The family and friends of a Chicago woman who went missing in the Bahamas last month are calling on the United States to intervene in the investigation into her disappearance.
Taylor Casey was last seen on June 19, about two weeks into a monthlong yoga retreat on Paradise Island in Nassau. Her family and friends held a news conference in Chicago on Thursday, Casey’s 42nd birthday, demanding action from the federal government.
“Please help us find Taylor,” Casey’s mother, Colette Seymore, said through tears. “I just want the senators to light a fire under the people in the Bahamas feet so they can correctly search for my child and help to bring my child home.”
Casey’s friends and relatives have been urging Illinois’ senators to pressure the State Department and FBI for help. They said they want U.S. officials to intervene with Bahamian authorities in Casey’s disappearance.
“If we don’t have answers, we’re going to keep pushing,” Emily Williams, a close friend of Casey’s, said. “That’s why we’re calling on the senators, Dick Durbin, Tammy Duckworth, to put pressure on the State Department, to tell the Royal Bahamian Police Force to get the FBI down there right now and find Taylor.”
A spokesperson for Durbin’s office called Casey’s disappearance “deeply distressing”
“It’s critical that the U.S. continues to work with the Government of the Bahamas to support all efforts to locate her,” the spokesperson said in an email. “The Senator and his staff are doing their best to provide support and regularly communicate with our State Department and the Government of the Bahamas to expedite this critical process.”
A representative for Duckworth’s office did not immediately return a request for comment.
In an interview with NBC News on Wednesday, Casey’s mother revealed that her daughter is transgender. She said that she did not want to initially disclose that publicly because she feared it would negatively affect the search for her daughter.
At Thursday’s news conference, Casey’s friends and family repeated some of their previous criticisms of the Bahamian authorities over their handling of the investigation.
They accused Bahamian National Security Minister Wayne Munroe of telling reporters information that contradicts what U.S. Embassy officials told Casey’s family and friends.
Munroe told reporters in June that he believed the FBI was advising the RBPF’s investigation into Casey’s disappearance. But Casey’s family and friends told NBC News on Wednesday that the embassy told them the FBI was not involved in the case.
The embassy referred NBC News to the State Department.
"We have no higher priority than the safety and security of U.S. citizens abroad," a spokesperson for the State Department said in an email. "We stand ready to provide consular assistance to U.S. citizens in need and to their families."
The spokesperson added that the State Department does not share information with the media about private U.S. citizens without their written consent and referred NBC News to the FBI.
A spokesperson for the FBI referred NBC News to the Royal Bahamas Police Force and declined to comment further. The RBPF did not immediately return a request for comment regarding the involvement of the U.S. government in Casey’s disappearance.
Scott Duffey, a former criminal investigator at the FBI who is a co-director of the Wilmington University Criminal Justice Institute in Delaware, said that the FBI would surely be assisting the investigation by now if the Bahamian authorities found any signs of foul play in Casey’s disappearance.
“I just don’t see the FBI not being in lock step with the authorities there if there was the slightest, and I mean slightest, bit of information to indicate that she did not disappear on her own,” Duffey said.
Police have not indicated there is any evidence of foul play. They have recovered Casey’s phone and a journal, but her passport remains missing. Seymore and Williams cleared out the tent Casey was staying in at the retreat, which they said still contained most of her personal belongings.
If the FBI were assisting in the case, Duffey said, the family most likely would have heard from the agency by now.
“The FBI typically doesn’t typically wait for the family to be sounding the alarm for them to say, ‘Oh, OK. Now we’ll get involved,’” he said. “That’s not how the FBI works.”
In an interview with NBC News on Wednesday, Seymore said she was under the impression that the RBPF was “unconcerned” with her daughter’s disappearance.
During Thursday’s news conference, Seymore pointed to the RBPF’s announcement last week that it had put its chief superintendent, Michael Johnson — who leads the department’s criminal investigations — on leave and under investigation. She suggested this strengthened her argument that her daughter’s case was being handled with a “lack of care.”
The family said they were expecting to get an update from the RBPF by the end of the week. The update did not come in time for Casey’s birthday.
“Taylor, today is your birthday, and we all just want to say happy birthday, although it’s not so happy because you are not here with us,” Seymore tearfully said. “The pain I felt 42 years ago while birthing you doesn’t compare to the pain I feel on today with you missing out of our lives.”
She added, “I wonder: Where you are? Are you OK? Are you in danger? Are you sick? Are you hurt? My nights are sleepless with worry about you. I am lost without you. We all are.”
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