Frances Franny Brown, 22, was last seen on November 11, 1989, in Rochester’s Lyell Avenue area, a neighborhood then known for street-level sex work. Days later her body was recovered in the Genesee River Gorge; reports said she was found nude except for her boots, and investigators concluded she had been beaten and strangled.

Her death came amid a sequence of disappearances and recoveries beginning in 1988, with several victims found along river corridors and natural drop-offs that suggested the killer used familiar terrain. Witnesses in the area reported Brown left with a customer known only by the street names Mike or Mitch, though attention soon shifted toward a single suspect as similar recoveries continued.

Arthur Shawcross was arrested January 5, 1990, and later charged and tried in connection with multiple murders discovered around the Genesee River; he was convicted in Monroe County in December 1990. Did anyone who knew Franny or worked the Lyell Avenue area that night see her leave with someone identified as Mike or Mitch?