The Zombie Hunter: Trial Started for Arizona's Real-Life Serial Killer and His Victims

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Frequently dressing up in Cosplay and known by friends as “Zombie Hunter,” Bryan Patrick Miller is also known as the Canal Killer by police after his 2015 arrest for the murders of Angela Brosso and Melanie Bernas in 1992 and 1993.

Known by his friends as the “Zombie Hunter,” Bryan Patrick Miller, 46, began his death penalty trial on October 14, 2019, in Phoenix, Ariz. Charged with the 1992 and 1993 murders of Angela Brosso and Melanie Bernas, investigators wonder if there could there be more victims.

Miller was arrested at his North Phoenix home on January 13, 2015, ending a search for a killer that haunted the Valley for more than two decades.

The Victims

Angela Brosso, 22, grew up in Camp Hill, Pa., outside of Harrisburg. Friends and family describe her as “happy go lucky” and fearless. “She was a force,” her mother Linda told E.J. Montini, a columnist at the Arizona Republic. “One of the things her father said about her was that she changed the nature of a room when she entered it. And it’s true, you know? She really did.”

She was a shy little girl who always wore dresses, with long blonde hair her mom would put in buns, pigtails and French braids. Her mom called her Angie.

Angela was an adventurer and an animal lover. In high school, Angela worked at Kentucky Friend Chicken and would spend everything she made on her guinea pigs and bunnies.

During a careers-day program in high school, Angela saw a presentation from a representative at DeVry Institute and enrolled in their school in Newark, N.J. for two years. She then transferred to the DeVry in Los Angeles and graduated with honors. Shortly thereafter, Angela accepted a job at Syntellect, a Phoenix electronics company and moved to North Phoenix where she resided with her boyfriend at an apartment complex located at I-17 and Cactus Avenue.

Angela would be nearly 50 now, had gone out for an afternoon bicycle ride in late 1992, along a bike path that snakes through the city along the Arizona Canal. Her nude and mutilated torso was found in a dirt field near her apartment complex. Her head discovered several days later, about a mile from her home, floating in a canal grate near Metro Center.

With Phoenix Police Department’s best working her case, it would come to haunt them throughout the years.

“Every homicide is a tragedy, but I can honestly say this was one of the most horrific murders to ever occur in the history of this city,” now-retired Detective Leo Speliopoulos told the Arizona Republic.

Though Speliopoulos has never said what evidence was collected at the scene, he has clearly stated what wasn’t found: No witness, no description of a suspect, no weapons, no belongings, and no bike.

Ten months after Angela Brosso’s murder, the body of Melanie Bernas was found floating in the Arizona Canal not far from where Angela’s body had been found.

Melanie Bernas was a junior at Arcadia High school and described as the “girl next door” with dreams of becoming a doctor. She was an achiever who had visits with Pepperdine University and the University of California-Berkeley scheduled just weeks after her death. Her friend Daphne Marcus told the Arizona Republic that she grew up just up the street from Melanie and would ride bikes, have sleepovers, and jump on Melanie’s trampoline growing up.

Melanie was found near I-17 and Dunlap on September 21, 1993. She had been stabbed several times; a turquoise bodysuit lay nearby. Her mountain bike - missing to this day.

Police later linked the two murders. To snare the perpetrator, police entered the DNA profile collected at the scene into the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) – and waited.

Police followed hundreds of tips over the years, even placing street signs along the path near where the bodies were found. Local reporters worked for years on stories to remind the public the murders were still unsolved.

Police revisited the case over and over throughout the years, accumulating enough files to justify its own cabinet.

Police enlisted the help of the Vidocq Society, an organization consisting of forensic experts who dedicate their time to solving cold cases to develop a profile of the man who would likely be their killer. Analyzing the cases, Vidocq predicted the man would still be living in the general area of the murders and would have committed precursor crimes. A man who possibly acted out fantasies and set fires. Vidocq detectives also said it was possible police had crossed paths with the individual earlier in the investigation.

When police circumnavigated the case files, they found Miller who, as a juvenile, had been arrested in the stabbing of a woman at Paradise Valley Mall in 1990. A precursor event that supported Vidocq’s predictions.

Miller told police he stabbed the woman because she reminded him of his mother.

Throughout the years Miller had avoided detection by police because his DNA profile had not been entered into CODIS, the national DNA database that cross-references DNA samples from crime scenes with convicted felons.

Phoenix Police Sergeant Trent Crump said Miller had been interviewed when the murders occurred, but there was no physical evidence tying him to the case.

In the weeks before the arrest, police had been surveilling Miller and, using a ruse, collected his DNA. Crump would not say what kind of ruse was used but admitted that it is relatively simple to obtain DNA from items people discard.

Who is Bryan Patrick Miller?

Bryan Patrick Miller is described as quiet by his landlady but went on to say he wasn’t a good tenant and rarely paid his rent on time. She explained the reason she didn’t kick him out was because of her affection for Miller’s 15-year-old daughter, Sarah.

Other renters described him as a shy and a not “quite normal” young man who would dress up in Cosplay, who drove an old decommissioned police car with lights on top and prominent sticker on the trunk reading Zombie Hunter.

Miller marketed himself as the Zombie Hunter on Facebook and other social media platforms, offering to make appearances at zombie walks and comic bookstores. Miller’s Facebook photographs feature the macabre and reflect a wide range of hobbies to include the fantasy subculture, steampunk, and Comic-Con.

On another popular website called DeviantArt, artists can upload their work and share it with the public. Like Facebook, fans of the art site would “like” the photographs. Miller chose to like some of the most frightening images consisting of women who were decapitated or horrifically mutilated.

Miller lived with his daughter Sarah and was a member of the Mennonite Church. Ironically, Mennonites are non-violent and tend to oppose violence and war.

Court records indicate Miller had petitioned for full custody of his daughter in 2008, claiming Sarah was suffering from health problems living with her mother who Miller claimed was homeless and unemployed.

The Arrest

On January 14, 2015, over 25 years after the gruesome murders of Melanie Bernas and Angela Brosso, police arrested Miller, 42 at the time, as a suspect after getting a DNA match using genealogy software.

According to court documents, Miller denied involvement in the murders but had no explanation of how his DNA matched the profile found on the victims. Miller told police that he lived near the bike path and admitted to frequently biking the path.

Police say they are not ruling out the potential that Miller could be connected to other Valley murders. Crump said Miller had moved to Hawaii and Washington prior to returning to Phoenix. Phoenix investigators are continuing to work with other state agencies analyzing unsolved murders for any connections. Crump told the Arizona Republic that it would be “very unusual” if Brosso was Miller’s first victim and Bernas his last.

When police made the arrest at Miller’s home on Ninth Street and Mountain View Road, one could see officers carrying out numerous boxes of items and even a bicycle.

When investigating the scene, police described Miller as a classic hoarder. “Floor to ceiling, it was packed with all sorts of junk – boxes to paper to furniture – I can’t even tell you what wasn’t in there,” said Crump.

Are There More Victims?

Reports obtained by ABC 15, revealed Miller’s own mother called Phoenix Police out of the blue to tell them her son had a strange obsession with Angela Brosso’s case over the years.

Miller’s ex-wife also made claims there may be more victims. In 2015, police released new details in the case that all but confirm those suspicions.

Brandy Myers

Brandy Myers, 13, vanished on May 26, 1992, while knocking on neighborhood doors raising money for her school’s book club. She just so happened to live in the same neighborhood as Miller.

Brandy’s sister Kristin Thelen describes her sister as having diminished mental capacity and very trusting. “So, we walked by him every single day. We had no idea we were living by this monster,” said Thelen. “He lived three blocks from my house and one block from our school.”

Police now believe Miller’s house was the last door Brandy knocked on. “I will tell you that he is a very strong investigative lead in the investigation,” said Crump. In fact, Phoenix police filed a first-degree murder charge against Miller in the disappearance of Brandy. However, the county attorney declined prosecution, stating there was “no likelihood of conviction.”

Miller’s ex-wife Amy’s interviews with police revealed that Miller had confessed to Brandy’s murder decades ago saying, “He grabbed her and dragged her into the house,” Amy told Crime Watch Daily. “At the time I truly believed he was just making up the story.”

Thelen recalls the day Brandy disappeared. “I was supposed to go with her,” said Thelen. “He pulled her into the house, killed her, dismembered her, and threw her body out in the trash,” said Thelen.

Thelen is calling for Miller to confess to the crime. Brandy's body has never been found and Phoenix Police say the investigation is ongoing.

Adrienne Salinas

On June 15, 2013, Adrienne Salinas, 19, was walking to a local gas station to get a cab. Somewhere between her apartment and the station only a quarter-mile away, she vanished.

Adrienne was living in Tempe, Ariz., and attending community college. Her friends talk about her smile and how she was soft-spoken, describing her as one of the sweetest and nicest people they have ever met.

Out on her own for the first time, she lived with two roommates. She also had a job but had been unable to work after suffering from Valley Fever and undergoing lung surgery.

The night she disappeared; Adrienne had left a party that she attended with several friends. That evening, police received a 911 dispatch call reporting a car driving erratically on First Street and had just hit a curb and had two flat tires. The vehicle plate matched Adrienne’s vehicle.

Adrienne had abandoned her car just a few blocks from her apartment. She sent a text to her boyfriend at 4:43 a.m. that she was coming over. Ten minutes later, she called for a cab.

By 5:07 a.m. she either turned her phone off or it went dead and so did her trail.

On August 6, Adrienne’s body was found in a wash in Apache Junction near the Superstition Mountains, 30 miles away from where she was last seen.

There had been a storm with 6 feet of rushing water going through a wash. When the water receded, her remains were found.

DNA confirmed is was Adrienne but in the medical examiner report, it doesn’t mention her head or hands, stating the remains were mummified, mostly just bones. Many questioned if she had been decapitated.

After learning about Adrienne’s condition, Keene Azariah went to Tempe Police and suggested they look at his friend Bryan Patrick Miller.

Azariah claimed he and Miller had attended a party together a mile away from Adrienne’s apartment on the same weekend she vanished. Her body was also found close to where Miller regularly participated in Steampunk and Cosplay activities.

“If you consider that he’s under investigation for murder and he’s a mile away from our case, it’s definitely on our radar,” said Detective Akey of Tempe Police Department. “He’s under investigation for this case, yes. Another person we would like to have a conversation with.”

Tempe Police say the murder of Adrienne is an ongoing investigation.

Shannon Aumuck

Shannon Aumuck, 16, resembled Brandy Myers and vanished when she ran away from a group home not far from Brandy Myers North Phoenix neighborhood. She was never reported missing.

Her body was found on May 27, 1992, in the north valley and remained unidentified until 2011. She had been buried as a Jane Doe at Twin Buttes Cemetery in Tempe until her body was exhumed on March 22.

Shannon was classified as a “throwaway child” who lived her life in foster care under Child Protection Services (CPS). She was a chronic runaway who had behavioral problems and contact with police constantly. According to police, between 1989 and 1991 it was reported she ran away at least 40 times.

Shannon’s birth has been a result of a sexual assault to a 16-year old mother and adopted out to a family who lived in Flagstaff and later moved to Scottsdale. Because of Shannon’s out of control behavior they gave her back to CPS when she was 12.

Her body had been found in a trash pile by an ATV rider in the rural area of 26^th Street and Deer Valley Road. “She was tossed aside in death as she was in life,” Detective Stuart Somershoe told the East Valley Tribune.

Somershoe and his colleague Will Anderson took over the case in late 2010. They soon found Shannon’s birth mother still lived in the Valley and collected a DNA profile from her. The two then began reviewing 1,600 reports on runaways between 1991 and 1994 hoping to identify the girl which eventually led to an unidentified girl buried in the Tempe cemetery. Shannon’s cause of death was strangulation.

Police continue to investigate Shannon’s murder and hope they can provide answers for both Brandy and Shannon’s families. “Nobody who dies should ever go as unidentified,” Somershoe said. “Everybody has a mother; everybody has a brother. The good news is that we have identified her. The bad news is we still have a child murderer on the loose.”

Whereabouts Unknown: The Disappearance of Maura Murray

Maura Murray vanished February 9, 2004, from Haverhill, NH.

Over 15 years ago, a young woman got into her beat-up Saturn on a cold winter night, drove away from her dorm room, and was never seen again. Maura Murray, 21, was a nursing student completing her junior year at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She vanished on the evening of February 9, 2004, in Woodsville, New Hampshire, a village in Haverhill.

At approximately 7:27 p.m., a local woman heard a loud noise outside her home, and through her window, she could see a car up against the snowbank along the sharp corner of Route 112. A passing motorist who also lived close by stopped at the scene of the accident, asking the woman driving the car if she needs help, but the woman declined and told the concerned citizen that she had called AAA roadside assistance.

The individual decided to call and report the incident to emergency services, but at 7:46 p.m. when police arrived at the scene, the lady driving the vehicle had disappeared. The police traced the car to Maura.

Maura's Early Life

Maura was born May 4, 1982, in Hanson, Massachusetts, the fourth child of Fred and Laurie Murray. Raised in an Irish Catholic household, Maura’s parents divorced when she was six, and Maura primarily lived with her mother.

Graduating from Whitman-Hanson Regional High School, Maura was a star athlete on the school’s track team. After high school, she was accepted at West Point in New York where she studied chemical engineering for three semesters.

While Maura was a good student and gifted athlete, she allegedly had some improvements to make in her personal life. During her time at West Point, Maura had stolen about five dollars’ worth of makeup from a commissary that resulted in an honor code violation. However, Maura was allowed to leave West Point without getting expelled, allowing her to transfer to the UMass Amherst nursing program.

While her father pushed her to succeed, she had also been busted for stealing a credit card that belonged to another dorm student, using the card at several restaurants around town. The charge had been continued in December to later be dismissed after three months of good behavior.

After midnight on February 9, Maura used her computer to search MapQuest for directions to the Berkshires and Burlington, Vermont. The first communication Maura had with anyone was at 1:00 p.m. when she emailed her boyfriend. She also called the New Hampshire Condo Association about a condominium for rent.

At 1:24 p.m. Maura then emailed her supervisor at the nursing school notifying her that she would be out of town for a week due to sudden death in the family. Her family later confirmed no one in the family has passed away.

Maura’s then made a phone call to a number in Vermont that provides recorded information about booking hotels in Stowe, Vermont. Her final call was to her boyfriend’s phone leaving him a message that they would talk later.

Maura then proceeded to pack her car with personal belongings, college textbooks, and birth-control pills. She drove off-campus in her 1996 Saturn sedan at approximately 3:30 p.m. Classes had been canceled that day due to a snowstorm.

When campus police later searched her room, they found most of her belongings were packed in boxes and pictures taken down from the walls. They also found a printed email to her boyfriend indicating they were having trouble in their relationship.

At 3:40 p.m., Maura withdrew $280 from an ATM. The closed-circuit footage showed she was alone. Maura then purchased about $40 dollars’ worth of alcohol, including Bailey’s Irish Cream, Kalua, vodka, and a box of Franzia wine. The security footage again showed Maura alone. At some point during the day, she also picked up the accident report from the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles.

Maura left Amherst between 4 and 5 p.m., probably headed north on Interstate 91 north toward Vermont. The police investigation revealed there is no evidence she told anyone where she was going, or whether she had even picked a destination.

The Accident

According to the official police log, at 7:46 p.m. a Haverhill police officer arrived at the accident scene but didn’t find anyone in the car. The car had impacted a tree on the driver’s side, pushed the radiator into the fan and severely damaged the left front headlight. The vehicle’s windshield was also cracked, both airbags deployed, and the car locked.

The officer found red stains that appeared to be red wine both inside and outside of the car with a damaged box of wine in the back seat. He also found a AAA card in Maura’s name, a map to Burlington, Vermont, Maura’s favorite stuffed animal, and a book named Not Without Peril -150 Years of Misadventure on the Presidential Range of New Hampshire about climbing in the White Mountains.

Maura’s debit card, credit cards, and cell phone were all missing, with no activity since her disappearance. Police later reported some of the bottles of purchased alcohol were also missing.

Alleged Sighting

At approximately 8:30 p.m. that evening, a contractor returning home saw a young person on foot traveling eastbound on Route 112 about 4 or 5 miles east of where Maura’s car was discovered. However, this lead would not be reported until three months later.

Police search for Maura Murray who vanished February 9, 2004. Photo courtesy of Valley News.

Police Investigation

The day following Maura’s disappearance, a “Be on The Lookout” (BOLO) was issued for her. A voicemail was left for Fred Murray informing him that his daughter was missing, and her car had been found abandoned. When he called the Haverhill Police Department, he was told that if Maura was not found by the following morning, the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department would initiate a search. With snow on the ground, the average temperature in Haverhill is 38 degrees during the day, plunging to 18 degrees at night.

Fred Murray appears on the Montel Williams Show about missing adults in 2004.

The Search Goes National

The FBI joined the search within ten days of Maura’s disappearance and Haverhill announced that search had gone nationwide. Meanwhile, Maura’s father interviewed on CNN’s American Morning pleading with someone to come forward. Eventually, Fred was interviewed on the Montel Williams Show reaching millions.

New Hampshire Fish and Game had conducted a ground search in the days following, but 10 days after Maura’s disappearance they conducted a ground and air search utilizing a helicopter with a thermal imaging camera, tracking dogs and cadaver dogs. Maura's scent was picked up approximately 100 yards from the vehicle but suddenly stopped indicating to police she may have gotten into a passing vehicle.

Fred Murray returned to Haverhill nearly every weekend to search for Maura until police informed him that they were receiving complaints he was trespassing on private property.

What People Think Happened

Maura’s disappearance has been referred to as “the first crime mystery of the social media age.” Facebook was only 5 years old and Twitter and YouTube didn’t even exist yet. Now social media is one of the most popular methods of communication and now you can find websites and podcasts dedicated to finding Maura.

On online forums and message boards, you can find armchair detectives analyzing and sharing their theories, obsessively connecting pieces of a puzzle that remains a mystery.

While there is little evidence that suggests what exactly happened to Maura, amateur sleuths seem to join one of four categories; people think she went missing on her own and started a new life somewhere, Maura died of exposure, she committed suicide in the woods, or killed by a killer who preyed upon her at her most vulnerable time.

The most popular theory is that Maura was picked up by a killer possibly local to the area, someone who knew Maura, or someone just passing through town. This theory is based upon the dogs losing her scent in the middle of the road, not too far from her crashed vehicle.

With some, Occam’s Theory abounds meaning the “more assumptions you have to make, the more unlikely the explanation, believing she simply died of exposure after becoming dazed as a result of crashing her car into a tree along a hairpin turn.

Fred Murray speaks to Oxygen News about the disappearance of his daughter Maura Murray. Photo courtesy of Oxygen News.

What Her Family Thinks Happened

Maura’s older sister Julie was very close to Maura. Julie told Oxygen News that her last conversation with her sister, 2 days prior, was about her upcoming trip to Myrtle Beach during spring break. When asked why Maura would leave school and potentially drive to the White Mountains, Julie's response was, “My guess would be to take a couple of days and clear her head but it doesn’t make sense to go up there alone.”

Maura’s father Fred thinks something bad happened to his daughter. He emotionally told investigative journalist Maggie Freleng his theory. “A guy grabbed her walking down the road and killed her. Probably that night.” He said his one wish is that he could just see her one last time. “I think she was really upset about something and drove there. I don’t know why she went,” said Fred.

Fred went on to describe his daughter as pleasant and funny. She was determined even as a little girl and a straight-A student. Now, over 15 years later, her father remains most determined to find her.

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

America's Homeless Are Going Missing

With over 500,000 homeless in the United States, homeless cities are popping up at record numbers Photo courtesy Mercury News, San Jose, Calif.

The numbers are staggering. According to the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), in the United States, there were approximately 554,000 homeless people on any given night last year. Sadly, that number is rising.

According to Forbes, cities with the highest rate of homelessness are in one of five states: California (129,972), New York (91,897), Florida (31,030), Texas (25,310), and Washington (22,304). It's not surprising that the problem has become much more visible in urban areas and over half of all homeless people live in one of the country’s 50 largest cities.

Homelessness is an issue that permeates many societies throughout the world but seems to be a unique struggle in the United States. One might be surprised to know, the Big Apple has one of the lowest levels of unsheltered homeless, at 5%, while in Los Angeles, 75% of people were found in unsheltered locations.

People who are homeless are often not able to secure and maintain regular, safe, and secure housing. Many become transient, never staying in one place for any length of time . . . wandering the streets, from city to city.

Who Are the Homeless? 

People often become homeless when the economic issues collide with their housing issues and often include other factors such as domestic violence, physical disability, mental illness, addiction, transitioning into adulthood, and strains on relationships.

Many homeless people start out with jobs and homes; then social and economic factors intervene.

Something that we see more and more often these days is homelessness caused by untreated Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), along with untreated depression and other serious mental illnesses.

According to the Mental Illness Policy Org., in January 2015, the most extensive survey ever undertaken by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) revealed 250,000 homeless individuals suffered from varying mental illnesses. That is 45% of the total homeless population.

At any given time, there are many more people with untreated severe psychiatric illnesses living on the streets than are receiving care in hospitals. Approximately 90,000 individuals with schizophrenia or manic-depressive illness are in hospitals receiving treatment for their disease.

How Many Homeless Are Missing?

As of April 30, 2018, there were 86,927 people in the United States listed as missing in the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. There are no statistics available about missing persons and homelessness being a factor in the disappearance.

To further complicate any understanding of the numbers, homeless shelters and service providers ride a very delicate line. Due to privacy-related HIPAA regulations, tracking a person that is navigating the hodgepodge of homeless services can be nearly impossible. Providers do not report entry logs with missing person systems because of HIPAA. Also, there is no training to use the counts to collect information and data that can help identify known missing persons.

As the law stands, adult persons can come and go as they please. Unlike with missing children, there is no statute requiring law enforcement to even take a report, though in some state’s legislation has been passed to change that and improvements being made.

Organizations like Missing and Homeless are urging communities to work collaboratively with the homeless with direct outreach efforts beyond that system that is in place. Small providers, nonprofits and homeless individuals themselves are more successful in assisting with the search efforts of other missing people.

What Happens When a Loved One is Homeless and Goes Missing?

There is nothing more intense and emotional than not knowing where someone you love is. The ambiguity alone can cause extreme emotional turmoil. Families are left frantically searching, hanging fliers, begging for media exposure, and talking to anyone who will listen in an attempt to find they're missing loved one.

Bridget Pendell vanished April 2003 and despite hundreds of leads she has never been seen again. Photo courtesy of SF Gate/Flier courtesy Kym Pasqualini - National Center for Missing Adults.

Bridget Pendell's Story

Bridget Pendell may look like a wasted-thin drug addict and could be wandering the streets of San Francisco or turning tricks in Portland or Phoenix. Or she could be dead, just another unidentified missing person buried in the city’s Potter’s Field.

Her sister Jackie Horne wants to know what happened to Bridget. She has spent the last 15 years searching for her, traveling from New York to San Francisco to scour the city for her missing sister.

Jackie Horne leaves missing person posters on mailboxes in the Haight district of San Francisco. Photo courtesy of SF Gate/Flier courtesy Kym Pasqualini - National Center for Missing Adults.

Pendell would be 46 now and shows just how easily homeless can disappear. Horne travels the hard-core sections of the city where women sell their bodies for sex and drugs, leaving missing person posters on mailboxes, giving out her missing person posters and scanning the worn-out faces. Horne quietly asks for help from anyone who will listen.

Bridget's Early Life

Pendell was a beautiful young girl who grew up in Plattsburg, New York, and graduated high school before becoming a Barbizon model student. She eventually became a nurse and met the “man of her dreams,” married, and had a baby girl named Sasha. Pendell had met some friends who followed the Grateful Dead, and she joined them and began following the band throughout the country.

Followers of the Grateful Dead followed the band to different locations throughout the country.

Divorce and Disappearance

Pendell’s new lifestyle broke the marriage apart as her husband would have no part in the lifestyle she was dabbling in. Following their divorce, Pendell began wandering between New York, Kansas, and Florida, sometimes with Sasha. There she began using heroin and cocaine and by 1996, she had succumbed to drugs and prostitution.

Pendell’s mother took Sasha while Pendell continued to live in California. Her last chance was when the family decided the only way to save Pendell was to have her enter a two-month drug rehabilitation program. If she refused, no one was certain what would happen to her.

She accepted the help and entered into Seton Health System rehab center. A doctor’s report explaining Pendell’s condition read: “Above average intelligence.” She was released from rehab two days early and immediately left for San Francisco.

Jackie Horne walks the streets of San Francisco talking to the home to help find her missing sister Bridget Pendell.

Her Sister's Search

From the answers Horne receives while out searching, it seems Pendell is known everywhere, yet a phantom in a dark world few can imagine.

“I saw her a couple of days ago, I swear,” a prostitute named Crystal said as she brushed on mascara, getting ready to hit the chaos of Mission Street. “She works this street. Shoots up heavy.” Another man said he believed Pendell went by the nickname Butterfly.

Now joining in the search is Pendell’s daughter Sasha, who, despite her mother vanishing, has maintained Straight As at school. Growing up without her mother, she did know her mother was on drugs. “Maybe she feels bad . . . maybe she doesn’t want to come back into my life while she’s on drugs . . . but if I could see her, I would tell her I wasn’t mad.”

Leads have been received from across the country, but most have led back to San Francisco and Santa Cruz. Another possibility is that known rapist, Jack Bokin killed Pendell. Horne reached out to him and he never denied killing her. It is unknown what happened to Pendell and if she is still alive out there somewhere.

Horrified seeing the numbers of other missing, San Francisco authorities explained to Horne that every year, hundreds of homeless die in the city, most identified.

Nobody knows exactly how many chronically homeless people are missing. Losing touch with family and friends, they are joining a steady stream of panhandlers and those sleeping on the sidewalk. Going under the radar, with no identification, no address, no welfare checks, they are impossible to follow.

According to the California Department of Justice, more than 17,000 women like Pendell are reported missing in California every year, but no records are kept about how many are homeless. Nearly 300 are found deceased, and although most are found safe, approximately 100 remain missing—whereabouts unknown. Morgues throughout California maintain remains of over 2,000 people, dating back 45 years, who have never been identified.

“We have about two bodies per year we can’t identify, and we cremate another 160 because we make an identification but can’t find relatives to claim them,” said Herb Hawley, administrator at the San Francisco medical examiner’s office. It is a similar story throughout the country.

"It’s just like she vanished off the face of the earth,” said Horne as she walks up and down a line of homeless men and women waiting for lunch at a local church. “These guys in line, all those homeless people around downtown—they have relatives, too, and hopefully some of those relatives know where they are. But Bridget? Nothing.”