Missing: Bryce Laspisa and Brian Shaffer (Part 1)

MISSING PERSONS: Bryce Laspisa was a 19-year-old college student when he disappeared on August 30, 2013. Brian Shaffer was a 27-year-old medical student at Ohio State University when he disappeared on April 1, 2006.

Neither has been seen since the nights they vanished and despite tips and reports, there have been no solid leads to where they could be. While it’s hoped they are still alive, their families and friends are searching for any information on what happened to their loved ones.

Bryce Laspisa

Bryce Laspisa was born on April 30, 1994, and is the only child of Mike and Karen Laspisa. While he grew up in Chicago, Illinois, and graduated from Naperville Central High School in 2012, Bryce’s parents decided that once retirement came it was time to move to warmer weather. Mike and Karen moved the family to Laguna Niguel, California.

Bryce had always been a good student and athlete. He played football and baseball in high school. Now that he was a high school graduate, Bryce decided that he was going to take classes at Sierra College in Chico, California. Chico is about 450 miles north of his parents’ Laguna Niguel home. Bryce was beginning his sophomore year at Sierra College in August of 2013 and was studying graphic and industrial design. In fact, the semester had just started days before he vanished.

In the days leading up to Bryce’s disappearance, he had begun acting strangely. So strangely, that his roommate and good friend, Sean Dixon had called Bryce’s mom, Karen to voice his concerns. Both Sean and Bryce’s girlfriend, Kim Sly had seen a shift in Bryce’s personality.

They had seen that Bryce was now drinking heavily saying that he “downed” a bottle of hard liquor every weekend. Kim was also concerned about Bryce’s drug habits. It was reported that Bryce had started taking the prescription ADHD medication Vyvanse so that he could stay up all night and play video games with his roommate (and probably others online).

The first day of his sophomore year was on August 26, 2013. Kim thought that Bryce was “erratic.” Bryce’s behavior got more concerning when he started giving away possessions – his diamond earrings given to him by his mom and his Xbox. Then on August 28th around 10 pm, Bryce broke up with Kim via text message saying that she “would be better off without” him. Despite the text break-up, Bryce drove to Kim’s home that night. She lived 90 miles away from his apartment near campus.

While at her house, Kim took Bryce’s keys. She felt like he was not acting right and that he shouldn’t be driving. Then, Bryce called his mom and told her Kim wouldn’t give his keys back. Kim talked to Karen and explained her concerns about Bryce. Karen spoke with Bryce, and she felt he sounded lucid and asked him if he wanted her to come visit him the next day. He told her he was fine and that he did want to talk to her about something, but discouraged her from driving to him. He would never get to tell her or anyone else what he needed to talk about.

Bryce left Kim’s house around 11:30 pm on the 28th. Everyone thought he was going back to his apartment. After he left Kim’s house, Bryce texted Sean: “I love you bro seriously. You’re the best person I’ve ever met, and you saved my soul.”

However, he hopped on the I-5 as if he was heading toward Laguna Niguel and his parents’ house. Then, around 1 am on the 29th, Karen missed a call from Bryce that was later found to have pinged about an hour from his apartment. Karen had thought he was just calling to tell her he was back at his apartment. They wouldn’t hear from Bryce again until after 11 am.

At about 11 am or 12 pm, Bryce called his parents and told them that he had used their roadside assistance plan around 9 am because he had run out of gas. A guy named Christian from Castro Tire and Gas delivered 3 gallons of gas and Bryce charged his parents’ credit card $20 for the gas. Bryce was in Buttonwillow, California at this point and if he had continued on this path to his parents’ house, he would have arrived in about 3-3.5 hours. However, that ETA came and went, but Bryce didn’t show and he wasn’t answering his cellphone.

So, Karen decided that she was going to call Christian at Castro Tire and Gas to see if he could maybe just drive to where he had taken the gas and see if Bryce was gone. Christian, being the good man he seems to be, drove to the spot Bryce was in before and he was surprised to find that Bryce was IN THE EXACT SAME SPOT. Christian asked Bryce like, Whatcha doing, Buddy? and Bryce told him, “Nothing.” Christian said Bryce seemed fine. He said his eyes were a little red, but otherwise, nothing seemed amiss.

Again, Bryce should be home in about 3 hours. So, when he still wasn’t home 6 hours later, Karen calls the police and reports him missing. The California Highway Patrol found him only 8 miles from where Christian had left him! He had moved 8 miles in 9 hours.

The highway patrol officers spent 20 minutes talking to Bryce and even searched his car. Due to his erratic behavior, the officers felt it important to search Bryce’s Toyota Highlander for drugs and/or alcohol. They found none. Bryce passed a field sobriety test, and the officers said he seemed to be acting normally – other than sitting in his car for hours on end. The officers noted that Bryce was “reluctant” to call his mom when the officers told him to. He was so reluctant that the officers physically dialed the number and put the phone in Bryce’s hand to talk to Karen. He told her he was on his way now, but it was also reported that he strangely told her he was going to go hang out with some friends later.

The officers couldn’t do much else because he was seemingly sober, lucid, and a grown-ass adult. He’s allowed to do whatever he wants as long as he’s not doing anything illegal. So, the officers left Bryce in his car in Buttonwillow. Around 11 pm Bryce called Karen again and told her that he was getting gas and a drink. The gas station was in Buttonwillow. It was reported that he then stopped at the Valero gas station and got $39 in gas.

THEN after being in Buttonwillow for most of the day, he once again called the roadside assistance FROM BUTTONWILLOW. The service technician that came out this time followed Bryce to the interstate to make sure he was going and in the right direction.

Then at around 2 am on August 30th, Bryce called his mom again and told her that he had gotten off the I-5, but he was back on it again and on the way. However, he called her back a few minutes later and said he was actually going to pull over and get some sleep. By this time he’d been awake for the better part of 2 days. It’s unknown if he slept in his car during any of the time he was sitting there in Buttonwillow.

Karen and Mike would not hear from Bryce again.

However, Bryce didn’t pull over to sleep or at all. Instead, he drove for another hour and a half to Castaic Lake. Bryce’s beige 2003 Toyota Highlander is caught on CCTV footage passing by the same place at 2:15 am and again at 4:29 am.

At 8 am on August 31st, Karen and Mike got a knock on their front door. It wasn’t Bryce. It was the police. Bryce’s Highlander had been found about 2 hours from Karen and Mike’s house.

It had been found at about 5:30 am when police were going out to conduct a training. The SUV was on its passenger side at the bottom of a 15-foot ravine near Castaic Lake. The rear windshield was busted out and Bryce was nowhere to be found. There was a little bit of blood in the car, but not a lot and not even enough to make law enforcement concerned that Bryce was seriously injured. Just a small amount on the passenger side and the backseat.

Investigator, Shannon Tulles said, “He likely didn’t sustain a debilitating injury at the scene. Given his physical conditioning, he absolutely had the ability to leave the scene.” What did concern everyone was that Bryce’s wallet, cellphone, ID, laptop, and a duffle bag with clothes in it were still in the car.

Also concerning was that the tracks left by the SUV indicated that Bryce hadn’t tried to brake and was driving at a fairly high speed when he went over the embankment. Bryce had been awake for a very long time and maybe could have fallen asleep at the wheel and gone off the embankment without putting on the breaks for that reason, but it was also thought that maybe Bryce drove off the edge on purpose.

Scuba divers dredged the lake for 40 miles but found nothing. Hounds were brought out as well to try and track Bryce’s scent. They were able to get his scent and follow that away from the lake and in the direction of a truck stop nearby, but the scent trail stopped without leading them to Bryce. Then on September 4th, the police and the family got a shock. A jogger was running near Castaic Lake when they saw a brushfire. They called 911 and the Los Angeles County Fire Department came out.

The brushfire was actually a burning body. The body was so badly burned that it was impossible to immediately tell the gender so they definitely couldn’t get an identity. The family, of course, didn’t want Bryce to be dead, and they didn’t want him to have been murdered and burned, but this would have at least given them the answer to where their son was. However, it turned out that the burning body wasn’t Bryce. It was actually 35-year-old, Lamondre Deon Miles. Before being burned, Lamondre had been shot multiple times in his torso. It was determined that Lamondre was murdered for failing to pay a debt.

Volunteers, dogs, rescue teams, scuba divers, helicopters, hikers, and police searched for about 3 weeks near that area and had absolutely nothing to go on (during the investigation, Mike – his dad – had his car broken into while they were searching). So, after the body of Lamondre Miles had been found and identified, the official search for Bryce Laspisa was called off.

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy, Johnie Jones said, “We pretty much exhausted searching in that area. They’ve found basically nothing. So we’re kind of at a standstill.”

Karen and Mike didn’t stop though. They sought out the help of a private investigator that specializes in missing persons. PI Denise Savastano took on the case pro bono and stated that she feels like Bryce intended to make it to Laguna Niguel as the address was in his GPS.

Unfortunately, the PI hasn’t been able to find Bryce or any clue to his whereabouts.

Karen said, “It’s gut-wrenching everyday not knowing. It’s a living nightmare. It’s just been difficult because there has been no new news. We continue to have hope Bryce will be found.”

Brian Shaffer

Brian Randall Shaffer was born on February 11th, 1979 to Randy and Renee Shaffer. He would be followed by his little brother, Derrek. Brian grew up in Pickerington, Ohio and graduated from Pickerington High School in 1997 and went off to Ohio State University. Brian graduated with his bachelor’s in microbiology in 2003 and by 2006, he was in his second year of medical school at Ohio State. He was in a serious relationship with his girlfriend Alexis Waggoner. She was also a 2nd year medical student at OSU and the two were called, “inseparable.”

Alexis was sure he was the one. She told Dateline that, “Pretty much since day one, I really thought of him as kind of the love of my life.” Alexis described Brian saying, “He’s brilliant, he’s handsome, he’s sweet and loyal and caring.” (Brian called her “awesome and amazing” on his MySpace profile.)

The two had planned a trip to Florida for Spring Break with their flight booked for April 3rd. She thought he might actually propose on this trip. In February of that year, Brian turned 27-years-old but in March, Brain’s mom, Renee died of cancer. Renee was called Brian’s confidante and hero. She was “the center of his universe.” And then she was gone. Brian, his dad, and brother were still reeling from this loss on March 31st (just 25 days after Renee’s funeral) when they got together at Outback Steakhouse for dinner.

Brian’s friends had wanted to go out drinking early that night, but Brian was adamant that he needed to be there for his dad, so drinking was postponed for after his dinner. The men had dinner and conversation. Other than the very painfully missing mother and wife from their table that night, nothing was unusual. Brian separated from his dad and brother to go out with his former roommate, Clint Florence. Brian and Clint went to a bar called Ugly Tuna Saloona (this bar is now closed) around 9 pm.

Clint said, “Brian and I always went out. There’s nothing new. Sat down, opened a tab, and then you know had three, four, five shots of liquor.” Around 10 pm, Brain spoke to Alexis on the phone. She was in Toledo visiting her parents before their Spring Break trip. Alexis remembers that he sounded completely normal. She said he didn’t seem down or concerned or anything. At the end of the call, Brian told her he loved her.

Brian and Clint bar hopped and met up with one of Clint’s friends, Meredith Reed. They did more shots and Meredith offered them a ride back to the Ugly Tuna.

The 3 of them went back to the Ugly Tuna and were seen on the CCTV footage outside the bar. In the footage from 1:15 am on April 1st, Brian can be seen leaning against the rail of an escalator outside the Ugly Tuna riding up to the second floor bar. Clint said, “Brian was doing his usual thing and was talking to those 2 girls.” The “2 girls” Clint mentioned are actually friends of Clint’s and are seen talking to Brian on another appearance on the CCTV footage. This was at around 1:55 am and in the footage, it looked like Brian says goodbye to the girls and walks away.

Clint said that he and Meredith saw Brian again at the bar. It was about 2 am at this point and the bar was closing. They told him that they were planning to leave, and then they never saw him again.

Clint and Meredith assumed that maybe he just left without them and headed home. His apartment was only about a mile from the bar, so he could have easily walked. They called his cellphone and checked the bathrooms before they left. No answer on his cell and he was not in the bathroom and the bar was kicking everyone out so they headed out too.

They kept calling Brian. Alexis also called Brian Saturday, but he never answered or called back. By Sunday she was getting close to a full panic. This wasn’t like Brian and they were leaving town the next day. Clint, Alexis, and by now, Randy were calling Brian with no answer. Sunday night, Alexis went to Brian’s apartment in hopes that maybe he was there. He wasn’t. And he wouldn’t be there any of the times she would come for the next few weeks.

Alexis told Dateline, “I came here every single day the first few weeks and just you know laid here in the middle of his bed and just sobbed.”

On Monday, April 3rd, Brian and Alexis were supposed to be on a flight, but Brian was still missing and not answering calls. They called the Columbus police and officially reported him missing.

A search started at the city level to find Brian or any clues about his whereabouts. Brian’s car was in the parking lot of his apartment complex. Dumpsters and sewers were checked and the Ugly Tuna was searched top to bottom in every sticky, booze-soaked corner. Officers checked hospitals and homeless shelters, landfills and riverbanks and even had their 50 plus officers working in concentric circles out from the Ugly Tuna and his apartment knocking on doors.

Both of the exits to the bar were covered by surveillance cameras just like the escalator. The only way out of this place where you wouldn’t be caught on camera was a part of the building that was still under construction. There was a service elevator with a service exit into a treacherous construction zone. Sgt. John Hurst said, “There is no reason for anybody to want to go out that area. It’s heavily under construction and would be difficult sober.”

Everyone in Brian’s life agreed to be polygraphed. Everyone except Clint who was advised by his lawyer not to participate. Clint’s attorney said that while he has nothing to hide, he has given the police all the information he has. Derrek reportedly spoke negatively about Clint after Brian’s disappearance, but there has never been any evidence that Clint was involved in Brian’s disappearance.

The 2 women Brian was seen talking to in CCTV, because they were friends of Clint’s, were able to be cleared. His, by then, empty apartment was broken into after Brian disappeared. It was a weird coincidence, but it turned out to be nothing more than that. In the 5 weeks after Brian’s disappearance there were no charges to his credit card and no purchases of bus tickets, plane tickets, train tickets, etc… His phone was not used either other than the repeated calls from Alexis.

Alexis called his cell phone every night without fail. And every night it went straight to voicemail…until one night in September.

That night, his phone rang 3 times and then went to voicemail. She immediately called again, but there was no answer. The police were able to follow the ping to a tower in the town of Hilliard about 14 miles from Columbus. Hopes were spiked and then just as quickly dashed when Brian’s service provider, Cingular informed them that it was just a computer glitch. A year after he vanished, Brian’s cell and credit card had still not been touched.

At one point after his son’s disappearance, Randy was so desperate that he went to a psychic. The psychic would tell him that Brian’s body would be found by a bridge in water held down by whirlpools. With this information as the only thing to hold onto, Randy took it and jumped into action. He began by wading into the Olentangy River. He and a search party spent hours in that river and found nothing. This one “tip” would give Randy a specific focus, and he would continue to wade into bodies of water with bridges looking for his son.

Brian’s favorite band is Pearl Jam. He even has a Pearl Jam tattoo on his right bicep. Word of Brian’s disappearance made it to Pearl Jam. When they played in Cincinnati, Eddie Vedder would take the opportunity in between songs to talk to the audience and ask them to report any information they had. Randy was still dealing with the death of his wife of almost 29 years when his oldest son disappeared. When Renee died, Randy said that he couldn’t bring himself to touch her things. He said the same was true after Brian disappeared. He said that the hardest thing is the not knowing or understanding what happened. What happened, why, where, or how. He said, “I mean there’s nothing that really fits.”

During the investigation, Detective Andre Edwards watched the surveillance videos so much and so repetitively that he was able to determine that anyone that entered the Ugly Tuna Saloona also left the Ugly Tuna Saloona. Except Brian.

He said, “I can say with 100% certainty that Brian Shaffer did not go back down that escalator.” Over the years, tips have come in and been looked into only to be dead ends. One time a woman in Michigan was at a local drive through and was waited on by a man that looked a lot like Brian. The man’s name tag even said “Brian S.” The woman called the police who attempted to follow up. They went to the restaurant and the owners claimed no one that worked there was named Brian. It wasn’t Brian Shaffer after all and once again, everyone was back to square one.

Then, on September 14th, 2008, Randy was in his backyard during a crazy windstorm, possibly picking things up when a limb was whipped off a tree and right at Randy. The impact killed him and he was found in the yard by a neighbor the next morning.

On the online guestbook, someone left a post:

(There were 2 versions of the post so here are both)

“I miss you dad love brian” OR “To Dad, Love Brian (US Virgin Islands)”

The post was investigated, but it turned out to be a very cruel joke and was posted from a public computer located in Franklin County, Ohio. While the Ohio CrimeStoppers continues to receive tips about Brian Shaffer even now, the biggest and most promising tip came in when a picture showed up of a homeless American in Tijuana in 2020.

Detective Blanche Tucker is now in charge of the case and she said, “We work every tip that comes in, no matter how small.” When this photo began circulating it was sent to Detective Tucker who got very hopeful when she saw the similarities between this “Homeless American” and Brian Shaffer.

Blanche, Det. Tucker if you’re nasty, sent the photo directly to the FBI so they could do a facial recognition analysis. Det. Tucker said, “My hopes were high that it could be him.” She noted that most detectives think that the stressors in his life caused him to just leave. “Adults can just disappear” she said, but she still believes it’s suspicious.b b But 4 weeks later, the FBI determined that the man in the photo was not Brian Shaffer.

Derrek is the only Shaffer left, and he isn’t talking to the media or anything. He was trying to move on and get married to his girlfriend. Alexis Waggoner went on to graduate and get engaged. And Clint moved to Tennessee.

For part two, click here!