It’s been more than six years since a Jane Doe was found along Sulphur Creek Road in the Whites Creek area of Davidson County in Tennessee.
It was Saturday, September 8, 2018.
“This couple was driving down the road and they happened to see some birds pulling something into the middle of the road and they thought it looked kind of odd, so, you know, they stopped,” Detective Matthew Filter of the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) told Dateline. “But then they got out and went and looked and they realized it was a human skull that [the birds] were pulling into the road. And then when they looked over in the direction from where the birds came, they saw the rest of the body -- in the ditch.”
The couple called the police and the MNPD responded to the scene. “The state of the remains when she was found were—she was in a very advanced state of decomposition,” Det. Filter said. “She was definitely unrecognizable.”
The detective said that they estimate the Jane Doe had been there for 5-10 days. “That was based off of some interviews done with some neighbors in the area and knowing that the county road crew had come through there and cut grass—cut the grass along the sides of the road,” he said. “We believe she was dumped after that, so that kind of gave us a rough time window.”
Detective Filter says nothing else was found at the scene. “Whoever dumped her down there, I think, was very familiar with that area and knew that that was a very desolate road and that you could dump her, and cover her up a little bit, and she probably wouldn’t be found for quite a while,” he told Dateline.
Filter says an official cause of death has never been released. “We’re working it as though it’s a homicide,” he added.
The Jane Doe was fully clothed, decked out in Vanderbilt University clothing. The only thing missing were her shoes. The MNPD has the case featured on their website and lists the clothing items. “She wore a black 1/4 zip Under Armor brand top with “VANDY” in gold stitching in capital letters under the white Vanderbilt “V” within the gold star, as well as black leggings that had the white Vanderbilt “V” inside the gold star in a wide-spread geometric pattern. She also wore a ZooZatZ brand black running hip band with zip pocket with the Vanderbilt logo,” the site states. She was also wearing a green and black leopard print sports bra, a black undershirt, and white socks.
The Jane Doe began to be referred to as “Vandy Jane Doe.”
Authorities checked with the university to see if they had any missing students. “Vanderbilt was never able to find any—any students that were on their roster that were missing or never showed up for class or anything like that,” Det. Filter said.
Initially, authorities believed the Jane Doe was 15-25 years old, but that was later revised. “The remains were reexamined by an anthropologist,” Det. Filter said. They now believe the Jane Doe was actually 21-35 years old.
“Her DNA is uploaded into CODIS and we’ve been working on forensic genetic genealogy with her for a couple years now,” Det. Filter said. “We’ve been trying to build her—build out her family.” He’s hopeful they’ll be able to make a positive ID. “We’re getting closer,” he said. “We’re getting reference samples submitted to try to continue building her tree out. So, I mean, we’re getting—we’re getting there, but it is very slow.”
The Metro Nashville Police Department isn’t the only group interested in identifying Vandy Jane Doe.
Tia Lorenzen and Jacob Darby are involved with a non-profit organization called DNA Investigative Solutions, which has details about Vandy Jane Doe’s case listed on the top of their featured unidentified cases page. They each reached out to Dateline about the case.
“We’re just still heavily interested in seeing that she gets identified, since she’s kind of what brought us all together,” Tia told Dateline.
Tia and Jacob, along with a few others, met in a Facebook group dedicated to missing persons and unidentified cases. They’re located all over the country — Tia in Virginia, Jacob in Texas. “One of the groups that we were in was focused on the Vandy Jane Doe. And so that’s where we all met,” Tia said. “And then kind of all came back together to work on this nonprofit together.”
Tia has a big interest in genetic genealogy, because she has used it in her own life. “I’ve always been fascinated with genealogy, and I’m adopted,” Tia said. “So, some years back, I took a DNA kit and was able to identify my biological father, and then in turn, helped other families and other family members identify their parents.”
Jacob’s interest in Doe cases also comes from a personal connection. “In November of 2015, my uncle actually came up missing,” he said. Ervin Brittnacher was last seen on November 6, 2015, in Alvin, Texas. “And we searched, and we searched.”
Texas EquuSearch was part of the search for Ervin. Six years later, remains were found in an undeveloped area of Texas. Those remains were unidentifiable and became known as John Doe. Eventually, authorities were able to identify the remains as belonging to Ervin. “It took us seven years to be able to find him,” Jacob said of his uncle. “So since that happened, I started working on missing people. I recently started also working on John and Jane Does. I’m actually in college right now getting my associates in criminal justice.”
When asked what stood out to them about Vandy Jane Doe’s case, Tia said she thinks it’s because it’s hard to believe no one would recognize this woman. “It’s recent -- it’s 2018,” she said. “[This was] somebody that would have been active in social circles, employment, having a residence somewhere. And yet, you know, she was still unable to be identified.”
According to DNA Investigative Solutions, Vandy Jane Doe’s body was exhumed in 2022 and her DNA was tested by Othram Labs. “We know that Vandy is about half African American, half European with the European primarily being Italian,” Tia said. The results showed she could be associated with these regions: Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, and Texas.
They were also able to rule out some missing persons as being Vandy Jane Doe. Tia shared a post that one of her colleagues at DNA Investigative Solutions put out on Facebook. In it, they list some of the missing people who have been excluded, including Phoenix Coldon, Shariece Clark, Asha Degree, Ebony Giddens, Darian Hudson, Alexis Scott, and Mercedes Toliver — all of whom have been featured in Dateline’s Missing in America and Cold Case Spotlight digital series.
Detective Filter confirmed that the missing women listed above have either been eliminated by DNA, dental records, or have profiles that would have hit in their databases if they were a match to Vandy Jane Doe.
Tia is hopeful that greater awareness and attention on Vandy Jane Doe’s case will be key to identifying the young woman. “I’d love to see her get her name back,” she said.
She also encourages more people to do DNA tests. “With African American DNA, the number of people testing are much—it’s much lower,” Tia said. The more samples there are to test, the greater the likelihood of finding a connection becomes. “So we’ve also been trying to bring awareness to that, trying to get more people testing, get more knowledge out there on what DNA testing is, where you can upload—to help with law enforcement.”
Jacob simply wants to help others who are going through the same thing his family did when his uncle vanished. “My goal is to help as many families get the closure and justice they need and deserve,” he said.
Detective Filter’s department was involved in the recent identification of Pecan Valley John Doe — whose body had been found in December 2010 — as missing Tennessee State University student, Marcus Rutledge, who had been missing since June 1998.
He’s hoping for the same success with Vandy Jane Doe. “I think we’ll get this case solved. I have confidence we will get her identified. It’s just a matter of being patient and keep working—working at it,” Filter said. “I think that it’s just a matter of time and it’s just a matter of making the right family connections there and we’ll have her identified.”
“We’ll, from there, be able to figure out how she ended up where she did,” he said.
Anyone with information about Vandy Jane Doe’s identity or case should contact Det. Matthew Filter at 615-862-7803 or the Metro Nashville Police Department Cold Case Unit at 615-862-7329.
If you have a story to share with Dateline, please submit it here.