Vanished Records in Teen Girl's Disappearance Clouds Prospects of Hope

It has been almost twenty six years since anyone saw Kerry Johnson, and missing person advocates are hoping someone in Salem knows something.

Special thanks to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children for the photographs of Kerry Johnson.

(SALEM, Ore.) - Advocates fear the case of a teenage girl who vanished from the Salem area more than twenty five years ago may fall completely into obscurity.

The case of Kerry Lynelle Johnson is especially troubling because the police records on her case are missing. Nobody seems to know exactly what happened.

Kerry was 17-years old when she disappeared. She was last seen in Salem Oregon in 1982. It would appear she has family in the area, or did at that time, as she was trying to reach the home of her cousin. We are hoping that someone can offer information that can help reestablish the case.

Police say Kerry Johnson was last seen hitchhiking to her cousin's residence in Salem, Oregon on September 14th 1982 and that she never arrived at the residence. It is reported that she may have been sighted in San Jose, California sometime after her disappearance.

She was alone, on foot, and possibly carrying a large blue suitcase at the time. She has never been heard from again.

Johnson's entire police file was lost sometime after her disappearance, according to the charleyproject.org.

"Investigators do not know the whereabouts of her relatives, if she has any, and so cannot compare their DNA to any unidentified remains they find. Johnson's disappearance remains unsolved. Few details are available in her case."

Since her disappearance on September 14th 1982 from Salem, Oregon, Kerry Lynelle Johnson has been classified as a missing, endangered person. She was born November 27th 1964 and was 17 at the time she was last seen.

Kerry was five foot eight inches tall and weight 160 pounds. She was a Caucasian female with brown hair and blue eyes.

The photos that accompany this story show her as a teen and in an age progressed image as she may appear today.

You can email our newsroom confidentially at newsroom@salem-news.com or you can leave a comment on this story if you choose. Any information you have may help establish a way for police to solve this case, so don't hesitate to write to us.

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Here is another resource on the case: Charley Project/Kerry Johnson case
This is her case with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children: Missing and Exploited Children