Two Decades old Cold Cases Re-opened...Six Skeletons Found

Two cold cases are reopened after cars containing six bodies that sank side by side but A DECADE APART, are found by chance after more than 40 years. They had lain undiscovered under an Oklahoma lake for over forty years. And now the discovery of two rusting vintage cars containing six bodies has reignited the mystery of how three teenagers and three other older people vanished more than four decades ago.

 Highway patrol officers testing their sonar equipment Foss Lake near Elk City, Oklahoma on Friday stumbled upon the rusting 1969 Camaro and a Chevrolet dating back to the 1950s. Inside the Camaro were three bodies believed to be of local teenagers who vanished after going out for a drive in 1970. Inside the Chevrolet were three more bodies – thought to be a 69-year-old man and his two friends who went missing in the state in the late 1950s or early 1960s, at least a decade before  the teenagers landed beside them in a watery grave.

 

Three bodies believed to be those of local teenagers who disappeared in 1970 were discovered inside the Camaro
 

The other car - a 1950 model Chevrolet - contained three bodies believed to be those of Washita County residents who went missing in the early 1960s

 

Police say the Camaro matches the vehicle associated with the three missing teenagers who disappeared on November 10 1970. They say they have confirmed the identity of at least one of the victims however details are yet to be released.
Authorities have not formally identified who all of the remains belong to but the local paper has made a clear connection between the discovered Camaro and the teens.  Jimmy Allen Williams 16, Thomas Michael Rios, 18, and Leah Gail Johnson, 18, all went missing after going for a drive in Jimmy’s blue 1969 Camaro on November 20, 1970. They are still listed as missing persons and were thought to have been headed to a football game in nearby Elk City but also could have detoured to go hunting at Foss Lake.

 

The bodies discovered in the Camaro are believed to be those of (L-R) Jimmy Williams, 16,  Leah Gail Johnson and Thomas Michael Rios who disappeared in 1970
 

Missing: Jimmy Williams poses next to his then brand-new Camaro as a 16-year-old in 1970
 

A 1950s Chevrolet similar to the older car which was believed to contain the remains of three people from Washita County, who went missing in the early 1960s

 

"It's been under water for 40 years. It's a mucky mess," Custer County Sheriff Bruce Peoples told KWEY radio.
In addition to the Custer County Sheriff's Department, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation, and the state medical examiner's office were on scene Tuesday.

Authorities discovered the cars accidentally as Betsy Randolph, spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, said dive teams were at Foss Lake conducting training with sonar when they came upon the vehicles last week.
"So they went back and did a scheduled dive today  to recover the cars. When they pulled the first car out of the water, they found bones in it," she said.

"When they pulled the second car out, another set of bones was discovered. The divers then went back in the water and searched around and found a skull," she added.

Other victims: Local news reports claim that the three people inside the Chevrolet were a 69-year-old man from Elk City and his two friends

 Police divers were sent down to investigate the cars before they were pulled out of the lake and the bones were discovered

Investigation: Custer County Sheriff Bruce Peoples said the decomposed nature of the cars made it difficult to positively identify them at the scene

The two cars are seen above. The remains found inside are to be turned over to the medical examiner's office who are expected to use DNA from surviving family members to identify the skeletons
 

Jimmy Allen Williams, 16, and his friends Thomas Michael Rios, 18, and Leah Gail Johnson, 18, disappeared on On Nov. 20, 1970.  Jimmy, who had a part time job at a grocery store, had bought himself a brand new Camaro muscle car six days earlier.
He told his parents he was going to a football game, but according to reports at the time, he backed up his car to the back door of the home and loaded several shotguns into the trunk with the help of one of his younger brothers. According to one of his friends called Wayne, the three friends were actually going on a shooting trip.
Wayne said he was had planned to join them but changed his mind at the last minute because there was not enough room for him in the car. The three teenagers never returned home.
 

The remains were turned over to the medical examiner's office who are expected to use DNA from surviving family members to identify the skeletons.
"We thought it was just going to be just a case of stolen vehicles and that's not what it turned out to be, obviously, "Randolph said.
Custer County Sheriff Bruce Peoples said he believes the bodies found in the Camaro are those of the three teens who went missing in 1970.
He said, "The decomposed nature of the cars makes it difficult to positively identify here at the scene."

Local woman Kim Carmichael was a friend of the Camaro's owner, 16-year-old Jimmy Williams. She told Oklahoma's Newsnine.com, "I just remember how devastated everybody was. We lived in a little town ... Nothing like that ever happened in Sayre."
At the time of the disappearance, Ms Carmichael's father was the undersheriff in nearby Beckham County where the teens were last seen.  He died in 2003 never knowing what happened.
Ms Carmichael added: "He said there was nothing ... There were no leads, no nothing. He said it was just like they vanished into thin air. I can't imagine what theWilliams' family was going through but I could see what my dad was going through."

Drudging up clues: There were five skeletons between the two cars
 

Scene: The cars weer found in Foss Lake near Elk City in western Oklahoma

Oklahoma Highway Patrol said they are hoping the discovery will offer some relief to families who may have gone decades wondering where a missing loved one was.
Spokesman Betsy Randolph added, "We're hoping that this is going to bring some sort of closure to families out there who have been waiting to hear about missing people. If that's the case, then we're thrilled we were able to do that for them".

The medical examiner had called a number of relatives of possible victims to the scene, many of whom said that they never lost hope.
"We never gave up. We always wanted some clue that somebody knew something,"  said Debbie McManaman, a possible victim's granddaughter.

 It goes to prove that people do not really disappear. They always leave some trace that they existed.