Current:Home > InvestAmateur Missouri investigator, YouTube creator helps break decade-old missing person cold case-Angel Dreamer Wealth Society D1 Reviews & Insights
Amateur Missouri investigator, YouTube creator helps break decade-old missing person cold case
View Date:2024-12-23 22:49:07
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A decade-old cold case centered on a Navy veteran who disappeared without a trace in rural Missouri is hot again after an amateur sleuth and YouTube creator’s help led police to unidentified human remains.
Donnie Erwin, a 59-year-old Camdenton resident, went missing on Dec. 29, 2013, after he went out for cigarettes and never returned. His disappearance piqued the interest of longtime true crime enthusiast and videographer James Hinkle last year, and the Youtuber spent a year tracing generations of Erwin’s relatives and spending his free time searching for him after work, documenting his efforts on his channel. He eventually discovered Erwin’s car hidden in a small pond.
Deputies and firefighters pulled Erwin’s algae-encrusted Hyundai Elantra and a titanium hip from a roadside drainage pond less than 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) from his home in December 2023, almost exactly a decade after he went missing.
“While a forensic pathologist will have to examine the remains to determine for certain if they are indeed those of Mr. Erwin, investigators are confident the hip and remains belong to him,” the Camden County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.
The case had gone dormant for years after Erwin’s disappearance, frustrating investigators and his family. Yvonne Erwin-Bowen, Erwin’s sister, said she felt emotions beyond pain, frustration, aggravation and sorrow that she “can’t even label.”
“This is one of those cases that keeps you up,” sheriff’s office spokesperson Sgt. Scott Hines said. “Because the car just disappeared, and zero signs of him anywhere.”
Hinkle had skills that equipped him to take up the search.
“I just decided, well, I’m a scuba diver. I’m a drone pilot already,” Hinkle said. “I’m like, what the heck? I’ll just go look.”
“Just go look” turned into a year of Hinkle searching, and in his final hunt, he visited every nearby pond, including bodies of water that had already been searched and searched again. Hinkle, along with another true crime junkie acting as his partner, planned to wait until the winter so algae obscuring the water would be dead and nearby trees would have lost their leaves.
Hinkle finally found luck retracing possible routes from Erwin’s home to the convenience store where he bought cigarettes, then pinpointing roadside cliffs steep enough to hide an overturned car from passing drivers.
From there, Hinkle flew his drone by a pond so tiny he had previously written it off, where he found a tire.
When he returned a few days later with a sonar-equipped kayak and his camera to find a large car in the middle of the pond’s shallow waters, he called the sheriff.
Hines said the car’s discovery marked “the new beginning of the investigation.”
“Everything we’ve done up to the last 10 years has led us basically nowhere.” Hines said. “And then suddenly, here’s this vehicle.”
Cadaver dogs brought in by volunteers later alerted to the scent of possible human remains in the pond, which will be drained for any additional evidence, Hines said.
Erwin-Bowen said the strangers who for years helped her search the area and the support she received from a Facebook page she dedicated to finding her brother taught her “there is still good in people.”
“If it wasn’t for the public, I don’t think that we’d be where we’re at today,” Erwin-Bowen said. “Because they kept his face alive.”
___
Ahmed reported from Minneapolis and is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter: @TrishaAhmed15
veryGood! (6)
Related
- Inspector general finds no fault in Park Police shooting of Virginia man in 2017
- 2 adults, 2 children found shot to death in suburban Chicago home
- Kim Petras surprise releases previously shelved debut album ‘Problematique’
- Irish Grinstead, member of R&B girl group 702, dies at 43: 'Bright as the stars'
- The Army’s answer to a lack of recruits is a prep course to boost low scores. It’s working
- You Won't Believe How Much Money Katy Perry Just Sold Her Music Rights For
- 5 people shot, including 2 juveniles, in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood
- Allow Anne Hathaway to Re-frame Your Idea of Aging
- Outgoing North Carolina governor grants 2 pardons, 6 commutations
- 2 charged with murder following death of 1-year-old at day care
Ranking
- Klay Thompson returns to Golden State in NBA Cup game. How to watch
- Centuries after Native American remains were dug up, a new law returns them for reburial in Illinois
- Broncos score wild Hail Mary TD but still come up short on failed 2-point conversion
- Hundreds of flying taxis to be made in Ohio, home of the Wright brothers and astronaut legends
- Get Your Home Holiday-Ready & Decluttered With These Storage Solutions Starting at $14
- CBS News Biden-Trump poll finds concerns about Biden finishing a second term, and voters' finances also weigh on Biden
- All 9 juveniles who escaped from Pennsylvania detention center after riot recaptured, authorities say
- Retrial delayed for man whose conviction in the death of former NFL player Will Smith was overturned
Recommendation
-
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign chancellor to step down at end of academic year
-
Hearings in $1 billion lawsuit filed by auto tycoon Carlos Ghosn against Nissan starts in Beirut
-
Wild black bear at Walt Disney World in Florida delays openings
-
Want to retire in 2024? Here are 3 ways to know if you are ready
-
Cold case arrest: Florida man being held in decades-old Massachusetts double murder
-
'Back to the Future,' 'Goonies' and classic Disney VHS tapes are being sold for thousands on eBay
-
Anderson Cooper on the rise and fall of the Astor fortune
-
'Person of interest' detained in murder of Los Angeles deputy: Live updates