Charla Maria Ghost, 19, Oakland, CA, Dec 26 1990

[victoriarobinson642]

Vital stats

NamUs #MP73761

Missing Age 19 Years
Current Age 49 Years
First Name Charla
Middle Name Maria
Last Name Ghost
Nickname/Alias Charla Maria Ceniceros

SexFemale
Height 5' 2" - 5' 3" (62 - 63 Inches)
Weight 120 - 125 lbs
Race / Ethnicity American Indian / Alaska Native
Tribe Enrollment / AffiliationYes

• - Enrolled with Rosebud Sioux Tribe of the Rosebud Indian Reservation

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Circumstances of Disappearance
Charla Ghost is a missing adult last seen on December 26, 1990. Charla has not been seen or heard of since that day when she left her home to go to the corner store to pick up medicine for her 8-month-old daughter. Charla was last seen wearing a black/white jacket, unknown colored silk shirt, black jeans, and white/black Puma sneakers.

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Physical Description
Hair Color Brown
Eye Color Brown

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Clothing and Accessories
Clothing
black/white jacket, unknown colored silk shirt, black jeans

Footwear
white/black Puma sneakers

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Investigating Agencies
CASE OWNER
Oakland Police Department
(510) 238-3641

Agency Case Number 20-045206
Mark Douglas, Police Officer
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[Murkywaters]

Charla Maria Ghost

 

[victoriarobinson642]

Searching her name on Google brings up this Ancestry record of what appears to be her marriage to D H, who it says is deceased.

 

[Murkywaters]

Charla Maria Ghost – The Charley Project

• Missing Since 12/26/1990
• Missing From Oakland, California
• Classification Missing
• Sex Female
• Race Native American
• Date of Birth 02/11/1971 (49)
• Age 19 years old
• Height and Weight 5'2 - 5'3, 120 pounds
• Clothing/Jewelry Description A black and white polka-dot faux leather jacket, a silk shirt, black jeans and black and white Puma shoes.
• Distinguishing Characteristics Native American female. Brown hair, brown eyes. Ghost may use the last name Ceniceros. She is a member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe.

Details of Disappearance
Ghost was last seen in Oakland, California on December 26, 1990. She went to the corner store to pick up medicine for her infant daughter, never returned home and has never been heard from again. Few details are available in her case.

 

[imstilla.grandma]

Snip:
...
She would be 49 today, but hasn’t been seen since the day after Christmas 1990, when, as a 19-year-old in a black-and-white polka dot jacket, black jeans and Puma sneakers, she vanished from the streets of Oakland. And that's really all we know.

What makes Charla’s story so important is not that it's unique; it's that it's so common.

Charla is a member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, one of the federally recognized indigenous tribes in South Dakota and a branch of the Lakota people.

A recent U.S. Department of Justice report revealed that American Indigenous women face murder rates that are more than 10 times the national average. One in three Native women is sexually assaulted during their life, and 67% of these assaults are perpetrated by non-Natives.

In a report earlier this year, the Sovereign Bodies Institute found that crimes against Indigenous women often fall into jurisdictional gaps in the system, leaving victims and their families without recourse. Problems include the misclassification of race (scrawling “white” or some other assumption based on appearance in the “race” column), and the labeling of many deaths as accidental, despite the evidence to contrary, which the study calls a "a chronic and pervasive failure to investigate.”

The FBI doesn’t even have comprehensive data on how many Indigenous women are murdered or missing.

In response to this epidemic of violence, the Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women (#MMIW) movement has drawn attention across North America in recent years.

Regional grassroots efforts, the elevation of the issue on social media and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women's Memorial March (now in its fifth year) have compelled many U.S. states to take steps toward passing legislation confronting the issue.

Charla may never be found, but there’s finally the chance that simply being an Indigenous woman in America will not mean your life is severely more endangered than anyone else.
...
These Bay Area residents vanished and have never been found

 

[victoriarobinson642]

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)
This is the only possible unidentified person I could come up with for Charla and it doesn't seem like there's a ton of information on this doe.

 

[Beccalicious]

Bumping

 

[Caring1]

Bump for Charla

 

[ChatteringBirds]

How sad that this young woman's case hasn't had more attention. Her child would be an adult now. I wonder if her family suspects they know who is responsible for her disappearance or if it was a crime of opportunity. IMO.

 

[Caring1]

She is mentioned in her stepfather’s obituary in December 2001. Not finding much else about her or her MP case.