LAKE COUNTY, FLA. – Sheriff’s investigators have identified the remains of a young woman discovered in 1984 through a DNA data base who may have been murdered by a serial killer.
The body of “Judy Doe,” was found by a dirt road near Lake Dorr in Altoona on April 18, 1984. She has since been identified as Rebecca Sue Hill of Arkansas, according to the sheriff’s office. Her family mistakenly identified the body of another person in Little Rock as Rebecca in 1981 or 1982. She would have been 16 or 17 years old at that time.
Last year, detectives submitted DNA to private lab Othram Inc., after an unsuccessful attempt to identify her through skeletal reconstruction, dental records and other DNA searchers.
Researchers were able find a match with Hill’s sister.
Investigators have discovered that a suspected serial killer, Michael Romming, left Lake County 10 days before Hill’s body was found.
Romming died a few years ago in prison. He was convicted of stabbing another woman to death and leaving her body in the woods in Arkansas, said Lake Sheriff’s Detective Zachary Williams.
His story became publicized through an episode on NBC TV’s “Dateline” in the early 2000s. He is suspected of killing others in Texas, Michigan and Arkansas. He reportedly was willing to talk about a case in Florida if authorities took the death penalty off the table. That didn’t happen, however, so it remains a mystery.
The Arkansas connection is part of that mystery.
“Is it just a weird coincidence that both victims were from Arkansas?” Williams said.
It is unknown how Hill came to Florida.
Williams is reaching out to police in Arkansas to learn more about the woman who was mistakenly identified as Hill.
It is not the first time a serial killer has come through Lake County, about 45 miles north of Orlando. Danny Rolling, the “Gainesville Ripper” who killed five University of Florida students in Alachua County, was halted briefly in a traffic stop by police near Lake Square Mall around the time of his murder spree in 1990.
The Sheriff’s Office currently has three other cases in the genetic genealogy process. “Julie Doe” was located in Clermont on September 25th, 1988, and is being investigated in the DNA Doe Project.
“Jane Doe” who was located in Sorrento on Dec. 7, 1991, in the Sorrento area. That case is being investigated with Othram.
Another case involves a sexual battery suspect from 2007, which is being worked with the help of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Parabon Nanolabs.