Police reopen cold case for Roseville woman missing since 2013 while grocery shopping
Eight years after Susan Jacobson disappeared during a trip to a Roseville grocery store, police officials have reopened the missing persons case and are hoping investigators will find new evidence to analyze with the latest technological advancements in cold case work.
Detective Dave Harlan has been assigned to Jacobson’s cold case, and he is hoping his team will be able re-examine old pieces of evidence to give the investigation some new light, the Roseville Police Department announced in a news release Wednesday.
“We have decided to reopen this case because the longer a case goes unsolved, the more challenging it becomes to find fresh evidence or new leads,” Harlan said in the news release. “My job is to look deep into small nuances or use new and modern technology to uncover new leads to push forward.”
Harlan and the police department hope highlighting the unsolved missing persons case and the methods of cold case work will encourage those who have new information in her disappearance to come forward.
Jacobson was 59 years old when she was last seen about 6 a.m. May 1, 2013. The resident of Sun City Roseville told her husband, Chris, that she was going grocery shopping and running errands. Her husband reported her missing when she hadn’t returned home that evening.
Her car, with her purse inside, was found in the Raley’s shopping center parking lot at Woodcreek Oaks and Pleasant Grove boulevards, police officials said. Her wallet was found and turned in at a nearby Starbucks. Her cash and credit cards were missing from the wallet when it was found by a passerby.
About 200 volunteers searched Mahany Park and open spaces in the Sun City area a few days after the disappearance. The search party included 14 members of the Placer County Search and Rescue team, who brought along seven trained search dogs.
The Police Department in 2013 worked the case with the urgency of a kidnapping and the manpower of a homicide investigation. Investigators at the time were unsure whether Jacobson was a victim of foul play or vanished willingly.
Her son, Kevin Jacobson, told The Sacramento Bee two months after her disappearance that his mother was missing the then-recent birth of her first grandchild, showing she didn’t leave on her own.
“She wasn’t unhappy with my dad. She was excited about the grandbaby,” Jacobson’s son said in a July 13, 2013, article published in The Bee.
The detective now tasked with finding the woman eight years later has worked for the Roseville Police Department for more than 25 years. Harlan has been assigned as a detective for more than nine years, and he has specialized training in homicide, sexual assault and domestic violence investigations, along with advanced training in crime scene management.
Harlan said he brings in other investigators with different specialties to assist him when reviewing cold cases, such as a member of the department’s crime scene investigations team to help examine evidence and determine whether further analysis is needed.
He said the Placer County District Attorney’s Office has criminal investigators who can help with Roseville’s cold case investigations, along with the FBI, which can offer behavioral analysis and video enhancement. And the California Department of Justice can help with DNA analysis and other evidence.
“At Roseville PD, we also have a volunteer, a retired Roseville PD lieutenant who has been assisting me,” Harlan said in the news release. “He has vast investigative experience and has developed a spreadsheet program that helps to organize complex cases.”
The detective said his job as a cold case detective is to review the case in its entirety with a new set of “eyes.”
“All aspects of the case are looked at including photographs, statements, video surveillance, media reports, and evidence,” Harlan said in the news release. “Usually during this review, many questions arise and leads may be developed simply by connecting things that may have gone unnoticed in the past.”
