On September 8, 1992, a traffic jam occurred on a busy street in Port Jaenem, California (USA) due to a woman standing in the road. The woman gestured strangely and made unusual dance moves, while not answering any questions.
The arriving police took the woman to the police station, but even there they could not get any specific information from her. Partly because she was mute or deaf and dumb and could only communicate with gestures.
At the same time, it was never found out who this woman was and where she came from, her traces were not found anywhere, her fingerprints were not in the database and no one was looking for her, she came as if from nowhere.
The woman looked like Hispanic, and the only clue to her identity was a receipt from the San Diego bank, which was 200 miles from Port Jaenem. She also had $ 10 in her pocket, a pearl pendant on a gold chain around her neck, and three rings on her fingers, one of which was engraved with the inscription “Inst. Bancario Comm. Latino Americano ".
At first, the woman was considered homeless, but expensive jewelry gave reason to doubt this. But the police did not know what to do with her further after interrogation, she did not commit any crimes, so she was soon released.
However, she was later detained again and this time placed in a shelter for homeless women. There they again tried to find out from her information about her name and where she came from, but the unknown only gestured and that was all.
At the same time, when a specialist in the language of the deaf and dumb was called, he could not translate anything, saying that all these gestures were not familiar to him at all and that this was some kind of new language.
Then it was decided to give the woman paper and a pen so that she would write about herself. But she only drew doodles, random numbers and some incomprehensible symbols. When she was shown the map, she also could not indicate where she came from and pretended to see this object for the first time.
Later, a special expert on communication with the disabled, Chris Barrow, was called, who somehow convinced the woman to write her name. The woman began to deduce a word that could be deciphered as "Luxi", it is possible that she wanted to write "Lucy" and they began to call her that.
She looked about 23 years old and the gynecologist said that she had given birth to a child some time ago. Also, Lucy at some point "told" that she flew on an airplane, but that was the maximum that was achieved from her.
Despite her Hispanic appearance, Lucy did not seem to understand Spanish at all and barely understood English. She did not understand sign language at all.
At the same time, she was in good physical shape, she was not beaten and was fed normally, her clothes were clean and recently purchased, and she was also very good at taking care of herself, which was contrary to the assumption that she was a severely mentally disabled and simply ran away from the house where she was kept.
Many questions about Lucy remained unanswered. Why is she quite healthy in appearance, but she has such a strange experience of dealing with people? Why does she feel normal on the street, is not afraid of cars, knows how to dance, etc., but as if she first encountered human society?
"This is a very unusual case, she seems to be a person, but her communication function is completely destroyed, and at the same time this amazing woman is in good shape and completely healthy," said Inspector Nancy Nazario.
No one has ever identified Lucy, despite the many flyers and news reports posted around the city. Even when she was shown on TV in the program "Unsolved Mysteries", the mystery of her identity was not solved. There was a feeling that Lucy did not live anywhere and that no one had seen her before until she appeared on the road.
And then Lucy disappeared and could not be found for a week before they noticed her sleeping in the corner of a street in the neighboring town of Cotati on a heap of newspapers. This time, a small amount of methamphetamine was found in her blood, and now there was a real reason for her detention, although this time she was not charged with any crimes.
After that, Lucy went through a series of tests and they revealed that her mental state is like that of a 9-year-old child. It was also found that her hearing was all right, but she still communicated only with strange quick gestures and did not seem to understand what others wanted from her.
Someone after this accused Lucy of only pretending to be disabled in order to receive treatment and so on, but these were rare accusations. According to 2014 data, Lucy lives somewhere in Santa Pola, California and leads a mostly vagrant lifestyle. She learned to speak a few phrases in English, but no more, and her personality remains a mystery.
