A woman being held in an Ohio jail who burned her fingertips in an attempt to alter her fingerprints may have a connection to Maine.
Detectives in Allen County, Ohio, say the Jane Doe has been in jail there for more than a month after being arrested on charges of using a phony Maine birth certificate to get an Ohio identification card.
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Investigators with the Allen County Sheriff’s Office in Lima, Ohio, are trying to determine if the woman is wanted in Maine.
A search of her computer revealed efforts to get information on destroying and healing skin to obscure fingerprints, as well as on methods of extradition from Ohio to face charges in Augusta or Kennebec County in Maine.
Photos of the woman were transmitted to Kennebec County deputies, who sent them around the state.
“So far, no one has been able to identify her,” said Ryan Reardon, chief deputy of the Kennebec County Sheriff’s Office.
Reardon got a call Monday from Gary Hook, a detective with the Allen County Sheriff’s Office, asking for help in the case.
While the woman, believed to be about 40, told officials she was born in Bangor to a woman named Jane Wadsworth, there is no record of her birth, and she has no Social Security number, Reardon said.
The woman also had done computer research on ways to conceal one’s identity, how to get a passport to go to Russia from Alaska, and how to cross the Bering Strait.
“Further evidence, such as searching for states that do not require a Social Security number for a driver’s license, as well as multiple applications in three states for Social Security numbers, lead us to believe that she is trying to establish a new identity of Julia B. Wadsworth,” Hook said. “The investigation has revealed that Jane Doe is attempting to establish herself this identity with the hope of obtaining a passport to leave the country.”
Hook did not say if the woman succeeded in removing her fingerprints when she burned them.
The woman also appeared to use a material to increase the size of her nose, he said. A comparison of photographs taken for the ID card and at her booking photo show considerable differences in appearance.
The woman is being held on charges that she tampered with government records, a felony under Ohio law. She had a fake Ohio state identification card, prompting an investigation by that state’s motor vehicle department, according to Hook. The department discovered that she had used a fake Maine birth certificate, he said.
Allen County sheriff’s officials went to the home where she was caring for an 95-year-old woman, and she ran out the back door, Hook said.
When she was arrested and taken to jail, she fought six corrections officers as they tried to get a DNA sample.
A call to Kennebec County District Attorney Maeghan Maloney for comment about whether the woman may fit the description of anyone either missing or wanted in Kennebec County was not immediately returned Thursday.
Amy Calder can be contacted at 861-9247 or at:
acalder@centralmaine.com
Twitter: @AmyCalder17
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