Father of missing kids won't give up hope (Kimyala murder)
Patty
Anjeanette Damon
RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
Thursday May 10th, 2001
The father of two Oregon infants missing for more than a month said Wednesday he refuses
to give up hope they are alive, as sheriff's deputies again searched the Nevada desert
near where their mother's body was discovered last month.
It was the third time deputies combed the sagebrush-covered landscape for any sign of
2-year-old Shaina Ashly Kirkpatrick and her 4-month-old sister Shausa Henson since
motorists April 29 found Kimyala Henson, 21, shot to death 25 miles north of Nixon.
"I'll grieve when we know we've lost them and I will hold out hope that the kids are OK
somewhere," said Steven Curtis Kirkpatrick, reached at his home in Portland. "My biggest
hope is that whoever has the children doesn't know they are being looked for. Those little
girls are sorely missed and very loved."
Aside from the motive, the girls are the only missing links in a cross-country murder
mystery involving claims of Satanism, identity theft and the murder-suicide of the suspect
and his female accomplice in Florida, authorities said.
Investigators don't believe the children ever made it to the Sunshine State.
Washoe County detectives are visiting each establishment where Henson's stolen credit card
was used, hoping to find video surveillance tapes that would indicate whether the children
were with suspects Frank Oehring and Christina Mayer as they bounced from town to town in
Nevada between April 6 and April 9.
Henson and her daughters were last seen April 5 checking into a motel in Redding, Calif.,
with the suspects, said Washoe County Sheriff Dennis Balaam, adding detectives cannot find
a reason why the suspects came to Nevada.
"Their route doesn't make any sense," he said. "It is very puzzling what the heck they
were thinking."
Kirkpatrick said he last saw Henson and his daughters April 4, when they left Portland
with Oehring, 28, and Mayer, 24, on what was supposed to be a sight-seeing trip to British
Columbia.
He didn't suspect anything was amiss when Mayer, a childhood friend of Henson, showed up
at their home a few days earlier with a man she called "Curtis" and said was her husband.
"I didn't know them at all," Kirkpatrick said. "Nobody knew Frank. He was introduced to us
as Christina's husband Curtis. We had no reason not to believe them."
But two weeks later, the disturbing details about Oehring's past began to surface when a
Florida deputy found the couple dead of a murder-suicide along a rural highway near Naples
and the Everglades.
Oehring was running from a warrant in Missouri that accused him of conspiring to have his
wife killed, authorities said.
His estranged wife survived the attack and later described how Oehring and his new
girlfriend had become involved in a Satanic religion, Balaam said.
Florida investigators discovered publications describing satanic rituals in Oehring's car,
parked near where he shot Mayer and then turned the gun on himself, Collier County
Detective Jared Browning said. He declined to provide further details about the texts.
The couple did not appear to be Satanists and did not discuss their religion while
visiting in Portland, Kirkpatrick said.
"They didn't dress for it. They didn't have their pendants showing," he said.
Henson was a devout Christian, Kirkpatrick said. If she had discovered Oehring and Mayer's
ideology, she would have wanted to leave, he said.
Kirkpatrick said he can't help but wonder about what happened before Henson was shot.
"Maybe she found out who Frank really was, or about his past, or about their religion and
in order to keep it secret, they killed her," he said.
Washoe County detectives have found no motive for Henson's slaying. And Oehring left no
clues about why he later shot Mayer and himself, Browning said.
"He was a fugitive," Browning said. "It is just speculation, but that may have been part
of it."
Kirkpatrick learned about Henson's death on Tuesday. But he began to suspect foul play
April 20 when Florida investigators notified them of Oehring and Mayer's death. Detectives
originally thought Mayer was Henson, after finding the younger woman's identification on
her body. But Mayer did not have a heart-with-wings tattoo that helped investigators
identify Henson.
After Oehring and Mayer stopped in Las Vegas to obtain identification in Henson's name,
they used her credit cards to travel across the country to Florida, Balaam said.
Kirkpatrick was in limbo during the two weeks it took to find and identify his girlfriend.
"I would sit there waiting by the phone waiting for someone to call and tell me Kim was
dead, or for Kim to call me and tell me she was OK," Kirkpatrick said. "The not knowing
kept me from grieving. It's the not knowing that really gets to you."
The wait is not over, as investigators continue to hunt for his daughters.
"I bounce all over the place," he said. "One moment my feeling is that they are dead, the
next moment I think maybe they are with Kim's friends in Sacramento. Maybe they were
dropped off at a church somewhere. I don't know."
Kirkpatrick said he doesn't know the names or phone numbers of Henson's friends in
Sacramento, but said his girlfriend kept a day planner with all of the information. He
believes police in Florida recovered it from Oehring's car.
Portland police said they have no leads to actively investigate but have tried to flood
the media with news about the missing family.
"The first crime we know about occurred in Nevada," Officer Henry Groepper said. "No crime
has occurred here. As to where the children are, your agency is working with Florida to
check that out."
Portland authorities are not examining Florida's evidence because the murder-suicide
occurred in that state, and investigators have not tried to track down Henson's friends
listed in her book, Groepper said.
Henson's body was left about 100 yard from the highway along State Route 447, but
investigators don't think that is where she was killed, Balaam said. Evidence suggests she
was in a seated position when she was shot more than six times.
Kirkpatrick described Henson as a fun-loving person and a good mother.
"She loved having fun and she loved her girls," he said. "She was a very good mother and
wouldn't leave the children anywhere she didn't feel they wouldn't be taken care of."
His oldest daughter had just learned to talk in the months before she disappeared.
"She would pick up words like you wouldn't believe," he said. "If you said the wrong word,
it would be her knew favorite word.
"She loved to have her picture taken and would smile for anybody. She was such a sweet
little girl."
jeannep...@gmail.com
boise...@gmail.com
katherin...@ymail.com
Greg Carr
> If you know something you should go to the police.
Lenaya Vargas
> I have been trio by to contact the father for years. Please have him call. I believe I have valid info that may lead him to the girls
Lenaya Vargas
> I am the cousin of the girls. Any information would be greatly appreciated
Lenaya Vargas
Lenaya Vargas
Greg Carr
Washoe County Sheriff
Sheriff's department in Reno, Nevada
Address: 911 E Parr Blvd, Reno, NV 89512, United States
Hours:
Opens soon ⋅ 7 a.m.
Phone: +1 775-328-3001