9 giug 1973 anni - Yvonne J Quilantang HOMICIDE

Descrizione:

Yvonne Quilantang was born on July 11, 1957 in San Francisco to parents Terezo Vincent Quilantang and Evelyn Marie Quilantang (nee Leroy). Yvonne and her siblings were biracial, half white, half Asian: their father, Terezo, was an immigrant from the Philippines. Some sources from the 1970s mistakenly list Yvonne as Black. However, thorough research on Ancestry indicates that she was not Black, but instead Filipina.

She was baptized Catholic. She was the youngest of six children: her older siblings are Sharon, Vincente, Michael, Linda, and Thomas; the latter was only two years older than her.

Yvonne's father was a seaman. Her mother eventually grew unable to care for her, so Yvonne was "taken into a foster home, where she had lived almost since she could remember." She seemed to still be in contact with her birth family.

In early June 1973, Yvonne was 15 years old and attending Opportunity II High School. She was living with the Brodericks, an Asian-American long-time foster family in the Visitacion Valley neighborhood of San Francisco. The family consisted of Joyce Jacqueline Broderick (nee Davies), William John Broderick, and their two biological children Tom (b. 1945) and Jacqueline ("Jackie," b. 1954).

In 1958, encouraged by both their local priest as well as their daughter Jackie's longing for another child around her age in the house, the Brodericks began fostering through the Catholic Social Service. The Broderick couple, both half-white, half-Asian themselves, became semi-known for taking in children of all ethnicities: at one point, the family was caring for a Mexican-American girl named Leilani, a Japanese orphan, and three Spanish-German sisters all at the same time.

William Broderick sadly passed away in 1965, though that did not deter his wife Joyce from continuing to foster children. In December 1971, when she was 17 years old, daughter Jackie married a 21-year-old named Kenneth G Tate; the couple continued to live with the Brodericks. By June 1973, Joyce was fostering at least two children: Yvonne Quilantang and another girl named Rita.

One of Yvonne's teachers stated, "Yvonne was shy and tried to hide it by coming on hard. It didn't work, though. About halfway through any conversation, that smile would break through. It was a wonderful smile. She just couldn't help smiling." Yvonne's sister-in-law said of her, "She was very quiet, just starting to break out. She was popular, going to lots of parties. She was well-liked." According to Yvonne's friend Carla Bell, "She had lots of friends. People liked her."

While Yvonne struggled with reading in school, she had been working hard to improve, and was apparently making "excellent progress." She was talented in art and music, and her singing class in school was one of her favorites. As the end of the school year was nearing, Yvonne was looking forward to the recording session that the class planned as "a sort of end-of-year ceremony."

Yvonne had promised to go to the recording session, which was held on the night of Saturday, June 9, 1973.

Earlier that afternoon, Yvonne asked her foster sister Rita if she wanted anything from the Cala store, where she was reportedly going to purchase cigarettes. The store was down the hill from their home at 140 Delta St in Visitacion Valley. Rita declined the offer. As Yvonne was getting ready to leave, the telephone rang, and she picked it up. It is unknown who Yvonne spoke to. A later report stated that she was heard "arguing with a male on the telephone." She reportedly ended the call by saying that she had to go to the store.

Yvonne took her purse, but not her coat, and left the house to go to the store. She was seen walking in the opposite direction as the store. Authorities reportedly believed that the story about her intended location was a ruse, and that Yvonne was instead actually meeting someone. It is unknown if she did intend to meet with anyone, let alone whom.

Yvonne's foster mother, Joyce Broderick, filed a missing persons report for Yvonne that afternoon, Saturday, June 9, 1973. Yvonne was 5'3 and 125 lbs with brown eyes, long black hair, and pierced ears. She was six or seven months pregnant at the time; more on that below. I could not find any description of what she was last seen wearing.

The next day, Sunday, June 10, 1973, the nude body of a young woman was found in some bushes in a trash-filled lot in the 1300 block of Galvez Avenue in the Bay View District by two neighborhood children who were playing there. Four days later, on June 14th, the San Francisco Coroner's Office officially identified the deceased as Yvonne after police matched the description of the body with the missing persons report that Joyce had made. At the time, police were uncertain as to the exact cause of death, and pathology tests were underway.

It was eventually determined that Yvonne had been strangled. There were no signs of sexual assault. Her clothes were not recovered. One clipping described her body as "battered."

Yvonne was 6-7 months pregnant at the time of her death; the father was reportedly a "friend in San Francisco" who was a "local man." Yvonne also reportedly had a boyfriend in the Army at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. According to friends, Yvonne had told them that, "she hoped to marry the soldier in Missouri, [and] that the baby would make no difference."

Yvonne wanted to keep her baby and seemed excited to be a mother. Prior to her death she had made plans to take training in how to care for an infant during the summer of 1973. The names of — or any further information regarding, for that matter — neither Yvonne's boyfriend nor the father of her child were made public.

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Ten days before Yvonne's death, on May 29, 1973, the body of Rosa Vasquez, a 20-year-old Latina woman, was found nude and strangled just inside Golden Gate Park. On June 24, authorities stated that Rosa and Yvonne's murders were unrelated. On July 1, 1973, the nude body of Angela Thomas, a 16-year-old white girl, was found in the play yard of Benjamin Franklin Junior High School in San Francisco. She had been smothered, possibly with a pillow. Authorities again stated they believed the murders were unrelated.

However, LE's opinions seem to have changed slightly two weeks later, after Nancy Gidley, a 24-year-old white woman, was found, nude and strangled, near the athletic field of George Washington High School in San Francisco on July 15, 1973. A spokesman for police stated at the time, "We're treating these cases as individuals. However, the similarities are sufficient that we cannot exclude the possibility we have one person involved."

All four victims — Rosa Vasquez, Yvonne Quilantang, Angela Thomas, and Nancy Gidley — were young women and girls who were found in public places in San Francisco, nude and strangled or smothered. There were no clothing articles at any of the scenes, and LE believed they had all been killed at a different location before being dumped where they were found. Several of them had "signs of minor injuries seemingly approximal to the time of death." All four also had connections to the military: in Yvonne's case, her boyfriend was an Army soldier stationed in Missouri.

On August 8, 1973, Chief of Police Donald M Scott of the San Francisco PD published an information bulletin regarding the four homicides, listing the similarities and summaries of each. The bulletin ordered that "All patrol units should pay particular attention to schoolyard areas during night watches and special attention given during weekends and holidays." It also provided contact info for anyone with information. The bulletin is available in the "Photos" section of Yvonne's FindAGrave page. The summary of Yvonne's case as detailed by the bulletin is as follows:
"Sunday, June 10, 1973, the nude body of Yvonne Quilantang, NFJ," — Negro female juvenile — "15 years, was found in an empty lot at the end of Galvez Street. She was last known to be alive on Sat., June 9, 1973 and had allegedly left her foster home to purchase cigarettes. Just prior to her departure she was heard to be arguing with a male on the telephone."

None of the four San Francisco cases were ever solved, including Yvonne's.

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In February 1975 the California Department of Justice (CA DOJ) issued a special report titled "Unsolved Female Homicides: An Analysis of a Series of Related Murders in California and Western America." The report indicated that, "After evaluating more than one hundred murder cases involving female victims, it appears that thirteen of these crimes" — with fourteen victims total — "were committed by the same person. Each of the thirteen cases occurred in Northern California within the past five years. As of this writing, the suspect remains unknown and the cases unsolved" (pp4 of pdf). The report summarized all thirteen cases, noted observations and similarities, created a suspect profile, and included a map of all of the cases.

The cases were:
- The six then-known cases — with seven victims — of the Santa Rosa Hitchhiker Murders (1972-1973): Maureen Sterling & Yvonne Weber, Kim Wendy Allen, Lori Lee Kursa, Carolyn Davis, and Theresa Walsh.
- The four 1973 San Francisco victims: Rosa Vasquez, Yvonne Quilantang, Angela Thomas, and Nancy Gidley.
- The 1969 murder of Leona LaRell Roberts
- The 1970 murder of Marie Antoinette Anstey
- The 1974 murder of Donna Maria Braun
- And possibly the 1971 murder of Linda Susan Dudley (the pdf is incomplete)

It should be noted that all fourteen California victims indicated in the report were white, with the exception of Yvonne Quilantang, who was Filipina. San Francisco victim Rosa Vasquez was the only Latina victim.

The report's summary of Yvonne's case is as follows:
"On June 9, 1973, Yvonne Quilantang was last seen leaving her San Francisco residence en route to the store. Her nude body was discovered the following day, lying in some bushes on a vacant lot. The victim was apparently dumped at the location completely nude, and none of her clothing has ever been found. She may have been sexually molested, as semen was found in her vagina. The cause of death was listed as strangulation."
It should be noted, however, that on pp28 of the report pdf, listed among other "General Observations" was the statement that, "Only those victims over eighteen years of age were sexually molested." Furthermore, the 1973 police bulletin regarding the San Francisco cases indicated that only Rosa Vasquez and Nancy Gidley had been sexually assaulted.

Also included in the report was a possible out-of-state connection involving the disappearances of eight young women in Washington and Oregon since January 1974. The only copy of the report that I could find online is missing the last ten or so pages, though a few other police reports are also included in the pdf. Because of this, only a few of the Washington-Oregon cases remain: Janice Ott, Denise Naslund, Lynda Ann Healy, and Donna Gail Manson. All four of these young women were later determined to have been murdered by serial killer Ted Bundy.

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In 1976, it was proposed that Yvonne was another possible victim of a then-unidentified serial killer who strangled young Black women to death in San Francisco from 1975-1976. By 1982, the man was identified as John Norris Hanks. However, he was never charged with Yvonne's death, and I could not find further reports on his possible connection to Yvonne's case after 1986.

Furthermore, thorough research on Ancestry indicates that Yvonne was not Black, but instead a dark-skinned Filipina girl. Her mother was white, while her father had immigrated to the US from the Philippines.

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Kenneth Quilantang Jr, supposedly son of one of Yvonne's first cousins on her father's side (aka Yvonne's Filipino side) who grew up in Hawai'i, wrote a short piece in 2010, when he was 37 years old. That work, titled "Hush", is listed in the "Fiction" category of the blog that it was posted on.

According to that work, Kenneth had an Uncle Fred — the older brother of his father, aka another one of Yvonne's first cousins — who died in jail at some point prior to 1986. According to Kenneth's father, who attributed Yvonne's murder to the Zodiac, Uncle Fred told him shortly before his death that he (Fred) had "caught the guy" and avenged Yvonne's death. The work ends, "This is for my aunt Yvonne Quilantang, a nursing student murdered by the Zodiac Killer on June 9, 1973, avenged unknown by Uncle Fred."

EDIT: I have done both Yvonne and Kenneth's ancestry. While Ken did have an Uncle Fred — specifically, his great uncle (i.e. his grandfather's brother) — it does not seem that either of them were related to Yvonne in any way, at least that I could find.

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Yvonne's case is still unsolved, and there does not appear to be any named suspects at this time. She is not featured on the San Francisco Cold Cases page; however, this does not necessarily indicate anything about the status of her case, as other high-profile SF murders, like that of Paul Stine, are not present on the site either.

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WRITE-UP COMPLETION DATE: May 29, 2025
LAST UPDATED: June 11, 2025

Cases mentioned above that are also/will be present on this timeline:
SRHM; Rosa Vasquez, Angela Thomas, Nancy Gidley, Leona Roberts, Marie Anstey, Donna Braun; Linda Dudley
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LUNAR PHASE: waxing gibbous
ZODIAC SIGN: gemini
DAY OF WEEK: Sunday

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