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Hiding in Plain Sight: The Murder of Doris Derryberry and Valerie Lane
Two young girls were hunted like animals — and it would take 40 years for the monsters among them to be caught.
It was November 11th 1973 and best friends Doris Derryberry, 13, and Valerie Lane, 12, from the town of Olivehurst near Sacramento were heading out to a shopping mall in nearby Linda.
However, when hours went by with no sign of the girls, their mothers grew worried and called the police to report them missing. According to witnesses, there had been sightings of them around town until the early evening, but then both seemed to vanish without trace.
A devastating turn of events
By mid-morning on November 12th, a full-scale search for Doris and Valerie was taking place throughout Olivehurst and the surrounding area. But it was two boys playing at target shooting near Camp Far West Lake almost 20 hours after they disappeared who would make a discovery that would devastate the small town.
Doris and Valerie were dead, with investigators concluding they were both shot to death at close range in the isolated wooded area just outside Wheatland. An autopsy also found Doris had been sexually assaulted.
