CA CA - Bryce Laspisa, 19, Castaic, 30 Aug 2013 - #9

[sreshowtime]

IMVHO I do not think Bryce walked out of the Castaic Lake area...I know it's not a popular opinion, but it is mine.
I don't know about the lake but the peripherals to the east/ne could very well still hold a key to what happened. And just maybe, some hiker, a bit off the beaten trail, will stumble across something of note. It is a very sad case and I do wish his family could have an answer...I can't even envision the pain of the unknown.

 

[Fireweed]

IMVHO I do not think Bryce walked out of the Castaic Lake area...I know it's not a popular opinion, but it is mine.
I don't know about the lake but the peripherals to the east/ne could very well still hold a key to what happened. And just maybe, some hiker, a bit off the beaten trail, will stumble across something of note. It is a very sad case and I do wish his family could have an answer...I can't even envision the pain of the unknown.

Do you think he just got a few miles away? Something like that?

 

[Quester]

(gf had reportedly expressed to BL that the worst part of her friend, LLomax, missing was the not knowing what happened to her, or something like that)

-Breakup w/gf
-Erratic behavior
-Gf/friend/mom allowed him to have his keys back
-Drives off, destination unclear
-Erratic behavior w/long unexplained stops & not answering calls
-Tells mom he's off to sleep possibly to stop the calls
- 19 yo male still developing brain



I think he's hidden his remains so that it will be very difficult to find him, if at all. JMVHO

 

[Fireweed]

(gf had reportedly expressed to BL that the worst part of her friend, LLomax, missing was the not knowing what happened to her, or something like that)

-Breakup w/gf
-Erratic behavior
-Gf/friend/mom allowed him to have his keys back
-Drives off, destination unclear
-Erratic behavior w/long unexplained stops & not answering calls
-Tells mom he's off to sleep possibly to stop the calls
- 19 yo male still developing brain



I think he's hidden his remains so that it will be very difficult to find him, if at all. JMVHO

I just have to wonder, logistically speaking, how that could have happened. As far as we know, BL did not have any sort of weapon with him.

If BL had schizophrenia, then his GF's statement about her friend missing could have been interpreted by him in any number of ways. We have no body, or anything like that. The accident was not very serious and BL was able to walk at least at that time.

My own theory is that he confused Lagoon Rd with Laguna Niguel, and that his driving in and out three times was the result of his disorientation. He was perhaps trying to figure out why his house was not there. He may have fled the scene still intent on finding his house, and perhaps (who knows?) became convinced that his family was purposefully hiding from him. He may still be out there, operating under an assumption like this.

A distant relative of mine with schizophrenia stabbed her own mother to death because she thought she was the devil. Now, one thing that always haunted me about that is that the daughter was not unreasonable in her decision to kill the devil, right? That is the thing with a schizophrenic's mind: their delusions are unreasonable, but often their reaction to them is not. They actually do follow a certain path of logic. Like, let's say BL thought that what his GF meant was that he, like her friend, should disappear and no one should know about it. And let's also say that he thought that Lake Castaic was where his house was supposed to be. Maybe he thought that his GF and parents were sending him a message that he needed to disappear. This is why I think it is entirely possible that BL is still alive out there somewhere. He may have even seen his missing person's poster, but if he has schizophrenia, then God only knows how his mind processed it.

 

[Quester]

Your theory sounds possible, Fireweed. I hope you're right!

Re my theory, remember the early question LE put to the family about whether any of BL's weights were missing from his apartment - I think LE may have believed suicide. JMO

 

[Fireweed]

Your theory sounds possible, Fireweed. I hope you're right!

Re my theory, remember the early question LE put to the family about whether any of BL's weights were missing from his apartment - I think LE may have believed suicide. JMO

They may have just been exploring different avenues. It seems pretty clear to me that BL's family is worried he may be mentally ill. I was under the impression that they search the lake Castaic area pretty thoroughly, though I will concede that it is sadly common that a body turns up where a place has already been searched.

Anyway, if he is alive, then I just see him in a really bad place.

 

[Quester]

I just have to wonder, logistically speaking, how that could have happened. As far as we know, BL did not have any sort of weapon with him.

If BL had schizophrenia, then his GF's statement about her friend missing could have been interpreted by him in any number of ways. We have no body, or anything like that. The accident was not very serious and BL was able to walk at least at that time.

My own theory is that he confused Lagoon Rd with Laguna Niguel, and that his driving in and out three times was the result of his disorientation. He was perhaps trying to figure out why his house was not there. He may have fled the scene still intent on finding his house, and perhaps (who knows?) became convinced that his family was purposefully hiding from him. He may still be out there, operating under an assumption like this.

A distant relative of mine with schizophrenia stabbed her own mother to death because she thought she was the devil. Now, one thing that always haunted me about that is that the daughter was not unreasonable in her decision to kill the devil, right? That is the thing with a schizophrenic's mind: their delusions are unreasonable, but often their reaction to them is not. They actually do follow a certain path of logic. Like, let's say BL thought that what his GF meant was that he, like her friend, should disappear and no one should know about it. And let's also say that he thought that Lake Castaic was where his house was supposed to be. Maybe he thought that his GF and parents were sending him a message that he needed to disappear. This is why I think it is entirely possible that BL is still alive out there somewhere. He may have even seen his missing person's poster, but if he has schizophrenia, then God only knows how his mind processed it.

They may have just been exploring different avenues. It seems pretty clear to me that BL's family is worried he may be mentally ill. I was under the impression that they search the lake Castaic area pretty thoroughly, though I will concede that it is sadly common that a body turns up where a place has already been searched.

Anyway, if he is alive, then I just see him in a really bad place.

BBM - LLomax went missing a year prior to BL going missing.

BBM2 - JMPO, early on in this case the family chose to take the position that the mental illness / medical alert idea would be a convenient and urgent alert/excuse to get the word out that BL was missing. I'm not sure there was anything released that firmly indicated or even suggested mental illness. JMO

However on the nights of the two breakups, I can only believe there were more clues/explanations/indications to BL's impending disappearance that were never released publicly. JMVHO

I wish the L family well, peace and closure - and I wish the same for all of us and on FB who have been closely following this case and who came to care for and about Bryce!

 

[Fireweed]

What I meant about the LLomax incident is that if a person is suffering from schizophrenia, then that person may take things other people say and interpret it in a way that makes no sense. When the other disappearance happened is totally irrelevant here. My point is that if BL had schizophrenia, and the people around him were talking about someone who disappeared, his schizophrenic mind may have interpreted that in a very strange way, such as being convinced that people were giving him the message to leave.

Again, I don't know what was going on with Bryce, but his actions coupled with things that are correlated with schizophrenia (age, left-handed, born in spring) to me at least is enough for those searching for him to at least consider physically going to areas where people with mental illness congregate.

 

[sreshowtime]

Do you think he just got a few miles away? Something like that?

something like that , yes
imvho

 

[Quester]

What I meant about the LLomax incident is that if a person is suffering from schizophrenia, then that person may take things other people say and interpret it in a way that makes no sense. When the other disappearance happened is totally irrelevant here. My point is that if BL had schizophrenia, and the people around him were talking about someone who disappeared, his schizophrenic mind may have interpreted that in a very strange way, such as being convinced that people were giving him the message to leave.

Again, I don't know what was going on with Bryce, but his actions coupled with things that are correlated with schizophrenia (age, left-handed, born in spring) to me at least is enough for those searching for him to at least consider physically going to areas where people with mental illness congregate.

:wave: Yes, I understood that to be what you had meant.

IMO, more than likely the discussions/opinions/observations about LLomax came about nearly a year prior to BL having gone missing. If schizophrenia or any other mental illness had been present and/or budding/emerging/?, I would think there would have been clues from that point on or at least in the months prior to BL having gone missing. As it was, the only reported indication of off behavior came about in the week prior to BL having gone missing and, reportedly and presumably, as a result of the video watching/playing marathon, ADD drug taking and breakups with gf.

I agree with you, I would like to see searches done/resume ... and, until BL is found! On that note, I just revisited a BL missing for one-year anniversary article which stated, BBM & UBM:

On the one-month anniversary of Bryce’s disappearance, his parents attended a vigil for their son. A crowd of about 50 people arrived at the lower end of Castaic Lake to pray for Bryce’s safe return.

“We have not done any searching there since the vigil,” Karen said. “And, we haven’t been up there (to the Santa Clarita Valley) in so long. It’s hard.”

8/29/14: http://www.signalscv.com/section/36/article/126934/
​

 

[Fireweed]

:wave: Yes, I understood that to be what you had meant.

IMO, more than likely the discussions/opinions/observations about LLomax came about nearly a year prior to BL having gone missing. If schizophrenia or any other mental illness had been present and/or budding/emerging/?, I would think there would have been clues from that point on or at least in the months prior to BL having gone missing. As it was, the only reported indication of off behavior came about in the week prior to BL having gone missing and, reportedly and presumably, as a result of the video watching/playing marathon, ADD drug taking and breakups with gf.

I agree with you, I would like to see searches done/resume ... and, until BL is found! On that note, I just revisited a BL missing for one-year anniversary article which stated, BBM & UBM:

On the one-month anniversary of Bryce’s disappearance, his parents attended a vigil for their son. A crowd of about 50 people arrived at the lower end of Castaic Lake to pray for Bryce’s safe return.

“We have not done any searching there since the vigil,” Karen said. “And, we haven’t been up there (to the Santa Clarita Valley) in so long. It’s hard.”

8/29/14: http://www.signalscv.com/section/36/article/126934/
​

Those places really should be searched again then. If I still lived in CA, I would help.

I think there was some speculation the Bryce had been having a "hard time" before the week of his disappearance. I cannot recall exactly where I read it, but it seemed to me like the family had moved to CA in part to give Bryce a "fresh start" and that he had issues with marijuana. Now, I think that it is normal for a teenage guy to smoke some weed, but often people with burgeoning mental illness will smoke way more than normal. I dunno, it did seem to me that Bryce had not be in a great place for at least a year before going missing.

Again, my friend with schizophrenia had a similar pattern. For about year before she was clearly very sick, she just seemed to be having a hard time keeping her stuff together. Were it not for her subsequent clear schizophrenia (like if she had recovered and gotten on with life), then it would have been one of those things of a person just having a bad year, or having a hard time adjusting, or whatever.

I could see something like that happening to Bryce. His friends and family might have seen a guy who was having a hard time adjusting to college, or who seemed "unfocused", etc.

 

[Quester]

Fireweed: I appreciate reading your viewpoint and hope, for everyone's sake, that you are correct as it gives the possibility of a live BL. However, I would need more info from the family/gf/friends detailing off behavior prior to the week of BL's disappearance in order to believe mental illness was a factor in this case. JMO

I would also like to read/hear a more detailed and thorough account of the events leading to and the off behaviors BL reportedly exhibited in the three days prior to his disappearance - details which have been entirely glossed over to date and which must hold significant clues. JMO

My belief, from the reports to date, is that BL's world was rocked/altered significantly and unwantedly; he left with an unclear destination; grew ?depressed? / ?angry?; couldn't cope; and, chose a permanent solution to his temporary problem. One year on, this is the only scenario that makes any sense to me with the details released to date. JMHO

 

[Quester]

If BL was affected by the LLomax case, perhaps he chose a similar end? I hope all trees within a reasonable distance from the crash site have been checked to eliminate that as a possibility. JMVHO

 

[Whiteorchids]

Longtime follower of the BL case since day one. Sadly, I still believe he was missed in the lake and was snagged on something and never surfaced. He was high on Vyvanse a drug like Adderall and acting bizarre as stated by his GF at the time. Her and roommate took his keys and did not give them back until Bryce's Mom told them to.

It was hot in the triple digits here in LA that week. I think he swam in the lake to cool off and wash his injuries and passed out from either a head injury or just fell asleep in the water from being up for days without sleep and drowned.

This case is so similar to BL he had red hair too. The water and surrounding area extensively searched for months even sonar in the river was used. His body was found in the river 5 months later by a hiker.

http://koin.com/2014/07/18/missing-man-kyle-peterson-found-floating-in-sandy-river/

 

[Hatfield]

Longtime follower of the BL case since day one. Sadly, I still believe he was missed in the lake and was snagged on something and never surfaced. He was high on Vyvanse a drug like Adderall and acting bizarre as stated by his GF at the time. Her and roommate took his keys and did not give them back until Bryce's Mom told them to.

It was hot in the triple digits here in LA that week. I think he swam in the lake to cool off and wash his injuries and passed out from either a head injury or just fell asleep in the water from being up for days without sleep and drowned.

This case is so similar to BL he had red hair too. The water and surrounding area extensively searched for months even sonar in the river was used. His body was found in the river 5 months later by a hiker.

http://koin.com/2014/07/18/missing-man-kyle-peterson-found-floating-in-sandy-river/

I agree. I think he entered the water because he was hurting from his injuries and he thought the water would help the pain. I think he took 1 step too far and it quickly got over his head and he had trouble getting back to shore.
When fully clothed it is very hard to swim and if he had like an arm or leg injury, he may not have been able to swim at all.

My understanding of the slope around some of the shore there is that it drops off very rapidly in some spots. The 1st dog search indicated he may have went directly down from the vehicle to the waters edge. If I could control a water search, i would research right there. A direct line down to the water from the vehicle. This is the spot the 1st dog search indicated.

Yes, I know a later dog search was brought in and they supposedly had better trained dogs but it does not mean that the 1st dog search did not scent him correctly too.
Also, I believe that 2nd dog search that had hits along the dam may have just picked up his scent from when he drove over the dam in his vehicle. There may have been residual scents still from him driving back and forth which it was said he did.

Ive just heard of way too many stories of finding bodies still on bottom and they never did surface for 1 reason or another. And heard of way too many stories of initial searches not finding a person.
We know they tried searching the lake but it should be searched again IMO. And that spot below the vehicle is where I would try first.

 

[Hatfield]

Somehow double posted. So deleting this one.

 

[Quester]

One year on, why hire another PI?

Why not recruit one of the independent professional teams/groups to do another search of the lake and the area surrounding the crashed vehicle?

Why have we heard nothing, zip, zilch, nada from the Klaas org and the other search group that led formal searches early on? One or both of them have got to have pretty strong ideas, given their vast experience, as to what happened to this young man?

Who's dropping the ball on this case?

 

[Hatfield]

One year on, why hire another PI?

Why not recruit one of the independent professional teams/groups to do another search of the lake and the area surrounding the crashed vehicle?

Why have we heard nothing, zip, zilch, nada from the Klaas org and the other search group that led formal searches early on? One or both of them have got to have pretty strong ideas, given their vast experience, as to what happened to this young man?

Who's dropping the ball on this case?

I have similar questions and I am really afraid that there has just been way too much tunnel vision from the very start of this case.

We all can understand wanting him to be alive and wanting the best outcome, but when searching for a missing person you cannot have tunnel vision and just focus on the scenarios that would mean he comes out ok. There were things in this case that also pointed to the unfortanate possibility that he may not be with us anymore.

-Acting very strange before he left. Most likely due to that drug mentioned. Enough to have his friends take his keys away. So there were indications he may not have been making the best decisions.

-Last known spot he is assumed to be was crashing his vehicle in the lake area.

-We dont know how bad his injuries were. Severe injuries that dont bleed could have happened to where he was hurting in severe pain. I.e., leg, arm, head, etc.

-The nice cool water is right there and 1st dog search seemed to point him going right to waters edge.

When I look at the few things we do know and try to put myself in his shoes. I am heading down to the waters edge to get relief from my car wreck i just had. If my mind was not all with it, I may mistakenly step in thinking it was gradual slope and perhaps it got way too deep and I am not be able to get out. A severe leg injury or arm injury may have prevented me from being able to swim at all.

From day1, that lake is where I am afraid he is and the longer we dont hear of any sign of him the more i believe that is unfortunately where he is.

 

[Hatfield]

I honestly wish I lived near that lake. I have a small john boat and about 2 years ago I actually bought an underwater fishing camera at a garage sale. I only paid like 75 dollars or so for it but it seems pretty nice. It has a relatively short cord though (around 50 feet max) and black + white screen, but I bet it works great. Brand new, it seems to be about a 700 dollar set or more.

I would love to take it out to that lake + help search but I am nowhere near CA.

I also have a good sonar device, which also was not too expensive. The point being is that at least some amateur searching could be done with a simple john boat and a good sonar graph device. A good sonar device or a good fishing camera can be bought for under 1000 dollars, and a good used john boat + trailer is about the same.

 

[Quester]

I appreciate and respect taking the prayer route ... but to the exclusion of all ground/lake searches effective one month post missing date and when that is that last know place BL was know to have been is, as you put it, "tunnel vision" and short sighted!

This case just is increasingly angry-making due to inactivity!

Is extreme denial in play?