Brenda Faye Crockett – July 27, 1971 – age 10

Brenda Faye Crocket was a 10 year old girl who lived in Northwest Washington, D.C., near Cardozo High School about 8 miles north from Congress Heights. She was a big sister, enjoyed playing with friends from school and the neighborhood, attending church, making her family laugh, and teaching their dogs tricks.

On July 27, 1971, Brenda’s mom sent her out to the local Safeway five blocks from their home to pick up dog food for their three dogs and bread. Reatha thought her daughter took a friend with her, since there was a neighborhood movie night going on. When she didn’t return within the normal time limit her mom immediately left to look for Brenda. 

While out looking for her daughter, Reatha missed two phone calls from Brenda, the first call her seven year old sister answered the phone and the second call Brenda’s stepfather answered. 

According to reports Brenda told her sister that she was in Virginia and that a white man had “snatched” her up. But Brenda said that her kidnapper had called a taxi to send her home. A half-hour later, Brenda called a second time, speaking to her stepfather. “Did my mother see me?” she asked. Then, after a pause, she whispered, “Well, I’ll see you.” The phone went dead.

Authorities quickly concluded that Brenda  likely called her home at the behest of the killer, who fed her inaccurate information in order to buy the necessary time to perpetrate the crime, and to hamper the investigation. At 5:50 am the next day, a hitchhiker discovered Brenda’s shoeless body in a conspicuous location alongside U.S. Route 50, near the Baltimore-Washington Parkway in Prince George’s County, Maryland. 

The first detective on the scene vividly remembers a little girl sprawled alongside the road, clad in blue-and-white print shorts and a matching halter top. Brenda had been raped and strangled, and a scarf was knotted around her neck. She had the same green fibers as Carol Denise Spinks. 

Detective Jenkins struggles to this day to make sense of the slaying, stating, “What is so appealing about a little 10-year-old that you would snatch her off the street and rape and kill her?” “Why her?”

Brenda was only ten years old, she never got to experience anything besides being a child to a loving family. 

If you have any information regarding to the abduction and murders of Carol Spinks, Darlenia Johnson, Brenda Crockett, Nenomoshia Yates, Brenda Woodard or Diane Williams please call Metro Police at 202-727-9099 or send an email to unsolved.murder@dc.gov.

Brenda Faye Crocket walked to the store and she didn’t come home.