I don't know much about San Francisco except of course, admiring the Golden Gate Bridge and unfortunately what it's known for - suicides. I think they've installed prevention barriers now but don't know if they're 100% effective.
Crissy Field:
(Surely someone would have seen her if she was on the bridge, right?)
The bridge has full CCTV and is heavily travelled so the chance of her jumping and no one knowing about it is really slim.
As it is now, there is next to no information that allows us to be helpful at all, other than the photos of Sydney's lovely self. Here is a short summary of what we don't know:
1. - exactly who reported her missing. We can assume her mother reported her to the NC police originally, and her uncle then filed a report with SFPD. SFPD only state 'family'reported her missing.
2. - who saw her wearing those clothes and when. This could be the last time her uncle saw her, so who actually knows what she was wearing?
3. - what the locaton method is for Crissy field. I did read a comment on a family member FB that it was a phone ping, which would explain why SFPD says 'last believed to be in the area of Crissy field on Sept 30"
4. - who she was living with. There doesn't seem to be an outpouring of friends saying anything publicly about her being missing except the one calling Syd her best friend on Syd's last instagram post, and I haven't found any further trace of her interacting with anyone local to SF online in the last year (that is not to say she has no friends, just that there isn't the kind of activity you normally see).
5. - whether she is in a relationship
6. - who last saw her physically and where. who last spoke to her on the phone or got a text and when.
7. - when she moved out of her dorm and where she has been staying and with who
8. - whether anyone at the university was expecting her and she didn't show (ie was she supposed to meet with a counsellor, register for classes, sign up for an account or anything like that and missed it?) or whether she formally withdrew. It sounds like her family didn't know that, but it isn't really clear. I think this is a big clue - if her things were just gone from her dorm and nobody saw her leave vs her dormmates knew but her family didn't. It is really possible she just hasn't called home in a couple weeks? No matter how close families are, it is not always unusual for someone to just not get in touch for awhile.
9. - whether there is CCTV. She was only reported missing 3 days ago so my guess is LE are working on this part now.
10. -Unfortunately syd doesn't have a regular or frequent pattern of online activity that we can see, so we don't know if she's dropped off since a certain date or not. What is clear is that she and a huge number of her friends stopped posting publicly to FB and other SM at the end of 2019 so she may have another profile or has just stopped using SM. This can definitely be a sign of depression but can also just be that she is too busy with RL friends.
So as it is now, all we know is a 19 year old young woman living in SF as an adult of her own free will may have chosen not to enroll for fall semester at Berkeley, had very recently begun living with 'a friend' in the SF area, hasn't called mom or uncle in over a week and last had her phone on in Crissy Field.
Is it possible Syd just lost her phone? Does she have a laptop or other means of accessing the internet to contact people? I can imagine a lot of bad things that could have happened, but I can also imagine Syd just being 19 and having other things on her mind other than calling mom, especially if she didn't tell them about college and is avoiding that discussion. She could be on a road trip with friends or something innocuous as well - the conditions in SF are really horrible, a friend of mine recently left there because it is so bad - the best e can hope for is she fell in love and is off escaping the anxiety that everyone elses expectations cause. I think it may be helpful for her parents to make a public statement that is focused on Syd and expresses how much they want her to be safe and that everything is OK and they support her vs how scared or terrified they are or that they want her to come "home" (Syd doesn't seem to want to be 'home' in NC). Just a thought.
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