Local concert will help send missing girl's remains home

Aiken resident Diane Blume is trying to raise the funds to ensure her niece's remains return to Missouri for a proper burial.

Blume and the band Night Watch are playing in a fundraising concert to make it happen.

Paula Beverly Davis disappeared in August 1987 from her home in Missouri, leaving her family, including Blume who was related by marriage, wondering what happened. Though they weren't blood relatives, Blume and Davis and Davis' sisters, Stephanie Clack and Alice Beverly, were close. The family was at first hopeful that Davis would return home since she had left her young son behind. But, as time went on, their hope grew dim.

"We wanted to think she was fine, then we would envision the worst," Blume said. "The last time I saw her she was 17. She was the kind of person that everybody liked. She was talkative, full of energy. She was constantly doing something."

Two days after Davis disappeared, her remains were found on an Interstate 70 entrance ramp in Montgomery County, Ohio. She had been strangled. But her body was only recently identified.

In October 2009, Clack received a phone call from a relative who told her about a public service announcement she had seen while watching an episode of a fictional crime-solving series. The announcement was about the Justice Department's National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs), whose website enables users to search a database of Jane and John Does whose remains have been discovered.

The TV show that inspired the family to begin their search was "The Forgotten," featuring a group of amateur detectives who work to solve the deaths of unidentified persons, a premise largely based on the services of NamUs.

According to the Associated Press, Beverly and Clack visited the NamUs website to see what they could find. They entered in Davis's information - age, race and state she went missing from. Nothing surfaced. Beverly removed the state search criteria, and 10 possible matches popped up.

One match stuck out. The body that had been found had two distinctive tattoos, one of a unicorn and one of a rose, the exact tattoos the sisters knew Davis had.

That and the post-mortem photo clenched it.

"It was hard to see her like that, but it was good to have that type of closure," Blume said.

The family contacted authorities, and Davis' father provided a DNA sample which was matched to samples taken from Davis' body before burial. Her remains were buried in a pauper's grave as Jane Doe No. 3 with no headstone.

The family needs to raise roughly $3,000 to have the body exhumed and transported to Missouri. Mark Friedman, executive producer of "The Forgotten," has offered to help pay some of the costs. All proceeds from the benefit concert featuring Blume and the band Night Vision will go toward those expenses, as well.

"I think when you help someone, you're blessed," Blume said. "She (Paula) was always curious about my music. She was one of my biggest fans."

Members of the Beverly and Davis families will be there.

The concert, Bringing Paula Home, will be held on Feb. 27 at VFW Post 5877 at 116 Midway Circle off Whiskey Road. Tickets are $10 at the door. Night Vision, Loose Change and gospel singer Mary Beth Goodman will perform.

The concert will begin with Goodman performing at 6 p.m., and Night Vision and Loose Change will perform from 8 to 11:30 p.m. A spaghetti meal for $5 a plate starts at 5 p.m.

Donations may also be made to the Paula E. Davis Beverly Memorial Fund, c/o U.S. Bank, 1599 NE Douglas St., Lees Summit, MO 64086.