Tawnya Dawn Knight (3 of Clubs, Kansas)

In June 1997, a farmer in Spring Hill, Kansas, found a human skull in his soybean field. The remains were identified as 15-year-old Tawnya Dawn Knight, who had been reported missing six months earlier. But here’s the twist that set the case on a path of frustration for decades: law enforcement had planned to search that exact field back in December 1996, right after she vanished. The search was called off at the last minute because a family member told police he’d received a phone call from Tawnya saying she was fine and would come home when her family life got better. The police believed him. They marked her as a runaway. Six months later, her remains were found in the field they never searched.

The Runaway That Wasn’t

Tawnya’s mother, Lori, never bought the runaway story. She told police from Arizona that her daughter had left without taking any clothes, money, or belongings—things a real runaway would pack. Tawnya had moved to Kansas about a year and a half before she disappeared to live with her father, Frank, and stepmother, Judy. She was doing well in school, had a part-time job at a grocery store, and was working on getting her driver’s permit. “Parents know their kids better than the authorities,” Lori said. But the Spring Hill Police Department entered Tawnya into the National Crime Information Center as a runaway and didn’t push further.