Trash Can Victim's Mom Questions Police

Updated 11:59 AM PST, Tue, Oct 27, 2009

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KXAS

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- A mother is questioning a sheriff's investigation after her daughter was found dead in a trash can in south Sacramento.

"I want to know what's happened, but I will probably never know," Jolene Robbins said.

The medical examiner has yet to confirm the identities of two bodies found Friday, but investigators believe they are Robbins' 23-year-old daughter, Tammula Robbins, and her boyfriend, Shawn Cope, 24.

The couple was reported missing from 39th Street nearly two weeks ago.

The bodies were found in south Sacramento, one in a field and another in a trash can by a home.

Douglas Elmore, 24, was arrested Sunday in Fairfield and is facing murder charges in the case. Elmore is due in court today.

Joleen Robbins said that days after she reported the pair missing, she called sheriff's deputies back to her home after she found blood on several blankets and pillows.

"They didn't do enough from day 1," she said in her criticism of investigators.

She said deputies should have come into her home, taken everyone out and carried out a throughout search.

Sacramento County sheriff's investigators said they found no evidence of foul play when they searched the home. They said the pillows and blankets were gone when they arrived at the house.

Elmore is the only suspect in the killings, sheriff's officials said. Family members believe more than one person is to blame.

Sheriff's Sgt. Tim Curran said on Friday deputies responded to a field near Mascot Avenue and 32nd Avenue regarding a report that a man, who was not Elmore, had wheeled a garbage can into the field and dumped a body from the can. Deputies arrived and found the badly decomposed body of what appeared to be a woman.

Deputies learned the man wheeled the garbage can from 39th Street, which is a short distance from the field. Deputies went to that address and contacted that man and several other adults.

After obtaining a search warrant, detectives, along with representatives from the county coroner's office, and the Sacramento County district attorney's crime lab, searched a second garbage can found on the same property and discovered a second body.

This article originally appeared on KCRA.com.