Croft and Barrow Jane Does Family Speaks About Identification

In November 2008, an electric company crew replacing a power pole in Oklahoma City made a grim discovery — the partial remains of a young woman. She was Native American, estimated to be between 17 and 23 years old, and she had no name. The only clue she left behind was a pair of black Croft & Barrow shoes. For sixteen years, she was known as the Croft & Barrow Jane Doe.

Her name was Amy Elizabeth Davis.

In this episode, we sit down with Darlene Nixon — Amy's biological cousin — who spent years searching for answers across state lines, fighting through closed adoption records, institutional silence, and a system that looked the other way. Darlene tells us how Oklahoma City police turned Amy's adoptive family away when they tried to file a missing persons report. How the family was told Amy was just a sex worker on the street, and that was that. How Darlene herself finally filed the report in January 2026 — and how just three months later, Amy's brother's DNA confirmed what the family had feared for years.

Amy is identified now. But the questions surrounding her death remain open. No cause of death. No suspect. And not a single person from her final years willing to come forward.

If you knew Amy Elizabeth Davis — from Oklahoma City, from the Will Rogers Court area, from anywhere — somebody needs to hear from you.

To share information, contact the Oklahoma Office of the Chief Medical Examiner at (405) 239-7141 or reach out to us at TheColdCases.com.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

We're here with Darlene Nixon, who is the cousin of Amy Elizabeth Davis, who was missing in Oklahoma and went unidentified for 16 years. As uh she she went unidentified. And um so Darlene, what type of person was Amy to you?

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Um Amy was a very quiet person. She was a gentle soul, from what I've been told from people. I'll be honest with you. Um in Amy's adult life, we didn't know each other because she was adopted by a family and had moved to Oklahoma, and we weren't aware of a lot of things about her missing un until later on. But um, in my searching and everything, um I found she primarily kept to herself and she was shy and reclusive.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

Yeah, and another element to this is that she was Native American, um, and y'all are biological uh relatives and everything. So the Native American part is very like um you know, people are people need to be more aware of Native Americans being killed and missing and all that kind of stuff. And um it it's just uh it's sad. But um the other thing is is the the foster or not the foster parents, but the um the adoptive parents didn't file a missing persons report. Um what can you say about that?

SPEAKER_00 1:44

Um correct. So they never legally filed a missing persons report on her. She ran away from home at age 18. Um, and from what I'm told it was kind of a back and forth for a little bit, and then that last time um they hadn't heard from her. Now Amy did have a prostitution charge and she was arrested. Um, the adoptive family did go down to the police department to file a missing persons report, and the Oklahoma City Police Department kind of um I don't want to say tossed them out of it, but they brushed it to the side that, you know, she was an own sex worker and that she was out in the street. She was 20 years old at that time. Um, so one was never fully filed on her until it was filed by me. Um, I want to say back in January when all this kind of came about.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

And yeah, they just uh they just uh they just uh identified her like two weeks ago, right?

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Uh yes, just last week. She was just officially identified. Um we had to go through a process and um her brother provided DNA, so we had to wait, which took about the the three months in total um for that to to be done.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

Um so do you think the family that adopted her have any involvement?

SPEAKER_00 3:10

I do not. I do not. Um Jane, the adopted mom, she has since passed away. And um I do know before her death she was looking for Amy. I'm in communication with the adopted dad, and I don't think that they had anything to do with it. I think that unfortunately Amy fell into a bad crowd and was out on the streets, and I think something happened to her in that sense. Um I think it's sad that nobody was looking for her, that in that area. Um, you know, if a woman is pursued to be a sex worker, they kind of leave it at that, but that doesn't mean that they don't have families, that they don't have people that care about them, and I feel like nobody just, you know, um felt it was necessary to look for her, and that's not right.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Yeah, and I just want to commend you because you're the only one that has looked for all these years, and I just want to commend you on how courageous you've been through all this.

SPEAKER_00 4:15

Well, thank you for that. Um we uh were told different things that I won't exactly get into in terms of biological family, but um, we were all led to believe it was a closed adoption at first, and we found out on our end that it it was not. Um so we weren't aware that Amy was really even missing until around 2018 um when her brother did come here from Oklahoma. Um, and then we we found out about that. And back then, you know, I feel like Facebook was kind of just starting to become popular. And y you know, like now I've been able to post and search for her and find our information. Granted, I haven't found that much, but back then um we weren't able to find that much. And then being told, you know, that she was in the street, that she was a prostitute, that um she was on drug, we kind of assumed, you know, that same thing. We never thought that she was dead.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

Yeah. Yeah, and it's unfortunate. Now I got a couple more questions because, you know, with the prostitution and everything, was she found uh near a truck stop or by I-40 at all?

SPEAKER_00 5:29

So the area that she was found in, and now and I am not that familiar with it, forgive me, because I live in Virginia and I've never been to Oklahoma. Um I don't think it's close to I-40, but uh from my understanding, it's not entirely too far. I did have a friend go to that area and video it and send it to me. And um, from my knowledge, it is in a very bad area of town that is known to have prostitution and um a drug area.

SPEAKER_01 6:03

Okay, yeah, uh, because one of my one of the things I was concerned about is because I-40, I I I lived in Oklahoma and I-40 is just a bad place for people there. And uh truck stops as well, so um, but uh is there anything else that you feel like should be said?

SPEAKER_00 6:26

Um you know, I think it's just we're trying to find out what happened to her, and we're all really hoping, you know, um the adopted dad, the biological family that she has that does care. Um, people that are so invested in Amy's case. We just want to find out what happened to her. We want answers. Um, I found in 2011 when that um bust was made that it was being investigated by a homicide team. Um we don't know COVID dust at this time. I mean she could have even passed from a drug overdose. We don't know that, but the fact that it to me it seems like she was dumped. Her remains were just there. If a body would have been laying there for that amount of time, somebody would have found her. Um that to me is suspicious. So we just want answers. And I understand that I've come to public, we might not ever get that fully, you know, in terms of a conviction or anything like that. But somebody has to know her from somewhere. I have yet to find one person, a teacher, a friend, you know, that knew her personally, that knew who she was hanging around, that could give me a a a trail of what happened to her when she was on the streets. And that that's my biggest thing. Um is is finding somebody and then finding out what what happened to her. So that it is suspicious.

SPEAKER_01 7:55

Yeah, it it's it's incredibly suspicious that you can't find anybody who knew her. You know.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

Yeah. And I don't know if it's if it's that time in that area. Um I'm told she was hanging around Will Rogers Courts, Robinson area, Avenue, um, which was big in the Brown Bates days, prostitution, you know, the video vigilante, um and and and all of that. So I I don't know if people just don't want to talk, you know. Um, but some somebody knows her. Somebody knows what happened to her.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

Yeah. And I'll just say this before we go. Um, the investigating agency is the Oklahoma office of the chief medical examiner. So you can call them at 405-239-7141. So Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:46

And we've been in communication with them. We're in a limbo period right now, kind of waiting on things.

SPEAKER_01 8:53

Yeah, yeah. And, you know, um, hopefully this case, you know, it reaches somebody that knows something because like you said, somebody has to know something. She didn't just, you know, it's not like she didn't have friends or or somebody didn't know her, you know. She somebody knew her, you know, like you said.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Absolutely. Some I had to go.

SPEAKER_01 9:19

Yeah. Um, but um I'm gonna put this article out there and also give the phone number on the article to the um investigating agency and try to promote this article as well. And um I I guess uh I'll call you back right after we finish this.

SPEAKER_00 9:39

Okay, sounds good. Thank you.