WA WA - Shantina Smiley, 29, & Azriel Carver, 8 (fnd deceased), Olympia, Mar 2010 - #1

[RubyRed]

I

Investigators are currently diving into her bank account and cell phone records.

http://www.michellesigona.com/2010/03/washington-mother-and-son-missing/

 

[raeann]

Once Shantina left the house she called her grandparents from (DW), she was never seen or heard from again? DW was just on TV and he's NOT an elderly person. He looks like a young guy. I am going to look into him a little, no reason not to.

LOL....I thought immediately that the "elderly" must be a stretch. For one thing, not too many people who are truly "elderly" would be eating pizza at 10 o'clock at night!

None of the people who encountered her that night seem to have felt that she had been drinking. The reason I take this as a serious impression is that ALL of these places are ones that would frequently encounter customers who had been drinking and would definitely recognize the signs. When the video shows the van pulling up to look at the pay phone that was out of order, the driving and stopping and restarting seem to be smooth and in control, not at all like someone who was impaired.

jmoo

 

[Calliope]

If she were drunk she would have crashed that car into something earlier - not driven down a dirt path that was hard to find at night and then back up her van into the water only to jump out.

Doesn't make sense.

From the officer's description of that road, I don't see how she could have navigated it drunk and in the dark.

 

[marcyjoy]

I think it's entirely possible she could have gotten lost. And knowing the area, if you were at all impaired (anxious, stressed, scared, drunk, etc.) one wrong turn could completely turn you around. Following are the mapquest directions form the approximate location where she made the phone call from the "pizza couple's" house.

1. Start out going WEST on 46TH AVE NE toward BOSTON HARBOR RD NE. 0.2 mi
2. Turn LEFT onto BOSTON HARBOR RD NE. 1.9 mi Map | Avoid
3. BOSTON HARBOR RD NE becomes E BAY DR NE. 1.2 mi Map | Avoid
4. E BAY DR NE becomes EASTBAY DR NE. 0.7 mi Map | Avoid
5. EASTBAY DR NE becomes PLUM ST SE. 0.5 mi Map | Avoid
6. Turn SLIGHT RIGHT onto E BAY DR. 0.5 mi Map | Avoid
7. Take the I-5 S ramp toward TUMWATER/PORTLAND. 0.4 mi Map | Avoid

There would have been no directional signage to I-5 until she got on to Plum Street (near DT Olympia). Although, really, you're just staying on Boston Harbor until you get to Plum Street...so maybe she thought she'd gone too far and turned? Or maybe made a right instead of left and got confused and tried to turn around?

 

[Ginky]

From this link: http://www.q13fox.com/news/kcpq-0314...,6651388.story

it says:

"Asked whether it's possible that they got lost in the nearby woods, Mealy said that there are too many houses with porch lights on for them to not have been able to get help."

 

[Ginky]

I think it's entirely possible she could have gotten lost. And knowing the area, if you were at all impaired (anxious, stressed, scared, drunk, etc.) one wrong turn could completely turn you around. Following are the mapquest directions form the approximate location where she made the phone call from the "pizza couple's" house.

1. Start out going WEST on 46TH AVE NE toward BOSTON HARBOR RD NE. 0.2 mi
2. Turn LEFT onto BOSTON HARBOR RD NE. 1.9 mi Map | Avoid
3. BOSTON HARBOR RD NE becomes E BAY DR NE. 1.2 mi Map | Avoid
4. E BAY DR NE becomes EASTBAY DR NE. 0.7 mi Map | Avoid
5. EASTBAY DR NE becomes PLUM ST SE. 0.5 mi Map | Avoid
6. Turn SLIGHT RIGHT onto E BAY DR. 0.5 mi Map | Avoid
7. Take the I-5 S ramp toward TUMWATER/PORTLAND. 0.4 mi Map | Avoid

There would have been no directional signage to I-5 until she got on to Plum Street (near DT Olympia). Although, really, you're just staying on Boston Harbor until you get to Plum Street...so maybe she thought she'd gone too far and turned? Or maybe made a right instead of left and got confused and tried to turn around?

Except surveillance footage shows she drove in the opposite direction from the pizza couple's house than the directions they gave her.

 

[eyes4crime]

I think someone had asked earlier about where the home was located that was the last place she was seen, I found this, BBM below:
__________________________________________________________

A search and missing person investigation was initiated after the van was found. The investigation indicates that Shantina and her son left Silverdale at approx 1700 hrs. on Saturday to visit a relative in Castle Rock. She can be traced to a West Olympia store at 19:50 hrs, a Martin Way restaurant at 2108 hrs., a Boston Harbor grocery at 21:50 hrs and finally a private residence in the 1400 block of 46th Ave. N.E. off Boston Harbor Rd. at approx 2200 hrs Saturday evening. Shantina was accompanied by only her son, according to the witnesses and various store videos that we have been able to access.

Shantina did ask for directions back to the freeway at the home on 46th Ave

http://www.yelmonline.com/articles/2010/03/15/first_report/doc4b9e6435c0289282666079.txt

5:00 pm (Saturday) left Silverdale going to Castle Rock
7:50 pm - traced to W. Olympian store
9:08pm - traced to Martin Way restaurant
9:50 - Boston Harbor Grocery
10:00 - private residence to make phone call

Do we know what kind of stores she stopped at?

 

[eyes4crime]

Except surveillance footage shows she drove in the opposite direction from the pizza couple's house than the directions they gave her.

I am direction and map impaired - if someone gave me those directions, I'm sure I would have done the same thing. I find places via land signs like gas station on corner, statue, etc. If someone ever gave me the directions above, I would be absolutely panicked. Especially with a hungry little boy in the car and on my way to see a step father I hadn't seen for a long time. Some people are just terrible with maps and directions - I'm one of them. moo

 

[raeann]

Except surveillance footage shows she drove in the opposite direction from the pizza couple's house than the directions they gave her.

There was no surveillance video from the home, they (LE) are assuming that she made the wrong turn, due to where the van ended up. There were no sightings of her after leaving that house where she got directions.


jmoo

 

[Texas Mist]

Except surveillance footage shows she drove in the opposite direction from the pizza couple's house than the directions they gave her.

Ya know, I got to thinking....my ex was *not* good w/ directions if they were given verbally....he could hear them, repeat them, get back in the truck & then not remember any of what he was just told 30 secs before.

Maybe SS has problems w/ directions too unless they are written down...and doesn't sound like they were since she got lost to begin with.

 

[raeann]

I am direction and map impaired - if someone gave me those directions, I'm sure I would have done the same thing. I find places via land signs like gas station on corner, statue, etc. If someone ever gave me the directions above, I would be absolutely panicked. Especially with a hungry little boy in the car and on my way to see a step father I hadn't seen for a long time. Some people are just terrible with maps and directions - I'm one of them. moo

LOL...and some people are notoriously bad at GIVING directions. I can simplify things and give directions that people follow easily. My husband puts in all kinds of extraneous information and people just look at him with glazed over eyes and you KNOW they are thinking "yeah right, well I can always stop down the street at Quick Trip and get someone who KNOWS what they are talking about"!!!!

jmoo

 

[Calliope]

LOL....I thought immediately that the "elderly" must be a stretch. For one thing, not too many people who are truly "elderly" would be eating pizza at 10 o'clock at night!

None of the people who encountered her that night seem to have felt that she had been drinking. The reason I take this as a serious impression is that ALL of these places are ones that would frequently encounter customers who had been drinking and would definitely recognize the signs. When the video shows the van pulling up to look at the pay phone that was out of order, the driving and stopping and restarting seem to be smooth and in control, not at all like someone who was impaired.

jmoo

Someone who is kind enough to allow strangers into their home to make a call, and observant enough to realize the child is hungry, and considerate enough to give him a slice of pizza isn't going to allow an obviously drunk woman to drive away onto the interstate with a child in her car.

 

[mysticrose]

Here is a map showing roughly where "pizza couple" home was located and where her van ended up. To me it is apparent it would be easy to get lost and take the wrong road. If she was anything like me when someone tells me to turn north, south etc I get very confused lol...I need a right , left direction or a landmark of sorts.

She turned in the wrong direction and followed the road until she found the beach and tried to turn around got the van stuck and according to some articles it was submerged. If it started to sink I am sure she panicked to get out, grabbed her purse in a hurry and her wallet fell out. According to this map it takes 11 mins max to get to where the van ended up, so if she left their place around 10:00 pm she got stuck here between 10:10 -10:30 pm.
I am under the impression that as many stops as she made and her stopping to find a phone that she would have went to someone's home for help to use the phone etc... perhaps someone offered to pull van out and she and her son got in the vehicle with someone with bad intentions. If they where in that area they would have been found by now if they where lost.
LE found the van around 11:00 am the next day so that is roughly 13 hours later right ?
I can not imagine her not asking for help from a nearby home especially with her son in tow ... I think if she would have drown or something that they would have found her son by now....jmo
Anyway here is the link A being pizza house and B being where she ended up:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&sou...49,-122.837791&spn=0.113989,0.362206&t=h&z=12

 

[dnrslucky1]

If I were lost, I would go to a very lit up public place. I would ask to use the phone, if I were told they did not have a public phone, I would then ask for directions to the nearest public phone.
If I found myself driving away from the main road, I would know immediately and turn around.
If it were late and my son were hungry, I would go to a restaurant, sit down order, relax and try to get my bearings! I would tell the waitress I was lost and needed a phone and or directions!

 

[cj327]

I am a local, and I put this together this morning from several news sources:

Investigators believe Smiley left Silverdale with her son around 5 p.m. (source 1)

About 6:45 p.m., she called her fiancé and asked him to bring her cell phone. But at that point, Simmons said, he was already en route to meet her in Castle Rock. Simmons had been at Cub Scout training that ended at [4:30] p.m., according to a Web site he has set up to help find Smiley and her son. (source 1)

Smiley stopped at the Handy Pantry on Division Street in west Olympia and made a purchase there around 7:50 p.m. (source 1)

9:08 p.m. Smiley and her son went to the Martin Way Diner. Mealy said a witness said Smiley purchased a corn dog, but did not take it with her after paying for it. (source 1) An employee there said Smiley bought a corn dog, then left without her purchase and then tripped and fell walking back to her van, but police said the fall was not serious. (source 3) (The specific time was reported in Source 4.)
Comment on TheOlympian.com website: “I work at the Martin way diner..your stepmom and Azriel were in about 9 pm Saturday. They ordered a corn dog and tater tots to go, and payed for them, but while I was cooking their dinner, I watched them get up and leave. I didn't think too much about it, but they never came back. My waitress asked me what should we do with their order, and I told her to just wait..they might come back..My waitress told me that the woman seemed drunk, but the kid told my waitress. "Mommy hit her head".

About 9:54 p.m., a store surveillance camera shows that Smiley stopped her car at the Gull Harbor Mercantile on Boston Harbor Road, but it was closed. (source 1). Surveillance video showed their van pulling into the parking lot of the Gulf Harbor Mercantile store shortly before 10 p.m. Smiley may have wanted to use the pay phone there, but it is out of order. The video does not show her or her son getting out of the vehicle. The van pulled out of the parking lot and headed the direction it came from. (source 3)

Smiley and her son were last seen by residents of a home on 46th Avenue about 10 p.m. Saturday. Her son apparently told one of the residents of the home on 46th Avenue that his mother had hurt her knee. Chief Criminal Deputy James Chamberlain said Monday that the residents of the home on 46th Avenue have told investigators that Smiley seemed out of sorts, but no more than would be normal for someone who was lost on an unfamiliar road. (source 1) "She seemed upset because she was lost," said Williams. Williams said Smiley used the phone to tell a relative they were lost and going to be late. He said the mother and son did not seem to be in trouble. If anything, said Williams, the boy seemed hungry. "We gave him a piece of pizza," said Williams. She was not injured but spoke of an accident, which investigators believe may have been a reference to falling down at the diner. (source 3)

NOTE: Gull Harbor Mercantile is NORTH of the Williams house. That means she got to the Mercantile, turned around and went back SOUTH toward the Williams house, turned left onto 46th and arrived at their house. Then when she left their house the again went NORTH on Boston Harbor Rd and passed the Mercantile a second time. I read in one story that she IS again on camera the second time, when she passed the Mercantile.

10:30 a.m. Sunday - local resident Jim Pribbenow was alerted by a neighbor to the gold 2005 Dodge Caravan on private beachfront property around 10:30 a.m. “The back hatch and the side door was open,” Pribbenow said. “The front end had gone in the mud and you could see where the wheels had spun in trying to back out.” Smiley’s wallet was inside but her purse was missing. (source 2)

Tides at the location where the car was found:
Low tide at 10:38 PM Sat. 1.7 feet
High tide at 6:08 AM Sun. 14 feet (difference of over 12 feet, which is typical for the area)


Source 1: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/03/16/1173785/few-clues-in-search-for-mom-son.html#ixzz0iMRUPRfV

Source 2: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/03/14/1172699/woman-and-8-year-old-son-missing.html#ixzz0iMR50YJy

Source 3: http://www.king5.com/news/Search-to-continue-for-missing-Silverdale-mother-young-son--87648637.html

Source 4: http://www.king5.com/news/Search-to-continue-for-missing-Silverdale-mother-young-son--87648637.html

 

[yosande]

Here is a map showing roughly where "pizza couple" home was located and where her van ended up. To me it is apparent it would be easy to get lost and take the wrong road. If she was anything like me when someone tells me to turn north, south etc I get very confused lol...I need a right , left direction or a landmark of sorts.

She turned in the wrong direction and followed the road until she found the beach and tried to turn around got the van stuck and according to some articles it was submerged. If it started to sink I am sure she panicked to get out, grabbed her purse in a hurry and her wallet fell out. According to this map it takes 11 mins max to get to where the van ended up, so if she left their place around 10:00 pm she got stuck here between 10:10 -10:30 pm.
I am under the impression that as many stops as she made and her stopping to find a phone that she would have went to someone's home for help to use the phone etc... perhaps someone offered to pull van out and she and her son got in the vehicle with someone with bad intentions. If they where in that area they would have been found by now if they where lost.
LE found the van around 11:00 am the next day so that is roughly 13 hours later right ?
I can not imagine her not asking for help from a nearby home especially with her son in tow ... I think if she would have drown or something that they would have found her son by now....jmo
Anyway here is the link A being pizza house and B being where she ended up:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=46th+Ave+NE,+Olympia,+WA+98506&daddr=Zangle+Rd+NE&geocode=FYiozgIdxCmt-CmxuuQld6CRVDER0lLdt-1xnw%3BFexuzwIdQPys-A&hl=en&mra=dme&mrcr=0&mrsp=1&sz=12&sll=47.119205,-122.863541&sspn=0.114008,0.362206&ie=UTF8&ll=47.145365,-122.829895&spn=0.227904,0.724411&t=h&z=11

If she were anything like you, ie, easily lost, then;

Why would she take an off ramp in Olympia, and not a smaller town, where it is easy off, easy on?

Why wouldn't her bff have her wait for him, so they could go together, I mean what was the hurry, she hadn't seen her stepfather in several years, a couple more hours wouldn't have been that big a deal.

If a person is known to get lost easily, they surely would not have forgotten there cellphone, and he would have been as concerned she took her cell, as he was his charger......

moo

ETA; Did she have her purse with her? In the video, to me she had a wallet, not a purse, but my eyes aren't that good, so if someone could clarify that for me that would be great.

If she had her purse with her, she would have likely had her cell with her too, b/c don't most women carry their cells in their purse, and return it there unless they are charging it?

 

[raeann]

One thing that I noticed that may be related to the doors of the van being open is that on the video where they are getting out at the convenience store, it appears that the van has a remote close button on the key control. Azriel just gets out and walks in leaving the door open and it appears to begin closing behind him. If someone else left the van at the beach, they may have inadvertently pushed the button that opens the back and side doors in an attempt to lock it behind them as they left.

jmoo

 

[paris_paris]

The stop for the corn dog... first time I read it... I had this feeling...

She's with her 8 year old. He's hungry. Kids tend to get whiny when they are hungry. In my mind she stopped to get him food. She orders him a corn dog... little guy says in a whiny voice "I don't want a corn dog"... she gets annoyed and takes him away from the restaurant. A little while later she feels bad because she knows he's still hungry, so she stops somewhere else to find him food (but somewhere else is closed). She's still lost, and stops at a house to use the phone, and the homeowner feeds him.

I don't know what happens after that.

 

[eleven]

I am a local, and I put this together this morning from several news sources:

Investigators believe Smiley left Silverdale with her son around 5 p.m. (source 1)

About 6:45 p.m., she called her fiancé and asked him to bring her cell phone. But at that point, Simmons said, he was already en route to meet her in Castle Rock. Simmons had been at Cub Scout training that ended at 6:45 p.m., according to a Web site he has set up to help find Smiley and her son. (source 1)

/quote]


Respectfully snipped....

The training ended early at 4:30, according to the boyfriend.

 

[SuziQ]

cj327, Welcome to WS and thank you for the timeline!