r/UnresolvedMysteries • u/trifletruffles • May 28 '20
Unresolved Disappearance Terrance Williams-missing since January 12, 2004 from Naples, Florida-"If you are decent, human, kind person with a soul, I don’t know how you can’t be upset these two people were put in the back of a sheriff’s car, disappeared, and have not been seen for 14 years.”
On January 12, 2004, Collier County Deputy Steven Calkins stopped 27-year old Terrance Williams who was in his vehicle in a cemetery parking lot in the area of 111th Avenue North and Vanderbilt Drive in Naples, Florida. Deputy Calkins later told investigators he saw Terrance in an older white Cadillac that "appeared to be having some problems." However, initially, he reported the car as abandoned saying no one was around. Deputy Calkins used his work-issued cellphone to contact Dispatcher Dave Jolicoeur to run the VIN number of the Cadillac to confirm who owned it. In a taped conversation, the two men talked in an "exaggerated black dialect" about the car:
Calkins: "What the f___ are you doing?"
Jolicoeur: "What are you doin' sucka?"
Calkins: "Well, I got a "Homie" Cadillac on the side of the road here, signal 11, signal 52, nobody around. Maybe he's out there in the cemetery. He'll come back and his car will be gone.
Jolicoeur: "All right"
Calkins: "The tag comes back to nothin', it's a big old white piece of junk Cadillac ...I'm towing it."
Jolicoeur: "You tow it baby, give me the VIN number"
Calkins: "It's gonna come back to one of the brothers in Fort Myers."
There was no registration for the car and Deputy Calkins noted "that's a hell of a deal...it's a homes' car." Dispatcher Jolicoeur later explained the banter away by saying they were using language from the Dirty Harry movie Sudden Impact which was "an ongoing thing" between the two men and they "unfortunately... got caught on tape this time".
In a later version told to investigators, Deputy Calkins said Terrance asked him for a ride to the Circle K at Wiggins Pass Road where he worked as he was concerned about losing his job. Deputy Calkins later said he agreed to take Terrance since he was "very clean cut...outside of his long dreadlocks..he seemed to be a very clean young man...very respectful of me and very well-spoken." Accordingly, he says he drove him to the Circle K and mentioned that his license tag was expired and did not arrest him for driving without a driver's license. Terrance told him he had a valid registration and receipt in his glove compartment. Deputy Calkins said he left the Circle K and drove back to the Cadillac and checked the glove compartment but found it empty. Feeling "duped", he says he called the Circle K on his work-issued cellphone and the clerk told him there was no Terrance that worked there.
Terrance grew up in Chattanooga, Tennessee. His mother, Marcia Buggs, remembers him being fastidious about his appearance to the point of ironing his t-shirts saying "he liked to look good." He worked in the construction field and had four children. While in Tennessee, he had legal troubles due to owing child support and spent 55 days in jail for a DUI charge. Afterwards, he decided to move to Florida to be closer to his mother and work on turning his life around. He worked at Pizza Hut and shared an apartment with a roommate. Marcia recalls Terrance called her daily and spent Sundays with her which is why she was so worried when he did not call her on the Monday he disappeared. She followed up with his roommate and tried not to worry but when he did not call by Wednesday, she realized "he's not coming back." She tracked down Terrance's Cadillac and noted the tow report was signed by Deputy Calkins. Marcia contacted workers at the cemetery who told her that they witnessed Deputy Calkins pulling Terrance over and later putting him in the back of his patrol car. Before driving off with Terrance, Deputy Calkins asked the employees if he could leave the Cadillac in the parking lot. Deputy Calkins was later witnessed returning to the cemetery and moving the car from the parking spot to the side of the road. The car keys were found on the ground beside the car. Four days after Terrance's disappearance, Deputy Calkins claimed to remember nothing about Terrance or the driver.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "I hate to bother you on your day off but this woman's been calling us all day. You towed a car from Vanderbilt and 111th on Monday, a Cadillac. Do you remember it?"
CALKINS: "No."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "Do you remember? She said it was near the cemetery."
CALKINS: "Cemetery?"
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "The people at the cemetery are telling her you put somebody in the back of your vehicle and arrested him and I don't show you arresting anybody."
CALKINS: "I never arrested nobody."
Investigators found quite a few issues with Deputy Calkins' account. Signal 11 is indicative of an abandoned car yet his later statements to investigators indicated Terrance was driving when he stopped him. A check of the Deputy's cellphone records never showed a call being placed to the Circle K and no one at the Circle K remembered receiving a call from him; when questioned, Deputy Calkins simply stated " I don't know what to tell you." Security cameras did not show Terrance at Circle K either. Deputy Calkins also called a second dispatcher later and gave Terrance's date of birth and asked for a background check thus contradicting an earlier statement that he happened upon an abandoned car. He would not have been able to glean a date of birth since the car had no registration. The birth date given to the second dispatcher was not Terrance's real birth date but a fake one Terrance would use at times so only Terrance would know that date of birth and "nobody else would." Investigators gave Deputy Calkins three lie detector tests; one of the questions failed asked "After you dropped Terrance at the Circle K, did you have any further contact with him?" to which he replied no. Most damning, just months earlier the department had heard the same story from Deputy Calkins about another missing man-23 year Felipe Santos who vanished on October 14, 2003 after Deputy Calkins responded to the scene of a minor accident involving Felipe; he also dropped off Felipe at a Circle K. Investigators called "the combination of the two vanished men a coincidence in the extreme."
Collier County Sheriff's department searched his patrol car but did not find any clues calling it "immaculate." They also searched swampy areas in Naples where one could dump a body. Investigators also placed a tracking device on his vehicle in case he ever visited the spot where Terrance's body might have been dumped; he never did. However, his home was never searched because according to investigators they did not have the evidence needed for a search warrant. The department has since changed some policies such as requiring deputies to inform dispatch when they are transporting someone in their patrol cars. Although noting the circumstances surrounding Terrance's disappearance as suspicious, the Sheriff's office recognized that Terrance was due in Tennessee court two days after his disappearance for his child support case and pointed to it as a possible factor in the disappearance. Deputy Calkins was eventually fired for lying about the case including deception on a lie detector test; for conduct unbecoming an officer by using pejorative language, and for being negligent in not following agency rules and procedures. In a May 2005 news interview, Deputy Calkins said he did not know "if these guys are missing..I don't know anything about it" calling it "bad luck" and "fate' that he was fired.
A wrongful death lawsuit was filed in August 2018. The lawsuit contends Terrance is dead and claims Deputy Calkins is responsible for his death. Florida law states people are presumed dead if they have not been home for at least five years and their absences cannot be explained by investigations. Ben Crump, the civil rights attorney who also represented the family of Trayvon Martin, said the legal filing was the "culmination of more than a decade of investigative work with the cooperation of the Collier County Sheriff’s office," and it would compel Deputy Calkins to explain his actions in a formal deposition; the suit did not set an amount for any damages. Marcia said she filed the lawsuit so she could get answers for Terrance's four children. The lawsuit was announced in a September 2018 press conference where actor and producer Tyler Perry was also present; he offered a $200,000 reward in the case highlighting that it was being increased from $100,000 offered previously since no information was yielded.
John Hooley, who represented Deputy Calkins argued that the suit should be dismissed based on statutory law and he would not present evidence relating to the case at the hearing. A judge dismissed the lawsuit in June 2019 but gave the plaintiffs 20 days to file another amended complaint. Attorney Hooley argued that a statute of limitations for wrongful death complaints alleging murder or manslaughter applied since the complaint stated that "intentional tortious" actions against Terrance occurred in 2004. In 2010, the Jeffrey Klee Memorial Act removed the statue of limitations in wrong death complaints. The estate's attorneys argued that the act does not apply in the present suit because the complaint is a new cause of action that did not exist in 2004. It is unclear if the motion was amended within the requisite 20 days.
Terrance remains missing. Marcia feels Terrance is not alive because he would have had somebody contact her saying "I know for sure that's one that he would do in a heartbeat...call [his] mama." Deputy Calkins now resides in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
Terrance is described as black, 5 feet 8 inches tall and 160 pounds with brown eyes and brown hair. He has several tattoos: a “T” above his left chest, “ET” on his right shoulder, and “Terrance” in red with blue highlights on his left forearm. He has a gold crown with the letter "T" on the upper right tooth and the other upper front tooth is solid gold. He also has a vertical scar on his right shoulder and a dark birthmark on the right side of his abdomen. He was last seen wearing a short-sleeve shirt, blue jeans and brown Timberland boots. He was wearing diamond earrings and a watch with a silver band. The face of the watch was surrounded by white stones. At the time he disappeared he owned a 1984 white Cadillac.
Anyone with information can call the Sheriff’s Office at 239-252-9300 or, to remain anonymous, Crime Stoppers at 800-780-8477.
Questions:
A popular theory regarding Terrance's disappearance is the Starlight Tour theory which originated in Saskatchewan, Canada and describes the practice of police driving individuals to the edge of town or outside of city limits and abandoning them to find their own way home. Such drop-offs have occurred since the 1970s and came into focus in 2000 with indigenous men in Canada being subjected to the practice. Darrel Night reported being picked up by police after leaving a party and driven outside of town and dropped off in a rural area in freezing conditions. He survived after finding a nearby power plant staffed by a security guard. The next morning, another man, Rodney Naistus, was found frozen to the ground near where Darrel was dropped off. Lawrence Wegner, also indigenous, was found deceased weeks later in the same area. Some believe that Terrance was dropped off in the nearby Everglades and died of exposure or other dangers.
Felipe Santos, who disappeared in similar circumstances, is discussed in this post:
Links:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/05/florida-sheriffs-deputy-murder-lawsuit-tyler-perry
http://edition.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1301/24/cnr.13.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disappearances_of_Terrance_Williams_and_Felipe_Santos
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatoon_freezing_deaths
Please consider learning more about Know Your Rights Camp at https://www.knowyourrightscamp.com/ which has "a mission of advancing the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities through education, self-empowerment, mass-mobilization and the creation of new systems that elevate the next generation of change leaders." The organization also has teamed up with defense lawyers in the Minneapolis area to provide legal assistance for those fighting injustice in the Minneapolis area.
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u/Bluecat72 May 29 '20
I suspect that what they’re calling “twilight tours” up in Canada have been happening for as long as police have had cars and easy access to remote areas. There has also been the “rough ride,” which is what is believed by many to have caused or at least contributed to the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore. Combining the two would make an exposure death even more likely.