Jessica Suzanne Gutierrez

• Missing Since 06/05/1986
• Missing From Lexington, South Carolina
• Classification Non-Family Abduction
• Sex Female
• Race White
• Date of Birth 12/03/1981 (43)
• Age 4 years old
• Height and Weight 3'0, 32 pounds
• Clothing/Jewelry Description A pink and white t-shirt and white panties.
• Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Jessica has a small scar on her upper forehead, ear-piercing scars on both of her earlobes, and a small brown birthmark on her right buttock. She had a wart on her left hand at the time of her 1986 disappearance, and her fingernails were painted. Jessica's nickname is Jessie.

Details of Disappearance

Jessica was sleeping in a bedroom with her two sisters in her family's Lexington, South Carolina mobile home during the evening hours of June 5, 1986.

An unknown intruder or intruders entered into the house sometime between 11:30 p.m. that evening and 9:00 a.m. on June 6, the following morning. The intruder(s) apparently broke in through the living room window and removed the screen and curtains. The abductor(s) then removed Jessica from the bedroom and left the residence through the front door.

Jessica's mother discovered the crime scene and her disappearance on the morning of June 6; her six-year-old sister, Rebecca, stated she had been taken by "the man with the magic hat and the beard." She has never been heard from again.

Rebecca, now an adult, remembers seeing a man lift Jessica out of the bed, put her over his shoulder and carry her away. She stated the man was able to do this without waking Jessica. Rebecca had been too frightened by what she saw to move or scream. She didn't tell anyone what had happened until the next morning, when Jessica was discovered missing.

Just a few days before Jessica disappeared, her mother, Debra, had broken up with her boyfriend, J.R. Gordon, and kicked him out of the house for alcohol use and what she described as possessive behavior.  Gordon was considered to be a suspect and was questioned repeatedly by police, and he admitted he had a problem with drugs and alcohol, but he said he didn't take Jessica and had no idea where she was.

He but never charged in her case and later cleared in the investigation. Jessica's father was also ruled out as a suspect in the case, as he had been living in California at the time of her abduction.

Investigators focused on Thomas Eric McDowell, a friend of the family who was 27 years old in 1986. He had briefly dated Debra, and shortly after Jessica disappered he stole a car, drove to North Carolina and raped a woman, which resulted in his incarceration from 1987 to 1997. He became a suspect after his fingerprint was found on the window of Jessica's bedroom. It was the only fingerprint on the window; Debra stated she cleaned the windows every night.

While he was imprisoned in North Carolina, McDowell allegedly told a cellmate that he had kidnapped a four-year-old girl from her bedroom in Lexington County, South Carolina. He took her to "a logging place" where he raped her, killed her and dismembered her body with a machete, he said. He mentioned that he was wearing a tall cowboy hat at the time of the kidnapping.

His cellmate told authorities about his statements, and when police confronted McDowell, he offered to confess if he got immunity from prosecution for the crime. Immunity was denied and McDowell did not speak further on the subject.

In 2007, when Rebecca was shown a photo lineup, she picked a photo of McDowell and said this was Jessica's abductor. The photo hadn't been taken until about eight years after Jessica's disappearance, however, so this identification was not considered conclusive at the time and investigators continued to look for more evidence. Rebecca had said in 1986 that her sister's abductor was a black man; she later said she'd been mistaken and he was in fact white. McDowell is white.

In January 2022, McDowell was charged with murder, kidnapping and first-degree burglary in Jessica's disappearance. A photo of him is posted with this case summary. The jailhouse informant whom McDowell allegedly confessed Jessica's murder testified against him at the trial. Rebecca also testified about the man she saw in her and Jessica's room that night.

In February 2024, McDowell was convicted of all charges after two hours of jury deliberation. He was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life in prison. He isn't the only convicted murderer in his immediate family; his older brother has been on death row in California since 1984.

Jessica's remains have never been found, but foul play is suspected in her case due to the circumstances involved.