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
Tiffany Louise Sessions
Tiffany, date, approximate 1989; Age-progression at age 44 (date, approximate 2012); Michael Knickbocker; Paul Rowles
Date Missing 02/09/1989
Missing From
Gainesville, Florida
Missing Classification Endangered Missing
Sex Female
Race
White
Date of Birth 10/29/1968 (53)
Age 20 years old
Height and Weight 5'3, 125 pounds
Clothing/Jewelry Description Red sweatpants, a long-sleeved white pullover sweatshirt with gray horizontal stripes and the word "Aspen" stitched in green lettering on the lower front of the collar, blue or white low-cut Reebok sneakers and a two-tone ladies' silver and gold Rolex watch with a blue-tinted face and the serial number R-6009006. Carrying a black Sony Walkman radio.
Markings and/or Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian female. Blonde hair, brown eyes. Tiffany's lower front tooth is chipped. She has a crescent-shaped scar on her left knuckle. Her family nickname is Tiffy.
Details of Disappearance Tiffany was a junior at the University of Florida in Gainesville in 1989; she majored in finance. She resided in the 2600 block of southwest 35th Place in Casablanca East Condominiums. Tiffany told her roommate she was going to take a walk along Williston Road at approximately 6:00 p.m. on February 9, 1989.
Witnesses saw a woman matching Tiffany's description speaking to several unidentified individuals in a vehicle shortly afterwards. The woman may have entered the car, but the witnesses were uncertain. Authorities have never confirmed if the person was Tiffany. She has never been heard from again. She left her wallet, keys and identification inside her residence.
Michael Christopher Knickbocker was considered a possible suspect in Tiffany's for many years. He was sentenced to five of life in prison in 1990 for the 1989 rape of a 20-year-old Gainesville college student. He had a prior record for sex offenses and other crimes
In 2005, he pleaded no contest to first-degree murder in the 1989 shooting death of a twelve-year-old Starke, Florida girl. He was given an additional life sentence for the crime and will be 74 years old by the time he becomes eligible for parole.
A photo of Knickerbocker is posted with this summary. He allegedly told other inmates that he chained Tiffany to a tree near Gainesville on the night of her disappearance. Knickbocker claimed that he murdered her shortly afterwards and disposed of her remains in the Caloosahatchee River near Fort Myers, Florida.
Investigators searched the area after receiving the information from an informant, but no evidence was found at the scene. Authorities stated that materials connected to Tiffany's disappearance may have been lost in the surf as a result of the time lapse. But it may be worth noting that Knickerbocker lived near the victim he killed and near the scene of his prior rape, but he wasn't living in Gainesville when Tiffany disappeared.
Knickbocker also mentioned that Tiffany's sweatshirt was buried outside of Gainesville. Investigators searched the specified location in August 2002 and recovered a piece of blood-soaked material. Authorities tested the material to determine if Tiffany's DNA was on the item. The results have not been publicly announced. Several media outlets reported that the material did not appear to originate from a sweatshirt.
In February 2014, nearly 25 years after Tiffany's disappearance, a suspect was named in her kidnapping and presumed murder: Paul Rowles. A photo of Rowles is posted with this summary. He had been sentenced to life in prison for a 1976 murder in Miami-Dade County, Florida, but was released from prison in 1985.
In 1994, he was sentenced on multiple nineteen counts including sexual battery, attempted sexual battery, kidnapping and lewd and lascivious molestation. (His victim in that , a nineteen-year-old Clearwater, Florida woman, managed to escape.) He died of natural causes in 2013 at the age of 64, still in prison.
Investigators believe Rowles was a serial killer and Tiffany was his second victim. They're searching for her body near the site where his other known murder victim was buried. Shortly after his death, DNA linked him to the unsolved murder of a 21-year-old woman whose body was found in a shallow grave only about a mile from where Tiffany disappeared.
He is known to have delivered scaffolding to a construction project along Tiffany's jogging path. Authorities also found a day planner Rowles kept in prison which, while it did not mention Tiffany's name, did have the number 2 written next to the date of her disappearance.
The Rolex company has "flagged" Tiffany's watch, so they will be notified if anyone tries to sell or pawn it. The watch can be identified by its unique serial number. Tiffany's remains unsolved. There have not been any arrests in connection to her disappearance.
Investigating Agency
Alachua County Sheriff's Office
352-367-4161
Other
NamUs
Child Protection of America
The Gainesville Sun
WSVN TV-7
The Independent Florida Alligator
The Doe Network
The Dallas Observer
NewsLibrary
The St. Petersburg Times
TiffanySessions.com
Fox 13 Tampa Bay
Unsolved in the News
The Ocala Star-Banner
Florida Department of Corrections
News4Jax
Fox News
WVZN-HD ABC 7
CBS News
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
