Tammy Jo Alexander was the name of a 16 year old girl from Florida who was murdered back in 1979. She became known as the Caledonia Jane Doe as her body was found in Caledonia, New York, and she remained unidentified until 2015. Her murder remains unsolved.
Tammy Jo Alexander was born on November 2, 1963 in Atlanta, Georgia to her parents Barbara Jenkins and Joe Alexander. She also had a half sister on her mother’s side named Pamela Dyson. Tammy’s parents later split up and they later began living in Brooksville, Florida. After their mother became addicted to medication she was taking, she became suicidal and emotionally volatile, the two sisters found comfort in each other. Pamela eventually left this home situation to go live with her paternal grandmother at about 11 years old. When she left, Pamela assumed that Tammy later escaped and found a new life as well, but she continued living with her mother and stepfather for time after.
Going into her teenage years, Tammy began working at a truck stop as a waitress along side her mother. She also began running away from home with one of her close friends Laurel Nowell. Laurel stated that the two once hitchhiked all the way to California together. When they arrived, Laurel called her parents, who then bought plane tickets for the girls to come back home.
In early 1979, Tammy ran away from her home in Brooksville, Florida again and began working at a prison ministry in Georgia. While working here, she would call and leave voicemails for her boyfriend who was still living in Florida. Her boyfriend states that in these calls, Tammy sounded happy and did not seem to be in danger. Tammy eventually leaves the prison ministry in the summer and was not heard from after that. It is believed that Tammy either hitchhiked back to Florida or out west after this.
Either the beginning of October or November of 1979, Tammy ends up somewhere in Upstate New York. On November 9, 1979, Tammy is seen at a diner in Lima, New York alongside an older man. The waitress who served them states that Tammy did not appear distressed or in any danger. Other people at the restaurant have also backed up the claim that Tammy was spotted there. Tammy was later killed sometime after leaving the diner with the unknown man.
On the morning of November 10, 1979, a farmer discovered the body of a young woman in his cornfield in Caledonia, New York. Based on her injuries, it was determined that the young woman was shot in the back of the head and then dragged into the cornfield where she was shot in the back. Her pockets were inside out, indicating that personal items were removed, including her identification. Due to heavy rainfall the night before, evidence, such as DNA, was washed away from the crime scene.
The young woman was said to have brown eyes and light brown shoulder length hair, which appeared to look like it had been dyed from blonde to brown. Her toenails were also polished a coral color. It was also noted that she had visible tan lines, indicating that she had previously lived somewhere that had a lot of sunlight exposure. Pollen found on the young woman’s jacket was tested and it was determined that the woman had previously been in the states of California, Arizona, and Florida.
Despite this information, the young woman could not be identified. She was later called The Caledonia Jane Doe or Cali Doe, and that remained her named for over 35 years.
In the 2010s, Tammy’s old friend Laurel began trying to find Tammy through social media, but she could not find her. Laurel then gets in contact with Tammy’s half sister Pamela to learn of her whereabouts, but Pamela tells her that she hadn’t been in contact with Tammy since she moved away when she was 11. Tammy and Pamela’s mother Barbara passed away on January 17, 1998 and in her obituary, it was stated that Tammy was deceased, which many of her family had assumed.
In August 2014, Laurel and Pamela went to the Hernando County Sheriffs office and learned that no missing persons report had been filed for Tammy, so they filed one. An artist named Carl Koppelman later became invested in the case of the Caledonia Jane Doe. He sketched a very accurate facial reconstruction of the Caledonia Jane Doe. Carl later saw the missing persons report filed for Tammy in 2014 and realized that Tammy and the Jane Doe had a striking resemblance.
In 2015, after DNA samples were successfully taken from Caledonia Jane Doe’s body, it was tested and compared to that of Pamela Dyson’s and it was a match. Tammy Jo Alexander was finally identified on January 26, 2015.
On November 2, 2020, what would have been Tammy’s 57th birthday, the Livingston County Sheriff’s Office released audio recordings from voicemails that Tammy had left her boyfriend in the summer of 1979. These were released in hopes that someone would recognized Tammy’s voice and remember seeing her or her killer. A sketch of Tammy’s presumed killer was released to the public as well. He is described to be a white male between 5’8″ or 5’9″ wearing black wire-rimmed glasses. He was also said to be driving a tan station wagon. In 1984, infamous serial killer Henry Lee Lucas claimed to have killed Tammy, but there was no evidence linking him to her murder.
After decades of being unidentified, Tammy was finally given back her name thanks to multiple people, along with the great advancements in DNA testing that is now available. The last thing now is to figure out who did this to Tammy. Hope cannot be given up; if Tammy was identified after all these years, I believe her killer will be identified eventually too.
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