LAKE COUNTY – On a winter day in late 2008, a small group of people who loved Barbara LaForge gathered on the banks of Goodby's Creek in a little park in Jacksonville, Fla.
The people there included members of the Jones family, who had been LaForge's adopted family after her father committed suicide when she was just a child.
It was a quiet and reflective gathering, said Lisa Hatcher, LaForge's adopted sister.
The group wasn't just there to remember LaForge, but to give her, at last, some type of burial.
With them they had the ashes of the murdered Kelseyville resident, who died on Oct. 8, 2002, in her downtown Lakeport frame shop, after being shot four times at close range with a .22-caliber weapon.
About a month before, the family had received the ashes from the Lakeport Police Department.
“In searching for evidence in this investigation we came across the ashes, the remains,” said Lt. Brad Rasmussen.
During the department's ongoing investigation into LaForge's murder – the city's only unsolved homicide – they discovered LaForge's ashes in an abandoned mini storage locker in Kelseyville, he said.
Rasmussen said the department, which took legal possession of LaForge's remains, then sent the ashes to the Jones family.
As they had when LaForge had been alive, the Joneses stepped forward and, with love and respect, took care of her.
Hatcher said the quiet little ceremony on Goodby's Creek, a tributary of the Saint John's River, included sprinkling LaForge's ashes into the fast-running stream, and placing a wreath in the water.
“We were there 'til the wreath floated away,” Hatcher recalled.
Christine Jones, who for LaForge was a beloved mother figure, said of her adopted daughter, “She was abandoned in death just like she was abandoned in life by her husband.”
LaForge's husband, Dan Hamblin, continues to refuse to speak with police or the press about the case.
Another year brings new case developments
Over the past year, there have been several developments in the ongoing LaForge case, from the solemn ceremony on the water in Florida to the hiring of a new detective, new forensic testing and a new round of interviews.
In April, the Lakeport City Council approved a special $35,000 allocation to hire a part-time investigator in an effort to finally solve the case, as Lake County News has reported.
As luck would have it, Lou Riccardi, a veteran San Mateo County homicide investigator, had retired to Lake County and was ready and willing to join Lakeport Police in a part-time capacity. He started in June.
Riccardi came with stellar credentials and powerful recommendations from former colleagues, including San Mateo County Chief Deputy District Attorney Steve Wagstaff.
Wagstaff said Riccardi is “remarkably tenacious,” with an incredible ability to work with people.
“If you work a cold case, you have to have some patience,” said Wagstaff, who noted that Riccardi fits that bill.
Wagstaff said Riccardi left a legacy behind in San Mateo County not just of great police work; his son, Anthony, has followed in his footsteps as an investigator, and is one of that county's finest.
Riccardi was paired with Destry Henderson, a Lakeport Police officer who had been promoted to investigator.
The two appear to have quickly achieved a sense of camaraderie as they've spent time examining the case's extensive documentation and evidence.
They work together in an office where a portrait of LaForge hangs on the wall. The picture shows a side profile of LaForge, who stares off into the distance, a thoughtful look on her face.
By the time Riccardi and Henderson came onto the case, police had discovered LaForge's remains in the Kelseyville mini storage, where they had been abandoned by LaForge's husband.
Police won't offer many details on the discovery or how it came about due to concerns about revealing too much about the investigation. However, they did confirm that the ashes were found in the early spring of 2008, and sent to the Jones family about seven months later.
More recently, over the summer, Riccardi and Henderson have begun sending off evidence for testing to the state Department of Justice. Some of it was new evidence, and some was to be retested with new technologies.
They've also done some basic, old-fashioned pavement pounding, passing out flyers along downtown Main Street, visiting with community members and beginning to conduct new interviews.
Riccardi and Henderson said they have another 15 people or so they want to talk to again. Henderson explained that it isn't necessarily a quick process, because locating people can be a challenge, especially seven years after the murder.
Some of the work also is rather mundane, said Henderson. The investigation involves clerical work such as running records. “It's kind of a slow, grinding process.”
Because much of their work so far has been behind the scenes, Riccardi said it may seem to the public that not much is happening. But the investigation continues moving forward.
“Since we've started we've made some significant strides in the case,” he said.
A very important part of their work right now is clearing people from the list of suspects, he said.
“Clearing people is just as important as finding out who did it,” Riccardi said.
They're not at this point saying who they've cleared.
That work also is necessary to prepare the case for the eventual, and hoped-for, prosecution, Riccardi said.
In an investigation such as this one, said Riccardi, there is a lot of hard work to be done – both before and after an arrest is made.
Rasmussen said Lakeport Police also is getting some outside assistance on the case.
The Western States Information Network – known as WSIN – is a criminal intelligence clearinghouse run by the California Department of Justice. The network covers California, Washington, Oregon, Alaska and Hawaii.
Rasmussen said WISN assists law enforcement by connecting resources and offering case analsyis. Currently, WISN is assisting by creating a case time line, along with working with the department to go through the case documents and evidence.
Also offering expertise is the Northern California High Density Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), said Rasmussen. Lake is included in the 10-county area, which receives extra resources to assist with reducing drug trafficking and related crime and violence, according to the HIDTA Web site, www.nchidta.org .
“We're still trying to use whatever resources we can to assist,” said Rasmussen.
The department welcomes anonymous tips on the case, which can be submitted through a special e-mail,
There also remains in force a $50,000 reward from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Office for information that leads to an arrest or conviction. That reward remains in effect indefinitely or until an arrest is made.
“We definitely want all of the community involvement we can get,” said Rasmussen.
Family welcomes LaForge home; hopes for a resolution
LaForge had begun staying with the Jones family, who lived next door, after her father's death, when she was about 11. By that time, her mother already had abandoned her and her brother, Jack, and moved west with her other children.
Later LaForge's older cousin had she and her brother placed in an Alabama orphanage because she didn't want them with the Joneses, who are Jehovah's Witnesses. Despite that, LaForge was baptized as a Jehovah's Witness at age 14, while still in the orphanage.
When the cousin died, LaForge – then 18 – was allowed to leave the orphanage three years early and return to her adopted family. Back in Jacksonville, she signed up for junior college and got her own apartment. Christine Jones later would help her reconnect with her birth mother, which would bring LaForge to Lake County.
Jones took LaForge to an attorney after she left the orphanage, where LaForge made a will. The will, created in 1978, called for LaForge to be cremated, with her ashes sprinkled at the grave of her father, Jack LaForge, at Oaklawn Cemetery in Jacksonville.
Hatcher said the family tried to fulfill those wishes, but “we were not permitted to do that.”
So instead they arranged for a small memorial service at Jones' home, where a church elder who had known LaForge spoke. The family then went to the creek to scatter LaForge's ashes.
Hatcher and Jones said when Lakeport Police sent them LaForge's remains, they were accompanied by some precious mementos of her life, including the outfit and the jewelry she wore the day she married Hamblin in October 1996.
“She saved everything,” said Jones.
Seeing the items, said Hatcher, reminded them of how happy LaForge had been, and how much she loved her husband.
“It was a good gift coming home,” she said.
Hatcher added that having the items and receiving her adopted sister's remains did offer a certain measure of closure, despite the fact that the murder hasn't been solved and prosecuted.
“It was a closure in that she got to come home to us,” said Hatcher.
Jones said the family loved LaForge, who remains an emotional subject for them.
She remembered her adopted daughter as having a stubborn streak coupled with a desire to “take care of the world.”
Thinking of how LaForge – who would have turned 50 this year – died, Jones said, “What a fight that child must have put up.”
Sometimes justice isn't served in this legal system, said Jones, noting that there are certain things in life one can't control.
Still, the family isn't worried about when justice will arrive, said Jones.
“Whoever did this, whoever planned this, whoever helped with this, will have judgment,” she said. “It may not be now, it may not be a year from now, but it will happen, and we have that to look forward to.”
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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