The bizarre case of unknown young girl ‘Little Miss X’ who was discovered on Halloween in 1958
Callum Jones
Featured Image Credit: The DOE Network
This is the tragic true story of a young girl's body discovered on Halloween more than sixty years ago - with several details still puzzling investigators to this day.
On 31 October 1958, the skeletal body of a young girl was found off a dirt road on Skinner Ridge, south of Grand Canyon National Park.
At the time, investigators said the body had been there anywhere from nine to 14 months.
She was given the name 'Little Miss X' on the coroner's inquest - the true identity of the girl is still unknown. The cause of death was homicide.
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Joe Sumner, who was a volunteer investigator for the Coconino County Sheriff's Office case unit, was part of a team still trying to get to the bottom of the case.
Sumner retired from the National Park Service in 2007 as a criminal investigator, and then came onto the cold case unit in 2008.
The former criminal investigator told the Arizona Daily Sun in 2013 that Little Miss X was never identified and was always investigated as a homicide.
The investigation was made complicated from the beginning as clothes were found near Little Miss X shortly after the body was discovered - but appeared to be too big for her.
A nail file case was also found, but could have belonged to a young woman who went missing the same year in Southern California, 15-year-old Donis 'Pinky' Redman.
She was later excluded as she didn't match the physical characteristics of Little Miss X.
After multiple links with other missing people, no concrete evidence or scientific research brought any answers to the Little Miss X case.
Even worse for investigators was that it was difficult to secure DNA samples, which made it tricky for the cold case unit.
The body was exhumed in 1962 as part of the investigation, and there is no record of where it's buried now.
Sumner said: "We've combed over the old burial records of the time and haven't been able to figure out where she might be."
Without a lot of this key information, Sumner conceded the case is going nowhere. He said: "The key of course is getting her identified.
"She was well cared for, somebody was missing her at the time."
The chances of a breakthrough in the investigation are slim, but the case still isn't closed.
The cold case unit have detailed dental records of Little Miss X, however, they are now many years old.
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