Murder and Regret: Carolyn Davis’ Sister Recounts the Fear that Permeated the Teen’s Last Days

Cold cases grow cold because their stories stop being told. Last year, the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office published an interactive map and timeline with over sixty missing and murdered people whose cases remain unsolved. We have taken on the task of writing about each and every one of those cases, to keep their stories alive and hopefully find justice for the victims and families. 

Note: The following is based on recollections from Judy Wilson, the sister of the victim, about events that occurred almost fifty years ago. What she has told us has not been verified and are based solely on what she said occurred. We have not gotten a response from the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office about Wilson’s statements.

two young women standing next to each other. The girl on the left with blondish brown hair wearing jeans, a red long sleeved shirt with a gold peace-sign around her neck, the girl on the right with long dark hair wearing a brown floral smock over a long sleeve white shirt

Sisters: Carolyn Davis with her older sister Judy [All photos provided by Judy Wilson]

Forty-nine years ago, Judy Wilson, holding her newborn baby, waved goodbye to her younger sister. She had no idea that moment to be the last time she would see her sister alive.

Judy is the older sister of Carolyn Davis, the fourteen-year-old victim of murder found in Sonoma County on July 31st, 1973. To this day, Judy weeps for her murdered sister, guilt and pain having affected Judy for her entire life.

After our cold-case coverage of Carolyn’s murder, Judy reached out to us to fill in some of the missing pieces of Carolyn’s story, as well as to disabuse some assumptions that have been perpetuated during the last forty-nine years.

Judy and Carolyn lived very different lives growing up, Judy said. The older of the pair, Judy, five years Carolyn’s senior, was raised by her grandmother in Humboldt County. Carolyn, Judy said, lived with their mother and siblings, and eventually with their stepfather. “[Carolyn] was more mature at 14 …than I was at 18,” Judy recalled.

According to Judy, Carolyn “was able to run wild” as a young teen. “She was a very good girl, she was just lost,” her sister recounted. Although news articles from the time of her murder indicated that Carolyn ran away from home to hitchhike around the U.S., full of wanderlust, her sister said that the truth is much more complex. Judy said that contrary to published reports, when Carolyn ran away from her mom and stepfather’s home in Anderson, she made her way to Garberville instead of hitchhiking south. Carolyn’s sister and grandmother lived in Garberville. Upon arriving, the teen stayed with Judy in her duplex apartment while their grandma lived in the same neighborhood.

a picture of a girl from chest up with cropped blondish brown hair parted in the middle, with a serious look on her face

Carolyn Davis

Judy said Carolyn’s departure from Anderson was not the age-old story of a teen running from a parent’s strict rules. Once in Garberville, Carolyn told her older sister that she had witnessed a double homicide in Shasta County and was afraid the murderers would target her next. Judy was skeptical of her sister’s fantastical story but became more convinced as Carolyn exhibited fearful behavior even though the tale seemed far-fetched.

Pregnant at the time of her sister’s arrival, Judy offered to let her sister sleep in the spare room set up for the impending little one. However, Carolyn was so scared that she preferred to sleep in the floor of the closet in Judy’s bedroom she shared with her boyfriend.

“She was so frightened that she actually took a blanket and a pillow and slept in my closet every night,” Judy said. “The reason she slept in there was because my boyfriend had guns,” she speculated.

Even with fear looming large for Carolyn, Judy said the two sisters were able to bond during the months that Carolyn stayed with her in Garberville. “Her and I would stay up all night laughing and joking and…talking,” Judy said.

While Carolyn was staying with Judy, the sisters’ mother and law enforcement thought Carolyn was in central California, having received a letter from Carolyn postmarked from Soledad, California. Judy said that Carolyn was afraid their mother would locate her and make her return to Anderson. Fearful for her life, Judy said that Carolyn gave letters to friends that hitchhiked south to mail the letter to her mother in order to keep her family, and ultimately, the people she was running from, from discovering her whereabouts.

“I’d beg Carolyn to let Mom know where she was at, but I didn’t want to betray my sister,” Judy recalled.

Judy said Carolyn’s fear and paranoia increased the longer she stayed in Garberville.  Afraid that the murderers had discovered her connection to the small town in Humboldt County, Carolyn left her heavily pregnant sister Judy and their grandmother with the intention of hitchhiking far away from the danger she was fleeing from. “She was afraid someone was going to get her. She left because she was afraid,” Judy stated.

Carolyn hitchhiked to Illinois, putting multiple states between her and the Shasta County murders. On the road, Carolyn would write to Judy and her family in Garberville. Judy still has a postcard that her sister had sent her from Illinois. It was only due to the impending birth of Judy’s child that Carolyn returned, Judy recalled.

Back in Garberville, the teen welcomed her newborn niece to the fold but was anxious to leave again. When Judy’s daughter was just a week old, her sister packed her few belongings and hit the road. “I begged and pleaded with her not to go,” Judy said. According to Judy, Carolyn was intent on making her way back to her beau in Illinois, the two having exchanged letters and phone calls while Carolyn was back in Garberville.

a young, thin girl wear short jean shorts and a crocheted yellow halter with boots

The outfit Carolyn Davis wore when she left Garberville on July 15th.

On July 15th, the pair’s grandmother drove Carolyn to the Garberville Post Office where Carolyn departed, headed for the south Hwy 101 onramp with the intention of hitchhiking south to visit friends before heading back towards Illinois. That day was the last day Judy, or their grandmother, saw Carolyn alive.

When news reached the family of a young girl found murdered on the side of a Sonoma County road, they became concerned since they had not received any correspondence from Carolyn since her departure, something out of the ordinary for the teen, Judy said. “She always called me, she’d call me every two or three days and let me know where she was at. When she left Garberville, she never called so I knew that something was wrong,” Judy recalled.

Under the insistence of their grandmother, twenty-year-old Judy made the call to Sonoma County investigators that would lead to the identification of Carolyn’s lifeless body.

Forty-nine years later, Judy is still haunted by the what ifs. Exacerbating those doubts is deep family trauma furthered by devastating grief. Judy said that her mother and siblings blamed her for her sister’s death, insisting that nothing would have befallen the teen if Judy had simply told her mother where the run-away was at or by not allowing her to leave in the first place. “She blamed me until her death that it was my fault that Carolyn died,” Judy said of her mother.

Judy says she begged Carolyn to stay but the fear of whatever or whomever Carolyn was running from far outweighed any sense of obedience the youth may have had.

After the murder of her sister, Judy said she spoke with investigators from both Sonoma and Shasta counties. Much to her surprise, Judy said the Shasta County investigators were able to confirm a double homicide had occurred in Shasta County prior to Carolyn’s arrival in Garberville. (We reached out to Shasta County Sheriff’s Office Investigators regarding the information Judy had given us but as of the publication of this article, they have not responded.)

a black and white photo of an older woman holding a baby standing next to a girl with dark hair in two braids wearing a striped shirt and shorts

Carolyn Davis as a baby, with her grandmother and older sister Judy.

Guilt intensified as Judy realized her sister had indeed been afraid for her life. To this day, Judy is unsure of whether Carolyn’s murder was at the hands of the people she feared or a random person that had picked her up as she hitchhiked south along Highway 101.

Fear mingled with grief as Judy realized that Carolyn had Judy’s house key in her possession at the time of her murder. In addition, she was worried that her knowledge of the murders that Carolyn had spoken of would lead to her own death. “After I realized what I told [the detectives], I was scared for my life,” Judy said.

In an odd twist of events, after Judy moved from Garberville to Anderson to be closer to other family members as she dealt with the grief and fear of Carolyn’s murder, she says she found one of her sister’s belongings in an unlikely place. While working at the California Motel as a maid, Judy said she found a map that had belonged to her sister in one of the motel rooms she was cleaning.  The map, complete with both Carolyn and Judy’s handwriting, was in Carolyn’s possession when she left Judy’s duplex on July 15th.

Judy said she had given the information to the local police at the time, who met with Judy and took possession of the map. Judy says she has never heard whether the investigators were able to lift prints from the map or contact the previous occupant of the motel room where the map was located.

With her sister’s murderer unidentified, questions left unanswered, Judy’s grief remains confounded by the unknown. The twenty-year-old young mother standing in the void of the terror, guilt and suspicion as the days leading up to Carolyn’s murder haunt her. “We enjoyed each other’s company. I’m very grateful we had that time together,” Judy shared through tears. “She was my best friend and I loved her very much,” Judy stated.

Judy’s gratitude for the months she was able to spend with her young sister is shadowed by the regret of not being able to foresee what evil lay awaiting for the teen when she returned home for the birth of her niece.

black and white photo of murder victim Carolyn N Davis, young features, long hair parted down the middleDid the people from Carolyn’s past catch up with her upon her return to Garberville, or did the fourteen-year-old inadvertently run into the grips of an unknown evil as she attempted to flee her past? Judy is left with these questions and the haunting knowledge that Carolyn would likely still be alive if she had never returned to Garberville.

Now, forty-nine years later and facing her own mortality as she battles with cancer, Judy wonders if new technology can help solve her sister’s murder and answer some of the questions that linger before her time on this earth is over.

If you have any information about the murder of Carolyn Davis or the murders that Judy describes, please contact the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office by calling 707-565-2727 or emailing [email protected] or the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office at (530) 245-6540 or email [email protected]

Earlier: Adventurous Shasta County Teen Last Seen in Garberville – An Unsolved Cold Case

This article is written by Lisa Music, a local freelance journalist. To reach Lisa about tips, questions or comments, email her at [email protected]

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11 Comments
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Humboldt Lady
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Humboldt Lady
1 year ago

My heart breaks for you Judy. Your mother should of never blamed you for her death. There is evil out there. You couldn’t of known this was going to happen. I hope you can find some peace in knowing that you gave your little sister some of the best times in her life before she left this earthly plane. And that she gave you some equally great memories to cherish. She is at peace now and karma will render itself, if it hasn’t already. Many blessings to you and yours.

Brent peeck
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Brent peeck
1 year ago

Very sad Rip

Cetan Bluesky
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Cetan Bluesky
1 year ago

You were doing the best you could with the circumstances at every moment. No one really knows what’s around the next turn. We live in a world that is filled with lethal characters mostly men who victim women, girls and children. Regrets are useless. Perhaps take up self defense?or scholarship someone to take self defense and pass those skills on to another. Possibly over time that will serve better than regret. No one is at fault for what happened except the perpetrators.

Vet
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Vet
1 year ago

What a sad tale. So much grief, so much pain.

trout fisher
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trout fisher
1 year ago

Heartbreaking

ThrivalistD
Member
Thrivalist
1 year ago

Judy so very sorry for your loss. your mom just couldn’t handle her own sense of guilt and projected it on to you, you were put into the “Big Sister” role without one of your own and while a young mother. If your mother blamed you she likely did other harsh things. Im glad you have had some family hopefully those you moved to be closer to we’re done support. “It takes a village” isn’t just a bumper sticker cliche; get as much love and support and you can and enjoy every moment you can.
Can’t help but wonder what at home down South Carolyn may have been running from ( could it have been related to the step father? Or friends of the family she didn’t want to disclose? They would have know. She hasn’t told you anything so it could explain your escaping harm if she really did witness a murder. Too bad she didn’t go to police with what she’d seen. Who could have been so powerful she wouldn’t have? The police involved in what she saw?). “Wayward” “Rebellious” etc is too often acting out due to troubles at or near home and girls get blamed and take on the role to cover their sense of purpose.

burblestein
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burblestein
1 year ago

I wrote this case up at Websleuths.This article puts a whole different light on the case; it makes so much more sense than the LE version. Congratulations, Ms Music, on an outstanding article.

And, boy, wouldn’t be great if after all these years, someone’s random memory is jogged by this and that leads to a solution.

thistle
Guest
thistle
1 year ago
Reply to  burblestein

You cannot blame yourself for the actions of others. Your sister loved you and you loved her. Look to her for strength as you battle cancer. She will help you you find courage.

I can’t help but wonder what happened to Carolyn’s baby?

Tami heeding
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Tami heeding
1 year ago
Reply to  thistle

She didn’t have a baby . Her sister Judy just had a baby

Wild@TenaciousTurkey
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Wild@TenaciousTurkey
1 year ago

Omg how sad.

Jay
Guest
Jay
8 days ago

The late 1960s and early 1970s was a very permissive time in American history, especially in California. Young people got caught up in things that they were not prepared for, and there were lots of cruel people who took advantage of them. I’m so sorry this happened to your sister.