Laureen Rahn was born on April 3, 1966, in Manchester, New Hampshire, the daughter of Judith Swanson and Peter Rahn. Her parents married and had Laureen very young, and shortly after her birth they moved to Florida. After the couple divorced, Judith returned to Manchester with her. By 1980, they were living in a three-story apartment building on Merrimack Street. She attended Parkside Junior High School and was said to be a good student and outgoing.
It is said that Laureen did not enjoy the change of environment, as she preferred the warmer climate of Florida, and according to a friend, she always hoped her father would “come get her” and take her back there. It seems clear that they did not have much contact with each other.
Disappearance
On April 26, 1980, one of Judith’s boyfriends—described as a squash player (although the media often reported him as a professional tennis player)—had a match in another city. Usually, when this happened, Laureen would accompany her mother and him, but on that day she chose to stay in town, and since she was growing more independent, Judith agreed.
According to reports, Laureen spent part of the day wandering around the city, at one point even “working” at a small market in exchange for alcohol. One article also stated that several family members checked in on her throughout the day.
That night, she invited a female friend and a male friend who brought wine and a case of beer, and they spent some time drinking (the exact time is unknown).
Judith and her boyfriend returned around 1:15 a.m. on the 27th and found the hallway lights unscrewed and the apartment door unlocked. She found this odd, but upon entering the apartment she saw nothing immediately wrong. As she passed by Laureen’s bedroom, she noticed a silhouette in the bed, apparently sleeping, which she naturally assumed was Laureen.
It was later determined that the lightbulbs on all three floors had been unscrewed.
However, when the boyfriend noticed that the back door was also open, Judith went to wake Laureen to find out what was going on—only to discover that the girl in the bed was actually Laureen’s friend, Kristen, and that Laureen herself was not in the apartment.
When questioned, Kristen said that she had been with Laureen and another male friend earlier and that after the boy left, the two girls lay down together on the bed until Laureen decided to go sleep on the couch, taking a sheet with her. (Indeed, there was a sheet on the couch.) But she said she didn’t remember anything else because of how intoxicated she was.
Judith and her boyfriend then drove around the streets looking for Laureen, but found no sign of her. Around 3:00 a.m., they saw a police car and decided to officially report her missing. The report was filed at 3:45 a.m.
She had left behind money, her purse, and her brand-new sneakers she had received for her birthday.
Developments
According to the male friend who had been with her at the apartment, around 12:30 a.m. on April 27, they were drinking in the living room when they heard voices in the hallway. Assuming it was Laureen’s mother and fearing getting into trouble, he left through the back doors, which Laureen opened for him. He also said he heard her lock them after he left. Another neighbor also reported hearing voices in the hall around that time.
On October 1, 1980, Laureen’s mother, Judith, discovered charges for three phone calls made from California.
Two were placed from a motel in Santa Monica, and one from a motel in Santa Ana—the latter being a call to a hotline for teenagers with sexual issues.
The physician who ran the hotline initially denied knowing anything but later changed his story years afterward.
In 1985, when contacted by Karole Jensen (Wings for Children), the doctor said that several runaway girls used to visit his wife. He suggested that one of them might have been Laureen.
He also claimed that Annie Sprinkle, sex educator and former adult film actress, might have information. Later investigations found no connection between Sprinkle and the case.
Judith received silent phone calls for years, always around 3:45 a.m. They increased during Christmas season. The calls stopped only after she changed her number.
Laureen’s aunt, Janet Roy, also received calls from a young girl asking to speak with her son, Michael. The girl always fell silent when he answered. Roy believed it was Laureen because she was the only one who called him “Mike.”
Jensen visited the motels from which the calls had been made and learned that one of them was used for filming by a known child pornographer nicknamed “Dr. Z,” though no link between him and the hotline was ever confirmed.
Theories
In a 2025 podcast, the hosts interviewed Michelle, a childhood friend of Laureen’s. She shared several revelations which, if true, change the context of the case:
– According to Michelle, she always understood that Laureen did not get along with her mother and wanted to “escape” from her and return to Florida, where she believed her father lived. Because of this, when Laureen disappeared, Michelle initially brushed it off, thinking she had finally managed to get back there. Only years later did she realize the situation was more serious.
-The family dynamics involved a lot of shouting among the relatives, and Michelle had the impression that Laureen was a “burden” to her mother. Judith also sold Laureen’s bicycle just one month after her disappearance.
– She worked with an English man named “Sam,” who compiled a full dossier on the case, interviewing more than 100 people connected to it and tracking down leads. He sent a Dropbox file in 2021 with his findings to the Manchester police but never heard back. In 2023, he discovered they had not even opened the email.
– Judith received a call from the producers of Unsolved Mysteries to feature Laureen’s case, but she never responded.
– Judith and Laureen reportedly had a very poor relationship. Michelle says that ever since she met the two, she had this impression and sensed that Laureen was trying to get away from her.
– Laureen’s father actually lived in Manchester, about 3 miles away, according to phone records.
– The male friend who was in the apartment with her died by suicide in 1985. (He was reportedly 18 in 1980.) According to the daughter of Kristen—the friend in bed the night Laureen disappeared—the girls had only known each other for two weeks, and there had also been another young man in the apartment. This was apparently unknown until then, and Kristen never revealed his identity.
– Several of Laureen’s friends mentioned someone named “Bob.” It was discovered that he was married to one of Laureen’s aunts, and he also slept with other aunts—including Judith. He was reportedly seen in front of the building on the day Laureen disappeared. He died in 2024 and had a long criminal history involving violence (domestic incidents, bar fights, etc.).
– Judith later married a strip-club owner, and after his death she became associated with an “entertainment” company.
SOURCES-
https://www.doj.nh.gov/bureaus/cold-case-unit/victim-list/laureen-rahn
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2256444/episodes/17733187-74-laureen-rahn-revisited
I live in Manchester (grew up about half an hour from here), and I'm about the same age as Laureen, so I very likely have mutual friends or acquaintances. Despite this, I only heard about the case through the online true crime community. The case has received relatively little coverage over the years, especially when compared to the Tammy Belanger, Bear Brook, and Maura Murray cases. Much like the Rachael Garden case in Newton, NH around the same time, I suspect that being from a grittier neighborhood and a less than ideal family situation made Laureen's case less appealing to the NH/Boston media.
Probably Judith (Laureen’s mother)‘s seeing lack of interest in pursuing the case has contributed also to a lack of media attention :/
Was it a “tree street” neighborhood? When I was in Manchester everyone told me stay away from any street named after a tree. I was out walking and started seeing Elm, Oak, Spruce and took note.
It really wasn’t bad at all.
Yeah, she lived on Merrimack St. It's in that Maple/Beech stretch that you mention. The neighborhood goes through periodic spikes in crime and gang activity. Right now, it's not terribly bad, but a cop was murdered nearby about 15 years ago, and the gang issues were a big problem in the late 90s.
It’s a damn shame to be reading about the disappearance of a 14 year old child and find so many adults who may have harmed her.
her own mother, these porn people, and a creepy uncle, plus there’s always stalkers or a crime of opportunity to consider.
the detail that her father actually only lived 3 miles away, which seems to have been unknown to Laureen who was desperate enough that people think she may have tried to flee across the country, just to be with him, is heartbreaking.
I don’t want to overstate though, that Judith and Laureen may have just had a typical rocky mother-teenage daughter relationship. my mom and I adore each other now, but when I was a teenager, i’m sure that a friend of mine could’ve credibly said I was trying to get away from her, that I seemed like a burden, etc. add in a separation and a move from florida to new hampshire, and we would’ve been at each other’s throats, but that wouldn’t mean she was trying to drive me out or murder me.
Agreed. It also seems that most if not all these claims regarding Judith and Laureen seem to come from one alleged childhood friend. Who knows how reliable a witness she is?
Yeah, or it may be that she’s reliably captured what her perspective was at the time, but that being the 14 year old friend is just a very particular perspective.
It’s hard to blame the mom for not calling netflix back too. it’s hard to imagine, but the poor woman’s kid vanished into thin air. she was plagued by these mystery calls that lead to nothing but the suggestion that her child was being sex trafficked, with no way to verify anything. after 50 years of guilt and shame and agony and grief and fear, all to no end, I can see her not wanting to relive the whole awful thing for the entire nation, just to probably still never learn where her baby is.
she may also have convinced herself that her daughter ran away and is living a happy life somewhere, and just doesn’t want to speak to her, and she’s afraid to ruin that life (or that story, which is better than dead or trafficked). there’s just so much complexity here besides “she doesn’t care.”
it’s easy to say “I would never give up hope” when you haven’t been suffering for half a century.
Do we know it was Netflix? I was thinking it was probably the original show. If so, it's a real shame, because the OG Unsolved Mysteries was really effective and solved a ton of crimes.
The only thing the new one and the old one have in common is the theme song. The new one should be called something else.
I totally agree.
The only thing that gives me pause in this case from thinking it was a family member or someone she knew was that NH actually solved their first IGG case in 2022 or 2023-it was a "beauty school" murder of Laura Kempton. The perpetrator was Ronney James Lee. One of the things that was a piece of evidence in that case was that the light bulb was unscrewed in the hallway of her apt...but that could be a relatively common tactic.
It happens in The Godfather II. Maybe it caught on.
Maybe it was the offshoot of the Happy Face Killers, the aptly named Loose Lightbulb Killers. Springfield 3 had a broken outdoor lightbulb... I think we just solved two cases.
Haha. First thing I thought of.
Why do they unscrew it?
I assume it’s so that when they knock on the door, and the person inside looks out the peephole, they can’t see the person outside.
Never even considered peepholes but that makes a lot of sense
I’ve always been suspicious of the people with her that night, or people close to those people who were privy to the situation
Me too, especially considering they weren't really what I would call friends because they had only known each other a few weeks.
Do you know where she meet them? I think the guy was 18, isn't? I'll like to read more about them.
I'm guessing school or neighborhood but not really sure.
One of the teens she was drinking with that night, a boy about her age, committed suicide about five years later. I have to wonder if he didn't unwittingly have a hand in the situation, perhaps introducing her to someone who later harmed her, and was racked with guilt over it.
The suicide definitely raises eyebrows for sure
Yeah, fair enough, but then again; they were just a bunch of kids. Could they really have conspired to somehow hide a body so well, and keep their secret to effectively, that nothing has been discovered even all these many decades later? Idk just seems unlikely to me that a couple of drunk young teenagers could pull so effective a crime off.
Has it ever been stated that the guys present were trashed? And it may have been someone who overheard what Laureen’s situation was; like one of the guys or girls talks about their plans absentmindedly to the wrong person. They also may of gotten lucky. Also parents have helped out their children before. They were also old enough that they may have had a similar minded friend help
I’m not 100% set on them but if I was a detective they’d be my first lead
Also, why was the friend so reluctant to say there was another guy that night and his name? That is suspicious as hell IMO
Every time this case is posted here the same questions run through my mind. First is if the California connection is just a red herring or an important clue. I remember using pay phones or a phone in a motel room to make long distance calls and having it billed to my home phone. I'm pretty sure I had to use a Personal Identification Number (PIN) to make those for verification. To me that means whoever made the calls would have had to know the PIN that went with Laureen's mother's phone number. Was there a way to charge a random phone number for a call without some sort of verification?
The Charley Project indicates that two of the phone calls were placed from a motel in Santa Monica to another motel in Santa Ana. There is the belief that Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) was shot at one of the motels but I thought I read somewhere that legal pornography was also shot at one of the motels.
Laureen disappeared not long before a 15 year old named Traci Lords was making adult films in southern California using a fake ID. Apparently there were other females appearing in adult videos who were not yet 18, but those didn't get the notoriety. Alexandra Quinn may have been just 16 when she started in 1989. I guess the point is producers were very lax (and maybe still are) when it came to verifying the age of the performers they put in front of the camera.
According to the Charley Project Laureen was interested in acting. Many times people don't want to take the long route and enroll in acting classes and get involved with community theater groups. Instead they head for California hoping to get discovered.
One of the times Laureen's case came up and I saw Law Enforcement (LE) was looking for some connection to adult film actress Annie Sprinkle. There's a website called adult film database that has head shots of almost everybody that appeared in adult films. When I looked at Sprinkle's film at the time (as well as other films) there were a lot of women who only appeared in one or two productions and that was it. I didn't think any of them looked like Laureen and I think LE already looked at that angle anyway. But this was back when these productions were moving from film to the much cheaper video tape and who knows how many productions were being shot in California at that time.
Considering the list of things Laureen left behind I know that makes California seem less likely, but I still can't get over the phone calls charged to her mother's phone, and the possibility that Laureen went to California and took on a whole new identity.
Just an unimportant aside : I met Traci Lords at a Dragoncon one year and got my picture taken with her AND her autograph! It was a high point in my life.
Well, that's certainly a mess. Though I'm not sure how reliable any of these accounts are.
The biggest question mark is Michelle's account. Even if her memories from 45 years earlier are correct (and that's a big if), how much would a teenager know about the family?
The father isn't mentioned in the investigation; surely they checked if she was with him. Did he do anything regarding his daughter's disappearance?
The friend's account of the night is unreliable, as she was drunk.
What is the significance of the unscrewed lightbulbs? To make it harder to see an abduction?
If the phone calls were from her, how did she end up in California? That whole aspect strikes me as implausible, like something out of a movie.
I think the boy (or one of the boys, depending on the account) did something to Laureen. It's the simplest explanation.
I think the mention of the lightbulbs being unscrewed on all three floors of the building implies someone was in the building - possibly casing apartments or looking for unlocked doors. Not sure how Manchester was in 1980, but that area of the city in current day is considered dangerous and high crime. Possible Laureen stepped outside her apartment to investigate the voices she was hearing and ran into one or more people up to no good?
I find it strange that the friend omitted the fact that another man was in the apartment, as well as his identity. As for “Bob,” considering he was sleeping with Laureen’s aunts and even her own mother, it’s not hard to imagine that he might have set his eyes on her as well.
Bolsters the theory that Laureen was likely abducted and murdered by someone she knew. Did "Bob" have any ties to CA and could he have been the one making the mystery phone calls? I figured from earlier accounts that Laureen's family was dysfunctional, but the claims made in this write-up, if true, take things to a whole new level.
Bob Evans was the name serial killer Terry Rasmussen was going by during the time of Laureen’s disappearance when he was living in Manchester New Hampshire. He is also suspected of killing 2 other women in the area during this time. He then moved to California in 1981.
I've heard about the possibility that Rasmussen was the perp in this case, but wasn't sure because I didn't know of any connection between him and Laureen or her family. The new revelation that a sketchy man named "Bob" was involved with Laureen's mom and two aunts could be the missing puzzle piece.
Terry Rasmussen died in 2010. According to the writeup, the "Bob" in this case died in 2024. I don't think they're the same person (though the coincidence is certainly uncanny).
Yeah, I honestly take a lot of that later information with a grain of salt. Why is “Bob” even being mentioned? Why were the friends mentioning him? Like what context is Uncle Bob being brought into this? Did Laureen mention something about him creeping her out? Or did she just mention something about meeting up with someone named Bob? And why does the write-up state it was found out much later her aunt was married to a Bob (how did her friends not already know this “Bob” was her uncle by marriage)? It’s just weird/messy information.
It was 1980, she vanishes in April and California comes up in October, six months later. It doesn’t say what date the calls were, only that they were discovered in October. a 14 year old could definitely make it from NH to CA in that timeframe, and even faster if she had an adult involved. even if she didn’t have any adult involved when she left initially, runaway teens are so vulnerable. she could’ve met someone with bad intentions anywhere and gone to California with them. or she could’ve hitched, or did odd jobs and gotten a bus ticket.
I don’t disagree that it’s a whole journey, but it’s far from implausible that she could’ve made it to California.
Edit: I initially wrote the year of her birth instead of the year she vanished.
So phone calls, like collect calls or 3rd party charges, showed up on the bill the month after they were made. So those calls were likely made in September. I used to do 3rd party billing to my parents number back when they'd kick me out and I needed to call my grandparents to be picked up. (I wasnt the issue, my drug addicted mother was)
I dont remember if phone companies billed on the 1st each month back then or did the weird billing they do now for utilities.
Oh, it's certainly possible, it just seems farfetched that she was abducted and trafficked to California, when there are suspects much closer at hand.
I agree that California makes more sense if she either 1) left willingly and without a predator involved and traveled there herself, perhaps later encountering trouble 2) left because she was lured by a predatory adult, who she then traveled with to California or 3) left willingly and independently and later encountered someone who preys on runaway kids, and then traveled to california with that person.
I don’t see “dragged from her back door in NH, kicking and screaming, all the way to California” as very likely.
the problem is just that teenagers are so vulnerable, and an “older boyfriend” (aka adult man) manipulating a teenager with a bad relationship with her parents into ‘agreeing’ to prostitution is a very common story. or Elizabeth Smart, who was 14, and the guy kidnapped her from her occupied home, and did go to California (from Utah, so much closer) with her, and she was even in public, but was so terrified that she didn’t flee. and what broke the case there was her sister remembering months later that the voice she had heard was a handyman she knew, the family circulating a sketch, his family recognizing him, they provide photos, someone spots him, etc.
but totally agree that something happening closer to home and that night is more likely. poor kid.
and I agree that generally, it’s more
I actually met Michelle at a rally advocating for Laureen. She seemed normal, for what it is worth!
To be clear, I don't think she's lying. I'm just not sure her memory is as good as she thinks it is.
No definitely ! I just think some of these “friends” come out of the woodwork sometimes, but they usually don’t show up to advocate for them!
💯 it's just boys wouldn't think of the lighbulbs drunk. That's my only issue.
They may not have been as drunk as the girls thought.
Sure. But to think of unscrewing them? Sounds like a mature creeper.
Or a planned getaway.
If Laureen did run away, she may have removed them herself to make her disappearance appear more mysterious/like foul play.
I think it could be as simple as teenagers are stupid, so they thought unscrewing the bulbs would make it easier to slip away undetected like some kind of spy movie.
I agree with everything you said, but the mom not returning calls to Unsolved Mysteries makea me really suspicious
Not me. That show was exploitative af. Not everyone wants their personal tragedy served up as entertainment for strangers, sandwiched between features on UFOs and Bigfoot.
Wtf? That show solved a lot of mysteries and brought together countless lost loved ones. If my kid is missing, I'm pulling out all the stops to try to get her found. Millions of people watched it every week, it literally could've been the difference between finding her/her body at least and not finding her
Absolutely! They solved tons of cases.
The mother's lack of action to the silent phone calls is weird to me. Why didn't she tell the police and insist they trace the origins? Whether they were crank calls or something else, it doesn't seem that it was ever pursued.
Maybe she didn't want the intrusion into her life? Especially if she was in the adult entertainment industry?
Though both of those come from the "childhood friend", so I'm dubious anyway.
From what I’ve seen, this friend, together with an English man, carried out a deep and detailed investigation, interviewing more than 100 people and compiling the information into a file. So I don’t think these are casual accusations.
Is there real proof of that or is it just Michelle's word? I don't know why she would lie but it could have been a rumor she heard from someone made up.
I’m fascinated by this case, especially the phone calls. Thanks for the write up!
I know the odds are against it, but I hope she made it. I hope she's out there somewhere.
Maybe it was unavoidable but I can’t believe her mom changed her phone number when she was potentially getting calls from her missing daughter.
It was probably unavoidable. Remember, this was before cell phones. If you moved to a different area code you couldn't take your landline number with you.
I’m sure the calls were immensely distressing though, and they went on for years without any proven link to her daughter. Her sister was answering them as well (no caller id back then) and i’m sure the poor kid was tormented.
If I were her, I probably would think after the first few silent calls, that whoever took my kid is just calling to harass me and my living child.
That is absolutely valid I can’t imagine how horrible it was to get those calls randomly and have no recourse.
yeah, and the ones after October 1980 are not reported as being charged to Judith, so that’s less of a reason to think that Laureen was making them.
I really do think that they may have been from someone who hurt Laureen or a hoaxer, and that it’s much less likely that Laureen was making the calls.
I just don’t know who else would be calling her other than her missing daughter, someone involved with the daughter disappearing, or a sick “friend” of Laureen who was pranking the mom.
unfortunately it’s not unheard of for total strangers to make hoax calls to the families of missing or murdered people as well.
https://abcnews.go.com/amp/GMA/story?id=124906&page=1
Some people are just not well
Reading that made me feel sick. This girl didn’t have any one in her corner.
If she left the area code she wouldn't have a choice.
And not wanting to have her missing young daughter featured on Unsolved Mysteries? Families used to try for years to get their missing loved ones on that show! It was a HUGE deal to get on there - i cannot imagine turning that opportunity down
When someone goes missing like that the family gets all sorts of crank calls.
I’m gonna be honest, I think Michelle’s testimony about the home life situation should be taken with a grain of salt.
It’s pretty common for 14 year olds to express desires to run off or go live with their other parent or to be unhappy to some extent, and it’s normal for that age group to have friction with parents. Michelle was 14 perceiving this, and 14 year olds often tend to interpret any conflict as dysfunction and fall really easily into the “wow parents suck” mindset.
I think it’s totally plausible Laureen was fighting with her mom regularly, but I’m hesitant to use that as concrete evidence she actually ran away because of that, especially with no clothes or personal belongings or money and given the crew of slightly suspicious people in her apartment at the time of her disappearance
She spent part of the day 'working' for booze. How many people did she meet that day, and tell them she was going to go home and drink with no one around but her other teenage friends? Normally, I don't put much stock in stranger abductions when there's potential for family involvement, but here we have an under-aged girl potentially telling people she'll be home basically alone and drunk. The boy and a neighbor both report hearing voices in the hall. Could someone she talked to earlier have decided they were going to come have their way with Laureen? She's drunk- her judgement is impaired- she opens the door when someone says they're so-and-so from earlier. Maybe they lie and say they just want to check on her since they know her mom isn't home. Kristen is blackout drunk and the boy(s?) has fled out the back door. Her kidnapper(s) leave the same way since that's the fastest way outside, leaving the door open either in a hurry/to avoid rousing Kristen, or so it looks like she may have gone out herself and drunkenly forgot to close it.
That's a scenario I think is possible. I think whether it was a stranger or family, though, she died that night.
I really want to hope she ran away from home and actually made it, but after so many years with no trace, it seems unlikely 😔
What's the name of the podcast mentioned in the post ?
Speculating Wildly About Crime, which seems incredibly apt. So many of these "facts" haven't appeared anywhere else.
Thank you so much for responding, I appreciate it. May I ask your thoughts on the podcast ? I noticed you put facts in quotations, so I am curious.
You're welcome. I didn't listen to it, but it appears that OP's write-up is based on this episode, so I was going by that.
I'm not trying to discourage anyone from listening, but it might be a good idea to keep the podcast's name in mind.
ETA: If anyone's interested, the best podcast episode I've listened to about Laureen's disappearance is Murder, She Told's.
Thank you for this info!
I think The Trail Went Cold did an episode on her awhile ago- he’s my favorite
He's definitely one of the best ones.
Ooohhhh, I love Murder She Told. Phenomenal podcast
Whoa, I used to live in Manchester and this case has always been one I can’t forget. Every year or so I revisit it and deep dive. This is the first time anything new has come up in a long time. Previously, Judith seemed portrayed as desperately searching and a good mother trying to parent a teen who was a bit rebellious. Of course, there is always much, much more to relationships and dynamics in these people’s lives, but there was just no information out there from anyone but Kristen and her daughter… and it appears Kristen only knew Laureen very briefly as a young teen. I tend to think the California lead wasn’t her. I think something happened to her that same night, and it was someone she knew. It seems they may have been closer to her than I thought. I would be so interested to read the 100 pages sent to Manchester PD that they never even opened
If you all want to really go down a rabbit hole: Bob Evans was the name serial killer Terry Rasmussen was going by when he was living in the same town at the same time as this disappearance (is he the “Bob”?) . He is suspected of killing 2 other women in the area during this time but moved to California in 1981….
I feel like he’s become a bit of a boogeyman since being discovered, but if he did indeed have definite connections to the area at the same time Rahn went missing, he should be looked at closely
Apparently there’s enough of a connection that both Laureen and Terry are mentioned in Denise Daneault’s Charley project page (although it does say no confirmed connection has been found between Laureen and Denise yet). https://charleyproject.org/case/denise-ann-daneault
I mean, him living in the same state at the same time would be one thing. Same town (and this new information about someone named “Bob”, even though that seems unverified to me) just led me down the rabbit hole. Not saying he was definitely the person that resulted in Laureen’s disappearance, just that he was active and in the same town as her when she disappeared (and apparently got Denise 6 weeks after Laureen’s disappearance). He was also married to another lady named Denise at the time (who is also missing).
I believe Terry Rasmussen was associated with this case because he lived in the building next door
That’s wild because he used the pseudonym “Bob Evans” while living in Manchester (as in the Bob who was sleeping with Laureen’s mother and aunts?). He also fled New Hampshire to California, though I’m not sure if that timeline matches up with Laureen’s disappearance
Great thinking! He was definitely active during that time but didn't leave NH until until 1984 I think. He was Bob then and an electrician who would think of the lighting. If he was the Bob both women knew, he could've known she was out that day/night giving him access. Maybe he watched the boys leave then pounced.
The California calls could be a strange coincidence. My feeling is she died that night.
He left New Hampshire in 1981, with his then girlfriend (presumed murdered) and girlfriend’s daughter (six months old, abandoned at an RV park alive in 1986)
Personally, I always found the male friend who was in the apartment that night most suspicious, as well as the female friend found in her bed.
Yeah, the 18(right?) male hanging out alone with 2 14 year old girls that weren’t even in high school kind of creeps me (but to be fair, I guess it wasn’t as weird for the time period). I actually believe the 14 year old girl was messed up. Maybe I was just overly innocent, but I can’t imagine not being drunk having even 1 beer at 14. (Hard for me to even accept 14 year olds drinking but maybe me and my friend group was just sheltered/“innocent” )
You bring up a good point, which is that it’s hard to understand context around situations in crimes from eras that were just different. Like, yeah today that would seem creepy but in 1980 the whole “senior guys picking up freshmen girls” age gap here probably wouldn’t have been perceived as odd or bizarre by most folks, or least teens, back then. So it’s really difficult to tell if that’s a red flag or just an “innocuous” thing of the times so to speak
Yep, absolutely. But also want to point out that according to the write up they were in junior high (age 14, so I guess 8th or 9th grade? I dunno. I’ve never understood “junior high school”. All school systems I’m familiar with is middle and then high school.) They theoretically wouldn’t have even been classmates/in the same school as the dude. But yes, definitely wasn’t as frowned upon as much back then.
I was a 14 year old in NH at the time. It was considered very weird.
I think in order to decipher what most likely happened, we need to carefully look at the prevailing three theories:
IMO, the runaway theory could easily be discounted. For one, according to Charley Project, Laureen would typically accompany her mother and her boyfriend on trips. While she did ask to stay behind on that day, you would think a teenager dead-set on running away wouldn't normally invite friends over to her place to drink beer and party. It just doesn't make any sense to do this. Plus, a runaway 14 year old is going to take clothing and brand new shoes. Nothing being taken would indicate that she did not runaway on her own free will.
Which brings us to the abduction/trafficking theory. For starters, the odds that someone unknown to Laureen would be lucky enough to pick a date where not only her mother and boyfriend weren't home, but also when she was asleep in the living room, with the front door ajar, moments after her male friend leaves through the back door, while her friend slept through the night in her bed, would be near astronomical. IMO, it had to be someone known to Laureen. The phone calls from California are interesting in this case because it would seem to indicate that someone known to the Rahn's was making those calls. However, if it was Laureen, and if in fact she was abducted against her will and driven to California, why not call the police and/or her mother?! Calling a sex line for teenagers would seem like the last thing on someone's mind who had just been taken across country against their will. I personally think that the porn angle is a huge red herring. As far as I know, Annie Sprinkle has been an advocate for helping women get out of the industry, not into it. And how exactly would this doctor who ran the hotline know or remember anything about one girl he briefly spoke to over the phone (and if he's remembering the right girl) and allegedly briefly met 5 years after the fact? The girl could have been anyone, honestly. I've never been big on the whole sex/porn/trafficking angle in this case. Assuming she did run into an older man, who somehow convinced her in a matter of minutes (assuming that she did not plan on running away prior) to drop everything and take off to California with him, how in the hell did this random guy from New Hampshire have the connections with people in California to take in Laureen and ingratiate her into the porn industry? Seems way too farfetched to be believed, IMO. And what would this older guy gain out of doing any of this? What's his motive behind taking an underage girl across the continent? Not only is this scenario unlikely, IMO, but it also leads to a myriad of other endless rabbit holes.
I tend to think the most likely theory is foul play by someone she knew. My main gripe with this theory are the phone calls from California, but I'll get to that below. Assuming that this comment is accurate, I could see this scenario playing out:
The 4 of them are hanging out and partying in the apartment. At one point, the 21-year old gets up to leave. He leaves the door ajar when exiting to gain access back into the apartment later, because he's infatuated with Laureen. He's the one who unscrews the light bulbs in the hall ways, because he plans on taking Laureen out through the front door. He stays outside and watches the building. At some point in the evening, the 18-year old hears voices and freaks out and leaves through the back exit. The 21-year old sees this and uses it as an opportunity: he goes to the back exit and knocks, knowing that Laureen will open it thinking he's the 18-year old. She opens it, sees it's the 21-year old, and he somehow either abducts her quickly and quietly (no reports of neighbors or Laureen's friend hearing anything suspicious that night and no signs of struggle in the apartment), or (more likely, IMO) he convinces her to step outside with him, and that's when he takes her and kills her.
I think she had to have been killed by someone she knew, who also knew her parents weren't home, shortly after she disappeared. And the only people who knew these details would have been the people in that apartment that night. The girlfriend who was spending the night is obviously not involved, because the mother found her in Laureen's bed shortly after midnight, and this goes along with what she told investigators. The 18-year old was never considered a suspect by investigators, which tells me that after he left the apartment, someone had to have seen him shortly after to give him an alibi. I don't think he was involved, but he possibly knew more than he let on. I'd even go as far to say that there is a possibility that the 18-year old knew what was going to happen that night, and him leaving was the signal to the 21-year old. It's not that likely, but because he committed suicide 5 years after Laureen's disappearance, I wouldn't discount it outright. The saddest part about this case is the fact that the cops really dropped the ball initially by treating this like a typical teenager runaway. That bought weeks for whoever took her to clean up a crime scene, dispose of evidence, and to work up an alibi. The only hole in the theory above are the phone calls from California. I can't explain those at all. Unless it was a one in a billion coincidence billing error (or someone unrelated using their phone number to bill calls) that somehow led back to a phone number connected to a missing person. I do not think the calls were from Laureen. It could have been her killer.
The phone calls *could* have been a hoax, a cruel joke. Remember, back then, individual phone numbers were listed in the white pages and were public info- even with names and addresses. Some people get off on causing grief to families with missing loved ones. I don't know how likely it is but that was my first thought when I read it.
yeah, I think only the california calls were charged to Judith, all the rest were regular calls.
honestly, given that the person never said anything, even when Laureen’s sister picked up, always called at 3:45 am initially, then switched to around the holidays, and they weren’t charging to Judith, I think 1) that Judith believed that these were hoax calls or possibly from the person who took Laureen, and that they were intended to torment her and her other child and 2) I think that belief is well-founded
The really weird thing about the phone calls is that Laureen's mother wasn't the only one to get them. Her cousin and her ex-boyfriend both also received strange calls that they thought might be from her. If all the calls came from the same person, it'd have to be either Laureen herself or someone with an intimate knowledge of her life.
If the numbers were in the phone book, it wouldn't necessarily have to be someone intimately close to her.
But how would they know who to look for? I presume her mother's name would have been mentioned in the media but her cousin and ex weren't nearly as close to the case.
How do you know the only ones who knew she was alone were the people inside the apartment? She easily could have told other people her mom was out of town, right? She was working for alcohol earlier that day. It isn’t far fetched that she’d mention she wanted the alcohol since her mom was out of town.
The odds that this person waited around for the male friend/s (that they may or may not have known were present at the time) to leave before somehow abducting or coaxing her out of the apartment in that short time frame are astronomical.
“The calls stopped only after she changed her number” Wow, how sad
Very odd detail that I find zero percent believable.