By Seamus McGraw

(Continued)

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The probe begins

When Tara Grinstead failed to be at her regular post at school greeting students with her welcoming smile on Monday morning, "co-workers and friends of the former cheerleader and Miss Tifton, Ga., of 1999 realized something was wrong" as one blogger put it at the time.

By 8:50 a.m. on Monday, Oct. 24, authorities had been notified that Grinstead was gone. They searched her house and turned up little. Her cell phone, without which she never left the house, was still inside on the charger. The clothes she had worn the night she disappeared were there. Though it took several days to find it, the necklace she wore that night was found, though the earrings, large chandelier-style earrings, were not.

There also were a few puzzling details that even now continue to haunt investigators.

Her bedroom lamp, for example, was found cracked and knocked askew. There was, of course, no way of telling when or how that had happened. What's more, her digital alarm clock had apparently fallen to the floor and was now six hours behind, but authorities had no way of determining whether that was significant either. Perhaps the clock had simply stopped during one of the not-infrequent power outages that hit the neighborhood. Or perhaps it meant something more. There was also the fact that the driver's seat on Tara's car had been pushed back farther than the 5-foot-3 woman would have been likely to favor it. Again, the cops didn't know if it meant anything.

Was there a struggle? The evidence, authorities say, is inconclusive. And with her car left behind, how did Tara make it out of her neighborhood? Did someone accompany her, did she go willingly, or had she planned in advance to make an escape, perhaps with the help of an accomplice? After more than 5,500 man-hours of investigation, authorities say they still don't know.

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Contact Seamus McGraw at seamusm@ptd.net

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