Wilma June Nissen was 23 years old when her body was found in a roadside ditch in Lyon County, Iowa on October 4, 1978. She went unidentified as a Jane Doe for 27 years. Her murder has never been solved.
On October 4, 1978, a telephone worker laying cable in a rural area of Lyon County came across her body, hidden in tall weeds along an unmaintained gravel road. She had been dragged into the ditch. No one in the area recognized her, and she remained an unidentified Jane Doe for nearly three decades.
In January 2006, investigators matched Wilma's left thumbprint to a fingerprint card from an old arrest record with the Los Angeles Police Department, finally identifying her as Wilma June Nissen, born in San Francisco in 1954. She had been working in California before her death.
Wilma's daughter, Krissi Atkisson, was an infant when her mother was killed and grew up not knowing what had happened to her. She learned of her mother's identification and death only after a friend's mother recognized the name in a newspaper article decades later. Since then, Krissi has devoted herself to pursuing her mother's case, maintaining the site Justice4WilmaJuneNissen.com and working with investigators and cold case researchers to keep the case active.
DNA evidence was recovered from the ropes used to bind Wilma's feet, and investigators have said they are waiting on forensic technology to advance further before it can be fully analyzed. The Lyon County Sheriff's Office has said Wilma's cause of death has never been released publicly, citing the ongoing investigation.
Wilma June Nissen was a daughter and a mother who never got the chance to be known as either during her short life. Her family has never stopped pushing for the answers she deserves.
How to report a tip:
Lyon County Sheriff's Office (Rock Rapids, IA): 712-472-8300