Mekayla Bali -- Teenager Missing from Yorkton, Saskatchewan Since 2016
Missing person: Mekayla Bali
Last-contact date: April 12th, 2016 (Tuesday) at 1:45pm
Disappeared from: Yorkton, Saskatchewan at the STC Bus Depot
Disappeared from: Yorkton, Saskatchewan at the STC Bus Depot
Link to Government Source: Canada's Missing 2016018567
Canada's Missing Description: "Mekayla was last seen at the STC Bus Depot in Yorkton at 1:45 p.m. on April 12, 2016. She went to school in the morning, but left shortly after arriving. She went to several businesses in Yorkton throughout the morning, then returned to school around noon. She bought lunch at the restaurant in the bus depot, but did not get on a bus that day. Mekayla left the bus depot in the early afternoon and hasn't been seen since."
Ethnicity/Race: White
Sex: Female
Age at time of disappearance: 16 years old
Hair: Blonde, shoulder lengthed
Eye color: Blue
Height and weight at the time of disappearance: 5'2" and 126 pounds
Clothing: Black/grey leggings, infinity scarf, turquoise blouse, maroon boots, and maroon coat
Sex: Female
Age at time of disappearance: 16 years old
Hair: Blonde, shoulder lengthed
Eye color: Blue
Height and weight at the time of disappearance: 5'2" and 126 pounds
Clothing: Black/grey leggings, infinity scarf, turquoise blouse, maroon boots, and maroon coat
Mekayla Bali was a high school student when she went missing from a small city in Saskatchewan known as Yorkton. This is an individual who had a well-documented timeline on the date of her disappearance. That's partly due to messages she sent before disappearing but it's also due to the surveillance footage that was available at the various venues that she visited the last day that she was seen.
Websleuths or amateur investigators that are thinking of doing some research on this case might benefit from watching the following Youtube video. It contained some useful information and video pertaining to her timeline. If you want to watch her timeline, then go to the 7:05 mark of the video.
The part of the case that intrigued me the most was her behavior in the Tim Horton's restaurant. At one point, she leaves the restaurant, re-enters, and then exits out the opposite door. To me, this looked like the actions of someone that was having trouble coordinating a pick-up, maybe for a shared ride and possibly with a stranger or someone she knew. The way she exits the Tim Horton's, re-enters, and then chooses the other exit might seem strange but the action is consistent with someone who isn't sure which door her ride is going to pick her up at. Perhaps, she never did actually find that ride.
I wondered if she was using ridesharing apps or shared-ride classifieds like what you find at Kijiji or Craigslist. It would be interesting if any ridesharing apps that were operating at the time had a record of drivers that were planning to pass through Yorkton on the day that Mekayla disappeared. Perhaps her driver wasn't reliable and that's what caused her to explore bus travel instead.
It's also interesting that she went to the bus depot but did not purchase a ticket. This is clearly someone who was dabbling with the idea of intercity travel on the day of her disappearance. That dabbling does invoke one phrase that's common to both intercity transportation and missing people: hitchhiking.
It's not quite fair to say that she was last seen hitchhiking but if the Tim Horton's scene was a failed pick-up location for a shared ride and if she didn't like the prices of the bus tickets then she might have turned to the cheapest form of travel there is: thumbing a ride. Reliance on hitchhiking is a well-known risk factor when it comes to missing people. This possibility cannot be discounted, especially as she has now been missing for almost five years. It would be very difficult for someone her age not to register on social media or touch base with someone that could help her for such a lengthy period.
Author: Shane Lambert (Facebook profile)
Twitter: @UncoolNegated (Twitter)
Pinterest: Missing Person Board
Original Time of Writing: February 15th, 2021
Original Time of Writing: February 15th, 2021
All articles are subject to editing after the original posting.
I am not a Private Investigator, however, I am currently studying to be one as of February 2021.
Website hashtag: #MPCSL
one person in particular stands out to me every time. now obviously whoever mekayla is talking to tells her to wait at tims for them. she plans on meeting them there for a coffee. possibly to discuss where they are going. her friends say she was talking about going to moose jaw, prince albert, saskatoon, or regina. so she didnt have a set plan. whoever she was talking to didnt make a clear plan to meet up with her. but she instinctively trusted them. they were telling her that they would send her money. 5 grand apparently. no "boyfriend" is gonna send some girl on the internet 5 grand. i dont believe she was as naïve as people make her out to be. i think she was struggling with her identity and wanted to know who her father was. i think somehow he found her via social media and started talking to her. he made her believe she would have a better life living with him. he wanted her to keep it secret for whatever reason, possibly because he is a bad person and didnt want her mother finding out mekayla was talking to him. he couldve even pretended to be a boy her age. maybe to seek revenge on her mother. like you cant have her now shes gone. if he really is her father he probably felt deprived from his daughter and decided that the only way to get revenge was to take her for himself. wether that be kidnapping or killing her. i strongly believe she is dead. this is quite the rant i apologize but back to the evidence. somewhere in the tims footage you see mekayla sitting at a table, often looking back at the front entrance. whoever shes talking to is telling her that they are on their way to meet her. this person shes talking to is stalling. now here walks in a man (mid to late 40's possibly older) wearing all black, hands in his pockets. his walk and demeanor is downright weird. he doesnt go to the counter and order anything. just walks in, slowly walks right past mekayla, walks past a table with a group of older men and is later seen coming back to their table. i think what happens here is he turns around and sees mekayla (he looks right at her) so he approaches these men across from her and pretends to make conversation as if he knows them so he doesnt come off weird. these men look awfully confused, like why is this man talking to us. obviously they have no idea who he is. it gets even weirder though. as this guy is talking to these men he keeps looking back in mekayla's direction and so do the men hes talking to. the fuck. beyond strange. but the weirdest part is when he approaches the men sitting at the table, mekayla looks up at him with some sort of recognition. could be his voice she recognizes. she then looks back at the entrance he came through seconds earlier. fuckin weird. now here's where rick is introduced. rick is a shorter slim build, mid to late 40's, brown hair. so i pause the video and take some screenshots of the man, zoom in on his face and make a side by side of rick and this mans face. identical. same nose, hair, mouth, build. he has bad posture so does rick. not a coincidence if you ask me. theres a reason why mekayla trusted this person wether he said im your father or not she decided it would be completely safe going on this trip with him. he couldve told her hey, i will send you 5 grand and we will go on a trip together but keep it secret i dont want your mother finding out. she thought she was going on a trip to get to know her dad. i dont think he is innocent the rcmp were definitely onto something when they investigated him 5 days after her disappearance. where was he the day of her disappearance thats what i would like to know. her body may be somewhere in the saskatoon area. we need to get the rcmp to investigate rick he is the only person with a motive. however if it turns out he is innocent, i would consider looking at mekayla's ex boyfriend next.
ReplyDeleteShe obviously tried to hitchhike her way to her destination. She was at the bus station around 12 and was told the bus would arrive around 5. By 5 o clock people would be looking for her and it was very obvious she didn't want most people to know she left. Unfortunately I believe she is dead because if she did hitchhike with success then the person who gave her a ride would have came forward if it was an innocent ride. Or.... Maybe the person who was going to pick her up was one of those people who say 10 minutes when the really mean 2 hours. The person may have had ill intent and realized the restaurant had cameras and had her meet them in a more remote location. That still doesn't give much to go on. Im surprised there wasn't any information with her cell phone pinging off cell towers and trying to triangulate an estimated location of her phone especially when her friend said she opened her snapchat message after she had went missing.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the comment. The Snapchat message is a red herring in all this. I think Snapchat confirmed that after a certain amount of time, a message that is not read will still be marked as read.
Delete