01/16/12: Mike Grefner, 34, Whistler, BC, Canada

Mike Grefner

Published: 2/23/12 5:12 p.m.   Revised: 3/20/12 8:54 p.m.
Last updated: 02/05/13 10:21 p.m.

Mike Grefner, 34, a well-known DJ in the popular ski resort town of Whistler, British Columbia, showed up at Garfinkel's nightclub around midnight. About an hour later, he took a taxi to the house of a female friend. He stayed about ten minutes, then left in a taxi (about 1:10 a.m.).

The woman's roommate told the media that Mike, who was drunk, had mentioned losing his wallet. The cab driver reported driving Mike around the village and back to Garfinkel's to pick up his jacket. Mike apparently did not pick up his jacket, but made two phone calls and one text message during this time.
 
At 1:58 a.m., the taxi driver dropped Mike off at his home and walked him to his door. Mike then called a female friend and talked for about 20 minutes. At 2:42, he tried to call a female friend, but there was no answer. He then made a series of calls between 4:02 and 5:15 a.m. (see the timeline), reaching one friend at 5 a.m. and speaking for about 10 minutes. She said he was in good spirits. It is unknown what Mike did or where he went after that.

Friends reported Mike Grefner missing on Wednesday, Jan. 18 when he did not show up for a shift at Whistler’s Maxx Fish nightclub, where he is a resident DJ, known as VS Zero.



Mike Grefner as DJ "VS Zero"

“It’s not possible that he would miss a DJ gig,” friend Robert Gorcak told the Vancouver Sun. “I’ve known him for seven years and that’s not something he would do. He’s meticulous when it comes to things like that. DJing music is his life.”

According to the Sun, "Grefner had been staying at a friend’s place in Whistler while she stayed with her boyfriend. His belongings had been left behind at the home."

"Grefner, who travels between Vancouver and Whistler often for DJ gigs, is a 'super optimist,' said Gorcak. 'He’s a very positive, karma kind of guy.'”

The Search for Mike Grefner

Authorities looked into the possibility that Mike was seen on Tuesday, January 17 sometime between 1 pm and 4 pm in the company of a woman with brown hair, of medium height and medium build at the Mile One café in Pemberton. This sighting has not been confirmed with degree of certainty. RCMP are trying to locate the woman he was reportedly seen with. There is also reason to believe that Mike may have been spotted at the AG Market in Pemberton on Jan. 17.

 Police have confirmed that Mike’s phone was last turned on Tuesday, Jan. 17.

Recovery

On March 14, 2012, Whistler RCMP confirmed that human remains found in the woods by hikers near the Alpine Meadows subdivision on March 10 were those of Mike Grefner. The reamins were discovered around 4:40 p.m. on March 10 near Whistler Secondary School.

Investigators are still looking into what led to Grefner's death, but said that foul play does not appear to be involved.

On November 21, 2012, the BC Coroner's Service released a report stating that Mike Grefner had "ingested a toxic level of cocaine and went outside on one of the coldest nights of the year."

The next day, Pique News Magazine reported:

According to the coroner's report, Grefner's behavior on the night he went missing was consistent with intoxication and some witnesses say he was more intoxicated than they had ever seen him before. He was also not dressed for the weather, which dipped below -20 degrees. He was found wearing shoes, jeans and a long-sleeve shirt.

The exact cause of death is unknown or how much the cold weather contributed, but coroner Isis van Loon wrote that "Toxicology testing showed significant concentrations of cocaine and its byproducts at a high enough level to cause death." As well, low concentrations of alcohol were identified, but it's possible that alcohol played a greater role and the lower concentrations were the result of postmortem changes.

As for the cold, the coroner wrote that "extreme cold was a contributory factor."

Mike Grefner's death has been ruled accidental.

 

Case Details

Name/age: Mike Grefner, 34

Last seen: Jan. 16, 2012, around 12 a.m.

Physical Description: Caucasian, 34 years old, 6' 2" tall with a slim build. He has short curly brown hair, green eyes, an olive complexion, and is clean shaven. He has no tattoos or piercings.

Possibly wearing: Possibly wearing faded jeans with stitched white crosses on back pockets, navy blue T-shirt, black military-style hat.

Investigating Agency: RCMP, 604-932-3044

Links: Find Mike Grefner; Facebook


Sources

Duggan, Evan. (2012, March 14). Human remains in Whistler belonged to missing DJ, police confirm. Vancouver Sun. Retrieved March 2012.
 
Mitchell, Andrew (2012, November 22). Coroner says drugs contributed to DJ's death. Pique News Magazine. Retrieved February 5, 2013.

08/22/05: Mark Kraynak, 23, and Steve Wright, 20, Montreal, QC, Canada

Steve Wright (left)
and Mark Kraynak (right)

Mark Kraynak, 23, of Uniontown, Pennsylvania, and Steve Wright, 20, of Guerneville, California, spent the night of August 21, 2005 at Vatican, a downtown night club on Crescent Street in Montreal.

The two had traveled from Toronto with a friend and their employer for a weekend in Montreal.

After spending some time at Vatican, they called their employer around 3 a.m. to say they were in a cab heading to the Red Lite, an after-hours rave club, in the city of Laval, 30 minutes away. They had been in the club earlier with him before getting separated.

They arrived at the Red Lite at 3:32 a.m., but never made it inside.

Ten days later, their fractured and severely decomposed bodies were found in the Demix rock quarry more than 300 feet from the Red Lite. Canadian authorities initially described the deaths as "suspicious" because despite the injuries, autopsies did not show any traces of violence. Neither man seemed to be missing clothing, jewelry or money, which might suggest a robbery. And toxicology tests were inconclusive as to whether they might have ingested anything that might have led to their deaths. It was determined that the men had suffered a 50-foot fall into the quarry below.

Surveillance video outside the Red Lite shows Kraynak and Wright dashing into an alley as the taxi chased the men. The cabbie then backed up and left a few minutes later. Police in Laval said they are considering the possibility that Kraynak and Wright might have been looking for a place to hide after they had stiffed the cab driver out of the fare for the trip from Montreal to Laval, which would have been about $40.

Laval police spokesman, Guy Lajeunesse, declined to discuss with the media whether the video showed the men exiting the taxi, as police were hoping the driver would call with details. The surveillance photos show a vehicle with no identifying words or symbols. Authorities don't know the race or gender of the driver, let alone any distinguishing characteristics, but they think he might be hiding because he has a criminal record or is an immigrant.

Janice Kraynak doubts that such a person would draw attention to himself by chasing the men down the alley near the quarry.

The police theory is that Kraynak and Wright refused to pay the driver, so they ran and got through a
5-foot-high barbed-wire fence to enter the dark quarry and ran another 20 feet in the darkness and accidentally fell into the quarry. According to The Montreal Gazette, the quarry had warning signs, but they were written in French only.

"It looks like they died for $40," Lajeunesse told the Tribune-Review. "It's unpleasant, but sometimes you do crazy things."

Mark Kraynak's mother, Janice, struggles to understand how the police could assume Kraynak and Wright had stiffed the cab driver before even interviewing him. She told the media that her son had paid his own way for much of his life, including earning money as a newspaper carrier to cover his expenses at Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus where he attended school. She said the men were also carrying enough cash and credit cards to be able to pay the fare. That night Kraynak, Wright, and a third man had even left a $200 tip for a waitress at Vatican; this is evidence, she says, that her son would not stiff a cab driver for $40.

"They can theorize all they want," Janice Kraynak told the Tribune-Review. "All they're doing is defaming my son after his death."

Kraynak also says she has seen the surveillance tape, causing her to further dispute the police theory that the men were running to avoid paying a fare.  The video, she says, shows Kraynak running from an intersection outside the club toward an industrial park of office condominiums. Wright is about two car-lengths behind her son, while the cab is moving behind both. "He was on the track team and I know the way he was running, he was running for his life," Janice Kraynak said. "I just have reason to believe my son knew he was in danger and that's why he was running the way that he ran."

Janice Kraynak said she believes another person was in the taxi, and that might have been the reason the two men were fleeing.

Wright's mother, Cheryl Crockett, also reviewed the surveillance tapes three weeks after Kraynak.

Both Kraynak and Wright were models for the California-based French Connection Française (FCF) agency which provides modeling for adult entertainment. The agency has offices in Toronto, Atlanta and Santa Rosa, California. Kraynak and Wright were supposed to return to the United States that day, via Toronto, after spending the summer working for FCF.

When the two men did not return from their Montreal night out, their boss--owner and CEO of FCF--who was with them that night, called police. He said the young men were always prompt and it was unusual for them not to contact him.

Wright, described as a "party boy," Kraynak, and four other Americans had been hired the previous summer to work as dancers at Remington's, a strip club for gay men in Toronto, although neither Kraynak nor Wright were gay.

Kraynak's family said he was planning to return to Fayette County to begin his sophomore year at the local Penn State campus, where he was studying business management. He had served in the U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne Division in Baghdad, Iraq in 2003. He received a Purple Heart for shrapnel wounds he received when an improvised explosive device went off while he was under a bridge with a group of children. He became involved with the FCF Agency through an Atlanta office while he was serving with the 82nd at Fort Bragg, N.C. Janice Kraynak said her son's dream was to be a model in fitness magazines.

Kraynak had reportedly told his mother that he was in Canada to do construction work, hoping to hide his occupation from her. His boss told the media that that model had appeared in fitness magazines and in pornographic films with female partners. He had also auditioned for an independent horror film because was interested in acting. Janice Kraynak fears her son was forced or coerced into "something much more sinister," and believes she saw a contract with FCF that bound him to the agency through August 2006.

Kraynak's credentials were passed along by FCF to the producer of "Dead Boyz Don't Scream," and he was invited to audition for the role of a model who is murdered. Janice Kraynak told the Tribune-Review that the script apparently was a horror movie about male models who disappear during a photo shoot, and she says, contains "sexual type of abuse," murders, and a cover-up by a modeling agent. She said her son's receipt of the script in his Yahoo! e-mail account on Aug. 5 is "so bizarre that I have to believe it's tied" to his death.

"It describes how Todd, which is the role my son was asked to look at, was axed to death," Janice Kraynak said. "And it says, 'Todd is history.'"

She recalled that the police asked her to keep the script quiet, which she has done up until now, but she now feels that it is time for this possible connection to be made public.

"We sympathize with Mrs. Kraynak's loss and understand her grief," said Jerry Goldberg, the film's producer in a statement. "Her son was one of dozens of actors briefly considered for a role in a film we have been developing for five years. He was proposed to us by his theatrical agent, and our entire communication with him consisted of one e-mail and one phone conversation. We ultimately chose another actor for the role."

Regarding the deaths of his talent, Kraynak's boss said to the media, "There's no doubt in my mind, in my soul, that this was an accident."

He also stated that Kraynak had a day-to-day contract, though there was a written agreement through next August that required the model to notify the agency if he received work with another group. Otherwise, if Kraynak got a job, he received 80 percent of the payment and the agency got 20 percent.

But Janice Kraynak believes the people who were with Kraynak and Wright that weekend in Montreal know more than they've told police.

"I have my opinion that the (adult entertainment) industry is behind this in some way," she said. "That is my opinion, and I will do everything I can to prove that."

In 2005, Janice Kraynak said she had placed a call to Congressman John Murtha, D-Johnstown for help.

FCF Agency has faced scrutiny before. In March 2004, 23-year-old Toronto woman, Natel King, who had been represented by FCF was found dead in Montgomery County. Her photographer Anthony J. Frederick, pleaded guilty to third-degree murder in 2005, saying he killed the woman after a dispute about money.


Sources
Foreman, Chris. (2005, October 14). Mom: Porn Industry Behind Son's Death. TribLive.com. Accessed 09/16/10 from: http://triblive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/regional/fayette/s_384093.html#axzz372XzfU8e

Published: 09/16/10.  Updated: 07/10/14.

03/13/10: Greg Hart, 23, Providence, RI

On March 13, 2010, after getting a late start, Gregory Hart, 23, drove his Mustang from Dedham, MA, to the apartment of a friend in Providence, RI. There, he met up with three old college buddies--Will, Zach, and Zach's girlfriend--to celebrate his new job. By 10 p.m., the group was heading out to the Red Room Tavern at One Fox Place in Providence.

At 1:21 a.m., Hart spoke on the phone with Will, who was at the bar that night. The two spoke for 8 minutes, but it has not been reported what was said. It was the last time Hart's phone was used.

Friends say that around 1:40 p.m., Greg just got up and left the tavern without saying a word. Nothing unusual appeared to be going on, but Hart left the bar (FOX 25 / MyFoxBoston.com, March 15, 2010).

Friends initially speculated that while they returned to their apartment, Hart may have gone to an International House of Pancakes (IHOP) on Promenade Street. But Hart's brother, JP, later told the Providence Journal that this wasn't likely. While he and his brother had indeed sometimes walked from the Red Room to the IHOP, it had been in the summer. Family members did not believe Greg would have walked to the pancake house in the rain, and there appears to be no indication that he did so. (Providence Journal).

Cell phone records indicate that, at some point, Hart's friend, Zach, tried calling Greg's phone (along with the police and local hospitals) to find out what happened to his friend.

Hart's family remained uneasy; Greg Hart's car was still parked outside the apartment building where he had left it, and his cell phone had not been answered.

By Sunday when he still hadn't returned for the St. Patrick's Day parade, they became "seriously worried" and they filed a missing person's report. (Boston.com.)


The Search for Greg Hart
Initially, police did not look for the missing University of Massachusetts-Amherst student.

When the police failed to search, family and friends of Greg Hart launched their own search effort. More than 50 people came to the aid of the Hart family, helping to look for Hart and/or post fliers around the area.

On Tuesday, March 16 at around 2:45 p.m., a family friend made a grim discovery just three-quarters of a mile from where Hart had last been seen. Hart's body was found washed up against a tree limb in the rain-swollen Woonasqatucket River in Providence, “half in and half out” of the water (ABC6.com). It was recovered by rescue crews from the Providence Fire Department.


Investigation
From the beginning, the Hart family expressed fears that foul play might be involved with Hart's death. Hart was a licensed and experienced scuba diver and very familiar with the water. There had also been reports that some type of disturbance or altercation had occurred at the bar on the night that Greg Hart disappeared.

"When a sudden death happens in an unusual place under unusual circumstances, it’s suspicious."
- Maj. Thomas F. Oates III, Providence Police Department

But an autopsy conducted by the Rhode Island Medical Examiner's office on March 17, indicated that Hart's death was a drowning and did not appear suspicious.

Yet, police said they would continue to investigate and treat the death as suspicious. "When a sudden death happens in an unusual place under unusual circumstances," said "Maj. Thomas F. Oates III, commander of the department’s investigative division, "it’s suspicious." (The Providence Journal, March 20, 2010).

On March 23, the medical examiner announced that Hart had been "highly intoxicated." The blood alcohol level was not released, but John Hart told the Providence Journal that investigators told him that his son's blood-alcohol level was more than .25. This is more than three times the legal limit of .08 for driving in Rhode Island. According to research by the paper, "most with levels between .21 and .29 would be subject to memory blackouts, staggering, double vision, loss of understanding of surroundings, poor judgment, impaired reactions and loss of balance."

Also at that time, police announced that they had found no evidence to suggest Hart had been involved in a fight. However, Hart's family said Hart's body had numerous injuries that suggested he had been in a fight, including: a broken cheekbone, jaw, eye socket, chipped tooth, cuts on his lips and knuckles, injuries to his palm and bruises on both legs in the same location. The family believes he was beaten up, possibly murdered.

Hart's father also said he believes a search should have been launched by the police after they heard about the possible disturbance at the bar.

The medical examiner addressed the family's concerns two days later, stating that any injuries found on Gregory Hart's body were caused after he drowned. His body had been in the fast- flowing Woonasquatucket River for an estimated 2-3 days. The Providence Police Department and the medical examiner maintained that there were no signs of foul play.


Private investigation by Hart family
The Hart family has hired an attorney to investigate the handling of the investigation. Police stand behind their investigation and say it was thorough, but the family has reported that the following areas are of particular concern:

Potential Conflict of Interest
Providence detective, Mark Sacco, who began investigating the case one day before Hart was found owns the property that the Red Room bar sits on. The bar itself is owned by Rebecca Caroll, the wife of Providence police detective, Shawn Carroll. The family of Greg Hart feels that this is a conflict of interest. In addition, there are no records of potential witnesses at the bar (e.g., bouncers, bartenders) ever having been interviewed by the police (ABC6.com).

Possible altercation at the bar
A police report, according to ABC6, says a disturbance of some kind (it is not known when or what type), occurred shortly before Greg disappeared. Hart's body had also suffered the type of injuries that may be indicative of a fight (broken facial bones, chipped tooth, cuts on lips and knuckles, bruising on palm and legs.) There were also two bruises in the same place on each leg, possibly caused by restraining Greg Hart.

Inconsistencies with police reports
The initial police incident report from March 14, states that police found Hart's cell phone and a house key in the bar’s parking lot. The report also states that police called his cellphone at that time and that it rang several times before going to voicemail. A police report two days later said that Hart's phone was found in the water along with Hart's partially submerged body and his driver's license.

Hart's Shattered iPhone
The police returned Hart's iPhone to the family in approximately 5 pieces. Officers told the family that even State Police experts were unable to retrieve any information from it because it had been in the water. However, technicians at AT&T told the Hart family that it had been taken apart in such a way that no information could be retrieved (ABC6.com).

Damaged indicator on iPhone

"This [phone] definitely wasn't in the water, definitely, 100 percent, this was not in the water."
- Alfred Demirjian, data recovery expert

The Hart family was able to take the phone to data recovery experts at TechFusion. The company found that the phone could not possibly have been in contact with water, as stated in the police report. The style of the Apple iPhone that Hart had is equipped with tiny indicators deep in the phone that signal whether the phone had been submerged in water or a liquid. According to Alexander Gessen, a data recovery expert at the company, Apple has installed these indicators in order to help determine whether the phone has been submerged or come into contact with a liquid that might void the warranty. Evidence indicates that the indicator on Hart's phone, something very difficult to remove, had been intentionally scratched off.

Alfred Demirjian, a data recovery expert at the company said, "This definitely wasn't in the water, definitely, 100 percent, this was not in the water." (Boston.com, 11/1/10).

Data Recovery from Cell Phone
TechFusion was also able to rebuild Hart's phone and compare the text messages and phone logs to AT&T's cell phone logs to authenticate them. The data included a log of the last 100 calls and the contents of the final 599 text messages, which indicate that the iPhone was not in the water. The family has declined to release the contents of the recovered data for fear of compromising any criminal case that may come from it.

Length of Time in Water
A white shirt returned to the family seems to be more river-stained than the shirt that Hart was wearing over it. The family has also said that the body itself was not as waterlogged as it should have been after 48 hours in the water.

About Greg Hart
Providence Police Lt. George Stamatakos described Hart as “a nice kid with a great family." Gregory Hart had just moved to Dedham, Massachusetts. He was a cum laude graduate of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst where he had studied economics and tutored students, and had been accepted into an officer's program to be a Navy fighter pilot. Relatives attributed his success to his hard work in school after receiving below-average grades his freshman year in college. He had just landed a new job at Meditech in Westwood, MA--a job that would give him some real money for the first time, according to ABC6.com--and he was scheduled to begin work on Monday, March 15. He was not typically a late-night partier.

The news has devasted his family. "He's my heart. I can't even function. Nothing's important anymore," said his mother, Marianne Hart, told the Providence Journal. Hart’s father said his son was his “best friend.” Relatives say he was also kind and generous, spending much of last year caring for his mother during breast cancer treatment.

Greg Hart will be sorely missed. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family.

Facts:
Name/age: Greg Hart, 23
College: University of Massachusetts-Amherst
Last seen: 03/13/10, Red Room Tavern, One Fox Place, Providence, RI
Recovered: 03/16/10, Woonasqatucket River, Providence, RI
Residence: Dedham, MA
Physical Description: 5’8,” brown hair. He was last seen downtown Sunday morning wearing a grey leather biker jacket, a green hooded sweatshirt, black pants and black shoes.

05/01/09: Gerald Smith, 22, Terre Haute, IN

Gerald Smith, 22, an Indiana State University senior from Avon, IN, was last seen about 1 a.m. Friday, May 1st, according to a news release issued by the university.

Smith had been at the Ballyhoo Tavern at 900 Chestnut Street in Terre Haute, Indiana celebrating the end of a class project. He was last seen around 12:40 a.m.* outside the bar by a professor who offered him a cab ride home. After refusing the professor's offer, Smith began walking south on Ninth Street.

He was reported missing Friday evening.

Gerald Smith's body was found in the Wabash River on Friday, May 8, the day before he was set to graduate. His mother was presented with his diploma during the school's weekend commencement ceremony.

----------------------
The Search for Gerald Smith
Friday (May 1) - Smith leaves the Ballyhoo Tavern at 12:40 a.m. walking south on Ninth Street. (Initial reports had indicated he was last seen at 10:30 p.m. Thursday, but ISU Public Safety officials determined this was not accurate.) After he was reported missing Friday evening, the area of campus closest to where he was seen is searched.
Saturday (May 2) - University officials along with 30 volunteers divided the campus into six sectors and searched between 7 and 9 p.m.
Sunday (May 3) - Two teams focused on searching the areas south and west of campus, including the Wabash River bank. Vigo County Sheriff's Department officers on horseback combed the banks of the Wabash River in Fairbanks Park. ISU Police and more than 24 student volunteers walked between Cherry and Ohio Streets, looking around the southern part of campus. According to ISU director of Public Saftey Bill Mercier, a bloodhound also sniffed a trail from the Ballyhoo to First and Chestnut Streets near the water. Mercier told the Indiana Statesman that photos on Smith's Facebook page led them to believe he frequented the river area, so the search effort was concentrated there.
Monday (May 4) - University public safety officers and student volunteers searched at 3:00 p.m.

Recovery
At approximately 7:30 p.m., on Friday evening (May 8), a local citizen found a body in the Wabash River near Vincennes, IN and alerted authorities. An ID inside a wallet in the pants pocket confirmed it was Gerald Smith who was last seen 50 miles away near the Indiana State University Terre Haute campus a week earlier. Smith's body was still wearing all of the clothes he had on when he disappeared.

Department of Natural Resources officials had been searching near the Wabash River for any sign of Smith during the last few days. Officials discovered the body after a tip from a witness who reported to ISU Public Safety officials that he had seen a man fitting Smith's description near Second and Canal Streets on Friday morning.

An autopsy conducted on Saturday morning (May 9, 8 a.m.) at Terre Haute Regional Hospital by Medical Examiner Dr. Roland Kohr. According to the Indiana Statesman, "ISU director of Public Saftey Bill Mercier said the autopsy revealed that there are no signs of foul play and the cause of death is consistent with accidental drowning."

About Gerald Smith
Friends have described Smith as a good student, very responsible and all-round good guy. "Especially from a student that has a pretty solid reputation as a sold citizen is a matter of concern and doesn't happen very often at all," ISU Police Chief Bill Mercier said.

According to Smith's Google profile, he is a "guy who enjoys scouring the web to learn about the latest and greatest software and hardware releases. My iPhone is my personal assistant. When it comes to my three Windows PCs, customization is the name of the game. I’m a huge fan of Stardock products and anything else that adds to the pc experience. I dabble in HTML but prefer to give my design ideas/thoughts to those who know best. Blogging is something I enjoy because it allows me to share my technical experiences and ideas with the world."

Smith grew up in Avon, IN where he attended Avon High School. In addition to Terre Haute, IN, he has also lived in Overland Park, KS and Kansas City, MO. He is the son of Robin and Billy Hill.

Facts of Interest
Name: Gerald Smith, 22
College: Indiana State University, Terre Haute
Major: insurance and risk management
Hometown: Avon, Indiana
Physical description: 5'7" 160 pounds, brown hair, brown eyes, glasses, light beard. Last seen wearing a red Hawaiian shirt, jeans and brown shoes.
Last seen: Friday, May 1, 2009, 1 a.m., 900 Chestnut Street in Terre Haute, Indiana
Recovered: Friday, May 9, 2009, 7:30 a.m., Wabash River near Vincennes, IN
Cause of death: drowning
Manner of death: accident

Anyone with information about Gerald Smith is urged to call ISU Public Safety at 812-237-5555 or Crimestoppers at 812-238-STOP.

Sources
TribStar
Indiana Statesman
Indiana State University
WTHITV
http://www.indstate.edu/news/news.php?newsid=1785
http://media.www.indianastatesman.com/media/storage/paper929/news/2009/05/08/Campus/Breaking.News.Body.Of.Isu.Student.Found-3739281.shtml

01/08/06: Cullen Fortney, 21, La Crosse, WI

Around 7 a.m., 21-year-old Cullen Fortney "walked into Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center sodden and caked with mud, wearing no coat and no shoes." He told hospital staff that he had fallen in to the river "but didn’t know where or how it happened."

Fortney, a student at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, had been visiting friends in downtown La Crosse. He and his buddies took a cab that evening from a home in the 400 block of South 20th Street to the downtown bars where he spent the evening drinking beer and mixed drinks. (There is some speculation this may have been John's Bar where Jared Dion also disappeared.)

According to police reports, Fortney said he left the downtown bars about 1:45 a.m. when he became separated from his friends Jay Larson and Jay Hoffland. He remembers very little after that until he found himself in the river, fighting a strong current that was rapidly carrying him downstream. After an estimated 15 minutes, he was able to grab onto a tall concrete structure and pull himself out. Later, he awoke on a rocky bank near Gundersen Lutheran, with the sound of traffic over his left shoulder. He told police he had likely passed out. He still had his wallet, but he had lost his hat, coat, shoes, cell phone and $20 in cash. The man’s blood-alcohol concentration was 0.043 about 9 a.m. Sunday, which means it would have been 0.163 about 1:30 a.m.

The Investigation
According to Roger Putnam, Fortney’s uncle and family spokesman, a full toxicology report revealed no suspicious substances in Fortney’s system. This supports La Crosse police’s earlier conclusion that foul play was not involved, Putnam said.“(The family) continues to believe the La Crosse Police Department did an outstanding job on the investigation,” he said.

On January 13, investigators concluded that Fortney had fallen into the river, thought to be about 32 degrees that night, but did not go under water. After Fortney narrowed down where he might have gone in, police found some of his personal items near the river’s edge.

An Odd Twist
La Crosse police Capt. Rob Abraham said the investigation has been suspended, though it is not considered closed. The case of a truck reported stolen that same night by a companion of Fortney’s has been cleared, police said. Nick Thompson, 25, also of Viroqua, turned up the same morning as Fortney at the same hospital, passed out in the lobby, police said. He told police he didn’t know how he got there, and his pickup truck, which he had parked in the Wettstein’s lot, was missing. The vehicle was found in the 900 block of King Street. Video footage from the Wettstein’s lot showed a man with keys entering the truck about 3 a.m. and driving away, Abraham said. While the footage isn’t sharp, the man is thought to be Thompson, Abraham said. Police do not believe the truck was stolen, Abraham said, and the investigation has ended.

Quick Facts:
Name/age: Cullen Fortney, 21, LaCrosse, WI
Hometown: Viroqua, Wis.,
College: University of Wisconsin-Madison student
Last Seen: 1/8/06 1:45 a.m.
Recovered alive: 1/8/06 7:00 a.m.
River temperature: 32 degrees

02/08/03: Glen Leadley, 23, Chicago, IL

Glen Leadley was attending a party at a friend’s apartment on Chicago’s Gold Coast, and left to catch a cab when he became ill. The police later received reports of a man walking near the water. Leadley's body was found near the Lake Michigan shore off Lincoln Park two weeks later.

Details
In November 2002, Glen Leadley moved to Chicago to take a new job as a buyer with Anixter, Inc. In February 2003, he was attending a party at a friend’s apartment on Chicago’s Gold Coast. According to Glen Leadley's father, Gary, the young man allegedly told friends he wasn't feeling well and left to catch a cab around 10:30 pm. The party's hostess saw Leadley walk toward a taxi, but she headed back to her apartment before seeing him get into the cab. A surveillance tape showed a partial image of a taxi leaving the building's driveway, but it was unclear whether Leadley was in the cab. The cab driver has not been identified. Investigators think Leadley possibly got into the cab, but then got out. He was not wearing a coat or gloves having forgotten them at a coworker's apartment earlier in the evening.

Clues
Witnesses called police to report a man walking erratically very close to rocks that line the shore near Lake Shore Drive and Fullerton Parkway about 11 p.m. Police searched the scene for the man but found no one. Investigators believed it was a good sighting and that Leadley “quite possibly stumbled into the lake,” adding “there was no indication of anything unusual happening—there was no despondency—before the disappearance."

Recovered
A little over two weeks later, a jogger spotted his body along the shore of Lake Michigan near Fullerton Avenue on a cement apron. A wallet and other documents initially confirmed Leadley's identity. Investigators said the body was frozen. An autopsy determined he had drowned. There was no official determination that the death was accidental, but it was also not known if foul play was involved.

Facts of Interest
Name/age: Glenn Leadley, 23 (from Portage, MI)
College: Michigan State/University of Northern Illinois graduate
Physical description: 5'7," 190#, brown hair
Last seen: 02/08/03 , 10:30 p.m., 1400 block of North Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, IL, then Lake Shore Drive and Fullerton Parkway about 11 p.m.
Recovered: 02/23/03, Lake Michigan
Cause of death: drowning, hypothermia

03/03/02: Brendan McNelis, 20, Binghamton, NY

Brendan McNelis, 20, a Queensborough Community College student in Queens, NY traveled by bus to Binghamton, New York on February 28, 2002 to visit his long-time friend, Fiorella Ramirez, a student at Binghamton University whom he had dated 18 months before.

McNelis spent both Thursday night (2/28) and Friday night (3/1) at Ramirez's dorm on the Vestal campus. On Saturday, March 2, the pair boarded a shuttle bus and headed to the east side of Binghamton to attend a fraternity party hosted by Phi Iota Alpha at the American Legion Post 1645 on Robinson Street.

When they arrived at the party, McNelis stayed at the bar while Ramirez danced with some of her friends. When she returned from the dance floor, McNelis complained he wanted to leave because he didn't like the music. Ramirez agreed and after having one last dance and saying goodbye to her friends, she returned 5 minutes later to find McNelis gone. It was the last time Ramirez would see her good friend.

On May 15, McNelis' body was found in the Susquehanna River, not far from where he was last seen.

03/10/01: Justin Hayduk, 18, Morgantown, WV

Justin Hayduk, 18, University of Pittsburgh freshman, vanished in the early-morning hours of March 10, 2001 after celebrating spring break in Morgantown, West Virginia. After drinking using a fake ID, he was spotted around 2:40 a.m. either sleeping or passed out on a bench in the bar. A bartender claims to have called a taxi for Justin, but his mother has found witnesses who said Justin was refused service. He was last seen on foot, headed west away from the bar. He was found two months later in the Monongahela River.

"Not the type to disappear"
Justin was a 2000 graduate of Chambersburg High School in his hometown of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania in Franklin County. He was a 3-year member of the YMCA swim team. He was attending college at the University of Pittsburgh on academic scholarship and was a member of a fraternity. According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, "Hayduk was simply not the type to disappear.

Hayduk visited his grandmother, Jane Hayduk, every few weeks while enrolled at Pitt. She "supplied him with clean clothes and home-cooked meals" while he "entertained her with stories of college life." He was a solid student and seemed happy. "A deeper look into his background led police to conclude that his life was as smooth as it appeared on the surface. 'We are doubters by nature, so we looked for the little things," said Detective Cpl. Phillip Scott of the Morgantown police. 'We didn't find them. His family life was good. He had no bad relationships."

Timeline
To help celebrate spring break, Justin Hayduk drove to Morgantown, West Virginia with a hometown buddy, Chris Kille, a student at Edinboro University. They went to a bar and drank. Kille, 21, could be served legally. Hayduk packed a phony Pennsylvania identification card carrying the name Michael Stiffler. After leaving the bar, which police would not identify (according to one report, it was Shooter's), they attended a fraternity party at West Virginia University and drank some more.

Around 2 a.m., Hayduk and Kille were in front of the West Virginia University student center. "While waiting for a bus that was to take them back to a friend's dormitory room, they got into a make-believe scuffle...this foolishness attracted the notice of passing campus police officers. They thought Hayduk and Kille were brawling, and swooped in to break it up. Kille panicked and ran. As officers chased him down, Hayduk walked the other way, toward the Downtown business district that abuts the river." Kille was written a citation for public intoxication. Once Hayduk moved down the street, police decided not to bother with him." It has been speculated that that Hayduk evaded police to avoid being cited for underage drinking.

"By 2:40 a.m., Hayduk had slipped into the 123 Pleasant St. nightclub. He either fell asleep or passed out on a bench in the bar. The club was closing and the band that had performed there was packing up. A man shooting pictures of the band decided, for no apparent reason, to snap some shots of Hayduk. Police say those photos are definitive proof that Hayduk was still exploring Morgantown as late as 3 a.m., when he and the last of the customers were shooed from the bar.

Here the mystery of what happened to Hayduk deepens. A bartender at 123 Pleasant St. told police he called a cab for Hayduk. Hayduk's mother claims to have witnesses who say the cabbie refused him service. The taxi driver told police he had no recollection of being called or of encountering Hayduk. Scott, of the city police, said hundreds of young men hailed Morgantown taxis that weekend. Many of them, like Hayduk, were wearing blue jeans and baseball caps, so it would be unusual for such a customer to stand out. "

From there, according to The Daily Antenaeum Interactive, Hayduk walked on foot and headed west away from a Yellow Cab taxi. He wasn't seen again until his body was found in the Monongahela River two months later.

Clues
Justin's bank accounts were not touched since his disappearance on March 10. Justin's hat was found three days after his disappearance in the brush along the Monongahela River.

Search and Recovery
Dogs and divers searched the Monongahela River for Justin's body for a week, believing that he may have fallen in while drunk. They came up empty-handed and suspended the search. Hayduk's family has canvassed the town, handing out fliers with the teen's photograph.

Justin Recovered
On May 24, 2001, a tugboat crew spotted a body in the Monongahela River and called the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the locks in Point Marion, Pa., who then called the police. Workers at Consol Coal's Humphrey Mine reportedly saw a body floating among debris. The body had become caught on a barge at the docks. It was pulled from the river at 11:30 a.m. and loaded onto an ambulance at noon. Using dental records, medical examiners in Charleston positively identified the body as missing freshman Justin Hayduk. The body was found about 4.5 miles away from where Justin's hat was found. According to police, the orginal search effort did not include the area where the body was spotted.

On May 31, 2001, police in Morgantown, West Virginia, announced that no foul play was involved and that Hayduk's death was the result of accidental drowning. An autopsy and toxicology tests found no signs of injury or drugs. Hayduk's blood alcohol content was .12. In West Virginia, the legal blood alcohol limit is .10.

Possible Victim of Smiley Face Killer?
Detectives Kevin Gannon and Anthony Duarte are considering the possibility that Dustin was a victim of the so-called Smiley Face Killer who they believe "is a network of killers who get a thrill out of stumping police." According to Gannon, "the coincidences include how the men drank large amounts of alcohol very quickly, were in a crowd and then vanished into thin air, somehow negotiated their way to a riverbank and happened to fall into the water unheard and unseen."

Hayduk's family doesn't believe that is so far fetched. His grandfather, John Hayduk, said he had doubts all along that his grandson's death was an accident. "So did my son, so did his mother, so did my wife have doubts," John Hayduk told Channel 4 Action News on Tuesday. "Why would you run into the river and drown, just like that?" According to his grandfather, Justin was "an avid swimmer ... he got ribbons for swimming and everything."

Facts of Interest in This Case:
Name/Age: Justin Hayduk, 18
School attended: University of Pittsburgh
Physical Description: 140 pounds, 5 feet 7 inches tall, brown hair, brown eyes, medium complexion, small scar under his chin.
Last Wearing: Tan vest over a white shirt, with blue jeans and a white Pitt baseball cap. The cap was discovered March 13, 2001 on a bank of the Monongahela River.
Last Seen: bar at 123 Pleasant Street, Morgantown, West Virginia
Autopsy findings: no signs of injury or drugs; blood alcohol content was .12.

03/01/01: Patrick Runningen, 23, La Crosse, WI

Patrick Runningen, 23, was last seen alive leaving the Nutbush City Limits tavern in LaCrosse, WI on March 1, 2001. Bartenders there told police he sat at the bar by himself, holding his head and looking extremely drunk. He said he needed a quarter to call a cab. The bartender flipped him one and he made a call. A cab arrived, but by then Runningen was gone. Some people at the bar told police they saw Runningen leave about midnight and walk south toward LaCrosse.

Recovery
Two fishermen called police on March 7 to say they'd read about Runningen's disappearance in the media. They said they found a hole in the ice covering the Black River, which runs just behind Nutbush, on March 2, the day after Runningen disappeared. Searchers dragged the area on March 8 and found Runningen's body. Toxicology reports found no signs of drugs in his system. His blood-alcohol content was 0.24 percent. Police concluded Runningen had probably walked out on the ice and broke through.

Facts of Interest in This Case
Name/age: Patrick Runningen, 23 (from West Salem, WI)
College: no information
Physical description: no information
Last seen: 03/01/01 NutBush City Limits Tavern (3264 George St.)
Recovered: 03/08/01, Black River by French Island Beach
Cause of death ruling: drowning
Manner of death ruling: accident
Injuries: no signs of trauma or altercation
Blood Alcohol Content: .24

03/07/98: Trevor Hoheisel, 27, Chicago, IL

Trevor Hoheisel, 27, a former St. Cloud State student and member of the Army Reserves who was living in Blaine, MN, was last seen leaving a sports bar near his hotel in Chicago, IL. His body was later found in the Chicago River.

Police believe he got turned around with all the tall buildings in the area and ended up on the pier, then accidentally fell into the water while fishing his hotel key card out of his wallet.

------------------------------------
Timeline
Trevor Hoheisel went to Chicago with roommate and longtime friend Brian Erickson to watch the Minnesota Golden Gophers play in the Big Ten basketball tournament. He and Erickson had frequently traveled to Gophers' games and had tickets to see the Gophers play in the Final Four in San Antonio in the upcoming weeks.

Following the Gophers' loss, the two men took a taxi to meet up with several old friends at Dick's Last Resort, a restaurant and sports bar located a block and a half from their downtown hotel--the Sheraton Chicago Hotel and Towers.

He was last seen leaving the bar alone at 11:30 p.m., after telling friends he was tired.

According to The Minnesota Daily, "using footage from a surveillance camera located just outside the bar, police detectives have determined that once Hoheisel left the bar, he was uncertain where the hotel was located, because it was surrounded by large buildings of the unfamiliar downtown area.The camera, which rotates 180 degrees, caught a figure that police determined to be Hoheisel standing near a pier overlooking the Chicago River at the time he was reported to have left the bar. He apparently stopped when he realized he was going the wrong way.When the camera returned to the pier, Hoheisel was nowhere to be found. Police believe once he was on the pier, Hoheisel reached in his wallet for his hotel card. Detectives told the family that he must have fumbled with the card in the rainy and slippery night and reached to grab it, causing him to lose his balance and fall into the river."

Hoheisel's body, which was found three days later by Chicago police marine unit divers, came to rest in a small isolated section off the main river just outside the bar where he was last seen. His wallet was found nearby.

The family told The Minnesota Daily that neither they nor the police suspected foul play.

About Trevor
Trevor Hohesiel was the son of Riley and Lynn Hoheisel of Howard Lake, MN. Family and friends describe him as very compassionate, accepting of others and family oriented. He was also an avid sports fan and, according to friend Bill Kinzinger, "a hard competitor" and "a team player." He coached football, loved playing baseball for the Orphans baseball team during the summer, and he and his roommate were avid fans of the Gophers basketball team, frequently following the team to games.

He graduated from Braham High School in 1988 and went off to "St. Cloud State University for three years before enlisting in the Army Reserves, where he excelled within the ranks of military intelligence."

At the time of his disappearance, Trevor Hoheisel worked for W. Houle Construction under the supervision of his cousin, Randy Houle.

Funeral services for Trevor Hoheisel were held at 10 a.m. on Saturday, March 14, 1998 at Church of St. Mary in Waverly, MN with Revs. William Martin and Nicholas Zimmer officiating.

Interment service was at St. Joseph's Cemetery, Pierz, Minn. with the Rev. Ken Brenny officiating.

Sources
http://old.mndaily.com/articles/1998/03/12/6207
http://www.herald-journal.com/archives/1998/stories/trevor.html
http://www.herald-journal.com/obits/1998/hoheisel0398.html

Facts of Interest in this Case
Name/age: Trevor Riley Hoheisel, 27 (from Blaine, MN)
Hometown: Howard Lake, MN (small town with population of 2,000)
Last Residence: Blaine, MN
Birthplace: Cedar, MN
Date of birth: 8/14/70
List of known residences: Cedar, Lanesboro, Moose Lake, Herman, Braham, Howard Lake, St. Cloud and Blaine, MN
College: former St. Cloud State University student
Family: parents Riley and Lynn; stepfather Bob; brother and sister-in-law, Brandon and Jennie
Physical description: no information
Last seen: 03/07/98, Dick's Last Resort Bar (425 E. Illinois Street), 11:00 pm, Chicago, IL
Hotel: Sheraton Chicago Hotel and Towers (301 East North Water Street)
Recovered: 03/10/98, Chicago River
Cause of death ruling: drowning
Manner of death ruling: accidental
Injuries: No signs of foul play
Blood Alcohol Content: unknown