Reet Jurvetson in her mid-teensCourtesy of family
Over the agonizing years, the Jurvetson family of Montreal worried and waited. Free-spirited Reet Jurvetson, a 19-year-old former Girl Guide with a trusting soul and artistic bent, had gone to California in 1969, only to vanish without a word. Now, decades after the case went cold and the family's hopes dimmed, her relatives have made a harrowing discovery. Ms. Jurvetson was the victim of a savage killing, and police even probed a possible link to the notorious Manson murder cult.
Police say they have no evidence tying the death to Charles Manson for now. Still, for the first time in 46 years, the murder victim known simply as Jane Doe No. 59 has been identified. Police say it is Ms. Jurvetson, a child of Estonian immigrants who grew up in Montreal, worked at Canada Post in Toronto and set off to California in search of adventure in the closing months of the 1960s.
She had been stabbed more than 150 times.
The news has come as small comfort to her only surviving immediate family member, 73-year-old Anne Jurvetson, who lives in Quebec and whose DNA allowed police to positively identify her sister.
"Finally, after all these years, we are faced with hard fact. My little sister was savagely killed," Anne Jurvetson said in a statement. "And now I have a lot to come to terms with. I can hardly grasp how she could have been stabbed over 150 times. It is devastating."
The family declined to comment in an interview on the death. However, a relative, reached at the family's home on Wednesday, asked for privacy. "You have to understand what we're going through," said the woman, who would not give her name. "It's a time of sorrow."
Ms. Jurvetson's disappearance had remained a source of anguish for loved ones. Born in Sweden, Ms. Jurvetson was the youngest child of refugee parents who fled Estonia during the Second World War and moved to Montreal in 1951. Growing up, the green-eyed girl was skilled at drawing, sewed her own clothes and sang in a choir, developing an adventurous streak that led her to leave home for Toronto after high school.
By 1969, she had landed in Los Angeles. She sent her parents a postcard saying she was happy and had a nice apartment, and not to worry about her. That was the last they heard from her.
The family assumed she was seeking out her independence, and waited until she got in touch. "As months and then years passed, we imagined that she was making a new life for herself," Anne Jurvetson said. They never dreamed she had been killed. But time passed without a sign. "We grieved her disappearance for many long years."
A breakthrough came last year, when friends came across a postmortem photo online and linked it to Ms. Jurvetson. The family contacted police in Los Angeles.
Detectives with the Los Angeles Cold Case Homicide Unit interviewed Charles Manson in prison as part of their investigation. Ms. Jurvetson's body was found in November, 1969, a few miles from the Manson murder spree, which occurred a few months earlier. Mr. Manson was convicted in the deaths of seven people, including actress Sharon Tate, wife of director Roman Polanski.
Police said Wednesday there is no evidence for now to link Ms. Jurvetson's death to the gruesome mass murders. "Their encounter with Manson did not produce anything fruitful and the investigation remains open and ongoing," the LAPD said in a statement.
Police say they are searching for someone named "Jean" or "John," whom Ms. Jurvetson met in Toronto before she set off for Los Angeles.
Anne Jurvetson said in her statement that she hopes publicity will lead investigators to her sister's killer. "I am horrified to think of how terribly frightened and alone she must have felt as she died," she said. But at least Jane Doe No. 59 now has a name, she added. "She had one all along, but no one knew."
With a report from Tu Thanh Ha in Toronto