Investigators Ask for Help Identifying Dismembered Woman Found in North Fairmount

Investigators are still trying to identify the dismembered remains of a woman found in North Fairmount over the weekend.

The woman's dismembered body was found the morning of Nov. 5 in the woods off Baltimore Avenue near Beekman Street. The Cincinnati Police Department responded to the scene after a passerby called to report the remains. The coroner listed her death as a homicide.

CPD Lieutenant Jonathan Cunningham told CityBeat there are no new updates since they addressed the case with Hamilton County coroner Dr. Lakshmi Kode Sammarco on Nov. 7. During that press conference, Sammarco said they cannot identify the victim off her remains alone.

"She doesn't have any tattoos, she doesn't have any birthmarks, she doesn't have any scars. We don't have enough remains for fingerprints or dental," she said. "There are no teeth to investigate."

The victim was also without clothes or jewelry when she was found. Sammarco said she's only seen about four dismembered bodies in her 12 years as coroner.

"We've had some dismembered bodies but we usually had a clue about who that person was," she said. "We've not had a case quite like this where there's so little information on the remains that we don't even know which direction to go."

Three trace evidence specialists from the coroner's office have been assigned to the case, according to Sammarco.

"We're going to be looking at hairs, we're going to be looking at leaves, we're going to be looking at fibers, we're going to be looking at everything in the area that was around her," she said. "We may be one of the few or only labs in Ohio that's still doing full trace evidence."

What we do know about the woman

Sammarco estimates the victim's time of death to be sometime during the evening on Nov. 3 or the following morning. She described the victim as a Black woman, likely in her late 20s to early 30s, about 5 feet tall and weighing around 120 pounds. She said the woman likely sustained at least one pregnancy in her lifetime.

The investigation

Chief of CPD Teresa Theetge said a homicide investigation is ongoing, but they need the public's help to identify the victim.