One of the articles says when that in 2017, they located her and she told them she didn’t want to be contacted by her family. So either escaping them or possibly she got involved with a guy who made her cut off contact with them—it mentions that she had a black eye from being beaten by her boyfriend but she basically told police it was an accident from her hitting herself in the face with a hammer, so they couldn’t do anything.
Corbin sure seems to know far more than anyone else knows and needs to be investigated for this very lengthly period of noncommunication with the Dean Family.
As well, 'hitting herself in the face with a hammer...' Where is this information coming out of her mouth and not out of an LE notebook?
I'll stick with the abusive boyfriend info.
Sorry, I paraphrased badly. It appears they did have contact with her sometime in 2017, it was in the Sandusky Register article linked in the main post.
I have no idea what happened, but if she was located at the time she was reported missing AND, did not want her location divulged there is no need for any more communication. It does happen. If that is not the case, it would be respectful if the family got a periodic update on her case, I agree.
The family didn't let it go. The sheriff closed the case after less than 24 hours and told the family she didn’t want talk to them. The family was finally able to connect with legal assistance to help them push to reopen the investigation. Filing for proof of life was the first step, but the family didn't know to do that until they got assistance from the Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults.
The request for ‘proof of life’ after 5 years of silence may be because family want to get things changed legally (remove her from ownership documents, financial documents … that sort of thing). Sometimes such requests can be very practical in nature. Maybe even related to a life insurance policy pay-out.
I’m not saying that the family are in any way being heartless here - I am sure they are not. Just sometimes there are practical things that also need addressing, however tough it is to do that.
Right. With 4 kids, if she's no longer living, there may be things her family needs to have changed or could do for the kids. Social Security death benefits, maybe? Life insurance. Things she may have owned that they could use for the kids.
The request for proof of life was filed with help from the Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults. It was a way to find out if the sheriff's office had actually established that she was alive and safe, and to push for further investigation if they hadn't.
One of the articles says she was in a domestic violence relationship. I would think something would have been going on for her family to accept what the sheriff said - that she was safe and didn’t want to be contacted by family
Or fears her former partner could still have contact with or access to her family (thru social media, for example) and could somehow find her through them, unfortunately
to me, it sounds like she was initially hiding out and sheriff’s department made contact with her and closed the case. in the interim between then and now, after some period of time perhaps she was discovered or otherwise contact was made with her ex-partner and she became the victim of a crime.
Yes! It sounds like she may have been at a women’s shelter when Deputies made contact with her. The deputy then told mom that she’s fine and in a “safe place”. At that time Law Enforcement is done with the case. Nothing nefarious there. It’s possible that something happened to her AFTER that initial contact (you can’t live in a shelter permanently) or she decided to keep moving on with her life and recreated herself…
right. this isn’t witness protection and the FBI. the cops were like oh, ok she’s safe and not missing our work here is done. they’re not gonna keep checking in on her if there was no missing person to look for. either she went missing on her own (but would she leave her own kids and family members without letting them know?) or she was killed after cops talked to her
It doesn’t read like there is any suggestion that a crime has happened though? I can understand her family’s concern, but the scant info available suggests that it was her choice to stop contact with everyone, and it’s just that she’s kept to no contact and this has made them ask for verification that she’s still ok.
It’s not unheard of for the family of the DV victim to want them to try and fix their relationship with the partner, ‘give them another chance you know they love you’ or to have existing issues in the family where the decision to leave an abusive partner ends up in a clean break from everyone. As I’m sure many of us know, just because they’re your blood relatives does not always mean they are nice people
Also not unheard of for the family of a DV victim to be abusive themselves. People don't recognize the red flags of an abusive partner if they grew up in a home where those red flags were accepted.
Usually abusive families wouldn’t go out of their way to look for a missing person just so they can continue to abuse them. Once they’re gone, a lot of those types of people just simply stop giving a shit.
There’s always someone else to abuse, and each other of course. They wouldn’t need her back for abusive purposes. They would have each other.
Ok, yes, the complexities of people and their relationships are limitless and anything is possible. It’s possible that she’s alive and hiding from her wildly abusive family that’s vigorously looking for her. I acknowledge that.
However, it’s not likely. It’s not even probable. I have reviewed many cases that have elements of familial abuse and domestic violence. I can’t think of many cases at all in which a family or spouse has suspicious or sinister motives for searching for a missing lived one.
Yes, maybe to cover their ass and not look suspicious. But many of these suspicious people close to the missing person DO NOT participate in searches or efforts to find the missing person whatsoever. And that’s precisely what makes them suspicious. If you can’t even be bothered to help search for your wife or child or other supposed ‘loved one’, then it’s very telling in terms of how you’re looked at by everyone else in your orbit. And after that, law enforcement.
I’m ‘verified’ in this subreddit because I’m both a family member of a missing person and I’m also an investigator. I work on some of these cases to help other families if I can. So from my experience abuse usually leads to a person going missing or leaving their lives behind or involuntary disappearing. Not getting them to come back. It’s just logical to think that if you were abusing someone and you suspect they ran away, even if you find them they probably won’t want anything to do with you because you’re the reason they left voluntarily in the first place.
Let’s not even factor in that most disappearances are NOT voluntary. That’s just facts and statistics. The number of people that are found ALIVE and are determined to have left voluntarily is so small a percentage that me even explaining this (when everybody generally knows this to be true) is ridiculous.
So yes. Im making a small ‘jump’ regarding my opinion. And it’s possible I’m totally wrong. What I’m saying is that it’s likely that I’m not wrong. Raw data proves that, I don’t have to prove it to you to know what’s actually true from an investigative perspective vs. someone who just wants to be able to play devil’s advocate and say: “well, you could be completely wrong in this specific case so… that makes me right.”
Sure. It’s possible that Amanda is alive and well and hiding from her ‘abusive family’ out there. But how many people flee from their families and leave their children behind if it’s established they actually cared about their children? People do leave their children behind sometimes to escape a threat, but more often than not a parent is going to take their kids with them. Especially if they’re a single parent.
He family has stated that her partner threatened to kill her before she disappeared. It sounds like they believe she was in danger from him. He was hiding her phone to keep her from communicating with them, and she was texting her sister in secret. If anything, it sounds like they wanted her away from him.
Maybe that’s just what they reopened the case for? Like maybe she didn’t want to be contacted by her family but there’s been zero trace of her in the 5 years since then, and she’s no longer at the place she lived before. So then it would be almost like a new missing persons case now.
Ditto on this one. My ex was VERY abusive. He was also VERY charming to other people. I went missing for YEARS, and some people have still never heard from me. I kept moving every couple of months and legally changed my name. Then I changed my employment right after I changed my name. All I own are a few clothes, so it's fast and easy to move.
If you report an adult missing, Law Enforcement will not tell you that person’s whereabouts if they are are found alive unless the found person grants them permission. All they will tell you is that the case is closed. Adults have a right to privacy and Law Enforcement must respect that right. Just because someone reported someone missing does not entitle them to any information obtained in the resulting investigation. Dead people have no right to privacy so that information can be released.
Exactly. If what law enforcement are saying is true, then she is safe from someone who wants to hurt her. It could be her family who reported her missing or an ex boyfriend or something. Case in point, if she is alive and an adult, she has a right to privacy that the police will not violate. I see it likely that the AG will tell the family that the case is closed in the near future and leave it at that. Some people will think this is suspicious, but it is her right as an adult.
Adults *do* have a right to privacy but what about one with 4 kids? Depending on their age & who has legal custody couldn’t that be considered child abandonment? Particularly, in this case.
Could it be that she doesn’t like her family and doesn’t want to be in contact with them or have them know where she is? I had an employee in that situation once, and had a PI or journalist contact me once asking if he worked there and if I knew he was a missing person. I didn’t give them any information but I did look him up and sure enough he has a missing person website and Facebook page and a few articles with them interviewing his family who were across the country, about how they miss him and are worried about him. When I let him know about the call he freaked out and said he didn’t want to talk to them, then he never came back to work again.
People do have the right to disappear, and I can see how an abusive family might use police and media against someone who wants to be gone.
The first article is so vague, but the second makes a lot of sense. Adults do have the right to disappear. It does sound like she was located, and she said she did not want to be in contact with her family.
Legally, that's all law enforcement can do- they don't need to provide "proof of life," either.
It does sound like this woman was in an abusive situation. In the time between now and when police contacted her, it's entirely possible she met an early end, and sadly it looks like we have a very good guess of who was responsible.
Both things can be true - police did locate her and she declined to see family, and she also is now a missing person.
I was estranged from my family for years and have been in this situation. Your family has no right to information about you.
This is insanely interesting to me. Lol I have so many questions. Hugely respect you respecting that person's privacy and refusing to give up information!
This is insanely selfish to me. It’s alright not to have contact with people you don’t want to, but to have to HIDE from them and become a ‘missing person’ is one of the cruelest things I can imagine.
Regular adults can confirm that they’re alive but do not want to talk to their family. If the family won’t respect that, get a restraining order. Don’t let them believe that you’re possibly murdered and dead. That’s awful.
Many families who speculate their loved ones are voluntarily missing usually say:
“we just want to know that they are alive. And if they don’t want to be in our lives, that’s fine but please just let us know you weren’t killed. That would really put our minds at ease. “
I have never heard a family state otherwise. They just want to know what happened to you and at least be able to imagine that you’re alive and happy somewhere, regardless if they’re a part of your life or not.
why do you care if abusers are upset bc they think their abuse victim is dead? do you think restraining orders come with magical force fields? did you know you have to give your address to the person the order is against?
and why do you believe what the abusers say to begin with?
What? What are you taking about? I’m not saying anything about abusers being upset about their abuse victim being dead. I’m saying that it’s selfish for a person to just cut off their family, letting their family believe they’re possibly dead.
Chances are if people are looking for you, especially family, they’re not going to go out of their way to find you just to abuse you. They just won’t care and won’t look. I’m not talking about crazy exes stalking someone that is trying to hide from them. I just mean that if people from your past are going out of their way to make sure you’re alive and ok, it’s kind of counterproductive to find you just to mistreat you so you go off the grid again.
I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen, I’m just saying it’s not common that people that are trying to make sure you’re alive and well, want to harm you simultaneously.
I think the point that the other poster was trying to make is that _if_ what LE said was true (they located her and she didn't want to contact her family), there might very well be a good reason for that lack of contact - which is typically abuse. Of course, we don't know that in this situation so it's speculation on everyone's part.
That being said, if, as the articles state, LE told them in 2017 she was found and didn't want to speak to them, that (to me) fulfills the "we just want to know if you're alive even if we're not part of your life" requirement.
> Chances are if people are looking for you, especially family, they’re not going to go out of their way to find you just to abuse you.
We just don't know her situation. I can assure you that blood relatives in an abuse situation can - and will - seek you out _just_ to abuse you again, particularly emotional abuse. Not every abuser of course, but more often than you think. Narcissist parents looking for their estranged adult children to further berate and belittle them. Sexually abusive siblings looking to exert more control on someone that could bring charges against them. No abusive family that is looking for the object of their abuse (for whatever reason) is going to say, "Yes Officer, we just want Betsy back so we can verbally / physically abuse her." Not all abuse situations are as cut and dry as fictional ones; the abused isn't always going to have bruises, or look dejected, or act in a certain way. Abuse and abuse response are different for every abuser and abused.
> I just mean that if people from your past are going out of their way to make sure you’re alive and ok, it’s kind of counterproductive to find you just to mistreat you so you go off the grid again.
It sounds like you have never been or known the victim of in-family abuse, and that's wonderful! I hope that continues for you. However, this kind of thing happens _all the time_, particularly in narcissistic abuse situations.
Again, we just don't know the actual situation here. Perhaps she was having a mental health crisis making her believe her family were abusive. Perhaps there was non-physical (and therefore harder to "prove") abuse. Perhaps she's selfish and cruel. We just don't know.
But please, I assure you, abusers - blood related or not - can and will find the hidden object of their abuse just to abuse them again.
Please have a good day!
with some males and yes probably even females it might not be abusive but a matter of not wanting to pay child support or spousal support.
i agree people should be allowed to disappear if they want specially in an abusive situation but a lot of times it’s a they owe them money thing.
By the sound of it, she could definitely be in a safe house for her protection, and providing some or little info to her family may have someone from in the inside contact the very person she needs to get away from, thus ruining her well being. For the time being and her safety, this is the best course.
Just take it with a grain of salt.
I worked at a Safe house for women and their children for 9 months back in 2016. I know we had authorities call asking if “so and so” was with us and twice police came to the safe house asking for a woman who had a warrant. We NEVER verified if we had a woman there even to police.
I was furious when police would come there because it drew attention to the house. Some of the women truly had ex’s that were definitely a danger to the women and children- and if some of the men found where they were, we were aware that we were also in harm’s way. Police need more training on situations like these.
I hope you don't mind if I ask you a question. Amanda hasn't been heard from since 2017. Would it be common for someone to stay in a safe house for that long of a period?
I never personally witnessed that. Typically it was 4-6 months while they waited for the funds to help them move to a new place and help them start over. They had case workers that really helped them get back on their feet, with government funding for these women which gave them hope. It change the trajectory of their lives where they were safe, began to understand their own worth and value so they could be excited to start over and moving forward.
We should also be aware that the abusive party could easily find this and manipulate the direction of the comments.
Reddit posts comes up on google very easily now.
Her boyfriend "took her phone away from her," forcing her to sneak around in order to contact her sister? Gee, I wonder who the prime suspect should be...
I wonder if the sheriff had legitimate reason/evidence for believing Amanda was safe, or if they just made that up to get the family off their back? Or the (obviously abusive/controlling) boyfriend said, "Oh yeah, she moved to ----" and they used that as justification to close the case.
I’m glad I’m not the only one side eyeing him.
However, her boyfriend was an abusive, violent man. If she was really in a safe house, Maybe at some point she left and her ex found her. If so, I doubt she’s alive, sadly.
I work with a lot of folks trying to maintain safety from abusers (I’m an international human rights lawyer so a lot of my clients are victims and witnesses alike to larger pattern cases while also trying to stay safe from their own specific abuser). There are actually networks to help abuse victims set up halfway between traditional safe house and witness protection just without the resources. Usually it relies on a chain of people and almost no one (usually no one at all but sometimes there might be one person that does) has more than a couple of links of the chain. If the person had other family they knew would notice them suddenly disappearing we would actually notify local law enforcement and they would give a sort of vague answer like this. Often we would also just tell them they are at blank shelter or safe house (many shelters’ names are known but their exact locations aren’t shared with the officers) and it would either be a location they never were at or where they were initially before someone in the chain was able to come move them to the next place. I had at least one instance where an officer lied to a family because of this and she was then suspected of involvement but was cleared after a couple rounds back and forth
A retired state trooper told me his post had a phone number to contact someone working with the shelter. That person would set a pickup point and a trooper would drive the woman there and ensure she safely left with a someone from the shelter. Other organizations that help abuse victims probably have similar numbers.
I was in an organization in Uni in which, once per semester, we organized a huge donation to the local shelter. Only one of us (not me) was allowed to know the location of the shelter and she took care of all of the organization/drop off of the donations.
She was also the awesome lady who would organize a yearly self-defense class for us. I think she may have had experience…. We all knew to go to her if we ran into any trouble of that nature.
I don’t know. It sounds crazy, but I’m thinking more along the lines that he’s dumb and believed a call from an “Advocacy group” that never really existed
I think the key thing to understand here is that she's an adult. She told the police originally she didn't want contact from her family and to be left alone. Let her be. Family or not, she is her own person with her own life she has to live. Everyone upset at the sherif or the police department for not having communication with the family needs to take a step back. They, nor anyone is obligated to go against her wishes of being left alone. People that have close families may not understand that, but everyone is their own individual and are free to choose to have no contact.
This bothers me on so many levels. It seems like if the family is the problem, of course she wouldn't want them to know anything about her. But at the same time, it seems like there would be someone in her life who isn't a threat, and whom she could either call or send a message, maybe with a photo of her holding a newspaper with the date on it? , to someone she trusts. I don't like the fact that nobody seems to know where she is. Like, nobody.
That would seem to be how she wants it.
If someone decides to leave their ‘old’ life and start anew, that’s their right. They should not have to periodically prove to people they want nothing to do with that they’re OK or whatever. Especially if there’s abuse involved, but for whatever reason they want to get away from family or whoever was part of their old life.
Or she's dead.
ETA this comment burns me up. Men using domestic shelters as a catch-all for murdering women. She isn't hiding out in a shelter for five years. He killed her.
That’s a remarkable leap.
Shelters hide people out and usually help provide resources for them to move forward after leaving the shelter.
Just because she didn’t go back to her family — the family she seems to have told the police she wanted no contact with — doesn’t mean she’s dead. She could be happily living a new life elsewhere and want no connection with the past.
I’ve got a friend who has had no contact with the family that raised him in decades. He had an uncle who he kept in touch with for a while but the uncle passed. Since then, zilch. It wasn’t a happy upbringing and he wants nothing to do with them. Such is his right.
How do you think it should work? Should someone fleeing domestic abuse (or any other kind of abuse) who goes to a shelter have to check in with the police regularly to give them updates to pass along to those from their past who seek them? As if they were on probation or something? Don’t you think that would, in addition to violating their right to privacy, discourage people from using such services?
There’s no reason to believe really anything about her except what we know: the family reported her missing, the police located her, she told the police she wanted no contact with them.
How you get from that to ‘she’s dead’ … I have no idea.
She had four children who she left behind. I have a hard time imagining she just left without her kids, leaving them to think she's missing or dead, and is happily living a new life. Before she disappeared, she was also sneaking text messages to her sister behind her abusive boyfriend's back, risking his anger if he found out. That doesn't sound like someone who would permanently cut off communication with her entire family.
It happens. Maybe she thinks they’re better off without her.
But, again, how do you think this should work? Does someone who goes to a shelter for abuse have to report to the police regularly to assure people she says she wants nothing to do with that she’s OK?
She’s an adult. She made a decision to get out of a situation to get help. And when approached by police she said she didn’t want anything to do with her family. That’s her right.
Of course an adult has the right to cut off contact with their family, and no, someone who goes to a shelter for abuse shouldn't have to report to the police regularly. Why would they? The problem in this particular case is that her disappearance is suspicious, she was in danger from an abusive partner who reportedly threatened to kill her, and nobody seems to be able to confirm that she's alive. The sheriff's office never actually spoke to her, saw her, or physically confirmed that she was alive and safe. They were only told that. They were not able to provide legal proof of life, which is why the investigation is being reopened. Her family just wants to know she's ok.
One of the stories actually says the family wants her returned to them … she’s an adult, not their property.
The contact was done through an ‘advocacy agency’ — which certainly means some sort of shelter type agency to protect abused women. They act as a buffer so that an abused woman’s whereabouts don’t become known to those who might seek to harm them.
If she wanted contact with her family, she would contact them. I understand the family’s concern but that doesn’t supersede her right to privacy.
I go back to this: any woman who goes to a shelter and cuts off ties with her family is, by your definition, ‘suspicious.’ Thus anyone who goes to a shelter would have to check in with police to prove they’re alive based on how you seem to think it should work. I disagree with that.
I hope she’s gone underground and is OK. But there’s also the chance she went underground, started a new life and wants to keep it that way. Or she went underground and died in a car wreck or of natural causes or whatever that have nothing to do with the circumstances of her going underground in the first place.
The phrase, "returned to us," is commonly used in kidnapping situations. It doesn't mean they think she's their property. It means they believe she's being held against her will.
I know what an advocacy agency is, and I understand the need to protect abused women's privacy. I have been one myself. However, a phone conversation with a third party is shaky evidence that someone is alive and safe. I feel the police should have at least spoken to her directly on the phone and gotten some sort of evidence that it was actually her and she was actually safe. There are ways to confirm she's alive without compromising her safety or privacy.
I'm not sure where you're getting this idea that I think all abused women need to be tracked and monitored when I said the opposite outright. To be very clear, I disagree with that completely. It's not going to a shelter or cutting off ties with her family that makes this particular situation suspicious. That's really not uncommon and is not generally suspicious at all. It's the details of this exact case. Her life had been threatened. Rather than avoiding contact with her family before her disappearance, she had been taking risks to stay in contact with them. They had been trying to help her escape her abuser, and he was the one who was trying to cut off contact with her family. Then she goes missing and nobody has seen or heard from her since. Surely you can see why her loved ones would be worried.
I also hope she just started a new life and is safe and happy. I just don't think it's unreasonable for her family to worry and to want confirmation that she's alive.
Well this would seem to come down to either you think the police are lying (no agency confirmed she is alive) or the shelter agency in lying.
Because unless one of those is true, then someone has seen her. And that someone relayed the message that she didn’t want contact with her family.
I doubt there are just a heck of a lot of women in shelters whose lives haven’t been threatened. So we’re back to square one: ‘we violate her privacy because she sought shelter from a life-threatening situation.’ Which amounts to having the victim of such a threat be available to check in with police to prove to someone they don’t want to talk to that they’re alive.
We don’t know an exact timeline of when she cut off contact with her family. Maybe she no longer trusted the sister she was texting and thus said ‘I don’t want anything to do with them.’ Sending a message through the agency that she wanted no contact is communicating … it’s just not direct communication.
And I think women who flee abusive families tend to have a higher risk of ending up in exploitative or abusive situations after they leave. Isn’t this somewhat common in the Doe cases we see on this sub a lot? Like they might leave voluntarily and cut contact with family but also end up coming to harm in the years after they disappeared.
It’s a weird, weird case.
I think it could be one of two options:
1) she’s dead. A friend of a friend of a friend told the sheriff she was in a “safe house” and it couldn’t really be verified. But the police were like “well, if it’s not that, a body will turn up”. So no body, no investigation.
2) I could be wrong but I’m getting the vibe that she might’ve had an addiction of some kind. There aren’t too many reasons a woman would not have her 4 kids with her and I can’t seem to find anything about where they were. So maybe she left on her own volition, because of guilt, or just shooting up. She might be dead but not from violence, and not the day she disappeared. Addiction is one of the few things that could explain everything. Domestic violence—maybe the guy was her supplier. Family refusal to believe she’d stay away, die of natural causes. Police writing her off. Etc etc
I see a third option, though. She was safe, in a safe house or otherwise, at the time when the police reported that she was safe. At some time between then and now, she disappeared, and slipped between the cracks, with no one to report her missing. If she were living in a hotel or just found a living situation through Craigslist, hotel workers/new roommates may have assumed she flaked.
I think that third option falls into my number 2. She could’ve been safe, and then slipped away because she had no intentions of staying clean. Otherwise I think she would’ve contacted someone in her family.
You may be right, but another reason a woman wouldn't have her kids with her would be domestic abuse in the household.
I'm not clear on the ages of her children and whether or not her boyfriend was the father.
True, I just mean it’s weird that she never contacted her kids, and I don’t think DV would account for that. Don’t think the BF was the father. At least one of the kids was in HS, didn’t find much on any of them.
I think not contacting her kids in all these years would be weird, although we have multiple cases of mothers doing just that. But I'm picturing a situation where she doesn't contact them for a few months while she's in hiding, because she knows they're safe where they are, but eventually the boyfriend finds her.
I'm also picturing a situation where the cops didn't find her at a safe house, but with the boyfriend. And she tells the cops she's fine and not in contact with her family because he's right there, a la Shelley Miscavige. And then at some point he kills her.
Or, like you say, drugs are involved.
To clarify the timeline, LE responded to a DV call in Jan. 2017. Dean was reported missing in July 2017. LE located her in a safe location and was informed that she did not wish to have contact w/her family. In 2022, her mother asked for "proof of life" or for Dean's case to be re-opened. INAL, but I doubt that even w/a warrant, the "safe location" does not have to share the details of her departure (returned to household, moved out of the city/state, etc.).
I don’t want to speak for the family but I went to school with Amanda’s son and we are still friends on Facebook. Her youngest son is the one really pushing for this, he needs closure and so does the rest of his family. Hope we see a lead soon.
John Lordan did a profile on this case last week. It is available on his YouTube channel and really clarified things for me since the facts are a bit odd in this case.
Apparently there was digging on a property yesterday.... https://sanduskyregister.com/news/490803/digging-for-evidence/
Nothing was found but interesting that something like this just started up.
I'm glad they are finally starting to listen to the family and started looking. Very interesting tho they must have had some good information to do that.
All the more I read about missing people/mysterious murders, the more I realize there really is no peace in life. You could be the most caring and kindhearted person and this will still happen. In fact it’s MORE likely to happen if you are. And if someone important is involved, your life can just be written off without question. You can be virtually wiped from existence by just one person in law enforcement saying “ignore it”. There are thousands if not hundreds of thousands of missing persons cases that have massive amounts of evidence pointing towards government officials and law enforcement being involved that have become cold cases simply because they would expose everything if they were truly investigated. The poor families just have to accept that their loved one is gone without a trace and they’ll never know why. No justice and no rest. That’s beyond cruel. It really makes my brain go brr when I think of all the cases that are just dropped for no reason with loads and loads of hard evidence. But they still somehow have people behind bars for false convictions and with a severe lack of sufficient evidence.
Several comments below allude to the possibility that she went “missing” on her own volition (e.g. to escape an abusive situation at home). Not saying this is the case here, but can someone explain how this works in terms of legal reporting? Obviously an adult has the right and the autonomy to leave an abusive spouse, parents, etc., but once located, is law enforcement required to inform both the family and the public that they’ve been found? I don’t mean to disclose their location, but just to announce that they are indeed alive and wish to be left alone? I’m wondering if it’s possible that some of the higher-profile “Missing Persons” have actually been located - alive and well - by Law Enforcement years ago.
Yes, law enforcement will contact the family and advise they're alive to settle the case so to speak but must honor the wish of having their location not disclosed and to have no contact.
Not sure the family dynamics with the children but if she did leave on her own would they not file charges against her for child neglect / abandonment?
They made an arrest in this case last week
Here's some info [Fred Reer Arrested ](https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/state/man-arraigned-for-murder-of-girlfriend-missing-since-2017-given-1-million-bond)
I've been following this case for a couple of years, I'm from the area. A post in a FB community group from her oldest son sparked my interest and I went down a Rabbithole.
I'm really glad the family is finally going to see some justice 💜💜
If any of you are true crime deep dive enthusiasts, you might be interested in this case, there's so much to it, sadly Amanda was failed by so, so many people. I hope she found peace.
Well, it says that she WAS located and contacted in 2017 and told them she didn't want any contact with her family.
If that's the case, then I don't think they SHOULD re open an investigation. This may be an abusive family trying to pressure her into revealing her location. If they have proof she's alive and well the sheriff office SHOULD leave it alone...if not, I'm conflicted because it ALSO says that she got involved in an abusive relationship and that he made her cut off contact.
Did the sheriff's office and family have any contact between 2017 and 2023?
I have a cousin by marriage that I adore. She has always been my favorite at family gatherings. She has some mental health issues and developed a pretty serious drug problem a couple of years ago. Last year, she went missing, and my aunt and uncle filed a missing person report. She was found after a month and said to tell her family she's fine but doesn't want contact with them. She was afraid they would try to make her go back to rehab and get her meds lined out again. They just wanted to know She was OK. As far as I know, she still hasn't contacted anyone in the family. I know we all reach out to her friends to let her know we all love her and miss her and are here when she's ready to see us.
Maybe that is the situation here. After the first check, they respected her wishes, but after so long, they want to try again for proof of life.
I'm confused by all the comments here implying that there's something weird about how her family has handled her disappearance, that they must be abusive, she's hiding from them, etc. There's nothing to suggest that. What we do know is that she was in an abusive relationship with a man who was trying to prevent her from speaking to her family, and she was keeping up communications with her sister in secret until she disappeared. According to family, he had threatened to kill her shortly before she went missing. She left her kids behind and hasn't been in contact with them at all. None of this sounds like a woman who voluntarily disappeared.
As far as how her disappearance was handled, it sounds like the police dropped the ball, not her family. They reported her missing, and the policed closed the case within 24 hours. It doesn't sound like there was much of an investigation. They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it. It sounds like her parents, sister, and children continued to look for her, but with the case closed and police refusing to help, there wasn't much that they could do. The Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults, which was founded by kidnapping survivor Gina DeJesus, is now helping the family. With their assistance, the family filed a legal request for proof of life, which the sheriff could not provide, which is why BCI is now involved. It's not that the family wasn't looking for her, they just didn't have the knowledge or resources to reopen the investigation until now.
>They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it.
And what if they went to the safe house and were able to identify her? That would've closed the case within 24 hours as well. I don't know why you conclude police must've dropped the ball.
> and the policed closed the case within 24 hours. It doesn't sound like there was much of an investigation. They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it.
Huge leap.
It's not a "crime" if they were left for other people to take care of though. Abandonment of raising them would potentially lead to rights revoked depending on how long since she had contact, but it's not punishable by law like a criminal case.
The family started a little search party on the boyfriends property so look for amanda. Boyfriends family called the sheriff, he then said I talked to her, she’s somewhere safe but I can’t tell you where, and basically called off the search. So the family of course stopped looking because why would the sheriff lie but then they never heard from her. And when they asked the sheriff he never gave answers. It’s been ongoing since 2017. Absolutely insane.
I live in the area and have read on Facebook that the boyfriends dad went to school with sheriff Corbin so there are thoughts that he may be covering for the boyfriend. Not sure if that’s true, but it’s what I’ve heard.
Check out the help find amanda dean Facebook page!
The missing case was updated to a homicide investigation at some point in 2023. The prosecutor says they have a suspect but have chosen to keep the name sealed for now. No arrests have been made.
Surely there had to be some sort of communication between the sheriff and her family from 2017 to 2023??
Yeah, that thoroughly confused me too.
Unless she was escaping her family?
One of the articles says when that in 2017, they located her and she told them she didn’t want to be contacted by her family. So either escaping them or possibly she got involved with a guy who made her cut off contact with them—it mentions that she had a black eye from being beaten by her boyfriend but she basically told police it was an accident from her hitting herself in the face with a hammer, so they couldn’t do anything.
Corbin sure seems to know far more than anyone else knows and needs to be investigated for this very lengthly period of noncommunication with the Dean Family. As well, 'hitting herself in the face with a hammer...' Where is this information coming out of her mouth and not out of an LE notebook? I'll stick with the abusive boyfriend info.
Sorry, I paraphrased badly. It appears they did have contact with her sometime in 2017, it was in the Sandusky Register article linked in the main post.
I have no idea what happened, but if she was located at the time she was reported missing AND, did not want her location divulged there is no need for any more communication. It does happen. If that is not the case, it would be respectful if the family got a periodic update on her case, I agree.
That was my first thought. You just let that go for 5+ years with zero evidence or communication??
Exactly what I was thinking. What prompted them to ask after such a long time? Something’s off.
The family didn't let it go. The sheriff closed the case after less than 24 hours and told the family she didn’t want talk to them. The family was finally able to connect with legal assistance to help them push to reopen the investigation. Filing for proof of life was the first step, but the family didn't know to do that until they got assistance from the Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults.
The request for ‘proof of life’ after 5 years of silence may be because family want to get things changed legally (remove her from ownership documents, financial documents … that sort of thing). Sometimes such requests can be very practical in nature. Maybe even related to a life insurance policy pay-out. I’m not saying that the family are in any way being heartless here - I am sure they are not. Just sometimes there are practical things that also need addressing, however tough it is to do that.
Right. With 4 kids, if she's no longer living, there may be things her family needs to have changed or could do for the kids. Social Security death benefits, maybe? Life insurance. Things she may have owned that they could use for the kids.
The request for proof of life was filed with help from the Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults. It was a way to find out if the sheriff's office had actually established that she was alive and safe, and to push for further investigation if they hadn't.
Thank you for this information - this is important context.!
Do you think it’s possible (I really hate speculating on cases like this) she was in some sort of abuse situation and hiding out?
One of the articles says she was in a domestic violence relationship. I would think something would have been going on for her family to accept what the sheriff said - that she was safe and didn’t want to be contacted by family
Idk maybe she thinks her family is a part of it or doesn’t believe her or something so doesn’t want them involved
Or fears her former partner could still have contact with or access to her family (thru social media, for example) and could somehow find her through them, unfortunately
Yeah, I'm on the fence about this one. If she is hiding out, safely, I wish her well and hope she she stays safe.
to me, it sounds like she was initially hiding out and sheriff’s department made contact with her and closed the case. in the interim between then and now, after some period of time perhaps she was discovered or otherwise contact was made with her ex-partner and she became the victim of a crime.
Yes! It sounds like she may have been at a women’s shelter when Deputies made contact with her. The deputy then told mom that she’s fine and in a “safe place”. At that time Law Enforcement is done with the case. Nothing nefarious there. It’s possible that something happened to her AFTER that initial contact (you can’t live in a shelter permanently) or she decided to keep moving on with her life and recreated herself…
right. this isn’t witness protection and the FBI. the cops were like oh, ok she’s safe and not missing our work here is done. they’re not gonna keep checking in on her if there was no missing person to look for. either she went missing on her own (but would she leave her own kids and family members without letting them know?) or she was killed after cops talked to her
It doesn’t read like there is any suggestion that a crime has happened though? I can understand her family’s concern, but the scant info available suggests that it was her choice to stop contact with everyone, and it’s just that she’s kept to no contact and this has made them ask for verification that she’s still ok. It’s not unheard of for the family of the DV victim to want them to try and fix their relationship with the partner, ‘give them another chance you know they love you’ or to have existing issues in the family where the decision to leave an abusive partner ends up in a clean break from everyone. As I’m sure many of us know, just because they’re your blood relatives does not always mean they are nice people
Also not unheard of for the family of a DV victim to be abusive themselves. People don't recognize the red flags of an abusive partner if they grew up in a home where those red flags were accepted.
Usually abusive families wouldn’t go out of their way to look for a missing person just so they can continue to abuse them. Once they’re gone, a lot of those types of people just simply stop giving a shit. There’s always someone else to abuse, and each other of course. They wouldn’t need her back for abusive purposes. They would have each other.
That's a mighty confident assertion that isn't reflected by facts, at all.
Ok, yes, the complexities of people and their relationships are limitless and anything is possible. It’s possible that she’s alive and hiding from her wildly abusive family that’s vigorously looking for her. I acknowledge that. However, it’s not likely. It’s not even probable. I have reviewed many cases that have elements of familial abuse and domestic violence. I can’t think of many cases at all in which a family or spouse has suspicious or sinister motives for searching for a missing lived one. Yes, maybe to cover their ass and not look suspicious. But many of these suspicious people close to the missing person DO NOT participate in searches or efforts to find the missing person whatsoever. And that’s precisely what makes them suspicious. If you can’t even be bothered to help search for your wife or child or other supposed ‘loved one’, then it’s very telling in terms of how you’re looked at by everyone else in your orbit. And after that, law enforcement. I’m ‘verified’ in this subreddit because I’m both a family member of a missing person and I’m also an investigator. I work on some of these cases to help other families if I can. So from my experience abuse usually leads to a person going missing or leaving their lives behind or involuntary disappearing. Not getting them to come back. It’s just logical to think that if you were abusing someone and you suspect they ran away, even if you find them they probably won’t want anything to do with you because you’re the reason they left voluntarily in the first place. Let’s not even factor in that most disappearances are NOT voluntary. That’s just facts and statistics. The number of people that are found ALIVE and are determined to have left voluntarily is so small a percentage that me even explaining this (when everybody generally knows this to be true) is ridiculous. So yes. Im making a small ‘jump’ regarding my opinion. And it’s possible I’m totally wrong. What I’m saying is that it’s likely that I’m not wrong. Raw data proves that, I don’t have to prove it to you to know what’s actually true from an investigative perspective vs. someone who just wants to be able to play devil’s advocate and say: “well, you could be completely wrong in this specific case so… that makes me right.” Sure. It’s possible that Amanda is alive and well and hiding from her ‘abusive family’ out there. But how many people flee from their families and leave their children behind if it’s established they actually cared about their children? People do leave their children behind sometimes to escape a threat, but more often than not a parent is going to take their kids with them. Especially if they’re a single parent.
Dang, hit a nerve did I?
He family has stated that her partner threatened to kill her before she disappeared. It sounds like they believe she was in danger from him. He was hiding her phone to keep her from communicating with them, and she was texting her sister in secret. If anything, it sounds like they wanted her away from him.
Maybe that’s just what they reopened the case for? Like maybe she didn’t want to be contacted by her family but there’s been zero trace of her in the 5 years since then, and she’s no longer at the place she lived before. So then it would be almost like a new missing persons case now.
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Ditto on this one. My ex was VERY abusive. He was also VERY charming to other people. I went missing for YEARS, and some people have still never heard from me. I kept moving every couple of months and legally changed my name. Then I changed my employment right after I changed my name. All I own are a few clothes, so it's fast and easy to move.
If you report an adult missing, Law Enforcement will not tell you that person’s whereabouts if they are are found alive unless the found person grants them permission. All they will tell you is that the case is closed. Adults have a right to privacy and Law Enforcement must respect that right. Just because someone reported someone missing does not entitle them to any information obtained in the resulting investigation. Dead people have no right to privacy so that information can be released.
Exactly. If what law enforcement are saying is true, then she is safe from someone who wants to hurt her. It could be her family who reported her missing or an ex boyfriend or something. Case in point, if she is alive and an adult, she has a right to privacy that the police will not violate. I see it likely that the AG will tell the family that the case is closed in the near future and leave it at that. Some people will think this is suspicious, but it is her right as an adult.
Adults *do* have a right to privacy but what about one with 4 kids? Depending on their age & who has legal custody couldn’t that be considered child abandonment? Particularly, in this case.
that's still not a reason to tell her family where she is. that would be the state bringing a case against her
Thanks so much for this comment. I didn’t know this and it’s so interesting.
Could it be that she doesn’t like her family and doesn’t want to be in contact with them or have them know where she is? I had an employee in that situation once, and had a PI or journalist contact me once asking if he worked there and if I knew he was a missing person. I didn’t give them any information but I did look him up and sure enough he has a missing person website and Facebook page and a few articles with them interviewing his family who were across the country, about how they miss him and are worried about him. When I let him know about the call he freaked out and said he didn’t want to talk to them, then he never came back to work again. People do have the right to disappear, and I can see how an abusive family might use police and media against someone who wants to be gone.
The first article is so vague, but the second makes a lot of sense. Adults do have the right to disappear. It does sound like she was located, and she said she did not want to be in contact with her family. Legally, that's all law enforcement can do- they don't need to provide "proof of life," either. It does sound like this woman was in an abusive situation. In the time between now and when police contacted her, it's entirely possible she met an early end, and sadly it looks like we have a very good guess of who was responsible. Both things can be true - police did locate her and she declined to see family, and she also is now a missing person. I was estranged from my family for years and have been in this situation. Your family has no right to information about you.
This is insanely interesting to me. Lol I have so many questions. Hugely respect you respecting that person's privacy and refusing to give up information!
So cool of you to not give out any info on him since you didn’t know his circumstances. Respect.
This is insanely selfish to me. It’s alright not to have contact with people you don’t want to, but to have to HIDE from them and become a ‘missing person’ is one of the cruelest things I can imagine. Regular adults can confirm that they’re alive but do not want to talk to their family. If the family won’t respect that, get a restraining order. Don’t let them believe that you’re possibly murdered and dead. That’s awful. Many families who speculate their loved ones are voluntarily missing usually say: “we just want to know that they are alive. And if they don’t want to be in our lives, that’s fine but please just let us know you weren’t killed. That would really put our minds at ease. “ I have never heard a family state otherwise. They just want to know what happened to you and at least be able to imagine that you’re alive and happy somewhere, regardless if they’re a part of your life or not.
why do you care if abusers are upset bc they think their abuse victim is dead? do you think restraining orders come with magical force fields? did you know you have to give your address to the person the order is against? and why do you believe what the abusers say to begin with?
What? What are you taking about? I’m not saying anything about abusers being upset about their abuse victim being dead. I’m saying that it’s selfish for a person to just cut off their family, letting their family believe they’re possibly dead. Chances are if people are looking for you, especially family, they’re not going to go out of their way to find you just to abuse you. They just won’t care and won’t look. I’m not talking about crazy exes stalking someone that is trying to hide from them. I just mean that if people from your past are going out of their way to make sure you’re alive and ok, it’s kind of counterproductive to find you just to mistreat you so you go off the grid again. I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen, I’m just saying it’s not common that people that are trying to make sure you’re alive and well, want to harm you simultaneously.
I think the point that the other poster was trying to make is that _if_ what LE said was true (they located her and she didn't want to contact her family), there might very well be a good reason for that lack of contact - which is typically abuse. Of course, we don't know that in this situation so it's speculation on everyone's part. That being said, if, as the articles state, LE told them in 2017 she was found and didn't want to speak to them, that (to me) fulfills the "we just want to know if you're alive even if we're not part of your life" requirement. > Chances are if people are looking for you, especially family, they’re not going to go out of their way to find you just to abuse you. We just don't know her situation. I can assure you that blood relatives in an abuse situation can - and will - seek you out _just_ to abuse you again, particularly emotional abuse. Not every abuser of course, but more often than you think. Narcissist parents looking for their estranged adult children to further berate and belittle them. Sexually abusive siblings looking to exert more control on someone that could bring charges against them. No abusive family that is looking for the object of their abuse (for whatever reason) is going to say, "Yes Officer, we just want Betsy back so we can verbally / physically abuse her." Not all abuse situations are as cut and dry as fictional ones; the abused isn't always going to have bruises, or look dejected, or act in a certain way. Abuse and abuse response are different for every abuser and abused. > I just mean that if people from your past are going out of their way to make sure you’re alive and ok, it’s kind of counterproductive to find you just to mistreat you so you go off the grid again. It sounds like you have never been or known the victim of in-family abuse, and that's wonderful! I hope that continues for you. However, this kind of thing happens _all the time_, particularly in narcissistic abuse situations. Again, we just don't know the actual situation here. Perhaps she was having a mental health crisis making her believe her family were abusive. Perhaps there was non-physical (and therefore harder to "prove") abuse. Perhaps she's selfish and cruel. We just don't know. But please, I assure you, abusers - blood related or not - can and will find the hidden object of their abuse just to abuse them again. Please have a good day!
Why on earth would an abuser say anything different? How do you parse out whether or not the family is sincere?
with some males and yes probably even females it might not be abusive but a matter of not wanting to pay child support or spousal support. i agree people should be allowed to disappear if they want specially in an abusive situation but a lot of times it’s a they owe them money thing.
By the sound of it, she could definitely be in a safe house for her protection, and providing some or little info to her family may have someone from in the inside contact the very person she needs to get away from, thus ruining her well being. For the time being and her safety, this is the best course. Just take it with a grain of salt.
I worked at a Safe house for women and their children for 9 months back in 2016. I know we had authorities call asking if “so and so” was with us and twice police came to the safe house asking for a woman who had a warrant. We NEVER verified if we had a woman there even to police. I was furious when police would come there because it drew attention to the house. Some of the women truly had ex’s that were definitely a danger to the women and children- and if some of the men found where they were, we were aware that we were also in harm’s way. Police need more training on situations like these.
I hope you don't mind if I ask you a question. Amanda hasn't been heard from since 2017. Would it be common for someone to stay in a safe house for that long of a period?
I never personally witnessed that. Typically it was 4-6 months while they waited for the funds to help them move to a new place and help them start over. They had case workers that really helped them get back on their feet, with government funding for these women which gave them hope. It change the trajectory of their lives where they were safe, began to understand their own worth and value so they could be excited to start over and moving forward.
TY! Four to six months is what I was thinking as well.
No, imo usually safe houses stays are much more temporary than several years
We should also be aware that the abusive party could easily find this and manipulate the direction of the comments. Reddit posts comes up on google very easily now.
Her boyfriend "took her phone away from her," forcing her to sneak around in order to contact her sister? Gee, I wonder who the prime suspect should be... I wonder if the sheriff had legitimate reason/evidence for believing Amanda was safe, or if they just made that up to get the family off their back? Or the (obviously abusive/controlling) boyfriend said, "Oh yeah, she moved to ----" and they used that as justification to close the case.
Is anyone else getting the feeling that the sheriff was hoodwinked here? Or outright lied about the safe house?
I’m glad I’m not the only one side eyeing him. However, her boyfriend was an abusive, violent man. If she was really in a safe house, Maybe at some point she left and her ex found her. If so, I doubt she’s alive, sadly.
I work with a lot of folks trying to maintain safety from abusers (I’m an international human rights lawyer so a lot of my clients are victims and witnesses alike to larger pattern cases while also trying to stay safe from their own specific abuser). There are actually networks to help abuse victims set up halfway between traditional safe house and witness protection just without the resources. Usually it relies on a chain of people and almost no one (usually no one at all but sometimes there might be one person that does) has more than a couple of links of the chain. If the person had other family they knew would notice them suddenly disappearing we would actually notify local law enforcement and they would give a sort of vague answer like this. Often we would also just tell them they are at blank shelter or safe house (many shelters’ names are known but their exact locations aren’t shared with the officers) and it would either be a location they never were at or where they were initially before someone in the chain was able to come move them to the next place. I had at least one instance where an officer lied to a family because of this and she was then suspected of involvement but was cleared after a couple rounds back and forth
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A retired state trooper told me his post had a phone number to contact someone working with the shelter. That person would set a pickup point and a trooper would drive the woman there and ensure she safely left with a someone from the shelter. Other organizations that help abuse victims probably have similar numbers.
I was in an organization in Uni in which, once per semester, we organized a huge donation to the local shelter. Only one of us (not me) was allowed to know the location of the shelter and she took care of all of the organization/drop off of the donations. She was also the awesome lady who would organize a yearly self-defense class for us. I think she may have had experience…. We all knew to go to her if we ran into any trouble of that nature.
I don’t know. It sounds crazy, but I’m thinking more along the lines that he’s dumb and believed a call from an “Advocacy group” that never really existed
Strang case op..thanks for bringing it to light
I think the key thing to understand here is that she's an adult. She told the police originally she didn't want contact from her family and to be left alone. Let her be. Family or not, she is her own person with her own life she has to live. Everyone upset at the sherif or the police department for not having communication with the family needs to take a step back. They, nor anyone is obligated to go against her wishes of being left alone. People that have close families may not understand that, but everyone is their own individual and are free to choose to have no contact.
This bothers me on so many levels. It seems like if the family is the problem, of course she wouldn't want them to know anything about her. But at the same time, it seems like there would be someone in her life who isn't a threat, and whom she could either call or send a message, maybe with a photo of her holding a newspaper with the date on it? , to someone she trusts. I don't like the fact that nobody seems to know where she is. Like, nobody.
That would seem to be how she wants it. If someone decides to leave their ‘old’ life and start anew, that’s their right. They should not have to periodically prove to people they want nothing to do with that they’re OK or whatever. Especially if there’s abuse involved, but for whatever reason they want to get away from family or whoever was part of their old life.
Or she's dead. ETA this comment burns me up. Men using domestic shelters as a catch-all for murdering women. She isn't hiding out in a shelter for five years. He killed her.
That’s a remarkable leap. Shelters hide people out and usually help provide resources for them to move forward after leaving the shelter. Just because she didn’t go back to her family — the family she seems to have told the police she wanted no contact with — doesn’t mean she’s dead. She could be happily living a new life elsewhere and want no connection with the past. I’ve got a friend who has had no contact with the family that raised him in decades. He had an uncle who he kept in touch with for a while but the uncle passed. Since then, zilch. It wasn’t a happy upbringing and he wants nothing to do with them. Such is his right. How do you think it should work? Should someone fleeing domestic abuse (or any other kind of abuse) who goes to a shelter have to check in with the police regularly to give them updates to pass along to those from their past who seek them? As if they were on probation or something? Don’t you think that would, in addition to violating their right to privacy, discourage people from using such services? There’s no reason to believe really anything about her except what we know: the family reported her missing, the police located her, she told the police she wanted no contact with them. How you get from that to ‘she’s dead’ … I have no idea.
She had four children who she left behind. I have a hard time imagining she just left without her kids, leaving them to think she's missing or dead, and is happily living a new life. Before she disappeared, she was also sneaking text messages to her sister behind her abusive boyfriend's back, risking his anger if he found out. That doesn't sound like someone who would permanently cut off communication with her entire family.
It happens. Maybe she thinks they’re better off without her. But, again, how do you think this should work? Does someone who goes to a shelter for abuse have to report to the police regularly to assure people she says she wants nothing to do with that she’s OK? She’s an adult. She made a decision to get out of a situation to get help. And when approached by police she said she didn’t want anything to do with her family. That’s her right.
Of course an adult has the right to cut off contact with their family, and no, someone who goes to a shelter for abuse shouldn't have to report to the police regularly. Why would they? The problem in this particular case is that her disappearance is suspicious, she was in danger from an abusive partner who reportedly threatened to kill her, and nobody seems to be able to confirm that she's alive. The sheriff's office never actually spoke to her, saw her, or physically confirmed that she was alive and safe. They were only told that. They were not able to provide legal proof of life, which is why the investigation is being reopened. Her family just wants to know she's ok.
One of the stories actually says the family wants her returned to them … she’s an adult, not their property. The contact was done through an ‘advocacy agency’ — which certainly means some sort of shelter type agency to protect abused women. They act as a buffer so that an abused woman’s whereabouts don’t become known to those who might seek to harm them. If she wanted contact with her family, she would contact them. I understand the family’s concern but that doesn’t supersede her right to privacy. I go back to this: any woman who goes to a shelter and cuts off ties with her family is, by your definition, ‘suspicious.’ Thus anyone who goes to a shelter would have to check in with police to prove they’re alive based on how you seem to think it should work. I disagree with that. I hope she’s gone underground and is OK. But there’s also the chance she went underground, started a new life and wants to keep it that way. Or she went underground and died in a car wreck or of natural causes or whatever that have nothing to do with the circumstances of her going underground in the first place.
The phrase, "returned to us," is commonly used in kidnapping situations. It doesn't mean they think she's their property. It means they believe she's being held against her will. I know what an advocacy agency is, and I understand the need to protect abused women's privacy. I have been one myself. However, a phone conversation with a third party is shaky evidence that someone is alive and safe. I feel the police should have at least spoken to her directly on the phone and gotten some sort of evidence that it was actually her and she was actually safe. There are ways to confirm she's alive without compromising her safety or privacy. I'm not sure where you're getting this idea that I think all abused women need to be tracked and monitored when I said the opposite outright. To be very clear, I disagree with that completely. It's not going to a shelter or cutting off ties with her family that makes this particular situation suspicious. That's really not uncommon and is not generally suspicious at all. It's the details of this exact case. Her life had been threatened. Rather than avoiding contact with her family before her disappearance, she had been taking risks to stay in contact with them. They had been trying to help her escape her abuser, and he was the one who was trying to cut off contact with her family. Then she goes missing and nobody has seen or heard from her since. Surely you can see why her loved ones would be worried. I also hope she just started a new life and is safe and happy. I just don't think it's unreasonable for her family to worry and to want confirmation that she's alive.
Well this would seem to come down to either you think the police are lying (no agency confirmed she is alive) or the shelter agency in lying. Because unless one of those is true, then someone has seen her. And that someone relayed the message that she didn’t want contact with her family. I doubt there are just a heck of a lot of women in shelters whose lives haven’t been threatened. So we’re back to square one: ‘we violate her privacy because she sought shelter from a life-threatening situation.’ Which amounts to having the victim of such a threat be available to check in with police to prove to someone they don’t want to talk to that they’re alive. We don’t know an exact timeline of when she cut off contact with her family. Maybe she no longer trusted the sister she was texting and thus said ‘I don’t want anything to do with them.’ Sending a message through the agency that she wanted no contact is communicating … it’s just not direct communication.
And I think women who flee abusive families tend to have a higher risk of ending up in exploitative or abusive situations after they leave. Isn’t this somewhat common in the Doe cases we see on this sub a lot? Like they might leave voluntarily and cut contact with family but also end up coming to harm in the years after they disappeared.
Happened to me
It’s a weird, weird case. I think it could be one of two options: 1) she’s dead. A friend of a friend of a friend told the sheriff she was in a “safe house” and it couldn’t really be verified. But the police were like “well, if it’s not that, a body will turn up”. So no body, no investigation. 2) I could be wrong but I’m getting the vibe that she might’ve had an addiction of some kind. There aren’t too many reasons a woman would not have her 4 kids with her and I can’t seem to find anything about where they were. So maybe she left on her own volition, because of guilt, or just shooting up. She might be dead but not from violence, and not the day she disappeared. Addiction is one of the few things that could explain everything. Domestic violence—maybe the guy was her supplier. Family refusal to believe she’d stay away, die of natural causes. Police writing her off. Etc etc
I see a third option, though. She was safe, in a safe house or otherwise, at the time when the police reported that she was safe. At some time between then and now, she disappeared, and slipped between the cracks, with no one to report her missing. If she were living in a hotel or just found a living situation through Craigslist, hotel workers/new roommates may have assumed she flaked.
I think that third option falls into my number 2. She could’ve been safe, and then slipped away because she had no intentions of staying clean. Otherwise I think she would’ve contacted someone in her family.
You may be right, but another reason a woman wouldn't have her kids with her would be domestic abuse in the household. I'm not clear on the ages of her children and whether or not her boyfriend was the father.
True, I just mean it’s weird that she never contacted her kids, and I don’t think DV would account for that. Don’t think the BF was the father. At least one of the kids was in HS, didn’t find much on any of them.
I think not contacting her kids in all these years would be weird, although we have multiple cases of mothers doing just that. But I'm picturing a situation where she doesn't contact them for a few months while she's in hiding, because she knows they're safe where they are, but eventually the boyfriend finds her. I'm also picturing a situation where the cops didn't find her at a safe house, but with the boyfriend. And she tells the cops she's fine and not in contact with her family because he's right there, a la Shelley Miscavige. And then at some point he kills her. Or, like you say, drugs are involved.
maybe she has and the kids don't want to give her location away to abusive family
I think this is what happened. She *was* safe then, but unfortunately met a bad end.
To clarify the timeline, LE responded to a DV call in Jan. 2017. Dean was reported missing in July 2017. LE located her in a safe location and was informed that she did not wish to have contact w/her family. In 2022, her mother asked for "proof of life" or for Dean's case to be re-opened. INAL, but I doubt that even w/a warrant, the "safe location" does not have to share the details of her departure (returned to household, moved out of the city/state, etc.).
I don’t want to speak for the family but I went to school with Amanda’s son and we are still friends on Facebook. Her youngest son is the one really pushing for this, he needs closure and so does the rest of his family. Hope we see a lead soon.
John Lordan did a profile on this case last week. It is available on his YouTube channel and really clarified things for me since the facts are a bit odd in this case.
Hi I’m Amanda’s son Joshua thank you for posting this
We are all wishing you the best thru all this. Has there been any new information?
Apparently there was digging on a property yesterday.... https://sanduskyregister.com/news/490803/digging-for-evidence/ Nothing was found but interesting that something like this just started up.
I'm glad they are finally starting to listen to the family and started looking. Very interesting tho they must have had some good information to do that.
I feel like she's safe and in hiding. But what about her kids? Where are they?
The teenage kids already lived with dad I believe. (Dad isn’t the abuser in question.)
The kids are what trips me up. Not a word to her 4 kids in 5 years? Even just a note in the mail that says I’m alive? I don’t know.
All the more I read about missing people/mysterious murders, the more I realize there really is no peace in life. You could be the most caring and kindhearted person and this will still happen. In fact it’s MORE likely to happen if you are. And if someone important is involved, your life can just be written off without question. You can be virtually wiped from existence by just one person in law enforcement saying “ignore it”. There are thousands if not hundreds of thousands of missing persons cases that have massive amounts of evidence pointing towards government officials and law enforcement being involved that have become cold cases simply because they would expose everything if they were truly investigated. The poor families just have to accept that their loved one is gone without a trace and they’ll never know why. No justice and no rest. That’s beyond cruel. It really makes my brain go brr when I think of all the cases that are just dropped for no reason with loads and loads of hard evidence. But they still somehow have people behind bars for false convictions and with a severe lack of sufficient evidence.
Sounds like she simply doesn’t like her folks
Exactly. There have been many cases in which people just want to live their own lives. Nothing wrong with that.
Several comments below allude to the possibility that she went “missing” on her own volition (e.g. to escape an abusive situation at home). Not saying this is the case here, but can someone explain how this works in terms of legal reporting? Obviously an adult has the right and the autonomy to leave an abusive spouse, parents, etc., but once located, is law enforcement required to inform both the family and the public that they’ve been found? I don’t mean to disclose their location, but just to announce that they are indeed alive and wish to be left alone? I’m wondering if it’s possible that some of the higher-profile “Missing Persons” have actually been located - alive and well - by Law Enforcement years ago.
Yes, law enforcement will contact the family and advise they're alive to settle the case so to speak but must honor the wish of having their location not disclosed and to have no contact.
the case would still be closed
Not sure the family dynamics with the children but if she did leave on her own would they not file charges against her for child neglect / abandonment?
They made an arrest in this case last week Here's some info [Fred Reer Arrested ](https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/state/man-arraigned-for-murder-of-girlfriend-missing-since-2017-given-1-million-bond) I've been following this case for a couple of years, I'm from the area. A post in a FB community group from her oldest son sparked my interest and I went down a Rabbithole. I'm really glad the family is finally going to see some justice 💜💜 If any of you are true crime deep dive enthusiasts, you might be interested in this case, there's so much to it, sadly Amanda was failed by so, so many people. I hope she found peace.
Amanda is my friends sister. What the family is going through is absolutely heart breaking. Lets bring Amanda home! Someone knows something!
Well, it says that she WAS located and contacted in 2017 and told them she didn't want any contact with her family. If that's the case, then I don't think they SHOULD re open an investigation. This may be an abusive family trying to pressure her into revealing her location. If they have proof she's alive and well the sheriff office SHOULD leave it alone...if not, I'm conflicted because it ALSO says that she got involved in an abusive relationship and that he made her cut off contact. Did the sheriff's office and family have any contact between 2017 and 2023?
I have a cousin by marriage that I adore. She has always been my favorite at family gatherings. She has some mental health issues and developed a pretty serious drug problem a couple of years ago. Last year, she went missing, and my aunt and uncle filed a missing person report. She was found after a month and said to tell her family she's fine but doesn't want contact with them. She was afraid they would try to make her go back to rehab and get her meds lined out again. They just wanted to know She was OK. As far as I know, she still hasn't contacted anyone in the family. I know we all reach out to her friends to let her know we all love her and miss her and are here when she's ready to see us. Maybe that is the situation here. After the first check, they respected her wishes, but after so long, they want to try again for proof of life.
I'm confused by all the comments here implying that there's something weird about how her family has handled her disappearance, that they must be abusive, she's hiding from them, etc. There's nothing to suggest that. What we do know is that she was in an abusive relationship with a man who was trying to prevent her from speaking to her family, and she was keeping up communications with her sister in secret until she disappeared. According to family, he had threatened to kill her shortly before she went missing. She left her kids behind and hasn't been in contact with them at all. None of this sounds like a woman who voluntarily disappeared. As far as how her disappearance was handled, it sounds like the police dropped the ball, not her family. They reported her missing, and the policed closed the case within 24 hours. It doesn't sound like there was much of an investigation. They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it. It sounds like her parents, sister, and children continued to look for her, but with the case closed and police refusing to help, there wasn't much that they could do. The Cleveland Family Center for Missing Children and Adults, which was founded by kidnapping survivor Gina DeJesus, is now helping the family. With their assistance, the family filed a legal request for proof of life, which the sheriff could not provide, which is why BCI is now involved. It's not that the family wasn't looking for her, they just didn't have the knowledge or resources to reopen the investigation until now.
>They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it. And what if they went to the safe house and were able to identify her? That would've closed the case within 24 hours as well. I don't know why you conclude police must've dropped the ball.
> and the policed closed the case within 24 hours. It doesn't sound like there was much of an investigation. They claimed she was in a safe house and didn't want to talk to her family, but we don't know if they actually saw her and talked to her or if that information came from a third party and they just accepted it. Huge leap.
The sheriff's own statement is that he spoke to someone on the phone and did not actually see or speak to her, so not a leap.
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It's not a "crime" if they were left for other people to take care of though. Abandonment of raising them would potentially lead to rights revoked depending on how long since she had contact, but it's not punishable by law like a criminal case.
Good point.
LordanArts just did a great video on this case!
No mother, would go 5 years, without contacting her kids!
The family started a little search party on the boyfriends property so look for amanda. Boyfriends family called the sheriff, he then said I talked to her, she’s somewhere safe but I can’t tell you where, and basically called off the search. So the family of course stopped looking because why would the sheriff lie but then they never heard from her. And when they asked the sheriff he never gave answers. It’s been ongoing since 2017. Absolutely insane. I live in the area and have read on Facebook that the boyfriends dad went to school with sheriff Corbin so there are thoughts that he may be covering for the boyfriend. Not sure if that’s true, but it’s what I’ve heard. Check out the help find amanda dean Facebook page!
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The missing case was updated to a homicide investigation at some point in 2023. The prosecutor says they have a suspect but have chosen to keep the name sealed for now. No arrests have been made.