Investigators identify homicide victim found nearly 41 years ago in OC – NBC Los Angeles

Investigators have opened a homicide investigation after a woman was identified 41 years after children discovered her skull in Orange County, according to the Orange County Sheriff's Department.

Authorities say the skull was discovered in April 1983 in a culvert in what is now Lake Forest. Once investigators dug up the body, an anthropological examination was performed, showing the victim to be a black or mixed race female, between 18 and 24 years old and approximately 5'3 to 5'6 tall, however, a full ID has not been determined.

DNA tests performed in 2022 were unsuccessful, which subsequently led investigators to post forensic renderings on a Facebook group for Jane Doe's disappearance in the 1970s and 1980s.

A woman who contacted investigators in late 2023 said the body found in Lake Forest could be that of her missing mother.

Upon further investigation, the woman was identified as Maritza Glean Grimmett, a native of Panama who married a U.S. Marine in the summer of 1978 and gave birth to a daughter shortly before moving to the United States. The family lived in Ohio and Tennessee, then began divorce proceedings in July 1979.

Grimmett, who was 20 when she was last seen, reportedly told her sister she was going to California.

Investigators are asking anyone with information about this case to contact Investigator Bob Taft at 714-647-7045 or by email at [email protected].