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DENNIS
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 29510
Registered: 9-2-2006
Location: Punta Banda
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Nothing new to say....they're just milking it. US investigators won't get much done down here.
I'll be looking for the next episode in around six months.
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surfer jim
Super Nomad
Posts: 1891
Registered: 8-29-2003
Location: high desert
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Does anybody know how to hack into that checking account?
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BajaNews
Super Moderator
Posts: 1439
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Few clues a year after McStay family disappeared
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/feb/03/few-clues-yea...
By Susan Shroder
February 3, 2011
FALLBROOK — Mike McStay tries to remain focused each day, being a good husband, raising three young daughters, running his fire-protection business in
San Clemente and preparing the family for the adoption this summer of two young orphans from Ghana.
But for the past year, he has been haunted wondering what happened to his beloved older brother, who vanished a year ago Friday along with his wife
and their two young sons.
The home of Joseph and Summer McStay on Avocado View Lane in Fallbrook is in foreclosure and empty, its contents distributed among family members.
Nearly $100,000 remains untouched in a checking account that Joseph McStay had, his brother said.
The family’s young dog, a puppy when they disappeared, is being cared for by a friend. Summer McStay’s mom has the family’s older dog at her Big Bear
home.
There have been no phone calls, text messages or e-mails from the family. The last credible lead on a possible sighting, which proved unfounded, came
in October, Mike McStay said.
He maintains a website — http://www.mcstayfamily.com — with information about Joseph McStay, now 41; Summer, 44; and their children, Gianni, 5, and Joseph Jr., 4. The
brother posts messages to them, like one Monday on the fourth birthday of his youngest nephew. Their disappearance baffles him.
“Joe just doesn’t do this kind of stuff,” McStay said. “He’s the guy that puts money away for a rainy day. He’s always been very wise with money,
always good with people. ... He’s just steady.”
McStay said the website gets about 4,000 hits a day. Although most people have been compassionate, some feedback has been negative. People have
speculated that the parents must have had ties to the Mafia, or to a religious cult, suggestions McStay finds absurd.
“These are just normal, everyday Americans,” he said. “This is a loving family.”
Sheriff’s homicide Detective Troy DuGal is in charge of the case, working with the FBI and law enforcement in Mexico, where it is believed the family
might have traveled to when they disappeared. He said he receives several tips a week and follows up on all of them.
“I am very hopeful this case will resolve,” DuGal said Thursday. “I am also very hopeful that it resolves soon. The longer this case remains open, the
more concerned I become that the McStays may be victims of foul play.”
Four days after the McStays disappeared, their white 1996 Isuzu Trooper was found abandoned in a parking lot near the San Ysidro border crossing,
child seats inside. The vehicle was paid for, as was the truck Joseph McStay used for his custom water-fountain business.
Records on the family’s computer show that the week before they vanished inquiries were made about passport requirements for traveling with children
to Mexico. They also had a Spanish-language educational disc, DuGal said.
A grainy U.S. Border Patrol surveillance video shows two adults with two young children walking toward a turnstile into Tijuana at the San Ysidro
pedestrian crossing on Feb. 8, the same day the Trooper was found. McStay said it’s so fuzzy it’s impossible to say if it was his brother. DuGal said
it is “likely” that it is the McStays.
“The physical evidence indicates it is probable the family left the residence voluntarily and traveled into Mexico” for unknown reasons, DuGal said.
“I am confident the McStays have not traveled out of Mexico unless they are using an assumed name.”
In May, a restaurant worker in the central Baja California town of El Rosario thought the family dined there and left a map. The map did not have
their fingerprints. In October, a family matching the description of the McStays was seen at an Ensenada hotel. They turned out to be from Canada.
Grasping for answers, McStay said he has not ruled out that the family might be hiding in protective custody for some unknown reason, though law
enforcement officials have rejected that theory.
McStay said he accepts that the odds of the family being alive decrease by the day. But like DuGal, he won’t give up.
Relatives also still place ads about the McStays with newspapers and radio stations in Baja California.
“I don’t expect to stop until I find out what happened to my family, period,” McStay said. “We’re just asking for help, for someone that knows
something to just come forward.”
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Anyone with information about the disappearance of Joseph and Summer McStay of Fallbrook and their children, Gianni and Joseph Jr., are asked to call
authorities.
• San Diego County Sheriff’s Department: (858) 974-2321 or (858) 565-5200 after hours.
• Crime Stoppers: (888) 580-8477. Tips can be called in anonymously.
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durrelllrobert
Elite Nomad
Posts: 7393
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Location: Punta Banda BC
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Mood: thriving in Baja
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Old question
Has any one heard anything about the McStay family that's been missing for 3 years and last seen crossing into Baja on foot?
Bob Durrell
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Ateo
Elite Nomad
Posts: 5912
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Funny you bring that up. My plumber was talking about this Sunday.
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sancho
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 2524
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Location: OC So Cal
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You got me to go searching, doesn't show any new
info, just old news speculation. Mex is a bit lawless,
I guess that is part of the appeal. Seems on the surface
somewhat unlikely an entire gruop to just vanish.
It would be hard not to leave some sort of trail,
good or bad
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DENNIS
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 29510
Registered: 9-2-2006
Location: Punta Banda
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Awww...I think they're OK. Private holiday and all.
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MMc
Super Nomad
Posts: 1679
Registered: 6-29-2011
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Mood: Current
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They might be under that third cactus from left. Their were always so many questions about there disappearance.
[Edited on 1-15-2013 by MMc]
"Never teach a pig to sing it frustrates you and annoys the pig" - W.C.Fields
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durrelllrobert
Elite Nomad
Posts: 7393
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Location: Punta Banda BC
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Mood: thriving in Baja
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Just saw this interview on TV news:
Posted: 01/16/2013
Allison Ash
FALLBROOK, Calif. - The author of an explosive new book about the disappearance of a Fallbrook family three years ago said he believes Summer McStay
killed her husband and took off with the couple's boys.
"I personally believe that Summer probably killed Joseph and we should be looking for Summer and the two kids, rather than a family of four that
decided to just flee on their own," said author Rick Baker.
Baker said he has spent the past three years investigating the case and reading personal and business emails written by Summer McStay.
"From the emails that she sent in the last year to family and friends and even business associates out of state from Arizona to North Carolina, we see
a very different woman… I think, a very conflicted woman," explained Baker. "I use the word 'evil' because some of the thoughts that she put down on
paper and emails and electronically sent to people show a very conflicted person... someone who was very unhappy, not just with her own personal life
but with Joseph as well and with Joseph's extended family, and just not a very nice person."
Joseph and Summer McStay and their children Joseph and Gianni disappeared from their Fallbrook home on Feb. 4, 2010. There were no signs of a
struggle, and no signs that the couple had financial problems. Their two dogs were left unattended and it was not until after neighbors complained
about barking that family members and investigators realized the family had vanished.
The couple's SUV was found days later near the border crossing in San Ysidro and when investigators checked surveillance video, they saw dark images
of what appeared to be the family walking into Mexico.
Several leads in Mexico proved to be false.
"I don't think they ever crossed the border. I don't believe law enforcement thinks that they crossed the border," said Baker, who called the video
"staged."
He added, "The car was put there for a specific purpose and I don't believe they ever went to Mexico."
Baker admitted that his book, entitled "No Goodbyes," does not have all the answers about the bizarre disappearance but does offer enough evidence to
show there was something "sinister" about what happened to the McStays.
"The reason why I wrote this book was to put the facts out there… that this wasn't just some happy family like Mayberry RFD and they chose to go to
Mexico one day. That's not what happened," Baker said.
Joseph McStay's brother told 10News over the phone that his family does not share the thoughts and opinions of Baker.
"If he has proof, then let him produce it," said Mike McStay, who spent months searching for his brother.
Mike McStay said he believes Baker is twisting the truth so he can sell books.
Baker told 10News the money raised from book sales will go to Texas Equusearch, an organization dedicated to finding missing persons.
"No Goodbyes: The Mysterious Disappearance of the McStay Family" will be available on Feb. 4, which is the third anniversary of the family's
disappearance.
Bob Durrell
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sancho
Ultra Nomad
Posts: 2524
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Location: OC So Cal
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| Quote: | Originally posted by durrelllrobert
spent the past three years investigating the case and reading personal and business emails written by Summer McStay.
Joseph McStay's brother told 10News over the phone that his family does not share the thoughts and opinions of Baker.
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How does one get access to personal emails, without
the familys permission? Unless there is someone in
family, group that turned them over to the author,
being the skeptic that I am,
I don't trust anyone with a financial motive like
pitching a book
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David K
Honored Nomad
Posts: 65099
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Location: San Diego County
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Mood: Have Baja Fever
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Thanks Bob,
Being near Fallbrook, we were following this on the local news. One of the unsolved mystery shows did an episode on them and followed leads in Central
America to try and find them...
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bacquito
Super Nomad
Posts: 1615
Registered: 3-6-2007
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Mood: jubilado
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McStays
I had forgotten about this.
http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/26/justice/mcstay-family-disappea...
bacquito
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rhintransit
Super Nomad
Posts: 1588
Registered: 9-4-2006
Location: Loreto
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me too, three years goes by quickly.
reality\'s never been of much use out here...
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DENNIS
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 29510
Registered: 9-2-2006
Location: Punta Banda
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Somebody mentioned this a few days back and I almost don't even want to know what happened.......I mean, how they could vanish from the face of the
earth. Hopefully, it was well planned and all good.
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BajaBlanca
Select Nomad
Posts: 13212
Registered: 10-28-2008
Location: La Bocana, BCS
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3 years already. I doubt very much that they are in Baja. one of us would have heard something about them .... Belize might be a possibility ....esp
since apparently he had property there.
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mtgoat666
Select Nomad
Posts: 19308
Registered: 9-16-2006
Location: San Diego
Member Is Online
Mood: Hot n spicy
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| Quote: | Originally posted by BajaBlanca
3 years already. I doubt very much that they are in Baja. one of us would have heard something about them .... Belize might be a possibility ....esp
since apparently he had property there. |
Latest theory (I think published in a book) is that the wife murdered the husband, took off. Fate of kids unclear in the murderous wife theory,....
May have been zero cxn to Mexico...
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BajaNomad
Super Administrator
Posts: 5001
Registered: 8-1-2002
Location: San Diego, CA
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Mood: INTP-A
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| Quote: | Originally posted by mtgoat666
Latest theory (I think published in a book) is that the wife murdered the husband, took off. Fate of kids unclear in the murderous wife theory,....
May have been zero cxn to Mexico... |
Mentioned a few posts before yours, including in a CNN link. Family's calling BS on the theory, but admits the book release helps bring spotlight
back to the story and situation.
Family's indicating they'll now work on releasing their own book from their perspective "inside the caution tape".
http://www.mcstayfamily.org/inside-the-caution-tape
When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
– Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel
We know we must go back if we live, and we don`t know why.
– John Steinbeck, Log from the Sea of Cortez
https://www.regionalinternet.com
Affordable Domain Name Registration/Management & cPanel Web Hosting - since 1999 |
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BajaNews
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The McStays: A lingering mystery
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/feb/02/mcstay-missing-fa...
By John Wilkens and Teri Figueroa
Feb. 2, 2013
A week after Thanksgiving, in a field southeast of Temecula, a hunter came across the partially buried remains of a human body. A little while later,
Mike McStay got a phone call.
“Did your brother ever have any broken bones?”
McStay’s heart pounded. He knew why the detective was asking.
It’s been three years since his brother’s whole family vanished — Joseph, wife Summer, and their two young sons — in a mystery that has baffled the
police, the public, and armchair sleuths from coast to coast.
For the relatives, that’s three years of not knowing, the worst kind of anxiety, hope riding with fear on a never-ending roller coaster.
It’s three years of sightings and tips that go nowhere, three years of strangers gossiping and trash-talking on the Internet, three years of every
possible scenario, good and bad, playing in their heads over and over.
Did the McStays decide to ditch it all — his water-fountain business, her real-estate plans, two dogs, thousands of dollars in bank accounts, the new
home in Fallbrook — and start over somewhere? Was that them in the grainy surveillance video, walking hand-in-hand into Mexico?
Or, as a new book on the case suggests, were there dark undercurrents in the seemingly placid waters of their life together, undercurrents that maybe
led to murder?
For the relatives, it’s also been three years of heart-grabbing moments like Mike McStay picking up the phone and hearing Sheriff’s detective Troy
DuGal, the lead investigator on the case, ask about broken bones.
“I knew why he was asking — they’d found an unidentified male body,” McStay said.
His brother never had any fractures, though, McStay said. The body wasn’t a match. The waiting and wondering continue, day after day, month after
month, year after year.
“It’s like living with a broken heart,” McStay said. “You’re going through the motions of life, but there’s this open wound that won’t be healed until
this is resolved.”
A normal day
Feb. 4, 2010 was a Thursday.
Joseph McStay, then 40, had a business meeting in Rancho Cucamonga about one of the fountains his company, Earth Inspired Products, was building.
Summer, 43, was at home with Gianni, 4; Joey Jr., 3, known as Chubba; and the two dogs, Bear and Digger.
The family had moved from San Clemente to the five-bedroom, two-story house on Avocado Vista Lane about two months earlier. It’s in one of those
housing tracts so familiar to Southern Californians: beige stucco, red-tile roofs, green lawns. This one, just east of Interstate 15, is called Lake
Rancho Viejo. “Entering a Traffic Calmed Neighborhood,” the road signs read.
The couple, both licensed real-estate agents, bought the house out of foreclosure for about $320,000. On a video tour Joseph shot before the purchase,
posted on YouTube, he talks about the hill out back and calls the neighborhood beautiful. Summer talks about being too close to a truck stop and calls
the neighborhood ugly.
They started renovating the house with new countertops, appliances, paint and wood floors. The plan was to sell the home for a big profit down the
road, then maybe get back to the beach. Joseph was an avid surfer.
On Feb. 4, Summer spoke on the phone with her sister, who had just had a baby, and made plans for a visit. In the afternoon, at a Ross store in Vista,
Summer’s credit card was used to buy beach towels, infant pajamas and a jacket.
The home computer was used that day to search for homeopathic anger-management medication, to scan Craigslist for children’s toys, and to visit the
Animal Planet website.
Throughout the day, phone calls from home went to Joseph’s cell, and calls from his cell went to one of his employees. The couple traded text
messages.
At 7:47 p.m., a neighbor’s surveillance camera captured the bottom 18-inches of what appears to be the family’s white Isuzu Trooper going by. About 40
minutes later, on his cellphone, Joseph called a co-worker.
Then nothing.
No phone calls, no emails, no texts. No credit-card charges, no ATM withdrawals. No confirmed sightings.
Nothing.
Into Mexico?
Sheriff’s deputies first went to the house on Feb. 10, after a business associate of Joseph’s called to report that he wasn’t responding to phone
calls or emails. The deputy knocked on the door and saw nothing amiss.
Three days later, Mike McStay came over from San Clemente, where he lives. He climbed in an unlocked window and looked around. He said he was
surprised the dogs were there, but didn’t want to overreact. He thought maybe the family had left for a quick vacation during the President’s Day
weekend.
Two days later, when he still hadn’t heard from them, he called the sheriff.
Detective DuGal works in homicide, which investigates missing-persons cases. At the house, he found a carton of eggs and a rotten banana on the
kitchen counter, child-size bowls of popcorn in the living room near the TV, Summer’s prescription sunglasses.
To him, it looked like they’d left in a hurry. But why?
The Trooper was located in a storage yard. It had been identified as an abandoned vehicle and towed from a shopping center parking lot in San Ysidro
at about 11 p.m. on Feb. 8, four days after anyone last heard from the family. Lot attendants said they believed the SUV had been there since about 6
p.m. that day.
Two child seats were buckled in place inside the Trooper. There were new toys in the back — Chubba’s birthday was Jan. 31 — and asthma medicine in a
plastic container on the floor.
Volunteers from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children scoured hours of border-area surveillance tape and found a foursome that
resembled the McStays, two grown-ups and two kids, walking toward the turnstile into Mexico at about 7 p.m. on Feb. 8.
Each adult was holding the hand of a child. The woman was wearing what looked like Ugg boots, a pair of which Summer owned. But the tape was grainy
and dark and a positive identification impossible.
Detectives soon found other evidence suggesting the family had gone across the border voluntarily. On Jan. 27, eight days before they disappeared,
someone used the family computer to email the “About.com” website about passport requirements for children traveling in Mexico. The month before that,
Summer was looking into purchasing Spanish-language software.
Family members weren’t convinced. Why would Joseph abandon his teenage son from an earlier marriage, Jonah, who lived with his mom in North County?
Why was Summer looking at “Evite.com” on Feb. 3 for children’s birthday party invitations if she was going away the next day?
And who leaves a budding nest egg house, pets, two vehicles, $100,000 in bank accounts — a life — without saying why and without saying goodbye?
‘Citizen sleuths’
Witness protection would be one answer, but law enforcement says no.
Detectives developed another theory: the family went into Mexico on purpose, and something bad happened. That would explain why there’s been no sign
of them. What it doesn’t explain is the four-day gap between their disappearance and the video of four people crossing into Mexico.
“We have not discovered any evidence leading us to believe a crime has occurred thus far,” said Lt. Glenn Giannantonio. “There has been no evidence to
show us that the disappearance is anything other than a family being missing of their own free will.”
He said leads have tapered off, but the investigation remains open. “A lot of time and effort was put into this case, more than any other
missing-person case I am aware of,” he said. “We have no idea where they are.”
In the absence of officials answers, the case has its own life on the Internet.
Mike McStay runs a site, http://www.mcstayfamily.org , where there are photos and videos of the family and occasional updates about sightings — Montana, Indiana, Baja —
and other developments. There is a Facebook page ( http://www.facebook.com/BringTheMcStayFamilyHome ), where the family’s supporters post messages of encouragement.
And there are sites like Websleuths and Justice Quest, where amateur detectives explore every nuance of the case. Joseph’s dizzy spells. Summer’s
aliases. Chubba’s birthmark. Their fascination seems endless, their numbers swelling every time Nancy Grace or Geraldo Rivera or Laura Ling explores
the case on TV.
Among those drawn to the story is Rick Baker, a former radio-show host and author who was living in Fallbrook around the time the family disappeared.
He overheard people talking about it in a coffee shop and got hooked.
He spent hundreds of hours looking into the case — at one point driving from the McStay house to the Ross store in Vista to see how long it took — and
is offering a $25,000 reward for locating the missing family.
Baker, who now lives in North Carolina, has also written a book, “No Goodbyes,” which comes out Monday and is full of sinister implications. Much of
it is based on private emails and other records that Baker said he obtained from “citizen sleuths” — documents that throw dirt all over the idea that
the McStays were a happy family who simply walked off into a Mexican sunset.
The book is hardest on Summer, casting her as hotheaded, manipulative and vindictive. In an interview, Baker said he thinks Summer “did something or
had something done” to her husband, although he admitted he has no proof.
Summer’s sister, Tracy Russell, said she’s heard about the book but doesn’t plan to read it. “We’ve suffered enough, and this just makes it harder,”
she said. “So many horrible things are being said, and they’ve made my sister into this horrible person. Everybody has character flaws, but to attack
her that way, when she isn’t here to defend herself, is so hurtful.”
The book also points fingers at Mike McStay and others over the handling of his brother’s business affairs and personal property after the
disappearance. “Did Mike,” the book asks, “know Joseph wasn’t coming back?”
McStay said, “Our family hasn’t taken any of that money, not one dime.” He said funds were used to complete fountain projects already under way and to
make child-support payments for Joseph’s teenage son.
Giannantonio, the sheriff’s lieutenant, said, “We have reviewed financial records and have found nothing that would lead us to believe a crime has
occurred.”
Asked about the book, McStay sighed. “For everyone else, this is just a story to them,” he said. “For us, this is real life. You try to take the high
road and turn the other cheek. Unfortunately, a case like this brings out the bottom dwellers, people trying to line their pockets on the misery of
others.”
Baker said any profits he makes from the book — at one point last week pre-orders made it Number 7 on Amazon’s “true crime” best-sellers list — will
be donated to a search-and-rescue organization in Texas.
Hopes and fears
Everybody waits.
“It’s three years later, and we have the same hopes and fears,” Russell said. “There’s not a day that goes by that we don’t wonder, worry and try to
figure it out.”
Joseph’s mother still sends him emails, catching him up on things, just in case.
Summer’s mom frets whenever the weather turns cold, worried that the family, out there somewhere, might not have enough clothing or shelter to stay
warm.
On Avocado Vista Lane, a new family lives in the McStays’ house, which went into foreclosure after they vanished. Neighbor Chris Southard said
memories of the disappearance linger.
“We are a close neighborhood. They were new. By the time we knew them a little bit, the news vans were here,” Southard said. The prevailing theory on
the street is that “something awful happened. They are never coming back.”
The same hopes. The same fears. The same mystery.
Family members have been encouraged to write their own books. Mike McStay is planning to. “What the heck,” he said, “everybody else is.”
Russell isn’t interested. “I just don’t think it’s going to bring my family home,” she said. “Who are we to sing their song, when we don’t even know
what happened to their voices?”
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EnsenadaDr
Banned
Posts: 5027
Registered: 9-12-2011
Location: Baja California
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Mood: Move on. It is just a chapter in the past, but don't close the book- just turn the page
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MIA
You mean you never heard about the posters in Newport Beach..."Where is Dennis?" | Quote: | Originally posted by DENNIS
Somebody mentioned this a few days back and I almost don't even want to know what happened.......I mean, how they could vanish from the face of the
earth. Hopefully, it was well planned and all good. |
[Edited on 2-5-2013 by EnsenadaDr]
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DENNIS
Platinum Nomad
Posts: 29510
Registered: 9-2-2006
Location: Punta Banda
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| Quote: | Originally posted by EnsenadaDr
You mean you never heard about the posters in Newport Beach..."Where is Dennis?" |
Those are "Not Wanted" posters.
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