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Nesconset-12 year old girl murdered

December 9, 1984.

The body of a 12-year-old girl was found on this date in 1984, in a clump of shrubs near a heavily traveled highway here, and hours later a 29-year-old janitor was arrested and charged with her murder, the Suffolk County police said.

The body of the victim – Jennifer Goff of 7 Bonark Lane – was found by the police at 10:30 P.M., hours after she disappeared while walking the 300 yards along Nesconset Highway from a small shopping center back to her home.

The police said she had been hit on the forehead with a rock and strangled with a plastic strap. The attack appeared to be a sexual assault, they said. But they declined to say if the girl had been sexually molested.

Suspect Is Scratched

Her clothes – the skirt and high- heeled shoes she had worn to church that morning – were in disarray. An autopsy was performed, but officials at the Suffolk County Medical Examiner’s office declined to answer any questions today.

Hours after the body was found, the police arrested Robert Turley, a custodian and warehouse worker at a furniture store in the mall, the Nesconset Shopping Center. He was charged with murder after he approached officers at the scene to report that he had been the victim of a robbery.

Mr. Turley, of Nesconset Highway in Smithtown, became a suspect because he had ”deep scratches” on his face, said Arthur Feldman, the Suffolk County chief of detectives.

The 100-pound, 5-foot 5-inch girl had ”put up a fierce struggle,” he said. She had fought off her attacker ”furiously,” he added.

The detective said that the suspect had apparently followed the girl as she was returning home along the shoulder of Nesconset Highway, a four-lane divided highway that bypasses the congested downtown Smithtown business district.

About 200 yards west of the plaza, the Nesconset Shopping Center, he accosted her and dragged her 20 yards into the dense shrubs that border the road, the detective said.

The victim’s godfather and neighbor, Ed Young, said that after church he dropped the girl off at the five-store center, where an electronics store was having a sale. She walked home and then returned to the mall, he said.

She was reported missing by her parents at about 5:30 P.M. when she failed to return to the family’s two-story, brick-and-shingle, raised-ranch house.

The house is on a tree-lined street that residents like to call ”a little city unto itself” – a 15-year-old development of single-family homes 60 miles east of Manhattan on Long Island’s North Shore.

Mr. Young said his godchild was a good student at St. Philip and St. James School in the village of St. James. He said her hobbies were camping in the backyard, Irish dancing and playing the violin.

Mr. Turley started work as a custodian and warehouse worker at Seaman’s Furniture Store in July, shortly after the center opened, according to the store manager, Martin Breslau, who said he was a ”good worker.”

Accounts From Witnesses

Mr. Breslau said Mr. Turley had dropped by the store Sunday, his day off, as he had done before. The police said that witnesses had seen him following the girl.

When Mr. Turley reported to work this morning, Mr. Breslau said, his face was scratched and swollen. When asked how he had injured himself, Mr. Turley responded that he had been mugged, the manager said.

Mr. Breslau said he told Mr. Turley to report the incident to the police. Mr. Turley became ”nervous and apprehensive,” he said. He added that he was able to persuade Mr. Turley to go to the scene of the murder to report the mugging.

The shopping center where this occurred is now Tesla. At the time of this murder, it was Crazy Eddie, Seamens Furniture, Petland Discounts, Staples and one other store.

https://www.newsday.com/long-island/crime/jennifer-goff-murder-robert-turley-msrlmnb6

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