November 9, 2002

11/09/02: Josh Guimond, 20, Collegeville, MN

Josh Guimond is missing.

Josh Guimond
Missing since 11/9/02
Josh Guimond, 20, left a small card party at friend Nate Slinkard's Metten Court apartment on the St. John's University campus in Collegeville, MN sometime around midnight on November 9, 2002. His friends believed he was just making a trip to the bathroom, but when he did not come back after 15 minutes, they assumed he had just walked back to his dorm room at St. Maur House. It was a three minute walk, but he never made it home. He has not been seen since. While there was some drinking at the party, friends say Josh Guimond was not inebriated when he left.

After he did not come back to the card party, Josh Guimond's friends called his dorm and got no answer. They assumed he was asleep. But when he did not show up for a Mock Trial team event the following evening, they reported him missing.

Josh's roommate also confirms that Josh never came back to the dorm. He last saw him about 8:30 pm as Josh and his friend were headed downstairs to go smoke cigars. The roommate politely declined a cigar, chatted with the pair for a few minutes, and then left. It was the last time Josh was seen by his roommate.

Friends and family say that Josh's life is so well-planned that his disappearance has to be foul play. He did not have his glasses or contact lenses, his car, credit cards, or even a coat that was appropriate for the weather. No belongings missing from his apartment. His parents are also convinced that he was taken against his will.



The Search and the Investigation

Josh Guimond
Missing since 11/9/02
According to The Record, by the morning of Monday, November 10, a massive search was underway for Josh that included the National Guard, hundreds of people in the community, and a search of the grounds and lakes by the Stearns County Sherriff's Department on both foot and horseback.

Early on, the Sherriff's Department had focused its attention on Stump Lake, which runs between St. Maur House, Josh Guimond's residence, and Metten Court, the location of the card party. The edge of the water is about half a block from Metten Court. It was reported in the newspaper that a search dog led officers to the lake after being given a scent of Guimond's clothing, which may have prompted this focus. However, the Trident Foundation conducted a thorough search of all three lakes on campus and found no trace of Josh Guimond.

Josh's car was also found undisturbed on campus.

Josh's father, Brian, believes that the investigation has been hindered by focusing on the lake and swampy areas of campus, a theory that has "precluded the possibility of an abduction" and "continues to give the public the impression that there was no foul play in the vanishing."

According to reports, when Josh disappeared, he had been writing a term paper on the university's response to sex abuse. Yet on December 31, 2002, authorities were denied access to search St. John's Abbey on the university campus. The monastery is well known for housing monks and priests who have been put on restrictions after being accused of or admitting to sex abuse.

According to posts on Josh's Web site, it was also determined that someone had erased over 300 files on Josh's computer after he disappeared. The family took it to computer experts who were able to recover all of the information on the hard drive, including evidence of fake ID ring. It is not known whether Josh was involved in the ring, but it seems unlikely. Josh's family believes they know who it was that erased the hard drive, but charges were never filed. The statute of limitations on the the fake ID ring has since run out.


About Josh Guimond

Josh was not depressed or withdrawn, and he is unlikely to have just run off. He is active in student organizations, including the college's Republican organization, and a friend describes him as “brilliant student of the law, shrewd politician.” His goal is to attend law school at Yale University and then serve in the Minnesota House of Representatives.

If you have information about Josh Guimond's disappearance, please contact America's Most Wanted, 1-800-CRIME TV1-800-274-6388.


Facts of Interest:
Name/age: Joshua Cheney Guimond, 20 (from Maple Lake, MN)
Date of birth: June 18, 1982
College: St. John's University (political science)
Physical description: 6," 176#, blonde hair, blue eyes
Last seen: 11/09/02, Metten Court on Fruit Farm Road, Collegeville, MN wearing a gray St. John's University hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans and a wristwatch.
http://www.findjoshua.com/

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I don't believe this one is related. I think this has to do with the corruption within the campus. Why else would they have refused to let his father search the grounds and to go as far as to file a restraining order against Josh's father. My father went to school with two girls that were murdered and a monk at st.johns was the main suspect. The lead investigator was an alum of the school and burned all the evidence incriminating the monk before he died.

Anonymous said...

Josh Guimonds' scent and chris Jenkins' scent traced by a bloodhound to the abbey at St. John's University-


6 Disappearances: Coincidence Or Serial Killer?

(The Father of Chris ) Jenkins said a Milwaukee-based bloodhound tracked the scents of two of the missing to the abbey at St. John's University, where Guimond disappeared. Hoover identified Guimond's scent and the scent of Chris Jenkins, who had no known connection to the school.

(For this to be dismissed as meaning nothing , with no further investigation is an outrage )

* Oct. 31: Friends saw the 21-year-old Jenkins, from Racine County, leaving a downtown Minneapolis bar dressed in his Halloween costume. No one's seen him since.

* Nov. 6: 75 miles east, University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire student Michael Noll vanished after leaving a party at the Nasty Habit tavern. It was his 22nd birthday.

* Nov. 9: 75 miles west, 20-year-old Josh Guimond disappeared as he headed home from a card party in a dorm at St. John's University.

* Dec. 12: 18-year-old Chad Sharon was going back to the dorm after an off-campus party near Notre Dame. There's been no trace of the northern Wisconsin teenager.

* Dec. 20: 17-year-old Brian Carrick was seen walking into the Johnsburg, Ill., grocery store where he worked. No one saw him walk out.

* Jan. 10: 21-year-old Nathan Herr headed home from Thursday's $10-all-you-can-drink night at a Sheboygan sports bar and vanished without a trace.


http://www.wisn.com/news/1973837/detail.html

Why was the fact that Chris Jenkins scent was found at the abby of St. John's University, where Josh Guimond scent was found , NOT INVESTIGATED THOROUGHLY INSTEAD OF BEING DISMISSED?

kloud said...

I was there on December 31st when the dogs found scent leading up to the abbey. The campus police were letting me into the dorm after I studied abroad. He got a call on his radio that was asking if the dogs could go into the abbey. He explained that he would be right up to deal with the situation. They never let them search. For all we know, there is one way in, one way out of that campus. He had to have been abducted, the only question is who did it. And whoever did it is still out there.

Mbaz said...

Why was that connection dismissed? I find it quite odd that a scent connecing two seemingly random abducted individuals in the span of ten days not prime evidence.
A good explanation is in order.

Unknown said...

Mbaz, you may be jumping to conclusions. I am as passionate about these disappearances as you are, but I'm not sure how dogs could track scent form Chris Jenkins from the Twin Cities to St Johns, I doubt that's possible unless he walked there. But I do believe there is something suspicious with St John's not allowing searches, and I do believe Chris Jenkins went missing at the same hands as most of these other missing college guys. The college guys they found dead, for some reason, decided to go for a drunken swim at Midnight, all by themselves, and drown? Pfft. I've been plenty drunk when I was in school, but I never had a knack to take a quick dip in the river at Midnite by myself. Well, one time I was with this girl, and it wasn't a river, it was a small lake with a public access, but you understand where I'm going with this. BTW, how come this only happens in the midwest...location, location, location...