‘Tornado of a mess’: Sisters learn of mother’s 1989 slaying near Las Vegas

About two months after Melissa Nava’s 37th birthday, she received a call from an investigator that would change her life.

That day, in August, Nava learned that her birth mother, a woman she never knew, had been stabbed to death in December 1989. Her body was found in Mohave County, Arizona, in a remote desert area about 50 miles south of Las Vegas.

“It was a big shock,” Nava said. “A lot of questions run through your head. Honestly, I’ve felt lately like I’m watching a movie.”

The Mohave County Sheriff’s Office posted on its Facebook page in September that, thanks to DNA testing, investigators concluded that the slaying victim, Marina Ramos, was the birth mother of Nava and her younger sister, Tina Mangum, 36.

Investigators believed that Ramos was with her two young daughters when she was killed.

Shortly after her body was discovered, two girls, ages 14 months and 2 months, were found abandoned in a park restroom in Oxnard, California, hundreds of miles away.

The girls were first placed in foster care, but were soon adopted by a caring family and raised in Ojai, California.

Those girls were Nava and her sister.

The birth identities of the two girls were not known until this summer. After they were found abandoned in the Oxnard restroom, nobody knew who they were or how they got there — and it wasn’t known that they were Ramos’ daughters.

Her sister now goes by her birth name of Jasmin Ramos, according to Nava. Nava lives in Arizona while her sister makes her home in Oregon.

Nava, reached by phone on Thursday, said the past few weeks have been surreal as the sisters’ story has garnered national attention following the sheriff’s office Sept. 22 Facebook post.

The sisters didn’t know who their birth mother was. In fact, Nava said, they didn’t even know they had been adopted until their parents got a divorce when they were teenagers.

“I never felt like I was adopted up until that point,” Nava said. “My family didn’t treat me any differently, and I never really had any desire, after we found out, to find my biological parents. I wasn’t curious about that.”

But a few years ago, Nava said, her sister decided to get a DNA swab done. She wanted to see if she could find out where she came from.

Nava said the answers that were found — answers she never sought out — have been difficult to process.

The phone call

On Aug. 27, Nava received a phone call from Lori Miller, an investigator with the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office who came to the department a few years ago with a goal of reviving cold cases that had many more questions than answers.

The case of Marina Ramos’ murder was among them. At the time of her death, Ramos also went by the name Maria Ortiz.

What Miller told Nava changed her life forever. All of a sudden, she had a new name — Elizabeth Ramos — and a new family that she didn’t know at all. And that was on top of the news that her birth mother had been violently killed.

“It’s been a crazy experience,” Nava said. “Being in the news and answering questions, it’s been crazy. We’ve been given a lot of information. I’m still working to process all of it.”

With the unsolved murder case receiving renewed attention, the sheriff’s office has asked for the public’s help in finding Ramos’ killer.

For years, Ramos was known as a Jane Doe, but the DNA sample that Nava’s sister provided opened a door.

Back in 1989, according to the sheriff’s office, a witness who was in the area where Ramos’ body was found told officers that she had observed a woman and two men with two children.

They were observed driving a black pickup. The two males were described as being Hispanic.

Working through a new past

Nava said, since the news stories began to come out, people have been congratulating her and referring to the story as being “heart-warming,” she said.

But she said her reality is more complicated. She said she has been in touch with some of her mother’s family members, including her aunt, but that she has found it difficult at times to relate to them.

“My brain constantly runs now with more questions,” Nava said. “What if we had grown up with this family? My mom is the one who had all the answers and those will never be given to me and my sister. I do feel fortunate that we grew up how we did. There’s no way I would be where I am today had I grown up with that family. We were blessed to be raised by the family that raised us.”

One of the breaks that investigators received came because Ramos’ fingerprints had been taken after she was arrested for shoplifting in June 1989 in Kern County, California. At the time, the prints were under the name Maria Ortiz.

Investigators in Mohave County received those prints in 2022. They were submitted to the FBI shortly after. Since 2023, investigators had been asking the public for help in solving the case.

Anita Mortensen, public information officer for the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office, said the reach of social media channels has helped the department in its efforts to solve cold cases.

“We talk about technology advancing, but social plays such a big role in cases like this,” Mortensen said. “With social media, you have the ability to reach so many people, not just in our community, but people in Las Vegas, Phoenix and California who may not know anything about us investigating this case, but maybe you start to drum up memories. Maybe somebody was there or maybe somebody saw or noticed something.”

While part of the overall mystery connected to Marina Ramos’ murder has been solved, it’s still not known who committed the crime and why. The sheriff’s office, Mortensen said, hopes to get those answers as well.

“The search for the suspects involved in the homicide of Marina Ramos continues,” read part of a Facebook post.

Knowing what she now knows, Nava said she wonders if her birth mother’s killer is still out there somewhere.

“You wonder if it was somebody the family knew and if they are still alive,” Nava said. “It’s been so long, I’m sure there are answers that we’re never going to get. To me, at the moment, I feel like I’ve been thrown into this tornado of a mess.”

Contact Bryan Horwath at bhorwath@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BryanHorwath on X.