This week Vanished Without a Trace investigates the case of 30-year-old teacher Tara Grinstead, who went missing after a day with helping out at a beauty pageant.
October 23 2005 in Ocilla, Georgia, and former-beauty queen Tara Grinstead attends a local pageant where she is coaching contestants and then heads to a barbecue.
The next day she fails to show up for work and her co-workers phone the police who head to her house. There they find her unlocked car outside but her purse and keys are missing.
Right away the cops get a bad feeling and get the Georgia Bureau of Investigation in on the case.
However, no sign of a struggle is found and the case soon goes pretty much cold.
The case was highlighted by a CBS News show in 2008 and the police they had found a latex glove with DNA near her home, but they were unable to match it.
In 2009 Grinstead’s disappearance was the subject of a hoax, with a prankster posting a video online claiming to have killed 16 women.
Watch the Latest on our YouTube ChannelFinally in February 2017 a tip led to the police arresting Ryan Alexander Duke, a former student of Grinstead’s. Cops suspect that he was burgling her home when he was discovered and strangled her, before removing her body and burning it.
Vanished Without a Trace airs on Mondays at 8:00 PM on Investigation Discovery.