Woman told friend someone was after her 39 years ago, CA cops say. She’s still missing
Thirty-nine years ago, Evelyn Joyce McDowell phoned a friend from a California bar with a chilling message.
McDowell, 22, dialed her friend from Chatter Box Bar in Clear Lake near Lucerne to tell them someone was “trying to get her,” according to a Nov. 15 Facebook post from the Winters Police Department.
“Soon after, the phone went dead,” police said.
McDowell’s friend reported her missing on Dec. 12, 1983, police said. Decades later, she’s still missing.
With the 39th anniversary of McDowell’s phone call on Nov. 14, 1983, police said they are asking for the public’s help for information about where she may be.
Mysterious message received
Days after the phone call, McDowell’s mother received her address book in the mail with a mysterious note, police said.
“Joyce, you don’t know me but I found this on the beach in Lucerne and thought you might want it. – Dave,” the note read, according to police.
After getting McDowell’s address book in the mail, her “family began asking her friends and acquaintances for information about Evelyn’s whereabouts,” according to a cold case file on the department’s website.
Others told the family McDowell was last “seen with friends in the Napa area,” police said. She had gotten out of the car after an argument with friends.
Investigation
Winters police, along with the Lake County Sheriff’s Office, investigated McDowell’s disappearance and “followed up on leads and possible sightings from 1984 through 1988,” police said.
Investigators ultimately tracked down the man behind the mysterious note attached to McDowell’s address book sent to her mother, but ruled him out as a suspect, according to the cold case file.
When police searched the area where the address book was found, they discovered “a ladies sock tied at both ends which had been filled with sand and rocks,” police said.
Investigators have also tried using DNA in their search for McDowell, police said. They got a DNA sample from McDowell’s brother, who had been stationed in Germany when his sister vanished, to add to her profile in the Department of Justice’s Missing or Unidentified Persons System.
At the time of her disappearance, McDowell was described as weighing 115 pounds and standing 5 feet 5 inches tall, police said. She was wearing blue denim jeans and a blue jacket, along with “dark oxford shoes.” She also has a “tattoo of a blue heart on her left shoulder, scar on left knee, scar on left forearm.”
Anyone with information is asked to call police at 530-794-6721.
Clear Lake is about 115 miles northwest of Sacramento.
This story was originally published November 17, 2022 at 11:18 AM with the headline "Woman told friend someone was after her 39 years ago, CA cops say. She’s still missing."
