July 2017 – The Charley Project Blog

Make-a-List Monday: The Gospels

July 31, 2017July 27, 2017Meaghan4 Comments

Cody N. suggested I do a Make-a-List Monday for people named Matthew, Mark, Luke or John — that four Gospels in the New Testament. I actually did a list of people named some form of John last fall. Today’s list is for people named John (and ONLY John, not Jonathan or Evan or Sean or suchlike) who have been added since then, and for people named Matthew, Mark or Luke (first names only, variants not included).

JOHN

LUKE

MARK

MATTHEW

Maybe I should phone this in on Monday

July 30, 2017August 1, 2017Meaghan17 Comments

Earlier this month I mentioned on this blog a case of a local guy who disappeared, Kori Glossett, and how I went to school with Michael and Michelle Glossett, presumably relatives of Kori. Kori himself went to the same school but he was many grades below me and I’m not sure we ever met.

In my blog entry I’d said I had seen Michelle in a gas station awhile back. She was working there. Yesterday evening I was at the same gas station and, as I’d like to satisfy my curiosity as to what the Glossett twins’ familial relation is to Kori and maybe get more details about his disappearance, I asked the guy behind the counter if Michelle still worked there. Nope, he said.

“Oh,” I said. “Oh well. I run a missing persons database, you see. There’s a guy named Kori Glossett missing from around here and I figure Michelle must be related to him and I was going to ask her about it, see if she could tell me something I could put on my site. I don’t know a lot about his case.”

“Kori?” the gas station guy said, as if in surprise. He looked to be about 25 or so, about Kori’s age. “That ***hole? He’s STILL missing?”

“Yup,” said. “For over a year now.”

I was a bit surprised he was using that kind of language, given how he was an employee and I was a customer and we didn’t know each each other. I mean, I didn’t mind but I bet his boss would have had something to say about it.

“He’s not REALLY missing, you know,” the guy said. “He’s buried out in the woods.”

“Hmm,” I said noncommittally. I know there had been multiple search warrants executed on private properties, and digs on said properties for Kory’s body. You don’t really need to read between the lines to realize the cops think he’s dead.

“A LOT of people wanted Kori dead,” Gas Station Guy said. “This is what happens to scumbags, especially when they get into drugs.” He just kinda shrugged and smirked at me as he said that.

I gave him one of the Charley Project business cards. Maybe he will give it to Michelle or Michael or someone else in the family, and they’ll contact me.

But what I’m thinking is maybe I should call LE about this.

Chances are this guy knows nothing in particular about Kori’s case and is just repeating rumors he’s heard. Maybe LE has spoken to him already. But suppose he DOES actually know something and suppose the cops HAVEN’T interviewed him or heard of him? Maybe he even knows the person or persons responsible for Kori’s disappearance. Anything’s possible.

I didn’t catch the guy’s name or anything but it should be easy for the cops to learn his identity. Only two people were working in the gas station when I walked in yesterday.

So what’ll y’all think?

[EDIT: Yeah, like ten minutes after writing this I decided to call it in right then and there even if it was Saturday. The man who answered the phone listened politely, wrote down what I said, and promised to pass the info on to the detectives, plus my name and phone number for if they need to talk to me.

My mom is worried because this guy has my Charley Project business card and I used my credit card to buy snacks at the gas station so he’s got that info too. What if the police come to talk to him and he gets mad about it, she says. Well, the credit card billing address is my dad’s apartment, not my own house. He could harass me online, I suppose, but I doubt he will, and even if I did, I’ve certainly dealt with that before. He could steal my credit card info and buy stuff with it just to give me a hard time, but if someone does that within the next few days or weeks, I will tell the credit card company to look at him as a possible suspect in the theft.

I doubt anything will come of this at all but I’ve done my bit. It’s all you can do.]

Flashback Friday: The Houghland Family

July 28, 2017July 28, 2017Meaghan6 Comments

I promise I will TRY very hard to get my “weekly features” obligations actually met this weekend. (Any suggestions for Sunday?) This week’s Flashback Friday case is actually three cases: Norma Louise Houghland, a 27-year-old mother, and her two sons, 8-year-old Richard Allen Houghland and 6-year-old Thomas James Houghland. They vanished from Sacramento, California on July 15, 1978, but because Norma was divorced and her ex-husband, the boys’ father, lived out of state, no one realized they were missing for a week.

Given the condition of the family’s apartment — uncashed welfare check left behind, nothing missing, dishes in the sink — it seems unlikely they left on their own. Given the fact that Norma’s car has never been found, I think the most probable explanation for this triple disappearance is an automobile accident. Norma and the boys may be in a ravine or at the bottom of a cliff somewhere, or more likely in a lake or river.

Wasn’t expecting this

July 28, 2017July 28, 2017Meaghan9 Comments

I got an NCMEC message in my email saying Aleacia Di’onne Stancil has been found alive. This comes as a most unexpected surprise. Frankly, I had not expected her to be found at all, never mind found alive. The police were outright admitting they had no idea where to look for her.

The NCMEC, of course, offers no details, and as of this writing, there’s nothing in the news. I’d love to know the circumstances under which Aleacia, who would now be 23 years old, was located, and what sort of woman she’s become. I’m hoping she was properly raised and is in college or something like that. It seems like the odds are against her growing into a functional young adult, but we can hope, right?

I’ve got a case, one of my “foul play is suspected but few details are available” cases, involving a toddler who disappeared in the eighties. A relative emailed me to say the child’s mother sold it for drugs. I don’t doubt this information, but I wasn’t able to confirm it with any official source so it’s not in the casefile, just in my head. In a way I hope that kid WAS sold for drugs, because if it was, maybe it’s still alive.

I often wonder about the little babies on my site who disappeared ages ago and are presumed to be still alive — I wonder what they’re like now. Alexis Manigo/Kamiyah Mobley and Nejra Nance/Carlina White seem to have turned out all right in spite of being raised by their abductors. Aleacia’s mother struggled with drug addiction and was murdered a year after her daughter disappeared; it’s entirely on the cards that whoever raised Aleacia was able to provide a more stable home environment than she could have gotten from her biological family. But the circumstances of Aleacia’s disappearance aren’t that clear and I’m not sure if she was, in fact, abducted.

I hope there’s something in the news soon. I’m happy to learn this baby lived to grow into a woman.

There shall be updates, never fear

July 25, 2017Meaghan14 Comments

I got kind of sidetracked from updating the last several days but I’m working on some stuff now. I’ve got a whopping six resolved ones coming in (or out, as it may be), five of whom were located alive. And I’ll probably be doing a picture dump on top of everything else.

MP of the week: Kelson Roby

July 25, 2017MeaghanLeave a comment

This week’s featured missing person is Kelson Ryanell “Ryan” Roby, who disappeared on June 15, 1990 at the age of 31. The Texas Department of Public Safety page for him is a bit unclear: it says he’s missing from New York, but that he was last seen in Irving, Dallas County, Texas.

The Newspapers.com archive yielded no articles about Roby’s disappearance, but I did found some articles from 1979 that mentioned a Kelson Roby who matches the details of the missing man. The Kelson Roby in the articles transferred to the University of Northern Iowa from Anoka-Ramsey Community College in Minnesota and played on the UNI football team. The articles describe the UNI player as a college junior and 6’1 tall. The Kelson Roby on the Charley Project would have been 20 years old in 1979 (that is, about the age to be a junior in college) and his listed height is 6’2, well within the margin of error.

I don’t know for sure but I think it’s entirely likely that they’re the same person in spite of the distance. Kelson Roby isn’t the world’s most common name, after all.

I wish I knew more about Roby’s case. Foul play is suspected but I don’t know why. I do think it’s worth noting that he was wearing a pricey Rolex — gold and platinum with a diamond bezel — as well as a diamond ring. I’m assuming those things have serial numbers or something and are traceable.

Make-a-List Monday: Missing surfers

July 24, 2017July 17, 2017Meaghan7 Comments

People who are presumed to have vanished as a result of surfing accidents.

An update on those reporters who came last month

July 18, 2017Meaghan7 Comments

I had written about how a reporter and photographer came to my house and spent seven hours there over two days, interviewing and filming me and taking pictures, for a future piece on the Charley Project.

Well, I thought I’d update y’all on that. I contacted the reporter to ask about the progress on the story and he said it will be coming out on Longreads, which specializes in long-form journalism. He has submitted a draft to his editor and predicts a late July/early August publication date. I know he’s spoken to least six other people besides me for this story.

I’m pretty excited about it.

There’s been a social media storm these last 24 hours

July 18, 2017Meaghan11 Comments

For those who haven’t heard, there’s a woman who claims she is Jennifer Klein who disappeared in 1974. This story has been floating around the internet for about a month, but yesterday there was a YouTube video published where the woman claimed she had DNA testing done and it proved her identity.

This woman also claims her abductors were members of a Satanic cult and that they kidnapped Kurt Newton and Etan Patz (who both disappeared in the 1970s, across the country from Jennifer) as well. She says she was brainwashed and didn’t start remembering what happened until after she was injured in a car accident.

As for what I think, well, I didn’t write this editorial but it pretty much sums up my own position on the matter.

Hopefully the truth will come out over the next few days or so. Until then, that’s all I’ve got to say.