Liz Falco
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"Someone had to see something, or know something, or maybe their conscience will bother them," Falco said, seated in the kitchen of her Cherry Hill home. "And maybe they'll come forward."

 So far, no witness has emerged to say what happened to 25-year-old Elizabeth Falco, who disappeared in the early hours of Sept. 14, 1990. She was last seen pedaling a bicycle toward her Center City Philadelphia apartment after leaving the Bank, a nightclub at Sixth and Spring Garden Streets.

 Her body was found a month later near Philadelphia International Airport, in a grassy area off Tinicum Avenue. The body was clad only in black, high-top Reeboks, and had been shoved partway into a green plastic trash bag.

 Government medical examiners who inspected the near-skeletal remains originally classified the case a homicide, saying they believed Falco was strangled. Those authorities, whose autopsy detected cocaine in Falco's system, have since reclassified the manner of death to "undetermined," although homicide investigators continue to pursue the case. 

 No one has been charged with her slaying, and Philadelphia Police Detective Joseph Fischer has felt the frustration. The decomposed state of the body offered few clues, and the leads have dwindled with time.

 "The case bothers me a lot, because I believe there are people involved who haven't come totally forward," Fischer said. "They haven't come forward and said, 'Let me exonerate myself.' "Fischer reads the case file at least once a week, mulling over unanswered questions and possible suspects. In his own way, he shares the ache of uncertainty with Joanne Falco.

 "You want to see justice done," Fischer said. "I want to see her get an answer someday. I want to give myself that answer. I really do."

Her body, clad only in her black, high-top Reeboks, was found near Philadelphia International Airport, lying in a grassy area off Tinicum Avenue.

 Someone had shoved her partway into a green plastic trash bag. Medical experts who examined the near-skeletal remains believe that she was strangled.

 Since then, her family and friends have been tortured with questions. Questions about where she was and whom she was with when she vanished.

 "The whole thing is fishy," said Nathan Sonnheim, Falco's friend and former therapist. "To me it's really mysterious."

 Because of the decomposition of the body, authorities were unable to determine whether Falco, 25, had been raped. Nor could they determine the exact cause of death. Although police and family members said Falco had been known to use drugs, no evidence of drugs was found in an autopsy.

 Elizabeth Jane Falco grew up in Cherry Hill, where she devoted much of her time and energy to the care of her younger brothers. She moved to Philadelphia about a year ago and was out of work when she died.

 Her life was unremarkable. Her death drew the attention of the medical examiner, several police detectives and an FBI agent.

But all that lay ahead on Thursday, Sept. 13.

Falco spent that Thursday evening at the Bank, a popular nightspot in a converted bank building at Sixth and Spring Garden Streets. It's an old building of stone and wrought iron, with two snarling gargoyles guarding the front doors.

 They fit the neighborhood, where discarded newspapers and beer bottles litter the bushes and rats scurry across the sidewalks.

 Falco was last seen about 1 a.m. that Friday, pedaling her boyfriend's bicycle toward their Center City apartment.

 "I knew immediately that something bad had happened," said Joanne Falco, Liz's mother. " . . . I had this terrible feeling that I had to talk to her, but I couldn't reach her on the phone."

 Because she couldn't reach her daughter, Joanne Falco went to Philadelphia and to her daughter's apartment on Race Street. It was unsettling, she recalled. There sat Liz's jar of face cream, which she used once a day, every day. If her daughter had deliberately left town, Falco said, that jar would have gone with her.

 She called the police to report Liz missing.

 Meanwhile, her sons posted fliers across South Jersey and Philadelphia, offering a $2,000 reward for information on Liz's disappearance. A Philadelphia FBI agent, acting on a request from a family friend, also made some checks.

 Nothing panned out. The bike was never found.

 "At first I wasn't too sure - I kind of thought she could have took off," said her brother John, 19. "In a week or so . . . I realized she would have at least gotten in touch with us."

Paul Falco, 13, said he knew on Oct. 13 that his sister was dead. That was his birthday, he said, and he was sure she would have phoned if she were alive.

 A week before Thanksgiving, Joanne Falco called Robert Kane, a private detective with Joseph Brignola Inc., Investigators & Consultants in Philadelphia.

 "I felt from the get-go that something had happened to her," said Kane, who spent 13 years as a city homicide detective.

 Liz had left behind her jewelry, including expensive gold chains. Her credit cards hadn't been used. She had filed for unemployment benefits but had never finished the paperwork so she could collect.

 From Philadelphia Detective Neal Aitken, Kane learned of a body that had been found Nov. 14 by a man walking his dog. Kane checked its height and hair color, and got a description of the clothing found nearby, which included a jacket with the logo "Bad Boys Club."

 "I called Mrs. Falco," Kane said. "Without me even telling her, she asked if it had 'Bad Boys Club' on it. I knew this was the right girl."

 Kane rounded up Liz's dental charts, took them to the Medical Examiner's Office and then to a forensic dentist in Bricktown, N.J., who confirmed his suspicions. Then he drove to Cherry Hill to inform the Falco family, his investigation over.

 "I was hired to locate her," Kane said, "and she was located." 
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