time, you are so desperate for answers."

However, the find did prove to be helpful, as shortly thereafter Dodenhoff learned that her daughter's dental records and DNA had not been entered into the National Crime Information Center database. The information was not officially entered until a year later.

In September 2009, Jackson was arrested in Rogersville, Tenn., and charged with aggravated burglary and arson for allegedly breaking into his girlfriend's former house and setting the shower curtain on fire. Fortunately for the homeowner, the fire extinguished itself before spreading. Jackson was held in the Hawkins County Jail without bond.

With Jackson behind bars, Dodenhoff and the police continued to work their own angles in the case.

"You can't put all your faith in the police," Dodenhoff said. "They are gonna do what they are gonna do. You have to keep pushing if you know in your heart that there is not enough being done. You push, you shove, you speak and you talk to anybody that will sit down and listen to you and tell them."

The case took yet another turn earlier this month when, according to a source close to the investigation, police received a tip. Authorities are not yet commenting on what the "tip" was; however, SbyNews.com has reported that it was credible enough for investigators to travel to Tennessee.

"They flew to Tennessee to speak with [Jackson]," an unnamed source told SbyNews.

Upon arriving back in town from that trip, authorities went to a location in Snow Hill, Md., and found human female skeletal remains next to the River House Inn. The location is roughly 10 miles from the Byrd Road farm. Jackson is a former handyman at the inn.

In an interview with WMDT.com, Worcester County Deputy State's Attorney Mike Farlow confirmed that his office had received "information that there were remains at a location in Snow Hill," but he declined to say how authorities got that tip.

The owners of the River House Inn were out of town at the time Sheddy disappeared. Authorities say they were unaware the remains were there and are not considered people of interest.

According to Albritton, the remains were found buried between a couple of cottages at the inn.

"They were in a side yard that backs up to a huge municipal parking lot that the post office is on," Albritton said. "It was a 15-by-15-foot area with sandy soil surrounded by evergreen trees."

Clothing and a shoe were the only known items found with the remains.

Based on authorities' trip to Tennessee and the sudden find thereafter, Dodenhoff and Albritton felt it likely that the remains would be identified as Sheddy's.

Sheddy's 10-year-old daughter, Hailey, was also resigned to the belief that she would not see her mom again. Last week she wrote the following poem for Albritton:

Beautiful Nightmare
This could be a sweet dream or a beautiful nightmare
Or it could be a good dream
Oh no I could believe in you
But you made it a beautiful nightmare for a sweet dream


As Sheddy's family agonized over the possibility that she had finally been found, authorities Thursday reportedly arrested Justin Hadel, one of Jackson's guests at the Byrd Road farm when Sheddy was staying there. Hadel was reportedly picked up by police in Tomball County, Texas, on a child obligation and fugitive warrant.

The timing of Hadel's arrest has raised eyebrows; however, authorities will not say if there is any connection to Sheddy's case.

"I don't talk about pending investigations," Worcester County State's Attorney Joel J. Todd told AOL News.

So while a connection to Hadel remains unclear, Sheddy's family did finally receive the news they were hoping for today, when Todd announced that the remains found in Snow Hill had been positively identified as those of Christine Marie Sheddy.

"No cause of death has yet been determined," Todd said. "All involved law enforcement agencies are treating this as a suspicious death."

The news came as a bittersweet relief to Dodenhoff.

"I knew she was no longer with us, I just knew it," Dodenhoff said. "I felt in my heart that Christine had been dead and with Jesus ever since she went missing, because she would never ever leave her children. I kept telling myself it would all come out in God's time. I was right and that time is today."

The investigation into the Sheddy case continues. No suspects or people of interest have been named.

VIA AOL NEWS

HAT TIP: S.R.

24 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:19:00 PM

    Hmmm, didn't know the NCIC had a dental record database for missing persons? I always thought the dental record database consisted of the dental records of unidentified human remains. Must be something new, real new, like today.

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  2. Anonymous11:28:00 PM

    Interesting that the inn owners "were out of town." Now who would have ever known that at the time? Wouldn't surprise me if they all decided to take up residence at that place after the farm fire.

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  3. Anonymous7:44:00 AM

    That data base of dental records is at least 20 years old, probably 40 years old.

    Here is a condensed version.

    The way it works is that a police officer has a dentist fill in a complicated form about the teeth of a missing person. That form is then "translated" into an NCIC III MIS File.

    When remains are found somewhere, a forensic dentist files out a form, and the data from that exam is entered into the computer. If there is a match, then x-rays and other data are examined for an exact ID.

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  4. God rest your soul Christine. You are loved and missed. Please help bring the people responsible for this crime against you to justice.
    Godspeed Girlfriend! <3

    ReplyDelete
  5. Clara Mae9:09:00 AM

    This is all getting more bizarre by the moment.

    Weren't we all just chastized by Mr. Henady of 3 View? Yet here we are with statements made to the media by his partner.

    And one more time blabbing about the case comes from Christine's family.

    Didn't Mr. Henady say that one of Christine's children - 10 years old had seen something on the internet? Well according to this story the oldest child is 8 years old. I thought Mr. Henady was "very close" with Lynn and the kids? What gives in stating a 2 year differnece in the age of a child?


    So where is it that the "leaks" in the case are coming from? Better get those "official subpoena's" going.

    If Lynn believes that it all will come out in God's time then she needs to shut up and let the SA office build a case.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous10:07:00 AM

    If they were "staying" at the inn and using cell phones it would have been known by LE fairly early on that they weren't at the farm, I would think, but near whatever tower was picking up the signal.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous10:07:00 AM

    Could your words be more foul CM? Its not possible. Have you ever watched The Wizard of Oz? There is a character there you might recognize.

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  8. Regardless of how any of us feel about this entire case we must remember that Lynn and her family are now deeply grieving. In spite of how she is viewed to the public we need to understand how deep sorrow can go.

    Christine can finally be laid to rest properly and her mother can now maybe rest at night. I know all about the heart breaking questions children ask and children's little minds tick on when we don't think they do. This family now has the clossure they so deserve. It will take forever for it all to be absorbed by them.

    As a mother I am so glad that Christine can finally be put to rest. Let's try to keep that in mind.

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  9. jmmb, thank you!

    Finally a voice of reason on this site.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Clara Mae2:18:00 PM

    9:54 & 10:07 - Don't try to paint a picture of me when you don't even know me. If you want to throw stones go right ahead but quit hiding under ANON! Don't be someone who hides in the dark.

    Pointing out facts as they have unfolded might be offensive to you two (or probably one & the same)however you need to read all of the stupid comments and posts that are going on - check it out and then see if I'm the bad guy!

    Everyone needs to shut up about about their speculations and let Christine's case develop through the professionals - LE and the SA's office. All of the "armchair" investigators are just ruining any chance for Christine to get justice.

    If you think I'm nasty & foul great but I can tell you that I'll become more so if this case never goes to trial and those responsible aren't prosecuted & convicted to rot in a jail cell becuase you dumb asses have a need to blab.

    If it makes you feel better in your twisted way to throw insults at me go right ahead. I hope it helps you get through whatever!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anonymous11:17:00 AM

    Then I must have misunderstood (I could have), Anon 7:44 am. It was a snippet I saw on identifing remains from mass fatalites (Katrina, WTC, airplane crashed) and why it takes so long to identity and return remains to the families. The way I understood it, the national registry didn't have the capacity or something to process dental record infomation unless certain criteria was met. This prompted Louisana to fund and maintain their own Missing Persons registry.

    They specifically mentioned MD (and other states) as already having there own missing persons dental record registry.

    Off topic a bit, but did anyone see Snow Hill featured on that US Marshall show the other night. A fugitive had a girlfriend in Snow Hill. They showed the sheriff's office and several deputies.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Anonymous11:46:00 AM

    What I'm finding a bit off kilter is that the mother never mentioned anywhere that her daughter felt she was in danger because of the phone call conversation to the friend that was going to give her the ride that day.
    Blink talks about the person hearing Christine trying to whisper something.
    We had never heard that before. Did the friend not report this to the authorities? What's obvious is that the mother didn't even know that Christine was feeling endangered.

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  13. Anonymous1:51:00 PM

    You never heard that before? Who cares what you heard or didn't hear. Apparently you aren't as well informed as you thought you were.

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  14. CM, you need to learn how to read. It seems like you are trying to be an "armchair investigator" yourself. It says Christine's kids were 2,4 and 8 in November 2007. It is now 2010. That would make her kids 4, 6 and 10 today. People are just trying to help. You obviously have some malicious intent. It is not enough that this girl got herself horribly abused and taken advantage of for trying to take care of herself and her kids. You have to come on here and try to make her mother look stupid. For what reason? To show you are smarter than other people? It backfired on you a little bit. You prove that even though Christine was found we are not safe from the people who come out and prey on the weaknesses and kindnesses of those who have something they want. This woman has been sufficiently preyed upon so you might want to move on to someone else and at least let her family pick up the pieces without your scumbag comments.

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  15. Anonymous3:38:00 PM

    1:51, So I guess you are saying Blink concocted another story or the friend figured out that they better come up with a story themselves for not being honest at the beginning. That's the only explanation for your agitation over a simple comment.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Anonymous6:35:00 PM

    It's obvious the B & B was closed during this time because if guests were present it doesn't make sense to bury Christine's body in the yard. Maybe they did decide to crash there after the fire and something went terribly wrong and they couldn't call for help being at the B & B illegally themselves.

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  17. Keeley, thank you.

    Your point that comments that kick victims and their families are preying on weakness are much like those that preyed on Christine is excellent. CM, take heed.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Anonymous7:49:00 AM

    Who ever is leaking information to this blog should be ashamed of themself. The above information can only be coming from inside the investigative department(s).

    I repeat, YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF!!!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  19. 7:49 I know it's early but WAKE-UP!!

    the information came from AOL news where they had interviewed the family and those involved and then PUBLISHED IT!!

    there's a credited 'link' at the bottom of the article.

    Soooo? does that make you think that those that spoke to media should be ashamed of themselves?

    ReplyDelete
  20. Anonymous10:54:00 AM

    Anon 7:49am, if it's the comments you are referring to as someone "leaking information", I doubt that's the case. Looks to me like speculation and it does sound quite plausable that this could be what happened.
    Unlike BOC which was full of outlandish riduculous nonsense speculations coming from her peanut gallery these posters comments sound more sane.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Anonymous11:25:00 AM

    I think this may not turn out to be the big murder mystery coverup some people would like to think it is.
    It does sound reasonable that Christine and "friends" were all doing something they shouldn't have been doing, somewhere they all had no business being and that being the case, the "friends" made the poor judgement call of not reporting and concealing her untimely and maybe accidental death.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Anonymous1:32:00 PM

    I wish for each and every one of you,that has said something nasty, disrespectful and down right hartless, reguarding Christine Sheedy's disappearence, go thru exactly what has happened to Christine and her family.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Anonymous2:35:00 PM

    Our "friend" Marci's over on BOC making stupid comments like "But we should look into the ones that didn't do all they could do."

    Well maybe we SHOULD be looking into the ONE that didn't TEll all HE could!!!!! And changed his story to most likely cover his own ass when he spoke to the "investigator."
    Like maybe the 40 year old urban ganster rapper wannbe!!!!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  24. Anonymous3:34:00 PM

    It wouldn't surprise me if that dopey boyfriend wasn't "inn" on the fun that night also.

    ReplyDelete

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