Rachael Cruise, 32, was last seen alive in Pittsburg, California on December 13, 1998. Her body was found two days later in a ditch off California Avenue in an isolated industrial area. She was described as a white woman with a history of drug use and a strained relationship with her family; she lived on 10th Street with her mother and brother and was known to local sex workers though she had no known history of prostitution.

Her body showed no obvious signs of injury or sexual assault, and there were no indications of a struggle at the scene. Authorities awaited the coroner’s report to determine the exact cause of death. Cruise’s death came amid the discovery of other female victims in the area, including 15-year-old Lisa Norrell and 27-year-old Jessica Frederick, raising concern about a possible serial offender.

Investigators looked into a contemporaneous beating of a woman found injured in a portable toilet in Bay Point; that survivor described her attacker as a Hispanic male driving a dark Chevrolet Monte Carlo. No arrests have been announced in Cruise’s murder. Did anyone in Pittsburg at the time have information about Cruise’s movements on December 13, 1998?