Missing California sisters found 36 years after mother’s grisly murder

The true identities of two young girls, sisters, found abandoned on the wet floor of a public restroom in Southern California in 1989 have finally been revealed, though the hunt for their mother’s long lost murderer continues.  

The nearly 36-year-old mystery began on Dec. 12, 1989, when a nude female was found stabbed to death in a desert area along Old Temple Road, approximately 50 miles south of Las Vegas, the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.  

“It appeared that she had been killed at the scene where she was found,” MCSO investigators said. “All attempts to identify the victim or suspects in the case proved unsuccessful at that time.” 

Detectives were, however, able to obtain a DNA profile from the woman’s remains that was entered into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), used by federal, state and local forensic laboratories.  

Two days after the gruesome discovery in an Arizona desert, on Dec. 14, 1989, a man walking at an Oxnard park heard what he believed to be children crying inside the ladies’ restroom. After asking a woman to check on the noise, she discovered the girls lying on the wet floor with no adult nearby.  

Officers with the Oxnard Police responded to the park, took the girls to the police station and later transferred them into the custody of Ventura County Child Protective Services.  

“The girls were placed into foster care and stayed there for a significant amount of time,” the release noted. “The girls were eventually adopted by a couple in Ventura County and were raised together in a loving home.”  

Then, in Feb. 2022, investigators with the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office submitted the deceased female victim’s fingerprints to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System for examination by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.  

Later that month, MCSO detectives were notified that the victim’s prints matched a set of prints obtained from a June 1989 shoplifting arrest in Kern County of Bakersfield resident Maria Ortiz.

“A records check with the Kern County Sheriff’s Office and the Bakersfield Police Department showed that Ortiz had listed a residential address in Bakersfield along with the name of two friends,” authorities said.  

One of the listed friends, located in Tennessee, was asked if she knew a Maria Ortiz who had been missing since 1989. The woman stated she did not, but that had a cousin named Marina Ramos that had gone missing in 1989 and provided a description of her cousin that matched the description of woman found stabbed to death in the desert.  

As the investigation unfolded, detectives learned that Maria Ortiz was an alias used by Marina Ramos and that the last time she’d been seen, she’d had her daughters, 2-month-old Jasmine and 14-month-old Elizabeth, in her possession.  

In the ensuing years, investigators put out press releases, utilized media and broadcast television asking for the public’s help in locating the missing girls.  

Ramos’ surviving family members provided DNA swabs for entry into CODIS and commercial DNA kits in hopes of finding the sisters.  

It wasn’t until August 2025 that investigators came across a woman with a high DNA match to one of Ramos’ family members. Further analysis revealed a high probability that the woman was one of the missing girls.  

“She was contacted by Investigators and during the phone conversation it was learned that she and her sister were abandoned in a park in Oxnard, California in December 1989,” detectives said.  

A call to her sister not only confirmed that information, but she was also able to provide newspaper clippings and photos of the 36-year-old incident.  

The sisters, whose adopted names were Tina and Melissa, according to SFGATE, provided DNA samples that confirmed the two to be Elizabeth and Jasmine, the daughters of homicide victim Marina Ramos.  

It wasn’t until their teenage years that the sisters learned the circumstances around their adoption, but only ever knew that they’d been abandoned at a park in Oxnard.  

“This is what I’ve been searching for and wanting for a very, very long time, and to figure out where I came from and who my family was,” The GATE reported Tina saying.  

While officials at the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office expressed excitement about finally solving at least one part of the 36-year-old mystery, they said the focus is now bringing to justice the suspects last seen with Ramos.  

A witness at the park in Oxnard told investigators that she had seen Ramos, described as a Hispanic female wearing a long red skirt and white boots, carrying a small child wrapped in a yellow blanket. She was reportedly accompanied by two Hispanic men, one of whom was carrying the other child, all of whom were seen inside a black mini pickup truck.  

A composite sketch of a man identified only as “Fernando” was later released by the Mohave County Sheriff’s Department in connection with Ramos’ 1989 murder, though no arrests have been made.

Lead investigator Lori Miller told SFGATE that finding the daughters alive and well was overwhelmingly satisfying and a victory in a case that has continued to be a challenge.  

“Now the challenge becomes to identify Marina’s killers,” she added.  

Anyone with information about the investigation is urged to contact The Mohave County Sheriff’s Office at 928-753-0753, ext. 4408.