The Death of Jeanetta DePaula

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Jeannetta DePalma was born August 3, 1956 in Springfield Township,  New Jersey. Sadly, she was suspected to be murdered  4 days after her birthday in 1972. She had just turned 16 when she disappeared on August 7,  1972, after telling her mom that afternoon that she was gonna take a train to a friend’s house.  When Jeannetta did not arrive at her friend’s house that afternoon or come home,  her parents filed a missing person report with the Springfield Police Department.  Six weeks later, on September 19, Jeannetta’s remains were found atop a cliff inside of  Houdaille Quarry when a dog found her decomposing right forearm and handed it back to its owner. 

Several witnesses at the scene said that Jeannette´s remains were surrounded by a series of strange and possibly occult objects.  Most people believed that the remains were found inside a coffin-shaped perimeter of fallen branches and logs. Inside the perimeter were several small makeshift wooden crosses. Some Springfield residents later said that Jeannetta’s remains were found lying on a pentagon, surrounded by mutilated animal remains, but law enforcement denied that this was true.  After this, the Springfield Police Department began an investigation on Jeanetta’s autopsy after it couldn’t reveal her cause of death. Her remains and clothes showed no evidence of bone fractures, bullet wounds,  or knife stabs. No drugs were found next to or around the body.  For undisclosed reasons, the coroner suspected that strangulation was Jeannetta’s cause of death, leading the Union County Prosecutor’s office to treat her case as an unsolved homicide. The coroner also discovered a high level of lead in her remains, but no explanation was found for this occurrence.

Early in the investigation, Springfield Police received a tip that a homeless man was living in the woods near the quarry. This man was known to locals as “Red”, and it was alleged that he fled the campsite in the woods shortly after Jeannetta went missing. While the lead looked promising, Union County decided that Red had nothing to do with Jeannetta’s death. Investigators continued to try and find leads but no tips from the public, along with inconsistent stories, the case went cold. Despite rumors by Springfield Police regarding Jeannetta’s possible death of drug overdose, no drug paraphernalia was found  near or around the body and she was not known by friends or family to use any prescription drugs other than occasionally smoking marijuana. Jeannetta’s autopsy report makes no mention of possible drug overdose and medical examiner Bernard Ehrenberg went on record saying he suspected strangulation, as he could not rule it out during the autopsy of her remains. 

Two weeks after the discovery of Jeannette’s remains several newspapers, including the Newark Star-Ledger and the New York Daily News, began reporting that she may have been a victim of an occult sacrifice carried out either by Satanists or a local coven of witches. Rumors about the case set off panic in several Union County communities, which were still recovering from the shock of the John List murders only 10 months earlier. Then in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, Weird NJ magazine began to report on the case after receiving several anonymous letters regarding Jeannetta’s death. Editor and co-founder, Mark Morgan, began an investigation on the case and wrote about many purportedly suspicious details, including the allegations that Springfield Police had lost or destroyed the case file. The Springfield Police said that the file was lost due to flooding caused by Hurricane Floyd in 1999. Mark Moran then eventually teamed up with Weird NJ correspondent, Jesse Pollack, to write the book Death on the Devil’s Teeth: The Strange Murder That Shocked Suburban New Jersey. Through their research, Mark and Jesse discovered several instances of possible cover up connections to Jeannette’s unsolved murder, and previously unknown suspects. The crime lab reports that stains were found in her underwear, bra, blouse, and slacks that were  ”too decomposed for conclusive blood and semen examinations¨ in 1972. 

During the spring of 2021, convicted New Jersey killer, Richard Cottingham, made a series of written statements to journalist, Jesse P. Pollack, saying to him that he possibly might have abducted and killed Jeannetta while she was hitchhiking. Jesse forwarded this correspondence to the Union County Prosecutor’s office after Richard agreed to speak to investigators. They met him but there have been no updates about this. In 2021, The New York Daily News mentioned that an organization, named Justice for Jeannette DePalma, is dedicated to keeping her memory alive. The organizers continue to look for clues even as the case approaches the half-century mark and has gone cold.

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