The Murder of Terri Lynn Ray, July 1976
In July 1976, Terri Lynn Ray was fifteen years old and a student at Anderson High School. The redheaded girl was described as a free spirit who, according to her mother, "was the light in our house. When she came in the door, everything came alive — she was so full of life and fun and happiness and everyone around her shared it with her."
Terri would pin inspirational notes on her bedroom wall. One of these messages, which read, "The best things in life aren't free, but the best thing in life is freedom," is now etched into Terri's headstone where she is buried in her hometown of Redding, Shasta County, CA.
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| Terri Lynn Ray. Photo from the City of Redding Cold Cases page. |
This was the last time LaVerne saw Terri, as LaVerne went out at about 6:45pm. When she returned home five hours later, there was a note inside from her daughter, stating that some family friends had called at 7:15pm about dinner the next night.
Willie Bailey told police that he decided not to go to the swimming hole that night, and that the last time he saw Terri was at the intersection of Canyon Rd and Highway 99. Willie's story, that he went to baseball practice and a party rather than swimming, was confirmed by alibi witnesses.
At about 7:30pm, Terri was last seen by neighborhood friends walking her dog away from her home at 1942 Canyon Rd toward Clear Creek. Her dog, Charlie, was a shepherd mix who reportedly went everywhere with Terri.
A woman familiar with the area reported driving past the creek at 7:50pm and established that at the time "the water was placid and there was no one in sight." Another person, male, went to the swimming hole at about 9:30pm looking for friends, and also reported that the water was placid and no one was present at the time.
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| A view of Clear Creek. Photo from Locations Hub. |
One of Terri's friends, a girl named Carla Benner, reported seeing Terri at the swimming hole at about 8pm talking with a dark-haired, balding man in his 40s. Carla said that she didn't speak with Terri at that time.
At about 8:10pm five individuals reportedly saw Terri sitting in a medium-sized yellow car — possibly an El Camino model pickup — in the parking lot of the Mini Mart, 7200 North Highway 99, with two males and possibly another female, "on the night before her body was discovered in Clear Creek." According to one clipping, this was the "last known sighting" of Terri before she was killed. However, the witnesses vary in their descriptions and "don't even agree on the model of auto. Some aren't sure if it was Terri in the car or someone who looked like her."
When Terri's mother LaVerne returned to her home at about 11:40pm on July 7, she noticed that Terri's dog Charlie was out of the house. Charlie appeared wet on the legs and bottom of the belly, perhaps from a swim. Also when she returned home, LaVerne found a note from Terri inside, stating that some family friends had called at 7:15pm about dinner the following night.
According to LaVerne, "There was something wrong with that note. It wasn't signed and Terri always signed a message. She always put 'Love ya, Terri,' or 'see you by 12,' or something." The message was verified as accurate, "but it wasn't finished and I had the feeling that someone else had been in the house," according to LaVerne. A glass of orange juice had been left in an odd place on a bar, and a hand towel in the front bathroom "was hung in a way that no one in our house hangs a towel."
Two people, a young boy and girl, reported having visited the creek on a stroll between 11:30 and 11:45pm that night. They left and went home after hearing splashes in the water "like someone throwing rocks." According to a detective, "The splashes could have been something as innocent as fish jumping."
When Terri hadn't come home by midnight, LaVerne, Terri's brother Mike, 10, stepsister Lori, 16, and stepfather Gary McGuire immediately began a search for her. One of the areas they searched was the swimming hole.
On Thursday, July 8, at 1am, two waitresses at a Denny's Restaurant at 735 Market St said they were nearly certain they saw Terri having coffee with an older man, about 40 years old. One of the women said she didn't recall any apparent tension between the man and the girl. She also said that she thought it was strange that a young girl was sitting so close to an older man. However, detectives state that these sightings, "don't tie in with anything else in the case"; same goes for the sighting of her talking to an older, balding man at the creek.
At 3am on July 8, LaVerne called the Shasta County sheriff's office and reported Terri missing. LaVerne said that Terri was always on time, and if she was even a few minutes late that she'd call home. Sheriff's deputies reportedly searched the area around the swimming hole (though when they did this prior to her body being found is unclear), but found nothing.
At about noon on July 8, two youths — Mitch Barsky, 19, and Linda Canfield, 29 — were swimming near the Clear Creek Bridge when they found Terri's body floating in the water near where it flows under State Route 273 and/or near what was then Highway 99 South. Police responded to the scene promptly, and the body was quickly identified as being that of Terri.
She was originally thought to have been stabbed five or six times, though an autopsy determined that she had been stabbed approximately fifteen times with a knife blade that was about 0.75in wide, though many of the wounds were superficial, and some of the ones on her hands and arms may have been defensive wounds. She also had wounds on her neck, chest, and lower abdomen. Only four of the fifteen total stab wounds were mortal, with one being in the neck and the other three in the chest. COD was determined to be deep stab wounds to the chest that punctured both lungs. According to one clipping, "the differing angles of the wounds lead to 'nothing conclusive.'"
The coroner said that Terri could have been dead 16-18hrs before her body was found, though he emphasized that the estimate was difficult to make because she was in the water so long. A single spot of blood on a rock was found at the scene, though there wasn't enough of it to determine if it was hers. It is uncertain if she was killed at the site, though a couple reports note that there were no signs that she died elsewhere and had been moved/dragged to the creek. An autopsy found no signs of sexual assault.
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| Clear Creek. Photo from Locations Hub. |
Less than a week after Terri's body was found, a 17-year-old boy was taken into custody after reportedly being seen in a car with a girl who looked like Terri on the night of the murder. However, he was released soon after. Further details are unavailable.
In late September 1976, an 18-year-old girl named Tina Lynn Crume made statements incriminating herself regarding Terri's murder while under hypnosis. However, investigators found four witnesses who put Crume elsewhere other than the murder scene at the time of the murder. After several weeks in jail, Crume was released, and murder charges were dropped on/by October 5, 1976. It seems that no one has been named as a suspect since.
In 1978, a newspaper article reported that Terri's mother LaVerne had written an open letter to her daughter's killer. She asked:
"Did Terri know why? Did she scream? Did her dog try to help? Did she think you were her friend? What did she do to deserve being killed in such a terrible way? [...] What were her last thoughts when she knew what was happening? [...] How can you live with the guilt of taking the life of a young girl that had just begun to live?"
21st Century
In 2006, an investigator proposed that Terri Lynn Ray was one of the first victims of EARONS or the Golden State Killer, who has since been identified as Joseph James DeAngelo. However, there was no evidence that Terri was sexually assaulted, DeAngelo's primary motive. Furthermore, DeAngelo was known to attack women and teen girls inside their own homes, and his first murder did not occur until 1979. It is unknown if any of the DNA found at the Clear Creek crime scene matched that of DeAngelo. Furthermore, Terri has not been mentioned in any of the many accounts of DeAngelo's crimes.
Terri's case was reopened in 2013 when evidence in police custody was sent for DNA testing; as of December 2024, I have not found anything about the results of this testing. Terri is still listed among the city of Redding's victims of unsolved homicides, and was included in a 2025 list of cold cases in the Record Searchlight. A $5,000 reward is available in her case.
Anyone with information regarding Terri's murder is urged to contact the Redding Police Department at (530) 225-4200 and/or Shasta County Secret Witness at (530) 243-2319, or email coldcases@reddingpolice.org. The agency case number is 76-15682.
Terri's mother LaVerne passed away in May 2024, having never learned the truth of her daughter's death. During several interviews across the years, LaVerne stated that she thought about Terri every day.
My Thoughts
While I originally had this case tagged as My Research, as I found it from the Redding cold case page, I have found that Terri's case was once mentioned on a Zodiac forum in an "All Other Possible Zodiac Victims" thread, so I have now changed this case to a Connection.
Part of me thinks that Terri may have been murdered by a female classmate or friend. There were no signs of a struggle at the scene, including no evidence of Terri's body being dragged. Investigators have posited that this may be because she knew and was comfortable with her killer and wasn't expecting the attack. Furthermore, I find it interesting that authorities discounted the eyewitness account of Carla Benner, one of Terri's friends. There were also no signs of sexual assault, meaning the motive likely/possibly wasn't sexual.
Note: Terri was killed only three days after the Fourth of July. See the Holiday & Events Reference Page for an explanation as to why this is being mentioned.
Sources
Record Searchlight 7/9/76 pt.s 1 & 2, 7/10/76, 7/13/76, 7/31/76, 10/4/76
Daily Breeze 10/5/76
Record Searchlight 2/11/77, 1/14/78, 7/7/78
July 2006 Record Searchlight article
September 2006 Record Searchlight article, accessed through Wayback Machine
July 2013 Record Searchlight article
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