Families of missing gather in Columbia
With nearly two dozen people missing or unaccounted for in Tuolumne County since 1980, family members and friends came together at Columbia State Historic Park on Saturday for the first Tuolumne County Missing Persons Awareness Day.
About 75 people attended the event, which included a group prayer and testimonies by some family members about their missing loved ones. The event was organized by private investigator Chuck Jones; his wife, Andrea; former Carole Sund-Carrington Memorial Reward Foundation Director Kim Petersen; and Linda Hatter, whose son, Allen Martin, disappeared in February and is still one of the missing.
The families of seven of the missing were represented: Carl Knight (April 2008), Allen Martin (February 2016), Nita Mayo (August 2005), Troy Galloway (March 2016), Darvis Lee Jr. (October 2010), Willie Elgen (January 2011) and Patty Tolhurst (April 2014). The organizers hope to make it an annual event aimed at keeping the cases in the public eye in hopes of gaining information that will bring them answers.
Jeff Jardine: 209-578-2383, @JeffJardine57
This story was originally published September 10, 2016 at 5:25 PM with the headline "Families of missing gather in Columbia."