Missing Person Photos
A missing person is a person who has disappeared and whose status as alive or dead cannot be confirmed as their location and condition are unknown. A person may go missing through a voluntary disappearance, or else due to an accident, crime, death in a location where they cannot be found (such as at sea), or many other reasons. In most parts of the world, a missing person will usually be found quickly. While criminal abductions are some of the most widely reported missing person cases, these account for only 2 to 5 percent of missing children in Europe.
By contrast, some missing person cases remain unresolved for many years. Laws related to these cases are often complex since, in many jurisdictions, relatives and third parties may not deal with a person's assets until their death is considered proven by law and a formal death certificate issued. The situation, uncertainties, and lack of closure or a funeral resulting when a person goes missing may be extremely painful with long-lasting effects on family and friends.
A number of organizations seek to connect, share best practices, and disseminate information and images of missing children to improve the effectiveness of missing children investigations, including the International Commission on Missing Persons, the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), as well as national organizations, including the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the US, Missing People in the UK, Child Focus in Belgium, and The Smile of the Child in Greece.
Resources for Missing Persons
According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day.
Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends.
Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.
Missing Person Case Updates with Photos
Anita Mary Luchessa
Luchessa, date, approximate 1972; Mary Pesce; Ed Kemper, date, approximate 1973
Date Missing 05/07/1972
Missing From
Berkeley, California
Missing Classification Endangered Missing
Sex Female
Race
White
Date of Birth 10/29/1953 (68)
Age 18 years old
Height and Weight 5'1, unknown weight
Clothing/Jewelry Description A red shirt and white bib overalls.
Markings and/or Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Luchessa wears gold-rimmed eyeglasses.
Details of Disappearance Luchessa disappeared with her friend, Mary Anne Pesce, from Berkeley, California on May 7, 1972.
The two young women, both students at Fresno State University, were hitchhiking when they were picked up by serial killer Edmund Emil "Ed" Kemper III. Photos of Pesce and Kemper are posted with this summary.
Kemper drove Luchessa and Pesce to a secluded wooded area near Alameda, California, where he stabbed and strangled both of them to death. He later dismembered their corpses in his apartment and dumped them near Loma Prieta Mountain. They were his third and fourth victims; his grandparents were his first.
Kemper would ultimately murder three more female college students, a fifteen-year-old girl, his mother and his mother's friend before turning himself in to police. He was convicted of eight counts of murder and sentenced to eight consecutive of life in prison, and remains incarcerated.
Pesce's skull was found in a wooded area on Loma Prieta Mountain in August 1972, but no trace of Luchessa has ever been located.
Investigating Agency
Santa Cruz Sheriff's Department
Other
The Santa Cruz Sentinel
Find a Grave
Missing Person Photos
A missing person is a person who has disappeared and whose status as alive or dead cannot be confirmed as their location and condition are unknown. A person may go missing through a voluntary disappearance, or else due to an accident, crime, death in a location where they cannot be found (such as at sea), or many other reasons. In most parts of the world, a missing person will usually be found quickly. While criminal abductions are some of the most widely reported missing person cases, these account for only 2 to 5 percent of missing children in Europe.
By contrast, some missing person cases remain unresolved for many years. Laws related to these cases are often complex since, in many jurisdictions, relatives and third parties may not deal with a person's assets until their death is considered proven by law and a formal death certificate issued. The situation, uncertainties, and lack of closure or a funeral resulting when a person goes missing may be extremely painful with long-lasting effects on family and friends.
A number of organizations seek to connect, share best practices, and disseminate information and images of missing children to improve the effectiveness of missing children investigations, including the International Commission on Missing Persons, the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), as well as national organizations, including the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the US, Missing People in the UK, Child Focus in Belgium, and The Smile of the Child in Greece.
Resources for Missing Persons
According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day.
Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends.
Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.
Missing Person Case Updates with Photos