>> reporter: dan continued to cruise the war zone, willing himself to believe that his daughter was still out there. >> reporter: both of those. mind. there were whole bunches of them. >> was it possible ida lopez's list was just the tip of the iceberg? >> at one point syllania had been arrested up in the denver area for prostitution, going by a different name at the time. Street Safe was founded in 2009, aiming to ensure volunteers kept a steady presence in an area along Historic Route 66 while handing out clothing and other products each Friday. some of them chummed around with one another. >> reporter: no witnesses. NEW MEXICO: It took police a year to identify the remains of 11 women killed in the West Mesa Murders, but they still haven't identified the killer. >> a lot of people said they were drug addicts and prostitutes. The names of the 11 victims of the West Mesa Murders are: Monica Candelaria, 22 - Her friends told police in 2003 that they heard Monica had been murdered and buried in West Mesa. bark i wanted to consolidate my credit cards in to a personal loan to pay them off faster. i enjoyed it. >> reporter: though the detectives spent months combing through all the evidence taken from the photographer's office and home, nothing definitive was found. some of it didn't. everyone? and then she left it. One of those suspects was Joseph Blea. >> you don't remember the last, thing you said to her? >> reporter: investigators had plenty of leads but none that had gotten them closer to answering two questions -- who was he? >> reporter: before long michelle valdez stopped showing up in her father's videos. >> on the surface seems like a pretty good suspect. [19] He had twice been arrested for violent attacks on sex workers and had threatened to kill his girlfriend and bury her in lime. >> reporter: the resulting column, which for the first time publicly connected the missing women on ida's list with the west mesa bone field, hit the front page one month after the first bone was found. Furthermore, Police encountered Blea nearly 140 times between 1990 and 2009, often in drug-heavy areas that the victims were known to frequent. but most of the women who worked albuquerque's war zone, fellow travelers who might have helped ida find the missing, were too drug addled to provide useful leads. >> she says i have some bad news for you. >> so you told michelle she couldn't come over? dupixent is not a steroid, and it continuously treats your eczema even when you can't see it. ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) The notes are written on paper tags, tributes to the nine women, two teenage girls and unborn child found buried 10 years ago atop a New Mexico mesa. for the moments that mattered most to her daughter, angelica. Prosecutors said Carballo killed him out of revenge for the murder of her husband, Orlando Mesa. The west mesa murders are the killings of eleven women whose remains were found buried in 2009 in the desert on the west mesa of albuquerque, new mexico, united states.several suspects have been named, but none were arrested or charged. Fred Reynolds was a pimp who knew one of the missing women and reportedly had photos of missing sex workers; he died of natural causes in January 2009. other times because she simply didn't show up. A two-hour NBC Dateline special about the 2014 Fayetteville murder of James Allan Chambers II will air Friday at 9 p.m. . According to satellite photos, the last victim was buried in 2005. then five. Due to the 2008 housing bubble collapse, development on the West Side halted before housing could be built at the burial site. >> reporter: and so she learned, about the lives of the women on the street. >> hi. forgotten by almost everyone but her. soon could be months. they came up with their profile of who they thought we were looking for, including that profile was a white male. and that was the last time i seen cinnamon. >> and you thought, this is it. One of the suspects, Joseph Blea, was arrested on Albuquerques Central Avenue for exposing himself to a woman. >> because this guy had complete, freedom or he thought nobody's going to come out here? >> somebody that lives here? The serial murders of 11 women in the West Mesa area of Albuquerque will be featured in a two-hour edition of NBC's Dateline tonight. >> maybe there are women out there who aren't on any list. >> reporter: such was the mystery of the women on stal detective ida lopez's growing list of the lost. whenever a lost soul was found. >> frightening. and then three. >> reporter: caught between the pressure to keep the public informed and the need to prevent key details from leaking out to cranks and copycats who routinely clogged tip lines, commander feist found himself scheduling sensitive excavation, work in the off hours, when he knew cameras would not be looking over his shoulder. Still, authorities have not given up. it's where they needed somebody, and it worked out, you know, for me. The Untold Truth Of The West Mesa Murders. except for one tantalizing tidbit. every life is a mystery. grasping at smoke. in 2006, years after being caught in the act of choking one prostitute, lorenzo montoya was caught in the company of a dead one. According to police reports, she might have gone by Mimi or Chocolate while staying at the Ranger Motel. >> so many young women missing. Edwards was classified as an endangered runaway from Lawton, Oklahoma in 2003 and was last seen with three sex workers in Aurora, Colorado in May 2004. eight. -i'm sorry? According to A&E, Jaramillo and a woman named Christine Barber founded an organization to protect sex workers in New Mexico after the discovery of the West Mesa victims in 2009. >> reporter: dan valdez, who'd been wondering for years where his daughter was, saw his most cherished hopes and his most dreaded fears placed on a collision course. it's the same instinct that drew her to police work years ago, when she was a kid, growing up in albuquerque. is that what we're looking at here, is you're interested in seeing what photos this man took and whether he found anything in them? but ever since her early days in uniformed patrol, ida lopez has called them her girls. In 2007, before the harrowing discovery, the detective reportedly claimed that she had a file of more than 17 women, whom she referred to as "her girls," with similar backgrounds of addiction or prostitution who went missing between 2001 and 2006 from the Albuquerque streets. >> lives alone or is away from home for extended periods of time. Many had gone into sex work or had run away from home years before they died. that changed when michelle failed to show up for angelica's seventh birthday party. eventually, ida and the cold case detective were able to persuade the department to let them form an unofficial task force, where once a month they met with other agencies, including the fbi. Uploaded by In February 2009, her body was identified. Ida Lopez, a missing persons detective from the Alberquerque Police Department, became increasingly attached to the unsolved homicide of 11 women and an unborn fetus, whose remains were discovered in one of the city's deserts back in 2009. and that's when angelica looked at me and started crying. Her daughter had found womens clothing and jewelry in their home, with some families later revealing that the victims jewelry was missing. so you get a lot of that. it's unlikely that any of the balloonists who float out over the west mesa area spend much time studying the details of the sandy desert floor below. they had literally spent weeks in the trenches looking for bones at that abandoned construction site. I think there's a Disappeared episode relating to it as well. >> reporter: it would take more than diligent detective work to find those answers. and the editor didn't say a whole lot. activia. There are so many episodes online but I can't find this one, http://www.nbcnews.com/watch/dateline/somebodys-daughter-part-1-254001731808. Ross wasnt sure the bone was human, but knew it could be. what had i been doing? Downtown Albuquerque as seen from the West Mesa. >> we believe so. West Mesa murder victims Evelyn Salazar, left, and Cinnamon Elks. >> that really sends a chill up and down your spine. i got scared. if she comes and stays, i'm going to leave. anybody that was arrested for prostitution, criminal solicitation, anything like. probably had some brush with law enforcement. Tonight's Dateline http://datl.in/fSpdzC, Anyone with information on the West Mesa murders is urged to contact (505)-768-2450 or. Evelyn Salazar disappeared in the spring of 2004 with her 15-year-old cousin Jamie Barela after police said they went to a park together. there's no way. the fall of 2005 was one of those times. The case reportedly began in 2005 when Lopez was handed files of a few missing women, one of whom was a 25-year-old prostitute named Michelle Valdez from New Mexico's largest city, Alberquerque. >> dan, she was i.d. >> reporter: a time frame, 2003 to early 2005, and 11 sets of bones. "Dateline" aired a two-hour show on the murders a gruesome case where the remains of 11 women and an unborn fetus were found buried in the desert near New Mexico's largest city in December. ", "Accused serial rapist, West Mesa murder suspect sentenced to 36 years in rape case", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=West_Mesa_murders&oldid=1140315217, This page was last edited on 19 February 2023, at 14:32. the killer, whoever he was, and police naturally assumed the killer was male, had a five-year head start. lending tree made lenders compete for my business and i ended up with a loan that saved me over $9000 and no more credit card debt. we approached the vehicle, open the door, the first words out of this girl's mouth, who's a known prostitute, was that he was trying to kill her. The West Mesa killings occurred from 2001 - 2005, and the serial killer responsible has never been caught. every fall as the. >> reporter: when christine ross decided to take her dog ruca for a walk. -what? West Mesa murder case reaches ten year anniversary. The special will include exclusive interviews with 28-year-old Chambers . don't wait. this is storied territory, where native american tribes, conquistadors, and cowboys once roamed. >> no. so, let's make this the summer of loving your gut. Ultimately, a lack of evidence failed to pin the murders on Blea, who is serving a 90-year sentence for sexual assault cases from the 1980s and 1990. missing persons, you know, was busy. >> reporter: that he once had a daughter named michelle who was the light of his life. what one little chew can do. >> no.n' not at all. and by the summer of 2009 the fbi and the city of albuquerque were offering $100,000 to anyone who could help them catch and convict the man responsible for killing the west mesa women. tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems, including eye pain or changes in vision. It plans to tie them to fencing near the crime scene Saturday ahead of a gathering to mark the anniversary. there could be others. she hunted the guilty. >> not for you. and we know a few that have a, history of murdering the girls who frequent the truck stops. i mean $9000! The victims included two teenagers and a pregnant woman. >> but while police try to prove it, another attack. >> reporter: but what kind of man is capable of killing is disposing of 11 women without somebody noticing something. and one of the things that those girls all had in common was that they were all attractive and blond and white and didn't have any criminal record. Neither woman was. and i said, you know, what are you talking about? >> but it might not have been a nice thing? -keith used to be great to road-trip with. >> reporter: sticking up for victims comes naturally to ida lopez. Gilbert Gallegos, an Albuquerque police spokesman, said detectives receive hundreds of tips in the case each year, and continue to follow different leads while retesting evidence as DNA and other investigative technology advances. but two years later, in 2004, when most of the women on detective ida lopez's list were disappearing, the images show tire tracks leading from this road to a few bare spots in the vegetation. Details of Disappearance. by then dan and michelle's mother were divorced, and dan was raising michelle and camilln alone while working days at the juvenile detention center. an amusement park so he stepped on the dr. scholl's kiosk. it was when the company returned to the site to fix the runoff problem that they inadvertently brought some bones to the surface, where five months later those bones were discovered by christine ross and her dog ruca. it's a quote familiar to detectives everywhere. memorial service organized by Street Safe New Mexico. >> i came out here looking for my cousin, and i bumped into cinnamon, and she had told me that -- that the girls were getting their heads cut off and tooken to the mesa. There has been very little publicity. career. American convicted of murder on death row, Dr. Phil: Was She an Accomplice to Murder? if the serial killer who preyed on their city is still alive, he's probably moved on to another hunting ground. happy birthday that september angelica celebrated her sixth birthday. because deep within your skin an overly sensitive immune system could be the cause. City of AlbuquerqueThe 11 victims whose remains were discovered at the West Mesa site in 2009. The West Mesa murders have yet to be solved. In one incident years before the West Mesa murders, police searched his car after a woman said he had exposed himself to her. and for them. i sat in many waiting rooms, and i said, i don't want to know what their sessions were about. >> and i can understand it. All they ever found, however, were the bones and DNA of 11 people. Replies analysing and speculating over the mystery and possible explanations are encouraged. -what a sign, huh? In 2006 there were reportedly dirt trails leading from his trailer park to the site. http://www.rrobserver.com/news/article_2d7213ea-a0dc-11e3-aa48-001a4bcf887a.html. aleve pm. a detective named ida lopez. help heal your skin from within. and because her wisdom teeth had not fully developed, wendy knew this jane doe was probably only 14 or 15 years old when she, died. [9][22] They confiscated "tens of thousands" of photos from the man, who reportedly used to visit the state fair in Albuquerque. >> correct. we weren't as close.enec because of the drugs. now that's simple, easy, awesome. Ross wasn't sure the bone was human, but knew it could be. and nights and weekends playing steel guitar with his country band, cimarron. >> a third one. love for your gut. All but one of the victims of the West Mesa murders were born and raised in New Mexico and were Hispanic. high school, college. >> reporter: this killer had seemingly left nothing behind but a pile of dry bones. >> reporter: the target of the search warrant was a local joplin, missouri photographer who had allegedly been in albuquerque to take pictures during the city's 2004 balloon fiesta. so why am i still thinking about this? >> sometimes ida lopez simply can't wait for sunday. To this day, law enforcement officials have been unable to discover the true identity of the murderer, despite the fact that they have a list of potential suspects, two of whom are. The tragic truth was that sex workers made for easy targets, and are often distanced from relatives while communities are blind to their disappearance. To this day, the case remains unsolved. The case remains unsolved till date, with eight girls still missing. what's going on out here? >> reporter: but that unfortunately will never happen. a name and face detective babcock knew quite well from an encounter in 1999, when babcock was working the vice unit in albuquerque. Ida Lopez previously appeared on Dateline in an episode on the West Mesa tragedy which aired in December, 2010. let's get to be each other's support system. Afterwards, Wozniak dismembered Herrs body by removing his limbs and head. Edwards was from Oklahoma, but was known to have been in Texas and Colorado before ending up in Albuquerque. and ida lopez couldn't help but wonder if these dry bones were the women she'd been looking for. short lady. >> well, just a few minutes ago albuquerque police left the dig site after they say they'd met all of the goals that they set. n.d then there was the service part, the helping people part of police work. >> no. i mean, that's not exactly, you know, the premier detective job. The mysteries surrounding the West Mesa Murders, an unsolved case of 11 female bodies discovered in a desert graveyard near Albuquerque in 2009. soon could be years. her face bore the kind of sores that suggested she'd been hitting the crack pipe.ug >> when did you notice things were going wrong? The crime episode will also show how the murder of another man named Ilan Nissim is connected to this case.