DNA confirms body found by highway is woman missing since 1975

Priscilla Blevins was a studious, pretty woman whod studied Spanish at Wake Forest University, taught English in Bogota, Colombia, and wanted to be a translator for the United Nations. She disappeared without a trace shortly after Independence Day in 1975.

Now, police say they have solved the 37-year-old missing persons case thanks to a persistent family and a swab of DNA collected at a Winston-Salem bookstore.

Its the oldest missing persons case the unit has solved, said Det. Lee Tuttle, the lead investigator who added that police still dont know how Blevins died.

Blevins was last seen alive by her roommate at their apartment on Tyvola Road near South Boulevard. Her younger sister, Cathy Blevins Howe, who lived in Arizona at the time, still vividly remembers the long-distance phone call from her worried parents saying her older sister couldnt be found.

As the years ticked by, the Blevins family stayed in constant contact with Charlotte police, urging them to find their daughter. But investigators had exhausted all leads.

They never knew that a womans body was discovered 10 years later in Haywood County, near the Tennessee-North Carolina border, roughly 150 miles from Blevins apartment. Unidentified, it was shipped to the chief medical examiners office in Chapel Hill in 1985. No one knew it was Blevins.

As her parents aged, Howe continued the search for her older sister.

As I got older and had a daughter of my own, my curiosity about this continued and it just never let up, she said. I just decided that I wanted to see what I could find out.

She called CMPDs missing persons team in 2000. Tuttle, a 20-year-veteran of the department, who is also from Winston-Salem, called her back. Over time, he found an article about Blevins disappearance written in 1978. He also contacted a private detective whod been hired by the family to find Blevins.

But the key to cracking the case would be newer investigative methods.

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DNA confirms body found by highway is woman missing since 1975