Some of the creepiest disappearance cases involve people who seemed to vanish completely without a trace, and to this day, they’ve never returned.
The girl on the highway
Valentine’s Day in 2000 was far from romantic for the Degree family in Shelby, North Carolina. Nine-year-old Asha Degree disappeared from her bedroom sometime after 2:30 a.m. Witnesses reported seeing a young girl walking along Highway 18 at roughly 4 a.m. in the rain.
Nobody knows why Asha left home alone at that hour, or where she went. The biggest clue that investigators have found is Asha’s backpack, which turned up buried beside another highway. They’re still actively following leads, but currently, Asha’s whereabouts are unknown.
The eight-block mystery
Jason Jolkowski only needed to walk eight blocks to meet his coworker on June 13, 2001. The 19-year-old lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and had been called into his job at Fazoli’s, but his car was being repaired. So, he decided to walk to Benson High School and catch a ride to work with his coworker.
A neighbor said they saw Jason helping his younger brother with the trash cans around 10:45 a.m. Yet Jason never arrived at the high school. Security cameras never captured him getting there, either, and his bank account remained completely untouched afterward.
The playground disappearance
Michael Dunahee’s family went through one of the worst tragedies imaginable on March 24, 1991. The family was attending a football game in Victoria, British Columbia, and four-year-old Michael was left playing in a nearby playground. He was near Blanshard Elementary School.
Despite the huge number of people nearby, Michael disappeared at around 12:30 p.m. There was a massive search for him. But it led nowhere. The case is still open to this day, and there hasn’t been a single trace of where he went.
The missing bar customer
In 2006, 27-year-old medical student Brian Shaffer was supposed to be enjoying his spring break. He ended up disappearing in one of the strangest cases around. Security footage showed him inside the Ugly Tuna Saloona in Columbus, Ohio, around 2 a.m. on April 1. He’d been on a night out that began on March 31.
Weirdly, though, investigators never found any footage showing Brian leaving the bar afterward. Neither his friends nor his family managed to find him. He was supposed to go on a vacation to Miami with his girlfriend, but he never turned up for that either. It’s all still a mystery.
The interrupted phone call
Brandon Swanson was a nineteen-year-old man who accidentally drove into a ditch near Taunton, Minnesota, during the early hours of May 14, 2008. He had been visiting friends, although they said he hadn’t been drunk when he left. Brandon called his parents, who tried to find him while talking on the phone.
But as it turns out, Brandon was nowhere near where he said he was, although his parents didn’t know that at the time. He suddenly swore while on the phone, and the call ended. His parents couldn’t reach him again. Later, police found his car with the doors open and the keys missing. But there was no trace of Brandon.
The passenger who vanished at sea
Amy Lynn Bradley was traveling aboard Royal Caribbean’s Rhapsody of the Seas with her family when she disappeared. It happened sometime early in the morning of March 24, 1998. The ship was on its way toward Curaçao after leaving Aruba.
Yet Amy was nowhere to be found, and it’s unclear whether she went overboard or disappeared in a different way. There have been several alleged sightings over the years, and the FBI has a reward of up to $25,000 for any new information that leads to the case being solved. Bradley was declared legally dead in 2010.
The abandoned Jeep
Leah Roberts left North Carolina on March 9, 2000, at the age of 23, without telling anyone where she was going. Her vehicle turned up nine days later. It was found on a remote logging road in Washington’s Whatcom County, but that was only the start of the mystery.
Investigators found receipts inside that came from Oregon, as well as a Bellingham movie theater ticket dated March 13. They also found cat food that was likely for her missing kitten. But strangest of all, there were signs that the car had been deliberately crashed, suggesting the scene might’ve been staged.
The girl who never reached the lobby
The scariest part of Nicole Morin’s disappearance was that it happened inside her own building. The eight-year-old left her family’s 20th-floor apartment in Etobicoke, Ontario, on July 30, 1985, and headed downstairs to meet her friend. They were going to go swimming.
But at some point between her apartment and the meeting place, Nicole disappeared. Police conducted an extensive investigation. They found no physical evidence to explain what happened. In 2025, Toronto Police offered a $50,000 reward to anyone who could provide useful information about Nicole’s whereabouts.
The car beside the lake
It was clear that something was wrong with Bryce Laspisa’s road trip in August 2013. He was driving from Northern California to his parents’ home in Laguna Niguel and kept making unexpected stops along the way. During the journey, his family spoke to him several times.
But he never made it home. Police did manage to find his car on August 30, overturned near Castaic Lake, with his wallet, laptop, and cellphone still inside. There was no sign of Bryce, though. Investigators believe he climbed out after the crash, yet they have no idea where he may have gone.
The family game that ended abruptly
It should’ve been easy to notice seven-year-old Dennis Martin. He was hiking with his father and grandfather on June 14, 1969, in Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains National Park. He was wearing a bright red shirt, and they were close to their campsite.
They were on a trip to Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee, but Dennis vanished into thin air. He’d been playing with other children near a stream, but when the family decided to head back, he was gone. Despite an exhaustive search involving hundreds of people, he never turned up.
The student who never returned
What was supposed to be an ordinary school hiking trip for Teresa ‘Tessie’ Gibson turned into a baffling case. She was 13 at the time. The incident happened at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in the 1960s.
Teresa split from her group and decided to head back toward the Clinchfield Trailhead. She was never seen again. The search lasted for days, but not a single clue turned up.
Sources: Please see here for a complete listing of all sources that were consulted in the preparation of this article.
15 famous missing persons who reappeared after years of mystery
Years can pass without any answers in some missing-person cases, but then, out of the blue, the person turns up alive, long after people expected them to come back.
15 famous missing persons who reappeared after years of mystery
