Missing: Florida

On this episode Steph discusses missing persons Ali Gilmore & Reny Jose, both from Florida.



RESOURCES USED


https://charleyproject.org/case/ali-iisha-gilmore
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna18561766
https://www.wtxl.com/news/crime_watch/the-insiders-ali-gilmore-where-did-she-go/article_8c5424c2-f51b-11e4-91e4-77e8977fc627.html
https://www.mysuncoast.com/2021/10/11/unsolved-florida-ali-gilmore-case-15-years-later/
https://www.frontpagedetectives.com/p/cold-case-florida-missing-victim#:~:text=Ali%20I%E2%80%99isha%20Gilmore%20was%20reported%20missing%20on%20Feb.,spoke%20to%20her%20over%20the%20weekend%2C%20police%20said.
https://projectcoldcase.org/2018/06/04/ali-gilmore/#:~:text=Gilmore%20disappeared%20just%20as%20her%20dreams%20were%20all,she%20never%20called.%20Gilmore%20was%20four%20months%20pregnant.

2nd case
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/reny-jose-still-missing-after-8-years-family-begs-for-answers/ar-AAUXD7Z
https://www.mypanhandle.com/news/crime/cold-case/cold-case-family-still-looking-for-college-senior-after-six-years/
https://charleyproject.org/case/reny-jose
Bonus case
https://www.disneydining.com/missouri-children-found-in-florida-near-disney-bb1/#:~:text=Children%20Missing%20for%20a%20Year%20Found%20Less%20Than,Walt%20Disney%20World%20Resort%20in%20Lake%20Buena%20Vista.
https://lawandcrime.com/crime/documents-reveal-why-prosecutors-believe-a-mother-abducted-her-own-kids-and-went-on-the-run-after-no-showing-court/
https://www.disneydining.com/missouri-children-found-in-florida-near-disney-bb1/

Episode Transcript

(00:04):
Welcome to the mother never did comeon. It's Dark Cast Network Indie pods

(00:29):
with a Dark Side. Hello everybody, welcome to Sinister Story Hour. This
is the story time that you didn'tget with your friendly neighborhood librarian. My
name is Steph and I'm back withanother missing person's episode. As we make
our way through the US, andtoday we arrived to Florida. Now,

(00:52):
if anyone in the true crime worlddoesn't hear Florida and automatically think of Florida
and Crazy Times being synonymous, thenyou haven't listened to enough true crime.
And that's actually why I expected Floridato be the leader in missing persons cases,
so it was a little bit surprisedwhen I saw that it's actually second.

(01:14):
In fact, it just follows Californiawith five point six missing people for
every one hundred thousand, and todayI'm going to talk about just a few.
The first one I have for youis a girl that was born in
January nineteen seventy six to working classparents in Florida. Her parents named her
Ali Aisha Grimsley. In high school, Ali was a track star, and

(01:38):
after school, when she wasn't atthe track, she was working at her
local public's market. Ali had alreadybegan to set her sights on college,
and she had a lot of potential. And it wasn't just at track.
She had equal amounts of intelligence andmotivation and of course athleticism. She kind

(01:59):
of strikes me as the girl thatI wish I was in high school.
She attended Florida A and M University, and she landed a great job,
and she had met somebody at anearby mall and they fell in love.
Soon the couple would marry. Alireally wanted to own a home, and
as you can already tell in mystory, she has the drive and the

(02:21):
perseverance to make exactly that happen.She can accomplish pretty much whatever she sets
her mind to. Not too muchlater, Ali and her husband, James
become homeowners in a nice neighborhood ofTallahassee, Florida. Ali was also four
months pregnant, and she had everythingshe wanted basically. By the time she

(02:42):
was thirty. She's living the dreamjust like she'd planned. But the stress
of the bills became a little bittoo much for the couple, as it
sometimes can, and stupid arguments wouldrandomly break out and cause both Ali and
James to become really frustrated with eachother. So they mutually decided to take
a short break and James moved intohis brother's house for a while. Ali

(03:07):
was really hoping to make things workwith James, even though there were some
problems, but she really wanted thingsto work out. I can also imagine
that the pregnancy was a lot ofa factor there. You want things to
work out for your child. Buteven though they were going to couples counseling
at the time, she was datingother men. In the meantime, However,

(03:31):
all of Ali's carefully planned out accomplishmentsin life seemed to go up and
smoke, and Ali was never heardfrom again since the early morning hours of
February third, two thousand and six. On February second, Ali had left
her job at Public's Market around elevenPM and she had gotten home just fine.

(03:52):
Apparently she'd been on the phone witha friend or a family member around
twelve forty five am. It wasn'tuntil she missed work on that Friday and
Monday without a call, but peoplereally close to her began to worry that
wasn't like her at all, andShe was then reported missing on February sixth.

(04:12):
When police went to Ali's home andlooked around, the door was locked
and her porchlight was on. Policefound her purse, wallet, and car
were all still at her house,and that's how we know she arrived home
from her part time job. Nothinginside the home showed any signs of a
struggle, and the only thing thatappeared missing were Ali's house keys. Her

(04:33):
bed had the blanket drawn back asthough she'd been laying on it, and
a pregnancy book was lying on hernightstand right next to her bed. For
a time, police believed Ali choseto go missing, after all, her
and her husband had split up,and a few days later she had learned
she was pregnant. On top ofthat, Ali was worried about finances losing

(04:55):
her house, especially now that herhusband, James wasn't contributing to expect senses.
Friends and family, even Alie's neighborsknew that something was amiss. Not
only was it not like Alie tomiss work without calling in, but Ali's
not going to just not show upand leave all of a sudden. She's

(05:15):
an expecting mother and she really neededthe support of her friends and family nearby.
She was a really responsible woman.She'd never done anything like this before,
and she had also suffered a miscarriageprior to that. She was being
very diligent about this pregnancy, andthe family knew that something was going on,

(05:38):
so at the family's urging, policelooked further into Ali's disappearance. James,
her estranged husband, was obviously thefirst suspect that police would look into
for the missing mother to be,but he was quickly cleared of any wrongdoing.
He had a rock solid alibi andevidence to also back up his alibi,

(06:00):
Plus, James was giving police hisfull co operation at that point.
Large scale searches were conducted all overTallahassee and in the nearby Appalacha Cola Forest.
Billboards were posted near highways, butstill nothing turned up. We've just
reached the seventeen year mark of Ali'sdisappearance and she's still never been found.

(06:23):
Police brought in another suspect named DwightAldridge in twenty twenty one. Detectives had
several reasons to believe the Eldrige eitherdid something to Ali and her baby,
or perhaps knows what happened to them. Was Dwight some one that maybe Ali
was dating before her disappearance. Policehave been pretty tight lipped about it,

(06:44):
and from what I can tell,there's no more movement in this case since
then. Alie Gilmore is five sixweighed one hundred eighty pounds and was a
black woman. She had dark brownhair and brown eyes. She has pierced
ears and a scar on her abbdeman as well as her name Ali tattooed
on her chest. Should you knowwhat happened to Ali, You're encouraged to

(07:05):
call crime Stoppers at one eight sixsix nine seven nine zero nine two two
and you can do this anonymously andthere is a thirty thousand dollars reward for
information leading to Ali's recovery. Mynext case is a twenty one year old
man named Rennie Jose. Rennie isof East Indian South Asian descent. He

(07:30):
went missing March third, twenty fourteen, from Panama City, Florida. At
the time of Rennie's disappearance, hewas attending Rice University in Houston, Texas.
He was a senior and he'd beenstudying mechanical engineering with a four point
oh great average, which is amazing. Rennie was excited for his future,

(07:50):
and he had resumes ready to gowith graduation only a few months away,
and I can only imagine the hugethings that Rennie was going to go on
to do. He also had allof his business suits pressed and he was
awaiting all of those interviews that heknew he was going to get. He
even had business cards made, andhis future appeared to be very bright.

(08:13):
On March first, he and twentytwo other students took a road trip to
Panama City for spring break. Heand a few friends rented a house there.
Rennie figured that this was his lastchance to enjoy the freedom and all
of his accolades he worked so hardto accomplish as a student were about to
come to fruition, so this wasreally time to let his hair down and

(08:39):
enjoy himself before he goes out andhe has to become an adult. Two
days after arriving to Panama City,Rennie would vanish around seven pm, never
to be heard from again. Hissoul called friends he had rented the home
with, didn't call the report Renniemissing until eleven am the next day.

(09:01):
After finding some of his clothing onthe beach, police came out and took
the report and didn't notify his familyuntil four pm that same day. Cleanup
crews working the same beach at sixam had said Rennie's clothing was not on
the beach when they were there earlierin that morning. Police found his cell
phone and more of his clothes ina trash bin behind the rental house.

(09:24):
Rennie's wallet, laptop, and suitcasewere still in the bedroom that he was
staying in. Rennie's family arrived inPanama City on the fifth of March,
absolutely puzzled as you can imagine onwhat could have possibly happened to their son
and brother. Sixteen of the twentytwo students had already left by the time

(09:45):
the family got there. Police surmisedthat Rennie had drowned in the ocean.
The ocean water was still pretty coldfor that time of year even in Florida,
and Rennie's so called friends said thatRennie had taken some LSD and he
was talking about hurting himself. Thatreally doesn't add up, though, and

(10:05):
it doesn't add up for me,but it definitely didn't add up for his
family. Rennie was never a druguser. He rarely even consumed alcohol,
so this was really a stretch.Plus he was excited about his future.
He was ready to graduate, hewas ready to land a magnificent job.
He wasn't suicidal by any means.And I mean, honestly, you can

(10:31):
look at all those pressed suits andthink of how excited he was about his
future. Right, that doesn't necessarilymean anything, but it does show me
that he was very meticulous in hisplanning and he was really excited about what
was coming. That left six remainingfriends of Rennie's left for the family and

(10:54):
police to talk to. Four ofthem gave different stories, and two refused
outright to talk to Rennie's family.One even secured an attorney. If all
of that doesn't raise red flags foryou, I'm not sure what does.
If found alive today, Rennie wouldbe thirty years old. He's five ten,

(11:15):
two hundred and twenty pounds, withdark brown hair and brown eyes.
Should you have any information on thedisappearance of Rennie, please call Bay County
Sheriff's Department at eight five zero sevenfour seven four seven zero zero. And
as for those friends, at leastone, if not all, of them

(11:37):
know something. My bonus case foryou this episode is one with a happy
ending, which I rarely get todo. This case started in Missouri as
two children, ages ten and eleven, a sister and brother, respectively,
were abducted by their non custodial mother, thirty six year old Christie. The

(11:58):
children are Brooke and Adrian Gilli.Adrian as a down syndrome child and Broke
as his younger sister by one year. The whole family had originally lived in
Texas, and when the kid's father, Blake, and mother Christie, divorced,
joint custody was given to both ofthem. Christie decided to move herself

(12:18):
and the children to Independence, Missouri, where her sister lived. The father
apparently followed, and when a custodyhearing was scheduled for both in Missouri,
Christie took the kids and moved toCalifornia with then she was staying with her
grandfather in Chico, California. Blakeonly found this out when the Marigold School
District in Chico had sent a letterto him requesting the kids' school records.

(12:43):
An APB was put out on Christiefor kidnapping her children and failure to appear
for her custody hearing. From there, Christie moved from state to state and
altered the appearance of her children andherself. Every time Christie tried to enroll
them in school, the school districtwould contact Blake asking for school records for

(13:05):
the children. When Blake would callChristie, she refused to allow him to
speak with the children. And she'dbeen on the run with the kids for
almost a year. What does thishave to do with Florida, you may
ask. Well, February first ofthis year, police were doing a routine
check of vehicle tags in a parkinglot of a wind Dixie grocery store in

(13:28):
High Springs, Florida, about twohours north of Disney World. The vehicle
came back registered to a fugitive.Police found Christie and the two children inside
the store and they were apprehended.The children are now eleven and twelve years
old, and they were returned safelyto their father in Missouri. So there

(13:50):
you have it. If you haveany information that could be of any use,
please reach out to authorities. Youcould bake the difference in one of
these cases. I'll return next timewith a case of a serial killer that
I personally had not heard of.I also want to give a huge thank
you to my one and only podcastBestie for the research in this episode.

(14:13):
You know who you are and thankyou. Have a terrific week everyone,
and be kind to each other.Bye. Site of some of the most
famous true crime cases in history,but there's more than meets the eye to
the crime in California. Joined Sean, Jessica, and Charles on the California

(14:35):
True Crime Podcast as they cover crimeboth infamous and overlooked from around our state
while looking at the deeper history thatgoes beyond the beaches and movie stars.