By: Shane Lambert
Original Time of Writing: January 28th, 2025
Occasionally, I look at cases of missing persons grouped together by a commonality. For instance, I have looked at several cases where women who experienced car troubles went missing. In another similar article, I looked at people who went missing off of a hiking trails. Other people have noted that missing people are often involved in hitchhiking.
When looking at cases involving missing people, I believe that the same kinds of events play out over and over again. Details certainly vary but in looking at what unifies cases, we can brainstorm the risk factors with regard to what's present when someone goes missing. Today, I will be looking at a few cases involving people who have gone missing after attending a party.
The tag I have chosen for this category of missing people is "went missing after a party." At the original time of writing, I only had tagged three cases with this phrase.
- Ryan Shtuka, who went missing in Sun Peaks, British Columbia after attending a party in 2018.
- Alexis Scott, who went missing in Peoria, Illinois after attending a party in 2017.
- Tavia Elizabeth Bailey, who went missing after attending a party in 1985.
Missing People, Parties, and Risk Factors
I think the following are the main risk factors concerning missing people and parties:
- The missing person is more likely to be drunk or high on drugs.
- The people who are around the missing person are more likely to be drunk or high on drugs.
- People who leave parties often do so at a dangerous time of night.
Each one of these bullets cold be expanded on. But it should be pointed out that they may or may not be present in all missing person's cases where someone disappears after a party.
With regard to the first point, the person who goes missing after attending a party could be viewed as at increased risk due to his or her senses being less acute due to alcohol and drunk usage at the party. Your ability to sense danger goes down the drunker or higher you are. This could make someone an easy target for a predator. Furthermore, on the return home from the party, reduced senses could increase someone's chances of being in an accident.
With regard to the second point, I would think that there are people out there that might not commit major crimes while 'normal.' But anyone with enough life experience will tell you that they know someone who was a completely different animal when using drugs or alcohol. These substances can make ordinary people more dangerous as they lose their inhibitions.
Concerning the third point, the late-night setting for most parties is a big risk factor. I've worked probably about a thousand night shifts in my life at hotels and I am a night owl by nature. I'm usually awake between the hours of 10PM and 5AM, unlike most people.
What I've noticed is that the time frame between 2:15AM and 3:45AM is the most dangerous time of night on average. The pre-2:15 AM crowd is usually people going home or back to their hotel rooms after businesses close. They can be loud but I would not call them dangerous for that reason alone. The people who are active around 4:00 AM are often just very early risers.
It's people who are loitering or active between 2:15 AM and 3:45 AM who are usually something different. It's this time of night when parties seem to slow down due to fatigue or even noise complaints.
Furthemore, there are a lot of dangerous people on the streets during this time frame. A lot of clandestine people like to operate when everyone else is sleeping. However, there's also just drug and alcohol usage from the public.
With regard to Ryan Shtuka's case, I felt that he may have been hit and subsequently disappeared by a drunk driver. On this matter, there are fewer witnesses to crimes at the late-night hours and that can be a factor in people going missing. Someone who is a victim of a pedestrian-vehicle accident at 2PM will likely be seen by numerous people. That's different than at 2AM, for example. The late-night hours create opporuntinities to disappear people that are not present on the same scale midday.
Looking at the three cases above, Tavia Bailey was thought to have been abducted, presumably while walking home from a party. You could see how all three of the risk factors could be relevant in her case
One common opinion with Ryan Shtuka is that he may have been hit by a vehicle while walking home from a party and then the driver disappeared him instead of facing the rap. You can see how all three of the risk factors could be part of his case.
With Alexis Scott's disappearance, it's not really known if she left the party or not with modern news saying that she didn't. You can see how the first two points could be relevant and possibly the final one.
I will be adding the tag "went missing after a party" for any relevant case as I continue to build the site. In a nutshell, I would say it's just drugs, alcohol, and the fact that the streets are dangerous at night that are the factors fueling these kinds of cases.
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