Charlotte Sena Kidnapping Suspect Scrutinized for Unsolved Teen Murders: Report
Authorities will look into any possible connections that the man charged with kidnapping Charlotte Sena may have to the abduction and murder of two teenagers that have remained unsolved since the aughts, according to a report.
Craig Nelson Ross Jr., 46, was arrested Monday and accused of taking 9-year-old Sena from upstate New York’s Moreau Lake State Park over the weekend, with authorities later rescuing Sena from a cupboard inside Ross’ camper. He will now be scrutinized for potential links to the killings of two young women who disappeared in 2003 and 2005, according to the Times Union.
Details Emerge About Sketchy Past of Charlotte Sena’s Alleged Abductor
Jennifer “Moonbeam” Hammond, 18, and Christina N. White, 19, were last seen alive near mobile home parks in the town of Milton, where Ross and his family have lived for decades. Their remains were later found a few miles apart in the Lake Desolation State Forest, about 10 miles north of where they were seen for the last time.
“At this time, we have no information to indicate that he was or was not involved,” Saratoga County Sheriff’s Investigator Matthew Robinson, the lead investigator in the women’s cases, told the Times Union. “I can tell you that one of the investigative steps that we will take with regards to the ongoing investigation around Mr. Ross will be any association he has with any major case in the area. And that is something that we are actively working on. But at this time, we have no information to indicate that he is involved in any of those [two] cases.”
Robinson added that considering any connection Ross may have to other cases is a “standard investigative step… [and] we will analyze any potential involvement as we continue to work on it.”
White’s family told police she left the Saratoga Village Mobile Home Park at around 10 p.m. on June 30, 2005, and witnesses saw her walking about three miles from her home. No further sightings of White were reported until her skeletal remains were found in March 2006.
An autopsy found that she had died from stab wounds to her abdomen and chest. Ross lived in the Saratoga Village Mobile Home Park in the early 2000s around the time when White went missing, according to property records cited by the Times Union. Robinson said he is “aware of Ross’ prior address” but would not say if he had ever been interviewed in connection with the deaths of White or Hammond.
Hammond, from Littleton, Colorado, was last seen in August 2003 in the Creek and Pines Mobile Home Park on Middleline Road in Milton—which is reportedly about 1,000 feet north of where Ross’ mother has lived for about three decades. Hammond was there selling magazine subscriptions alongside co-workers but failed to show up at pre-planned pickup spot about two hours after entering the park.
Skull fragments and teeth were found in the woods near Lake Desolation six years later. A forensic analysis confirmed that they were Hammond’s, and her death was ruled a homicide. Saratoga County Sheriff Michael Zurlo has previously said investigators believed there was a “strong possibility” that Hammond’s and White’s killings were linked to the same suspect owing to the close proximity of the sites where their remains were discovered as well as the locations where they were last seen.
Robinson said authorities currently do not have any information or direct evidence linking Ross with the teenagers’ cases. “We have nothing to give us [evidence] that he is involved—there’s no, like, hot lead that says he’s our guy or anything like that,” he added.
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