Resources for Missing Persons

According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day. Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends. Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.

Missing Person Case Updates with Photos

Jack Daniel Phillips




Jack, date, approximate 1995; Age-progression to age 35 (date, approximate 2021); James Crummel
Date Missing 08/06/1995
Missing From
Big Bear Lake, California
Missing Classification Endangered Missing
Sex Male
Race
White
Date of Birth 06/22/1986 (36)
Age 9 years old
Height and Weight 4'0, 72 pounds
Clothing/Jewelry Description A black tank top, gray shorts with an image of the Tasmanian Devil cartoon character, white socks, white sneakers and a hoop earring.
Markings and/or Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian male. Brown hair, brown eyes. Jack has facial freckles and a gap between his two front teeth. He has a scar on his left cheek and his left ear is pierced. His nickname is J.D. He still had baby teeth at the time of his 1995 disappearance.
Details of Disappearance Jack was last seen near the Aspen Glen picnic grounds in Big Bear Lake, California between 5:00 and 5:30 p.m. on August 6, 1995. He was picnicking there with his younger half-brother, his mother and her live-in boyfriend.
Jack had an argument with his mother and her boyfriend that day and he told a witness he was tired of arguing. He apparently vanished while walking back to where the adults were. An extensive search of the area around the picnic grounds and his nearby home turned up no sign of the child. He has no history of running away.
Several days after Jack's disappearance, a friend of his family in Bakersfield, California received an automated phone call asking whether she would accept a collect call. She thought she heard Jack's voice on the line when the caller was supposed to identify himself, but the caller hung up before she could speak with him. It has not been confirmed that the caller was Jack.
The only other person Jack knew in Bakersfield was his father, who was in prison in 1995. His mother and her boyfriend aren't considered suspects in his disappearance. Jack's father and mother later reconciled and now live in West Virginia.
Convicted child killer James Crummel is the prime suspect in Jack's disappearance, as well as the 1979 disappearance of 7-year-old Charles Christopher Francis from Santa Ana, California. He was a violent serial sexual abuser a record of child molestation dating back to the 1960s. All but one of his known victims were boys in roughly the same age group as Charles and Jack.
Crummel lived only a few blocks from Aspen Glen at the time Jack vanished, and later told a cellmate he had murdered the child. Authorities believe he may have dumped Jack's body in the ocean.
A photo of Crummel is posted with this summary. In August 1967, he abducted a fourteen-year-old Wisconsin boy, molested him and beat him almost to death. He served five years of a thirty-year sentence for the crime. In 1983, he was convicted of the February 1967 murder of an Arizona boy and sentenced to life in prison, but the conviction was overturned in 1987 because of ineffective counsel. He ended up pleading guilty to kidnapping in the Arizona and was released later that year.
In 1997, Crummel was charged with the murder of a thirteen-year-old neighbor boy, James Wilfred "Jamey" Trotter. Jamey disappeared in 1979. In 1990, Crummel "discovered" the teen's skull, but it wasn't identified until 1996. After his murder arrest, investigators approached Crummel about Jack's and he offered to confess to Jack's murder if prosecutors would not seek the death penalty for the Trotter murder.
The deal was turned down and Crummel was convicted of Jamey Trotter's murder in 2004 and sentenced to death. In June 2012, he died by suicide on death row, hanging himself with an electric cord. He didn't leave a note.
Foul play is suspected in Jack's due to the circumstances involved in his disappearance, but no one has ever been charged in his .
Investigating Agency
San Bernardino County Sheriff's Office
909-356-9652
Other
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
California Attorney General's Office
America's Most Wanted
Child Cyber Search
The Doe Network
NamUs
The Big Bear Valley News
The San Bernardino County Sun
Newport-Corona Del Mar Patch
The Los Angeles Times
Behind the Badge OC

Missing Person Photos

A missing person is a person who has disappeared and whose status as alive or dead cannot be confirmed as their location and condition are unknown. A person may go missing through a voluntary disappearance, or else due to an accident, crime, death in a location where they cannot be found (such as at sea), or many other reasons. In most parts of the world, a missing person will usually be found quickly. While criminal abductions are some of the most widely reported missing person cases, these account for only 2 to 5 percent of missing children in Europe. By contrast, some missing person cases remain unresolved for many years. Laws related to these cases are often complex since, in many jurisdictions, relatives and third parties may not deal with a person's assets until their death is considered proven by law and a formal death certificate issued. The situation, uncertainties, and lack of closure or a funeral resulting when a person goes missing may be extremely painful with long-lasting effects on family and friends. A number of organizations seek to connect, share best practices, and disseminate information and images of missing children to improve the effectiveness of missing children investigations, including the International Commission on Missing Persons, the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), as well as national organizations, including the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the US, Missing People in the UK, Child Focus in Belgium, and The Smile of the Child in Greece.

Resources for Missing Persons

According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day. Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends. Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.

Missing Person Case Updates with Photos