| Welcome to Porchlight International for the Missing & Unidentified. We hope you enjoy your visit. You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free. Join our community! If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features: |
| Brach, Helen 17 Feb 1977; Rochester, Minnesota 65 YO | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Apr 3 2006, 08:33 PM (767 Views) | |
| ceestar92 | Apr 3 2006, 08:33 PM Post #1 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/b/brach_helen.html http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murd...en_brach/5.html http://www.nwitimes.com/articles/1994/07/28/export169566.txt http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=News&id=2581980 |
| Someone who thinks logically provides a nice contrast to the real world | |
![]() |
|
| oldies4mari2004 | Dec 18 2006, 08:16 PM Post #2 |
|
Unregistered
|
Helen Marie Voorhees Brach Above Images: Helen, circa 1977 Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance Missing Since: February 17, 1977 from Rochester, Minnesota Classification: Endangered Missing Age: 65 years old Height: 5'10 Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian female. Red hair, brown eyes. Helen was overweight at the time she disappeared; she was otherwise healthy. Her former married name is Littlecock. Clothing/Jewelry Description: A full-length fur coat. Details of Disappearance Helen kept a checkup appointment at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota on February 17, 1977. The doctors there found nothing wrong with her save that she was overweight. After paying her bill, Helen began walking back to her hotel. She stopped at a gift shop and purchased $41 worth of cosmetics and bath towels, telling the clerk she was in a hurry because her "houseman" was waiting. Investigators are not sure what Helen meant; she was traveling alone and no one was seen with her. Helen did have a houseman named Jack Matlick. A photograph of Matlick is posted below this case summary. He helped run Helen's house after her husband, Frank, died. Frank had been the owner of E. J. Brach and Sons and was one of the world's wealthiest candy producers. He met Helen, a native of Ohio, when she was working as a coat-check girl at the Palm Beach Country Club in Florida. After their marriage they lived in Chicago, Illinois during the summer and rented a house in Palm Beach, Florida, in the winter. Frank and Helen apparently had a very happy relationship. Frank died in 1970, seven years before Helen's disappearance. He left her with an estimated net worth of $20 million. Matlick claims he met Helen at O'Hare International Airport when she flew from Rochester back to Chicago, but the plane crew, could not remember anyone matching her description on the flight that day. They were not interviewed until a significant period of time had passed, however. Matlick says he picked up Helen at O'Hare and drove her back to her home in Glenview, Illinois. That weekend, Matlick called his wife and said he would be staying in Glenview because he had work to do. This is uncharacteristic of him; he normally lived apart from Helen in a house she owned in Schaumberg, Illinois. Matlick told police later that Helen had stayed in Glenview that weekend preparing for her upcoming trip to Florida. But friends who dropped by to visit her were told she was unavailable, and Helen did not call anyone, which is uncharacteristic of her. Matlick says he drove Helen to O'Hare at 7:00 a.m. on Monday without much luggage or a flight reservation; Helen normally traveled with lots of luggage and a carefully planned itinerary. She is also a late riser who would not normally fly out so early in the morning. There is no record of Helen flying out of O'Hare that day. Matlick said Helen signed several checks totaling $15,000 before she left; many of the checks were to his benefit. When investigators determined the checks had not, in fact, been signed by Helen, Matlick changed his story and said he had signed the checks for her because she had injured her hand. Handwriting analysis experts do not believe he actually signed the checks, however. They were never tested against anyone else's writing. Matlick's wife said he gave her a different story about Helen's disappearance; he said she did not return from the Mayo Clinic and he was waiting for her in Glenview. That weekend in Glenview, Matlick arranged to have carpeting replaced in one of the rooms of Helen's house, and had two rooms repainted also. The workers who did the job did not notice anything out of the ordinary about the room. Matlick had the pink Cadillac he'd been driving cleaned and waxed, and the interior shampooed. Matlick did not try to report Helen missing for over two weeks after her disappearance. The missing persons report had to come from a family member, so he contacted her brother, Charles Voorhees, in Ohio and notified him about his sister's disappearance. After flying to Illinois and reporting Helen missing, Voorhees and Matlick searched her Glenview home for clues. Matlick destroyed her diaries, which she had written in every day for years. Voorhees says Helen left explicit instructions that they should be burned if anything happened to her, so he allowed Matlick to burn the papers outside of his presence. Authorities' initial suspect in Helen's disappearance was Matlick. No ransom demand had been made for Helen and investigators did not think Matlick's story was incredible. He took a series of lie detector tests but the results were inconclusive. John Cadwallader Menk, an attorney, was appointed to look after Brach's estate in her absence. He was not permitted to see her will but Matlick told him she had willed all her money to various charities and to Voorhees. Menk tried to question Richard Bailey, whom Brach had been dating at the time of her disappearance and was supposed to meet her when she flew to Florida, but Bailey hired an attorney and refused to cooperate with Menk. He would not even admit he knew Brach. A photograph of Bailey is posted below this case summary. He was active in the city's horse market; he was the owner of Bailey Stables and Country Club Stables. Bailey had a reputation as a con artist around Chicago; he would romance recently divorced or widowed middle-aged wealthy women, then fleece them out of their money through bad investments in horses. Bailey had introduced Helen to the horse business; her accountant estimated that she had spent $250,000 on horses. Bailey and his brother had sold Helen some horses for much more than they were worth. Helen was declared legally dead in 1984 and her brother and some animal protection organizations got most of her money. Helen's case remained open but inactive until 1989, when a prosecutor investigating horse fraud took a closer look at her disappearance. It was revealed that Bailey had connections to Silas Jayne, the founder of the Jayne Gang, which was involved in the horse business and in organized crime. Silas is a possible suspect in the 1966 disappearances of Renee Bruhl, Patricia Blough and Ann Miller, who vanished together from Indiana Dunes State Park in Indiana. They rode their horses at one of Silas's stables. Silas had an established reputation as a vicious, cold-blooded gangster and many feared him. Police believe he and Richard Bailey were involved in Helen's apparent abduction. They theorize that Helen realized Bailey had scammed her and was planning to tell authorities and have him jailed, and he conspired with others and had her killed to silence her. In 1994, Bailey was charged with numerous counts of fraud and with conspiring to commit murder, soliciting to commit murder, and causing the murder of Helen. Bailey pleaded guilty to racketeering, conspiracy, mail and wire fraud and money-laundering and admitted to conning elderly widows and divorcees. He denied scamming Helen, however, or having anything to do with his disappearance. before a federal judge. After hearing the evidence against him in Helen's case, a federal judge becided Bailey had conspired to kill her and sentenced him to life in prison. The sentence was later reduced to 30 years. Bailey is not believed to have acted alone in Helen's case, but no one else was ever charged in connection with her disappearance. If it were not for the Brach allegations, he would have been sentenced to only about 11 years in prison. In 2005, investigators announced that an individual, later identified as Joe Plemmons, had come forward with information about Helen's alleged murder. Plemmons, a horseman who had known Helen, confessed that he and ten others, including a police officer, beat and shot her to death at the behest of Silas Jayne and his nephew, Frank Jayne Jr., and incinerated her body at a steel mill off of Interstate 65 near Gary, Indiana. Plemmons admitted to being the shooter after signing an agreement granting him immunity from prosecution. He said Helen was murdered to keep her from going to the police about being swindled in bad horse deals. He also stated that Bailey had nothing to do with the murder. He named nine of the conspirators; the tenth, a woman, he did not identify because he says he never knew her name. Plemmons stated that the female conspirator impersonated Helen and used her plane ticket home from the Mayo Clinic, and that Helen herself was actually driven home. Police are searching for corroboration to support Plemmons's confession; as of yet there is not enough evidence available to charge his alleged accomplices with anything relating to Helen's case. Silas Jayne died in 1987 and Frank is serving a prison sentence in Illinois for arson; he denies involvement in Helen's disappearance, as do all the other alleged conspirators who are still living. Plemmons has given multiple contradictory accounts of his involvement in Helen's death and is an admitted lifelong con man, but his testimony had previously helped put a man in prison for murdering some boys in the 1950s. (This same man is one of those implicated by Plemmons in Helen's murder.) Plemmons told investigators that he finally confessed to his involvement in Helen's death because he could not bear the guilt anymore. Bailey sought a new sentencing hearing as a result of Plemmons's testimony, arguing that the evidence proved he was innocent of involvement in Helen's disappearance and should therefore be released from prison. The court ruled against him in 2005, however, stating that the evidence would be more appropriate to overturn his conviction than reduce his sentence, and in any case it did not prove he was not complicit in Helen's murder. Although Bailey might be able to appeal to the U. S. Supreme Court, it is likely that he will remain in prison to serve his full sentence. Helen's remains have never been found, but foul play is suspected in her disappearance due to the circumstances involved. Left: Jack Matlick; Right: Richard Bailey Source Information The Crime Library The Doe Network The Chicago Sun-Times The Chicago Tribune ABC 7 Chicago Unsolved Crimes: Great True Crimes of the 20th Century by Kirk Wilson Updated 5 times since October 12, 2004. Last updated November 27, 2006; middle name, height and clothing/jewelry description added, distinguishing characteristics and details of disappearance updated. Charley Project Home |
|
|
| oldies4mari2004 | Dec 18 2006, 08:17 PM Post #3 |
|
Unregistered
|
me.jpg |
|
|
| oldies4mari2004 | Dec 18 2006, 08:18 PM Post #4 |
|
Unregistered
|
me.jpg |
|
|
| monkalup | Dec 31 2006, 12:44 PM Post #5 |
|
The Old Heifer! An oxymoron, of course.
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
http://z13.invisionfree.com/PorchlightUSA/...opic=1095&st=0& |
|
Lauran "If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. | |
![]() |
|
| Ell | Jan 6 2007, 06:41 PM Post #6 |
|
Heart of Gold
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...ssing%20Persons Police End Search for Heiress Save Share Digg Newsvine Permalink REUTERS Published: January 10, 1988 LEAD: Law-enforcement officials from two states have called off a search for a missing heiress after concluding that a prison inmate had led them on a wild goose chase. Law-enforcement officials from two states have called off a search for a missing heiress after concluding that a prison inmate had led them on a wild goose chase. The authorities said Friday that the inmate, Maurice Ferguson, contended twice that he knew the answer to the mysterious disappearance of Helen Vorhees Brach, the 65-year-old widow of Frank V. Brach, a millionaire candy company owner. But both times his information proved wrong. The tips from Mr. Ferguson brought the reopening of a case that began in February 1977 when Mrs. Brach left the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., after a routine checkup. Mrs. Brach, of Glenville, Ill., was declared legally dead in 1984 and much of her estimated $35 million fortune was left to animal protection groups. On Friday, after two days spent visiting 10 cemeteries in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, the police from Minnesota and Illinois said they would no longer pay attention to the inmate, who is serving a 35-year sentence in Mississippi for armed robbery. |
|
Ell Only after the last tree has been cut down; Only after the last fish has been caught; Only after the last river has been poisoned; Only then will you realize that money cannot be eaten. | |
![]() |
|
| « Previous Topic · Missing Persons 1977 · Next Topic » |





![]](http://z6.ifrm.com/static/1/pip_r.png)



brach_helen.jpg (9.11 KB)
9:26 AM Jul 11