On May 28, 1980, Dorothy Jane Scott, 32, was in the emergency waiting room at the UC Irvine Medical Center with co-worker Pam Head. They were waiting for another coworker, Conrad Bostron, who was being treated for a black widow spider bite. Bostron was discharged around 11 p.m. and Scott asked her co-workers to wait at the exit for her. She never met them there.
Head and Bostron went to the parking lot to see if they could find her. Suddenly Scott’s white Toyota station wagon sped toward them. The headlights were on full beam so they could not see who was driving. Head and Bostron thought Scott had gone to pick up her son Shawn from her parents’ house. They waited for two hours to see if Scott would return. When she did not, they called Scott’s parents to ask if they had seen her but they had not. Head and Bostron reported Scott missing to the police.
The next morning, Scott’s car was found burning in an alley in Santa Ana about 10 miles from the hospital. A week after the disappearance Scott’s mother Vera received a call from an anonymous man who said “I’ve got her” before hanging up. Scott had previously told a coworker that she was getting anonymous phone calls from someone who had been watching her and knew specific details about her life. Authorities believed Scott and Vera had calls from the same man.
In August 1984, the partial remains of Scott were found near Santa Ana Canyon Road. The case remains unsolved.