Two missing men, one deputy, zero charged. What happened? : NPR

The Final Journey investigates a disturbing thriller, examines systemic issues in media and policing and illuminates the deep wounds which can be left when nobody is held accountable. Hearken to The Final Journey on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Almost twenty years in the past, I used to be looking out by my Southwest Florida newspaper’s archives and noticed this tragic headline:

It topped a 2004 letter to the editor written by Marcia Williams.

Her letter learn, partly:

Please assist me discover my son, Terrance Williams. On Jan. 12, my son was driving to Naples from Bonita Springs. In keeping with eyewitnesses, at roughly 9 a.m. he was pulled over by a Collier County Sheriff’s deputy. 

Cpl. Steven Calkins searched him and put him behind his car and drove him someplace! He has not been seen or heard from since.   

We miss him terribly! Please reply a heartbroken mom’s plea.  

The letter, buried on web page D17 of the Naples Day by day Information, was gorgeous for a lot of causes.

For one, Terrance Williams was the second younger man of coloration to go lacking after being seen within the patrol automobile of Deputy Steven Calkins, a veteran of the Collier County Sheriff’s workplace. Terrance disappeared in January 2004.

Steven Calkins is seen in 1999, on the scene the place a ship fell off a trailer and blocked site visitors.

Michel Fortier/Naples Day by day Information

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Michel Fortier/Naples Day by day Information

Steven Calkins is seen in 1999, on the scene the place a ship fell off a trailer and blocked site visitors.

Michel Fortier/Naples Day by day Information

Three months earlier, in October 2003, on the identical road in Naples, Felipe Santos vanished after entering into the identical deputy’s patrol automobile. Each males had been driving illegally. As an alternative of taking them to jail, Calkins mentioned he dropped them off at completely different Circle-Okay shops. However his tales may by no means be backed up.

Marcia Williams did not know concerning the disappearance of Felipe Santos when she wrote the letter, however her plea helped to attach the hurting households.

Because the story coalesced — two lacking males, one deputy, zero charged — one other gorgeous side was that there was so little media protection. It was straight out of the “lacking white lady syndrome” lesson from journalism college on how media usually fail lacking individuals of coloration whereas saturating protection on younger, fairly lacking white ladies.

The Final Journey is a podcast that examines systemic issues in media and policing and illuminates the deep wounds which can be left when nobody is held accountable. Pay attention on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

The letter from Terrance’s mom led to one in all my first investigative tales as a younger reporter. I’ve adopted the thriller all through my profession. Through the years, my colleagues and I sought to inform the haunting story of those Florida disappearances in a extra impactful means, particularly as soon as beforehand confidential audio and case notes had been launched.

The disappearances gnawed on the households, the police, us, and our neighborhood. Perhaps a podcast may get the circumstances to extra individuals? Spur new concepts? Jostle reminiscences?

The Final Journey, an eight-episode deep dive into the thriller, is the consequence.

‘I am not going to surrender’

I met Marcia Williams in 2005.

After I interviewed her, I recall seeing containers of her son’s belongings in her Naples dwelling. A suede coat. A Ralph Lauren shirt with the tag nonetheless connected. All simply left behind. “I pray each evening. I do know God is uninterested in me,” she mentioned then. “I am not going to surrender.”

By that point, Calkins had been fired after an inside affairs investigation associated to Terrance’s disappearance discovered about two dozen situations the place his statements had been untruthful, deceptive or contradictory. A number of legislation enforcement businesses investigated, however they by no means discovered legal proof to implicate him.

Terrance Williams’ mom, Marcia Williams, sits in her condominium surrounded by a few of his possessions, which fill a nook of her eating room.

David Ahntholz/Naples Day by day Information

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David Ahntholz/Naples Day by day Information

Terrance Williams’ mom, Marcia Williams, sits in her condominium surrounded by a few of his possessions, which fill a nook of her eating room.

David Ahntholz/Naples Day by day Information

I additionally interviewed Felipe Santos’ father. He informed me Felipe got here to the USA from Mexico at 19 with desires of creating wealth and beginning a household. And, within the information studies I’ve dug up, I nonetheless look to be the final reporter who interviewed Calkins.

I believe he solely talked to me again then as a result of I dropped in the truth that we share a hometown in rural Illinois.

“I did not do something flawed,” he informed me as his kids performed within the yard of his Naples dwelling.

Struggling to get consideration on the case

Within the a few years since, there have been a number of main developments.

Filmmaker Tyler Perry grew to become an advocate for the households of the lacking males and supplied a reward for suggestions. Perry stood with Marcia Williams at a 2018 press convention and underscored how onerous it was to attract media curiosity to the disappearances.

“When someone goes lacking and they’re a blue-eyed, blonde lady, it is all around the information,” Perry mentioned on the time. “This lady has been struggling privately for a lot of, a few years simply to get consideration.”

After Terrance went lacking, his household pleaded for protection from nationwide shops. Most did not take a lot discover till Perry realized of the story almost a decade after the disappearances and used his platform to focus on them.

Media mogul Tyler Perry, left, holds the hand of Terrance Williams’ mom, Marcia Williams. On the time, Perry supplied a $100,000 reward for data fixing the lacking individuals case of Terrance Williams and Felipe Santos. He later elevated the provide to $200,000.

William DeShazer/Naples Day by day Information

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William DeShazer/Naples Day by day Information

Media mogul Tyler Perry, left, holds the hand of Terrance Williams’ mom, Marcia Williams. On the time, Perry supplied a $100,000 reward for data fixing the lacking individuals case of Terrance Williams and Felipe Santos. He later elevated the provide to $200,000.

William DeShazer/Naples Day by day Information

After we had been placing collectively The Final Journey, the 2021 disappearance of 22-year-old Gabby Petito dominated headlines. Tales of her disappearance, the invention of her stays and the seek for her boyfriend, who killed her after which himself, had been quick and nonstop.

The distinction in protection between her disappearance and the lacking males was stark.

In 2022, The Columbia Journalism Overview got here out with a instrument that makes use of information to investigate such disparities. Many individuals within the media are conscious of those disparities however have not bothered or found out find out how to repair them.

Most lacking persons are discovered rapidly. So, it is comprehensible that the media does not cowl all of them. But I’ve firsthand expertise of witnessing after they — we — ought to have.

The pursuit for solutions

5 years in the past, the household of Terrance Williams filed a civil lawsuit in opposition to former deputy Calkins.

A girl holds an indication for Felipe Santos throughout a remembrance ceremony for lacking individuals at Cambier Park in Naples on Oct. 25, 2017.

Nicole Raucheisen/Naples Day by day Information

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Nicole Raucheisen/Naples Day by day Information

A girl holds an indication for Felipe Santos throughout a remembrance ceremony for lacking individuals at Cambier Park in Naples on Oct. 25, 2017.

Nicole Raucheisen/Naples Day by day Information

Legal professional Ben Crump introduced the go well with on the 2018 Naples press convention: “This lawsuit goes to formally say, what individuals have been informally saying, and that’s that he deliberately murdered Terrance Williams and Felipe Santos.”

Round that point, my colleagues and I began reporting The Final Journey. Veteran reporters Ryan Mills and Melanie Payne had been simply as haunted by the circumstances. Why had been they by no means solved? Did legislation enforcement drop the ball? Did we?

Our pursuit of solutions went from Florida to Tennessee to Illinois to Iowa. We interviewed investigators, witnesses, Tyler Perry, Ben Crump and advocates and family members of the lacking males. We scrutinized a whole bunch of pages of information. And we adopted the civil go well with to its abrupt conclusion. Steven Calkins efficiently fought the go well with. The podcast options compelling court docket audio, dramatic polygraphs and questioning of Calkins.

This thriller started as a neighborhood story, however the points are common.

Janine Zeitlin is the host of The Final Journey and an award-winning Florida journalist.

The Final Journey is distributed by the NPR Community, reported by veteran journalists with the Naples Day by day Information and The Fort Myers Information-Press, a part of the USA Right this moment Community, and produced in partnership with WGCU Public Media. Pay attention on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.