Deep Dive
Shownotes Transcript
You hear about things and you never expect to see them in person or have to go through it. There was a girl when I was younger that went missing. She got into a van and then she disappeared. But it's not like that. He disappeared. There's nothing. There's no footprint. There's no piece of the shirt. There was nothing and there is nothing. I can't even say how dumbfounded I am.
that this is something that I'm experiencing and my family is experiencing, but it's like unsolved mysteries, but there's nothing. You don't even know if that person actually saw him and gave him a flashlight. What if it was somebody else? So I can't wrap my head around it when there's absolutely nothing at all.
On June 28, 2024, Daryl Johnson left his home in Phoenix, Arizona, and traveled to Cochise Lake State Park in New Mexico to join a group of over 30 people camping there for a birthday celebration.
The group arrived and settled into their campsite. According to those camping with him, Darrell was last seen around 11:00 p.m. that night. However, a fellow camper who was not part of the group reported seeing Darrell after midnight. The camper recalled that Darrell asked to borrow a flashlight and was then seen walking back toward his campsite with it in hand. This was the last known sighting of Darrell Johnson. What happened to him after that moment remains a mystery.
In the months that followed, Daryl's family launched an intensive search, determined to find any clue that could point to what happened to him. Despite their relentless efforts, not a single trace of Daryl has ever been uncovered. I'm Marisa, and from Wondery, this is episode 472 of The Vanished, part one of Daryl Johnson's story, Where the Trail Ends.
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That's code FRESHMANNY20 for 20% off at oliveandjune.com slash FRESHMANNY20. 67-year-old Daryl Johnson vanished from Conchas Lake State Park, a popular recreational destination in northeastern New Mexico. The park, which spans over 1,000 acres, is centered around Conchas Lake, a reservoir created by the Conchas Dam on the Canadian River.
Located roughly 100 miles east of Albuquerque, the park draws visitors for its scenic views, desert landscapes, and a wide array of outdoor activities.
Despite its appeal, Conchas Lake State Park is somewhat isolated, with the nearest town situated roughly 30 miles away. It's the kind of place where walking into town for help isn't an option, which made Daryl's disappearance all the more perplexing. When he went missing in late June, many assumed that he couldn't have gone too far. Surely he must still be in the park. Perhaps he had gotten lost during a late-night walk to the restroom.
In the days that followed, extensive searches were conducted, but they didn't find any traces of Daryl. Daryl wasn't familiar with Conscious Lake State Park. He had traveled to New Mexico previously, but never to that location before. Residing more than 500 miles away in Phoenix, Arizona, his family faced the added challenge of traveling nearly nine hours to help search for him, making their already painful ordeal even more difficult.
The search for Daryl began on June 29, 2024, when a woman called law enforcement to report that the group she was camping with had grown concerned after realizing her mother's friend was missing. Here are some clips from that call. Daryl Johnson. Daryl Johnson. Yeah, he's my mom's best friend, and he's in town right now visiting from Phoenix, Arizona for my birthday, and we're here at Gwyneth's Light. I came with my mom. Do you have him? No. How could he take off walking?
Oh, I don't know. I haven't seen him this morning, so I don't know. So when was the last time you saw Daryl? I saw him last night, and then this morning, my mom said she didn't know where he was, and that's it. And then somebody just called me and said that they see him on 104. Right now? At 7 this morning. He went to walk up to the bathroom. I didn't know where he is, but he's still not back, so I'm worried. Who was the last person to talk to him? Okay.
Okay, so who was the last person who talked to him last night before bed then? You said goodnight to him? Yeah. And what time was that? Midnight? Okay, so my mom said goodnight to him at midnight, and that was the last time we had seen him. But like I said, when we all woke up, we were like, hey, where's Bubba? What would be the reason for him to take off like that? That's what I'm saying. We don't know. I don't know if he went to look for a bathroom. I'm not sure. There's 34 people here with us for my birthday, and like I said, I really, like, I don't know why he would have left.
I don't know if he... No? No, he's an older man. No, he's an old man. Like, there's no way he's going to be fighting with him. He's very soft-spoken. He's very... Who was he with? He was in his own tent. But how did he get to the campsite? With my mom. They came from Phoenix, Arizona. Let's see what I can do, because I'm far from you guys.
Before we dive deeper into the details of Daryl's disappearance, it's important to take a step back and learn more about Daryl. Those who knew and loved him often referred to him as Bubba. Here's Daryl's daughter-in-law, Michael Lynn, with more about who Daryl was to the people who cared about him the most.
He was very caring. He didn't have much, but he always helped everybody that needed it, no matter what. He was a mechanic and he worked on vehicles. So if someone had a problem with their car, who did they go to? They go to Bubba. He was always available when you needed him for something. He was a very kind-hearted person. He was funny. He has one other daughter, which is my husband's sister.
It's Daryl Jr. and Jaina. He has a junkyard that has cars and stuff on it. He lived alone in a trailer on his junkyard, and he would just work on things during the day. He didn't have a regular job.
So he would just do side things, I guess you could say. And he collected things. If people that he knew very close, he'd fix their cars, things like that. Back in the day, he collected cars too. He was a low rider enthusiast. He has an Impala, like a 1964. He was into that low riding years back when he was younger and just was part of that scene.
He pretty much kept to himself besides if me and his son went over there to bring him something or see how he was doing. We'd visit with him for a little bit and didn't really go many places. Even though he kept to himself, he still was very outgoing, if that made sense. He
He never caused problems for anybody. He never wanted problems with anybody. Kept his composure, remained very professional, was always just genuine overall. I want to say, too, he was very independent. We also spoke to Daryl's son, Daryl Jr., who told us more about his father from a son's perspective.
Everybody calls me little Bubba and they call him big Bubba. My dad was a very good, peaceful person. Never caused no problem with anybody. He loved to help people a lot. He was a big hearted person. He always lent a hand to everybody that he knew. He always was exuberant when he was around people.
Michaelin mentioned that Daryl had two children. Earlier in life, he had been married to their mother. While their relationship ultimately didn't work out, Daryl and his ex-wife remained close friends, maintaining a strong, amicable bond.
It did end years ago. However, they've maintained a friendship through the years. He would go over there. If she cooked certain things that he'd like, she would say, oh, to my husband, tell your dad I'm cooking this. And he'd show up and he'd get a plate and eat. It was a positive, good relationship that they still had. And he also had a good relationship with her husband that she has now.
Daryl lived what appeared to be a simple, content life at his junkyard property in Phoenix. He didn't have much, but he didn't need much either. Daryl was at peace with his world.
In late June 2024, he left town to go camping with a group of more than 30 people. This is where things start to get a bit complicated. Daryl's connection to the group was a woman he had known for many years, but the exact nature of their relationship remains unclear. Michael Lynn explained that to Daryl's family and friends, it seemed as though she was his long-term girlfriend. However, after Daryl disappeared, the woman disputed this, adding another layer of mystery to his disappearance.
He wasn't a very emotional person. So he wasn't very expressive of his affection towards people. And I've known him for 13 years. And that's how he's always been from what everybody thought that knew his relationship with her. Some of his friends that knew of her, his son, obviously me, because I've met her before, thought that they were boyfriend and girlfriend.
And why people thought that you would be under the assumption, just as anybody else, that they were boyfriend and girlfriend. Because he would stay over there when it got cold. And he didn't have air conditioning in his trailer or heat. So when it got cold or really hot, he would stay at her house. When she needed things fixed around the house, he would fix them. He had clothes there. So he wasn't fully living there. And just how he behaved, really.
when he was with her and how their relationship was, you would think that their relationship was more than just friends because she would kind of take care of him in a sense, inviting him on family trips, feed him. And he was staying over there. I wouldn't just stay at my guy friend's house
All the time, if there was nothing going on, that's just me. But I don't think anybody would stay somewhere so frequently if there wasn't something else going on.
Well, it turns out that supposedly she said that they were not boyfriend and girlfriend. They never had any type of romantic relationship ever. And she's known him for 40 years. When asked if that was true to my father-in-law's ex-wife, she said that she never knew who she was.
And a lot of his friends didn't know who she was. So they had a close relationship. I guess you'd call her the companion now because she denies that she was the girlfriend. Daryl Jr. believed his father was in a relationship with this woman and often felt she was somewhat controlling, particularly when it came to how she demanded Daryl's time and attention. So what I noticed when I moved back here a couple years ago with my wife from Connecticut,
He did not live there. To me, like, I know he had a curfew that she would get mad about going back to her house. I think how they had my dad was he was over there working on her house a lot that I noticed, too. To be honest, I really didn't like her. There was one time that my dad had to go over there. We went there, and she pretty much came home from work, I think, and she was mad, and she just ran right aside and left.
pretty much locked my dad outside of her house. I told him, you don't need to be here if you're going to be acting like this. One day, my dad's cell phone wasn't working and me and my wife were trying to fix his phone and she was constantly blowing up his phone saying like, where are things, things that you say when you're going out with each other? Stuff like, oh, if you don't want to talk to me anymore, if you talk to somebody else, just let me know and I'll let you be. So,
So I called and I told her, I was like, you know what? I'm trying to fix my dad's phone right now. And you're scathing out for no reason. But I'll make sure I tell my dad what you said to him. And she kind of played off like, oh, I didn't mean it like that. Well, the way you sound like it, you didn't mean it like that. I cannot control how my dad felt about this woman. She did take care of my dad. He was happy. Yes, I can say that. So after those couple of times, I just didn't like her. At the same time, I couldn't really tell my dad what to do because it's his life.
Daryl Jr. believes this woman was part of his father's life for a long time. However, Daryl wasn't the type to openly discuss his personal life with others. He seemed to mostly keep those details to himself, a reflection of his private nature.
I want to say since I was little, since I was a baby for a very long time, I found some stuff in his belongings. I found a picture from, I want to say the eighties of them two together. So they knew each other for a while and everybody went out, had a tight circle, real close friends. And they even said, yeah, he's been around the longest around your dad.
The uncertainty surrounding the true nature of Daryl's relationship with this woman only deepened the confusion following his sudden and mysterious disappearance. While it was clear Daryl didn't want to discuss the details of his personal life with his children, we wondered about his friends. In a search for answers, Daryl Jr. and Michael Lynn turned to those close to Daryl, hoping they could shed some light on the situation and provide the clarity they desperately needed.
What his friends have said that we've had communication with, oh, that was his old woman. They would say, oh, yeah, she always needed something. If he didn't answer phone, she would get mad. She'd blow up the phone. She send text messages all the time, always keeping tabs on him, too. So that's kind of like more than a friend.
that I would think as well. But again, he never said, oh, this is my girlfriend. And she never said, this isn't my boyfriend. When I've met her a couple of times or indicated that she just would always be like, oh, your father means a lot to me. I try to take care of him. Never to the point, but the way things were said and the way their living arrangements were, that's where the assumption came. And no one ever denied it either.
Since this relationship is disputed, we're going to refer to this woman as Daryl's companion. The purpose of the camping trip to New Mexico was to celebrate the birthday of one of the companion's daughters. Michaelin told us that this companion had ties to New Mexico, and it wasn't abnormal for Daryl to travel to the state with her.
So he's been to New Mexico before. Every year they do this hot air balloon festival. It's very popular. And last year he went to it. New Mexico is where she is originally from. She has a daughter there. Her mother lives there. So he's been there before to New Mexico.
Daryl left Phoenix on June 28, 2024. In the past, whenever he planned to leave town, he would always call his son to arrange for him to care for his dog while he was away. However, this time, Daryl never called before leaving, which was the first unusual sign leading up to his disappearance. This small, seemingly insignificant detail would become one of the many red flags in the days to come.
Normally, when he goes out of town, because he has a dog at the yard, he will tell his son, you need to go and feed the dog. And that's how he knows that he's out of town. But this time, he didn't tell my husband that he was going out of town.
My husband saw him on the 27th of June, which was a Thursday. They did a dump run and then he got him something to eat after. I think it was a fish sandwich. He said they ate together. My husband left and came home. He stayed there. The next day is when he left for New Mexico. He never called him.
Nobody knew that he was going out of town and it would be either my husband that would go and feed her. Her name is Muffin or I would go and feed her or we'd go together. But he gave no indication to go and feed the dog, which is a red flag in itself.
In the middle of the summer, the dog needs water. It's going to die. And he loved that dog. That was his best friend, his companion. He wouldn't neglect her and he wouldn't not tell somebody. And another thing is that the yard, the junkyard is gated and it has big chains to lock it. And his son is the only one that has a key to get in. He's the only one that would be able to go over there and feed the dog or check on it. He didn't know, obviously, until he found out he was missing. So the dog hadn't been taken care of.
No one knew. How could we know? It's things like that, the little things that you notice that were different this time around. That was the start of red flags or things being different about this trip. To this day, no one can quite explain why Daryl left home without making arrangements for Daryl Jr. to care for Muffin. Daryl Jr. wasn't even aware that his father had left to go on a camping trip, so he was stunned when they received a phone call on Sunday morning informing him that Daryl was missing.
My husband got a call Sunday morning, and I want to say it was about 1130, 1140, something like that in the morning. It was the police officer and told him that his dad was missing.
When he went missing, the family called the police and made a report. And the officer told the companion to call his son and tell him he was missing. She didn't. It ended up being the officer that called. And that's how everything started. But he did go and check on the yard. He did check on the dog. He got her food, fed her, gave her water.
And obviously he wasn't there. There was nothing in there that would indicate that he left in a hurry, that he was forced, that anything happened to him there. After learning that Daryl had disappeared, Michael Lynn began carefully reconstructing a timeline of his trip to the state park, trying to make sense of the events leading up to Daryl going missing. She explained what she's been able to piece together so far.
Friday the 28th is when they left very early in the morning because they arrived to the campsite around 11 a.m. on Friday. So I guess from what one of the daughters and the mother have said to me and Daryl is that they invited him on the camping birthday trip. They said he wanted to go and he drove up there with one of the daughters that lives in Arizona from Phoenix.
And they drove up together in their car. They get there to the campsite at 11 a.m. That's why if you see the picture of him with the red shirt and the lay on, that's him at the campsite at the time. Obviously, during the day, it's taken on Friday of him. And he was there at the campsite participating in this party. Going into the day and night, what we were told is that around 11 p.m.,
The companion asked him if he was okay. She said she was going to sleep. She zipped up his tent at 11 p.m., went to sleep supposedly. At 1230 a.m., he leaves the tent probably a couple minutes before because at 1230 a.m., a neighboring tent had
had said that he requested a flashlight from them. Nobody in this family of people for this birthday party camping trip saw him exit his tent, supposedly. There was 33 people plus him, so 34.
Now he walked over to the neighboring campsite. He asked them for a flashlight and that's all they said that he said was he wanted a flashlight. So once he retrieved the flashlight, he walked in the opposite direction of his tent. Per what the tent that gave him the flashlight said, they saw him go in the opposite direction of his tent. Then they saw him turn around and walk back towards his tent. And then that was it. He vanished and nobody knows what happened.
The companion said that around 7 a.m. on the morning, she got up and noticed Daryl wasn't in his tent. He does take walks, but he doesn't go in unfamiliar places. Like he wouldn't just walk off on his own agenda, especially in an unknown area. She said that around 7 a.m. that she thought maybe he went to the bathroom or that he was taking a walk. She wasn't worried at first.
A couple hours passed, so probably around like 10 or something or 10.30, I think that that's when they called the police because the police arrived there at 11.40 a.m. They said that they looked around the people in the family and then the officer and the park ranger and a couple other people that were a part of the park itself, they did start looking for him immediately when he was reported missing.
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At the beginning of this episode, you heard the call that was made to report Daryl missing. According to the records we obtained from the New Mexico State Police, the woman who made the call stated that she and her group had traveled to the area the day before, arriving around 11 a.m. Daryl had been with her family, and she last saw him around 11 p.m. She mentioned that her mother noticed Daryl was missing from his tent the following morning around 7. The officer then spoke with her mother,
who confirmed that she had last seen Daryl around 11 p.m., when she checked on him in his tent. At that time, she asked if he was going to be okay sleeping there, and Daryl assured her that he would be fine. When she went to his tent the next morning and found it empty, she wasn't initially concerned, as she said Daryl was known to take walks. However, after a couple of hours without him returning, she became worried and instructed her daughter to call 911.
One strange detail that emerged while reviewing the records was that after speaking with the witnesses, the officer visited Daryl's tent. It was described as a blue six-man tent with two sleeping bags inside. If Daryl had been sleeping alone in the tent, then whose sleeping bag was the second one? The officer then spoke with Daryl's companion.
asking if Daryl had left behind any belongings. She confirmed that his duffel bag, which was filled with clothes, was in her daughter's vehicle. She said she last saw him wearing a red shirt, jeans, and brown shoes. When asked if Daryl had any mental health issues, such as dementia, she said no.
The officer inquired whether Daryl could have navigated the area on his own if he had decided to leave. She assured him that Daryl was fully capable of living independently. He then asked if there had been any disagreements or reasons for Daryl to leave unexpectedly, to which she again said no. Here's a clip of the investigator speaking to Daryl's companion that day. Note here that the audio in the following clip is somewhat affected by wind.
Okay, so who is this gentleman with? Who brought him? My daughter. So does he have a cell phone? Yeah, but it's dad. Does he have it with him? Yeah. So he came with you? Yeah. And does he just walk off like this or what? Well, we're from Arizona, so we're out of town. Does he have family over there? In Arizona? Yeah. Who does he have? His son. His daughter and?
I mean, it's her best friend. So I just brought him with us because he's a family friend. So nobody saw him? They saw him last night at midnight or what? No, I said goodnight to him last night at midnight. You saw him, though? Physically saw him? I saw him and I said, are you okay? Okay.
Where is he staying at? Next to us. You know my boy put that red and gray one up. Does he take off like this? No. I mean, he walks home every now and then because he lives with me. But that's in Arizona, not out here. No, you don't have nobody here.
The officer then visited a neighboring campsite, where a camper reported seeing Daryl around 12.30 a.m. According to their account, Daryl had walked past their campsite, then stopped at the next one, where they witnessed him briefly speak to another camper, and then walked back in the direction of his own campsite. This led the officer to go inquire next door, where the campers confirmed that they had seen Daryl around that time. They also recalled that Daryl had asked them to borrow a flashlight.
They said they watched him walk south along the shoreline before turning back north toward his campsite. When asked if Daryl had said anything else, the campers mentioned that he only asked for the flashlight, nothing more.
From the very start, Michael and Daryl Jr. have been perplexed by the fact that Daryl was camping with a group of more than 30 people. Yet no one seemed to know where he had gone or noticed anything unusual. And what was even more puzzling was that the park was crowded with visitors, as it was just days before the 4th of July holiday. The person who reported Daryl's flashlight request wasn't part of the group he was camping with, and they mentioned that Daryl seemed drunk or under the influence at the time.
which struck Michaelin as both odd and out of character for her father-in-law. They made a comment, I guess, to the police officer that he was very quiet when he spoke, but it sounded like he may have been under the influence of something. And Daryl, that's not him. He never drank, never smoked, never did drugs, nothing like that.
So for them to say that, that was very odd as well, for them to make that comment. And this is the neighboring campsite that gave him the flashlight. From 1230 until the following morning, no one saw him. Daryl Jr. echoed Michael Lynn's thoughts, emphasizing that his father was not known to use any substances. As a result, the description of Daryl appearing drunk or under the influence seemed completely out of character and didn't align with what his family knew of him.
My dad's not a drinker. He doesn't use drugs. He's like the cleanest person you could ever meet. Was it really Daryl who had asked the other campers for a flashlight? Or could it have been someone else staying at the park, who merely resembled him in the darkness of night? Michael N. pointed out that the people camping with Daryl insisted they never saw him leave their site that evening, which only added to the mystery surrounding Daryl's disappearance.
Some of them were still awake, making s'mores and doing things. The daughter that lives in New Mexico is the one that made that comment. So if he left the tent, how it was positioned, I don't know exactly where everything was, but...
If he left the tent, there's no way that they wouldn't see him. Supposedly, he was alone in the tent. And then we found out in the police report that there was another sleeping bag in there. So we don't know why there would be two sleeping bags in there if there was only one person.
Officers and park rangers canvassed campsites to the north of Daryl's, speaking with roughly 10 to 15 groups of different campers. However, none of them reported seeing Daryl or hearing anything unusual that night. Searches were conducted throughout the campground, but Michelin said they came up empty-handed. Along with Daryl, his cell phone was also missing. They did find some intriguing activity on his phone, which again served to only raise more questions than answers.
They never found the flashlight. They never found the cell phone. The cell phone pinged in the area of the campsite when they pinged it, but they never found the phone. Never found anything at all. No trace of him, not even the necklace, the lei that he was wearing. With the phone, it pinged in the area of the campsite. There was a tower right near there.
But the phone was never recovered. And we don't know what happened with the phone because you would call the phone and it would go straight to voicemail. And coincidentally, after he went missing at 1230 a.m. on the 29th of June, his phone was used for Internet access after 1230 until the following morning into the 30th. The phone only for Internet access was being used.
It says here that Daryl's phone pinged at the cell phone tower north of the dam by the campsite where he was. The ping was at 3.23 p.m. Central Time, which would have been 2.23 p.m. New Mexico Time. That was on the 29th. So the afternoon after he went missing. Another thing, too, is that his phone, one of the daughters said that he asked for a charger for his phone because it was close to being dead. But they
But they didn't give him a charger for the phone. They made it sound like, oh, we couldn't charge it because the only charger we had was in the car. You could still charge a phone. You turn the car on for a couple of minutes, let the phone juice up a little bit so it has a little bit of life. And it wouldn't make it at 1248 in the morning when the last time anyone saw him. If they did, they gave him the flashlight at 1230. Then he disappears off the face of the earth.
At 12.48 a.m. on the 29th is when the internet access used the most megabytes out of all the remaining timeframes that it was accessed, which is kind of odd. Well, that's only 18 minutes after the fact.
Because the data was used sporadically, like 1248, then 214, 811 in the morning on the 29th, then again on the 30th at 1131. So there's mostly big time increments between the next morning on the 30th, though it was accessed at 1131, 1139, 1146, 1148, then nothing after that. Big possibilities in relation to that. And then his phone pings.
The next day in the afternoon, still in the area. The records we obtained show that Daryl's phone was last pinged at a cell tower north of the dam, near the campsite where Daryl and his group were staying. The time of the ping was 3.23 p.m. Central Time, or 2.23 p.m. New Mexico Time.
After learning this, the officer returned to the campsite and asked Daryl's companion and her daughter to check Daryl's tent and bag for his phone. But they didn't find it left behind at his campsite. Given that the phone had continued pinging in the area of the campsite the afternoon after Daryl was last seen, they decided to search the area with ATVs. Still, there was no sign of Daryl. The police report also details the call made to Daryl Jr.,
When the officer inquired about the relationship between Daryl and the woman he had been camping with, Daryl Jr. confirmed that she was his father's girlfriend. The officer asked why she referred to Daryl as just her friend. Daryl Jr. explained that while she called him a friend, she was really his girlfriend. When asked if Daryl would have walked off in an unfamiliar place, Daryl Jr. said no. However, when pressed again about whether his father may have walked off,
Daryl Jr. acknowledged that if the woman had said something to upset him, Daryl may have taken a walk to cool down. Daryl Jr. clarified that his father had done this before during disagreements at her home, but he would have never walked off for good. He would have simply needed time to let the tension subside. When asked if Daryl would have been able to find his way back, Daryl Jr. confidently answered yes, noting that his father lived independently and was fully capable of taking care of himself.
When we spoke to Daryl Jr., he reiterated that while his father would occasionally go for walks to calm down after arguments, he would have never just walked into the wilderness and never returned.
When they first called me, they weren't even going to call me. The state police called me and was telling me about my dad. And I'm like, what do you mean my dad's missing? I told him straight out, like, my dad does walk off, but not the way that they're saying he walks off. And if he did walk off, he knows that he can call me or
or call his friends. Even I will go out there and go get him. And I told him, I witnessed this, that when my dad gets mad at that woman, that he just takes off to ease the problem. So, and I even told him something is not right. So when they called me and told me all that, I was just like, you know, this ain't right. That's why we, me and my wife and my kids, we shot out there because this whole feeling that day wasn't right. And even me going up there,
I don't know what it was, but this was a feeling of beyond a person missing. It was a feeling like he was suffering the whole way when I was going up and out. And I felt to myself that I wasn't going to make it. So it wasn't just a missing person. All this ain't a missing person for me. So that's how I feel about all this stuff. After Daryl Jr. received the call informing him that his father was missing, he said he immediately tried to call Daryl's phone, hoping to reach him. This had to be some sort of misunderstanding.
I called my dad's phone five times, and all those five times it rang with the voicemail, and the sixth time, then it turned off, went straight to voicemail while he was missing. Somebody accessed his internet around the same time that he was missing. Daryl's companion and her family left the campground shortly after his disappearance. And as time wore on, tensions began to rise between her and Daryl's family, further complicating an already troubling situation.
When he went missing, they were supposed to come back the following day, which was the 30th, which was Sunday. You would think that if somebody that you loved and cared about and have known for 40 years, you'd stay there and look for him or you'd make a family member stay there and look for him or you would do whatever you could. You wouldn't just leave right away and go back home. Yeah.
If I loved and cared about someone that I was really close to, supposedly, I would wait and check the areas. I wouldn't leave. Her and her family left the next day to come back home. So that was another weird thing. Like, why would you leave knowing that you brought somebody that's supposedly like family that you care about, knowing that he's missing? And then when my husband would talk to her, the phone calls would be like,
poor me. She always, I guess the best way to say it is she played the victim. She would say, oh, that she had a heart problem and this was going to give her a heart attack and make her end up back in the hospital and always had to be about her. You know I helped him. You know I cared for him. But you weren't the first one to call him and say your dad's missing. It was the officer that called and said your dad's missing. And then a lot of the conversations were kind of defensive in a sense. She
got very upset when it was mentioned by my husband or sister, how could you leave knowing that he's missing? She would just get very defensive about things. But the conversations with her weren't very promising or welcoming.
After Michael Ann and Daryl Jr. were informed of Daryl's disappearance, they quickly packed up their family and made the nine-hour drive to Conscious Lake to search for him. Upon arriving, they were stunned to discover that the other campers had already left, leaving them as the only ones still searching for Daryl.
When my husband found out that my father-in-law was missing, we went on Sunday to New Mexico, to Conchas Lake, and stayed up there for a week. Now, when we got up there, there was nobody there, obviously, except us. You know, we looked and did what we could do in such large
Daryl Jr. couldn't shake the feeling that something was off about the story surrounding his father's disappearance. He felt torn, wanting to stay in contact with those who had last seen Daryl, believing they might hold crucial information, but growing more frustrated with each interaction. The inconsistencies and lack of clarity only deepened his sense that something wasn't being fully revealed.
When it happened, I was back and forth with her. I was trying to be civilized, even through, you know, my dad missing and how I felt, all the feelings, keeping everybody calm. I was still trying to talk to her respectfully. I didn't even want to see her or talk to her at the time all this was going on. So...
Like I said, me and my wife were up there for almost two weeks and a couple of days. My mom, my stepdad came up there. My other cousin came up there. And then my close friend, my dad's godson came up there. I think I talked to her on a Friday and I told her, you know, you guys should be up here looking for my dad also. And don't tell me because this was her.
sad story. Oh, well, I was looking for your dad and I got sunburned and blah, blah. I'm like, I told her I do not care. I told her I have my kid out here explaining to them how what's going on
and looking for my father that you guys lost. So there's no excuse why you guys shouldn't be up here and why you guys left when I was up here. I even told you to put a red flag for you guys when you guys all just left. You 34 plus people left. So she popped up on a Saturday with her daughter, which was the one I was talking to the officer at first in the beginning of those videos. So my cousin was like, oh, you need to talk to him.
I told my cousin, I really don't want, I don't for come to talking to them because I already know that they're just something about them. It's just not telling the truth with everything that's going on. So he was like, well, you got to see in this point of view, they're going to tell us stuff without telling us stuff. I'm like, okay, whatever. So I get up there. I play Mr. Nice guy, even pull it to the side and try to get more stuff for him. But she was just kind of sticking to her story, but she was still changing her stories here and there.
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Early on in the investigation, it seemed as though an assumption had been made that Daryl had simply walked off. But where would he have gone? He hadn't driven there in his own vehicle, and there was no nearby town within walking distance.
The closest town was many miles away, and Daryl disappeared during the height of the summer heat. This theory appeared to originate from a sighting on the day Daryl was first reported missing, but it only served to muddy the waters. Here's a clip of the investigator speaking to a witness who believed they had seen Daryl.
What was he wearing? He had a red shirt on and he had a blue Walmart bag, but he was walking in the middle of the highway. So going to Tootin' Carrie, that's the lane he was on, but he was walking this way. Okay. It was up those narrows, the S curve between here and Tootin' Carrie. Okay. That's it. Like I said, I almost hit him because we come around that corner and there's guardrails right there and he's walking on the street. It was like 6.37 in the morning. 6.37 this morning? Yeah. His phone's showing over here by the dam, so I bet you his phone's still at the campsite.
And how far out do you say? You know where the Narrows are? Is it just right outside of Conchales? Right between here and Tickens Cary. About halfway. About 20 miles. From here? That's where you saw him at? Yeah. One of the Corps people here, I guess they were talking to me. He said he had seen him too.
I don't know. He says he remembers seeing the blue bag, the Walmart bag. That's what caught my eye was there was no Walmart around here. I don't know this dude. I don't know if he hitched a ride out of here. Did they just lose him or what? I guess he was at a camping right up here, down there. And I guess he wandered off or he took off. I'm thinking he took off because there's chicks down there. You think he got a ride and then somehow was coming back? I don't know. So he was pretty far out then, huh? Oh, yeah.
Oh yeah, that's halfway between here and Tinker. You don't ever see anybody out there walking. Michael Lynn believes that this assumption has clouded the investigation, slowing down the search efforts and diverting attention from where it needed to be. The camp area, if you Google a map of Conscious Lake, you'll see that there's a lot of camping area where you can camp, but then the lake is very, very big. So
I'll be honest with you. If he walked off, there's nowhere he's going to walk because the closest city is Tucumcari and that's 30 miles away. I think it's 30 or 40 miles away. And he's also 60 years old and he didn't have a water bottle with him and it's hot too. So if he was to essentially, if that was an option for him to walk off, there would be no way. And the
The companion made a comment to the police that he likes to take walks, but nobody ever said to the police that he walked off the campsite, that he would walk off the campsite. Nobody gave an indication, but because that comment that he likes to take walks, the police just...
automatically assume and we're under the assumption that, hey, you know, there's a chance that he could have walked off and to the main road, which was miles away and hopped a ride back to Arizona. But that wasn't the case. There's no way he would have made it out of there alive. The state police won't budge because even in the police report, it says here, which is an assumption, and I'm going to read it to you word for word. It says on July 2nd, Robert Rogers with the New Mexico State Police
search and rescue division. The officer that did the initial case, the reporting officer, he said that Daryl walked off from the campsite and that's why they couldn't activate the helicopter to do search and rescue. But nobody ever said that he walked off the campsite because how would they know? Even the so-called girlfriend didn't say he walked off the campsite. She said that I think Daryl may have gone for a walk.
He walks around here in Arizona. If he's at his junkyard and wants to go to Circle K, the gas station, to get a drink, he'll walk back and forth because it's not far. But he ain't going to walk somewhere that's nine and a half hours away, that's a terrain like that, that's unknown.
And that place is pitch freaking black. It is so dark there that even if you have a flashlight, good luck seeing it. We went there and we couldn't even see at night how pitch black it was. So there's no way possible.
What they later found out was that there was another person at the campground who somewhat resembled Daryl, but was much younger. Michael M. believes that this has fueled the theory that Daryl simply walked off, and the confusion over this false sighting still lingers today. Now, the officer did go, here it says, after speaking with about 10 to 15 campsites.
And this is just asking, hey, have you seen an African-American male over here? This wasn't an interview asking, hey, how long have you been here? Did you see anything come from this campsite? Did you see anything, anybody in the water in the wee hours of the night? All of them said they did not see anything or anyone walk by. There was another African-American gentleman who was younger who I
I don't know if he was at the campsite or if he was in the area, but people saw him walking on the side of the road. He had a red shirt on too conveniently, but was of younger age. And they were thinking that was my father-in-law, but obviously it wasn't. Because it says here too, in the police report, the officer saw the guy, his name was Jimmy,
Saw him around 630 to 7 and he was traveling on the 104 between Tucumcari and Cochise Dam towing his boat to the lake. That was the guy that said he saw the African-American gentleman. But there was a male individual towing a boat that had seen a black male subject walking, wearing a red shirt and blue jeans, carrying a Walmart bag. But it wasn't him. It was a younger black male and it was not Daryl.
It's evident from the police report that the initial sighting of someone believed to be Daryl significantly complicated the early stages of the search. When search and rescue teams were called in, they initially refused to mobilize because of the belief that Daryl had walked off on his own free will. As Michael N. pointed out, it was later confirmed that this person seen walking along the road wasn't Daryl at all. A park ranger who had seen the man described him as much younger. Even after this mix-up was cleared,
On July 2nd, attempts to deploy the New Mexico State Police helicopter were refused. The report notes that due to the assumption that Darrell had walked off, they were unable to activate the helicopter for a search. When someone disappears in a vast wilderness area, one of the first theories that must be considered is whether the person got lost or injured. Michael N. wondered if Darrell had gone for a late-night walk, perhaps to use the restroom. Could he have gotten turned around? If
If this had been the case, everyone assumed that Daryl would have been found quickly. Michaelin shared more details about the search efforts in the days that followed Daryl's disappearance. At 9 a.m. on the 29th, the daughter called and reported to the superintendent of the park that Daryl was missing. The superintendent, which is the park ranger, I guess they call him superintendent, he notified the state police and that's when they came. Then the
the same day, park staff searched the park until 5 p.m. They searched the areas of the different campgrounds, Central, Cove, Bell Point, and North Area. Park staff conducted the search. It included six people, compromised a full-time, part-time, and volunteer staff. Then following the initial incident, park staff continued searching areas within the park for two weeks. Park searches were coordinated during regular work and shift hours. So if
If they were on the water, they would glance and see, hey, is he over here? If they were on their ATV picking up trash, they'd look and see if he was over there. On Monday, July 1st,
It says at 10 a.m., they flew a drone around the area where his campsite was located for several hours and were unable to locate anything. We did ask the officer that was assigned to meet with us to kind of show us where Daryl's dad was last seen and everything like that. The officer did escort us over to the location and did show us where he was.
And then the park ranger and the employees that work with the park, they continue to search. But then I want to say after a couple of days, it fizzled out. They stopped looking because it wasn't until...
I want to say the beginning of August or sometime into July, I have to look at my email that a search and rescue team went and looked for him. I'm thinking you send a search and rescue right when something happens. You don't do it so long after. On July 20th through the 21st is when the Sandia search dogs arrived.
It's a volunteer organization. It says they deploy dogs for human search and rescue. SSD worked the land areas from the park visitor center to the Boy Scout area, Bell Point, North and Cove campgrounds. Nothing turned up.
Daryl's family and friends had always assumed he was in a romantic relationship with the woman he went camping with, so they were shocked when she denied it. The records we obtained show that investigators were just as puzzled. Daryl's family referred to her as his girlfriend, while she insisted he was merely her friend. When questioned directly, she confirmed that they had been friends for over 40 years, and that she had been taking care of him for the past two.
However, Daryl's family was even more stunned when they learned that she had a long-term boyfriend who had been on the camping trip along with Daryl.
The companion friend ended up saying that she had a whole nother boyfriend that she's been with for 12 years who was supposedly at the campsite when all of this happened. Nobody met him. And when we told friends of my father-in-law that she had a whole nother boyfriend, everybody couldn't believe it. They were shell shocked, really confused as well.
It says he was looked at his body to see if there was any indication of any fight or anything, but they never interviewed. They only interviewed the companion, the companion's daughter, her son-in-law and the people that he got the flashlight from. Now, there was more adults there within that party. They didn't interview anybody else in those 33 people.
We'll say my father-in-law's the 34th just to make it easy. But I understand there's kids. They're not going to interview a toddler. But there was enough people over 18 or well enough over the age to be interviewed or spoken to. And the only ones that they interviewed were three people out of that party. One of the daughters, she had messaged my sister-in-law on Facebook and said, oh, I think...
And Daryl may have gotten in a fight, but then everybody retracted it. They told the sister, don't be saying stuff. Don't open your mouth. You're stupid. All this comments and everything. So then she went radio silent. So what if there was a fight, which we'll never know? What if they said something? What if at the campsite, he didn't know was her boyfriend.
What if he was under the impression, hey, this is my girlfriend, then gets to the campsite and is there because they didn't travel together. They didn't drive together. Daryl drove with the daughter, not with the companion, quote unquote. What if he found out there that she had a boyfriend? Because there was no previous acknowledgement or indication that he knew she had a boyfriend.
And even in the police report, it says that the officer asked why she keeps referring to herself as his friend and not his girlfriend. But then when she's interviewed as a witness, she's labeled as a girlfriend and doesn't try to retract it, doesn't try to fix it. But then when she's referred to the girlfriend on speaking terms, she says, I'm not the girlfriend.
As Michael Lynn mentioned, rumors began to circulate about a disagreement that took place on the night Daryl vanished from the campground. Upon hearing this, Daryl Jr. contacted the investigator to share what he had heard, hoping it might shed light on what happened to his father.
Mm-hmm.
She was saying that they weren't drinking at the campsite. He's a really, really jealous person. And they're saying that the other daughter was talking with my dad and my dad was saying he doesn't like the way that the gentleman, her boyfriend was speaking to her. And they pretty much said that he was,
When he drinks, he acts like a child and he starts stuff. And I did call the daughter again earlier before I let my old child ask for an update and let her know that, hey, can you at least get with your mom, your family, and you guys get to come up with a better explanation of what would happen at this campsite because I'm getting stories from different people across your family.
Daryl Jr. said he received a call from his father's companion about a month after Daryl's disappearance, and the conversation left him shaken and confused.
Before the first month hit, we got back and she called me again and she told me to come pick up my dad's belongings at her house. Like, I can't stand looking at your dad's belongings because he's gone. So I'm like, okay, this is where, how I feel about things. Because when everything happened, she said that my dad had his wallet, his keys on him and
and his phone. So the keys that my dad always carries are to his yard. And me and him are the only ones that have the keys to his yard. So I'm like, okay. And then she told me that, oh yeah, can you come by and pick up your dad's belongings and his keys to his yard? In my head, I didn't say nothing to her, but in my head, like you just said in the beginning that he had his keys. This was like face to face with me and her on the phone that he had his keys on. I'm like, okay. So I go there
and pick up his belongings. And I told my wife when I got there, I just felt very, very sick to my stomach when I even barely got to the front of her door. I don't know what it was. I just didn't want to be there. I told her, let's get his stuff and let's get out. And that was the last time I talked to her because like I said, her story is changing. Even though she talks to everybody, like my aunts and everybody else, everybody that she talks to, her story changes.
And that was the last time I talked to her was almost, I want to say, three months ago, the last time I talked to her. When I went to pick up my dad's belongings, something was off with one of the daughters. I actually was with the mom. When I got there, I know both the daughters was there. So the daughter that was on the phone was there with her husband. But the other daughter gave me a weird vibe because she was like kind of in a rush to get out the house when I was there.
So I felt like by her doing that, like she knew something and she didn't want to be part of that situation when I was there. It was really off that how fast she was trying to get out the house and leave. If her mom and them are not saying something that she knows about, that's the kind of vibe that I got from her leaving so quick. I even tried to, like I said, being a bigger person, like, "Hey, apologize for everybody on my side of the family going after your mom," all that stuff. But yeah, she was just quick to get out and leave.
And this is where we're going to pick up next week with part two of Daryl Johnson's story. We're going to take a deeper look at some of those who were camping along with Daryl and hear what they had to say to investigators about what transpired the night he vanished.
We'll also delve deeper into the possibilities of what may have happened to Daryl and where the search stands today, more than six months later. If you have any information regarding the disappearance of Daryl Johnson, please call the New Mexico State Police at 505-425-6771.
I'll be honest with you, I don't know if your mind starts to play tricks on you or you start thinking outside of the box or what, but what if he didn't want to go on this trip? Because I can tell you with 100% certainty, he would not leave his dog without notifying his son that has the only set of keys to the yard to feed the dog. There's a lot of unknowns and what ifs. Why would you, if you knew someone for 40 years, know that they go missing and leave them there?
I don't know what kind of friendship that is. And then the family being like, oh, you know, we loved him. He was part of the family. But then you say you have bad juju with his stuff being in your house that you want it all out.
That brings us to the end of episode 472. I'd like to thank everyone who spoke with us for this series. If you have a missing loved one that you'd like to have featured on the show, there's a case submission form at thevanishedpodcast.com. If you'd like to join in on the discussion, there's a page and discussion group on Facebook. You can also find us on Instagram. If you like our show, please give us a five-star rating and review. You can also support the show by contributing on Patreon, where you can get early and ad-free episodes.
Be sure to tune in next week for part two of Daryl Johnson's story. Thanks for listening.
Hello, ladies and germs, boys and girls. The Grinch is back again to ruin your Christmas season with Tis the Grinch Holiday Podcast. After last year, he's learned a thing or two about hosting, and he's ready to rant against Christmas cheer and roast his celebrity guests like chestnuts on an open fire.
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