Dolores Marie Wulff (née Rocha) (November 4, 1933 - c. July 31, 1979) was a woman whose torso and legs were discovered in Benicia, California, in September 1979.
She was identified via DNA comparison in 2020.
The partial skull of Tomye Smith, then unidentified, was discovered in 1983 close to where Dolores' remains were found. Both sets of remains were buried in the same plot, as they were presumed to belong to the same person.
Background[]
Wulff lived in Woodland, California, with her husband and children. On August 1, 1979, her husband Carl told family members that Dolores had fled in the night and would not be returning.
Dolores' children and extended family members believed that Carl was responsible for her disappearance and reported her missing to the police. Police investigations found an earring and a bloodstained blanket in the trunk of Carl's car, but they could not be conclusively linked to Dolores, and the District Attorney's office would not charge Carl with murder without a body.
In 1985, the family appealed to the Attorney General's office in Sacramento, which agreed to try the case. Carl was arrested on March 8, 1985, and his son attempted to convince him to confess. He refused to do so and was released on bail. Court proceedings continued until December but were eventually dismissed, as the judge ruled that the long interval between the initial investigations and Carl's eventual arrest violated his right to a speedy trial. Carl died in 2005.
Case[]
In 2019, internet sleuth Stacie Sherman noticed similarities between Dolores' disappearance and the remains found in Benicia six weeks later. This tip led Yolo County police to reopen the case, and her remains were exhumed in September 2020 to extract a DNA sample.
DNA testing of her remains ultimately matched a sample provided by her son, but also showed that the skull found in 1983 was not hers.
Gallery[]
Sources[]
- Dolores Wulff at the Doe Network
- Dolores Wulff at the Charley Project
- CBS Sacramento
- ESPN
- SFGate