Alissa Turney's stepfather facing charges 19 years after Arizona teen went mysteriously missing from school
Anyone associated with or having knowledge of Alissa Turney's disappearance will tell you they know the man responsible: her stepfather. Alissa was 17 years old and a junior at a high school in Phoenix, Arizona, when she mysteriously disappeared in 2001, according to Hue and Cry. She had been living with her stepsister Sarah and her stepfather Michael Turney after her mother had passed away.
Her relationship with Turney was a complicated one. While he was said to have been cool and laid-back with Sarah, he was uptight and strict with her, claiming it was necessary because she needed more guidance and direction in life. He would be the last person to see her alive. On May 17 that year, Turney told Sarah that her stepsister was missing after he failed to pick her up from school as was usual. All attempts at contacting her had failed, the reason for which became apparent when they reached back home -- her cell phone was on top of her dresser, next to a note.
"Dad and Sarah," the note read. "When you dropped me off at school today, I decided I really am going to California. Sarah, you said you really wanted me gone – now you have it. Dad, I took $300 from you. That’s why I saved my money."
The note did not come as too much of a surprise, not just because of the teen's fraught relationship with Turney, but also because she had recently been speaking about going to California to live with her aunt. While Turney, a former police officer, reported Alissa as a runaway and police did open a missing person file, they conducted no further investigation into her disappearance since he claimed he knew she was in California.
A week after she "ran away," Turney reported to the police that he had received a call from Alissa, where she blamed him for her leaving and told him she was never coming back from California. He also provided police with his phone records to prove that the call had taken place.
But in the first sign that something was terribly wrong, Turney changed his stance about his stepdaughter's disappearance. He began telling family members that he believed someone might have been following her and caused her great harm. He said that, because police were not doing anything, he would go search for her himself and even made several trips to California to pass out missing person flyers.
In 2006, five years after she was last seen, investigators inadvertently realized something was amiss while looking into a man named Thomas Hymer who was serving time in a Florida prison for murder. After they quickly ruled him out as a suspect, they started looking into other inconsistencies in the case that they had ignored.
For one, in the years she was missing, Alissa had not contacted a single one of her friends or family members, including the aunt she was supposedly to be living with. Her bank account, which had $1,800, was still untouched and her social security number had never been used, which meant she had neither worked at a job or gone to school. Investigators also learned that she had not been in school for the entire duration of the day she went missing and that Turney had picked her up near lunchtime. The story was confirmed by not only her boyfriend but also several friends who shared that the teen had promised to make it to an end-of-the-year party that night.
When questioned about the same, Turney claimed he had a fight with Alissa at home, and that the 17-year-old subsequently stormed off to her room. If true, it would be easy to confirm because of his paranoid nature - he documented every incoming and outgoing call to the house and had cameras all over the property, including one that was hidden in the vent of the living room.
Conveniently, audiotapes for the day the 17-year-old disappeared were not available because he said he had turned off the recorder. He declined to let them review the videotapes as well, claiming he had browsed through them and that there was nothing relevant to their investigation. The findings gave them enough probable cause to obtain a search warrant, the execution of which resulted in investigators uncovering 26 homemade pipe bombs, as well as a 90-page manifesto where he suggested his stepdaughter had been abducted and killed by two men from an electrical union he worked for as revenge. He said he had avenged her death by killing them in return, but both the men he named were found to have died of natural causes.
They also found a mountain of documents, which included letters Alissa had written where she claimed to have been molested by Turney, as well as contracts that she signed where she said she had never been sexually assaulted. Turney did end up pleading guilty and serving 10 years behind bars for the bombs and was ordered to participate in mental health treatments after being diagnosed with paranoid personality disorder, but remained free of charges linking him to his stepdaughter's disappearance.
That finally changed this week. It's taken 19 long years, but police announced this past Monday, June 8, that they are submitting Alissa's case to the prosecutor's office for charges against Turney. The news was confirmed by Sarah, who has been very vocal about believing in her father's guilt, and has even written a blog titled, "5 Reasons I Know My Father Killed My Sister, Alissa Turney."
But detectives are still looking for more information and have encouraged anyone with leads or tips to contact the Phoenix Police Department or call 602-534-2121 and ask to speak with Detective Stuart Somershoe. Anonymous tips can be made by calling Silent Witness at 480-948-6377.