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 Photos

Racine Lamour Taliaferro
Taliaferro, date, approximate 2014; Scar on Taliaferro's arm; Some of Taliaferro's tattoos; Jonathon McMahen
Date Missing 04/26/2014
Missing From
Detroit, Michigan
Missing Classification Endangered Missing
Sex Female
Race
Black
Date of Birth 11/26/1986 (35)
Age 27 years old
Height and Weight 4'11, 135 pounds
Clothing/Jewelry Description A black shirt, a red leather vest and black pants.
Markings and/or Distinguishing Characteristics African-American female. Black hair, brown eyes. Taliaferro had copper-colored highlights in her hair at the time of her disappearance. Her navel, left eyebrow and right upper lip are pierced and her ears are triple-pierced. Taliaferro has a long keloid scar on her forearm, extending from wrist to elbow. She has the following tattoos: the word "Loyalty" across her upper chest, paw prints down her right side extending from shoulder to foot, writing on the side of her neck, an unspecified tattoo on her lower back, and several tattoos on her arms, including the name "Will" and a face with a cigarette in its mouth, on her upper right arm. Photos of Taliaferro's scar and some of her tattoos are posted with this summary.
Details of Disappearance Taliaferro was last seen in Detroit, Michigan on April 26, 2014. She lived with her boyfriend, Johnathon Michael McMahen, at the time of her disappearance; a photo of him is posted with this summary.
McMahen was a member of the Satan's Sidekicks Motorcycle Club. According to the club rules, only men can be members, and women are considered to be property of the men. While she was seeing him, Taliaferro was also intimately involved with other men, including at least one other member of the motorcycle club. Her relationship with the other club member was widely known within the club.
Taliaferro was last seen while in a heated argument with McMahen at the club headquarters in the 48300 block of east Davidson between 1:00 and 2:00 a.m. They got into an altercation in the restroom which turned physical. Taliaferro was heard telling McMahen she didn't want to leave the club with him, and McMahen tried to bodily pull her out of the club.
She removed the motorcycle colors she had been wearing, clothes which proclaimed her to be McMahen's property, and seemed very angry and afraid. Witnesses saw McMahen pin her to the floor with a knife at her neck. Later, the couple went outside andTaliaferro sat in the passenger seat of McMahen's black GMC Jimmy pickup truck. McMahen stood in front of her, blocking her exit, and they continued to argue.
WhenTaliaferro's best friend, Alfreda Robinson, tried to approach them, McMahen wouldn't let her speak toTaliaferro. Robinson went back inside the clubhouse for about twenty minutes, and when she came out, they were both gone.McMahen returned to the clubhouse alone about forty-five minutes later.
During the early morning hours of April 27, McMahen awakened his Merry Wade and Jason Wedel, both of whom were staying with him andTaliaferro, and asked them to leave the house so he could speak privately toTaliaferro.Wedel never saw or heard Taliaferro in the house that morning, but he assumed she was asleep in her bedroom. While Wade was waiting for someone to pick her up from the house, she tried to callTaliaferro twice, but both calls went to voicemail.
When Wedel called McMahen later that day, McMahen told him he had broken up with Taliaferro and kicked her out of the house. That afternoon, McMahen went to a T-Mobile store and soldTaliaferro's phone. Wade came back to the house on April 28 to get some belongings, but when she tried to go into the basement to get them, McMahen stopped her and went into the basement himself to fetch what she wanted.
Wedel didn't return until April 30, and when he did, McMahen told him Taliaferro had three days to collect her belongings and that he would be moving a new girlfriend in after that.Taliaferro never did come back to the home, though, and Wedel helped McMahen move her things into the abandoned home next door. They were later recovered by the police.
In the days followingTaliaferro's disappearance, McMahen contacted Randy Hendricks, who regularly cleaned his home, and asked him to clean his basement with bleach and water. For safety reasons, Hendricks refused. While he was cleaning, he found dried blood on McMahen's bedroom door.
Robinson repeatedly tried to contact Taliaferro by phone, but she never saw or heard from her again after April 26, and neither did any of her other friends or her family. Robinson eventually filed a missing persons report for her.
Paisley Almore, McMahen's ex-girlfriend, spoke to him several times aboutTaliaferro's disappearance after she found out about it in May. When she asked him about some bloody clothes at the abandoned home next to his, he told herTaliaferro's clothes were bloody because "when you choke someone and they take their last breath the person coughs up blood."
He told her he andTaliaferro had gotten into a fight after he found out about her infidelity. At first he saidTaliaferro had jumped out of his car, but after Almore challenged him, he admitted he had choked her in his car.
He said when they got home and he got out of the car andshe didn't follow him, he assumed thatTaliaferro, who was drunk, had passed out. When he went back to try to help her, he realized she was dead.McMahen told Almore that he put Taliaferro's body in the back of his truck and then dumped the body in a building, but didn't say where. He said he thought he would get away with it because "with no body there's no ."
McMahen was arrested for Taliaferro's murder, and tried later in 2014. At his trial, a cellmate of his testified that McMahen had confessed the crime to him, telling the same story he told Almore. The county medical examiner testified that McMahen's statement about Taliaferro coughing up blood as she was choked was consistent with what would happen during strangulation.
McMahen was convicted of first-degree premeditated murder and sentenced to life in prison. Taliaferro's body has never been found in spite of extensive searches.
Investigating Agency
Detroit Police Department
313-596-2221
Other
NamUs
Racine Taliaferro's Facebook Page
Justia
Michigan Department of Corrections