On an evening in the spring of 2014, a 26-year-old man named Lonnie Lee Wilkins disappeared from Ypsilanti, Michigan, leaving behind a mystery that endures for his family and community. On April 25, 2014, Lonnie's girlfriend dropped him off around 9:00 p.m. at a Kroger grocery store on Carpenter Road in Pittsfield Township. He was an African American male with black hair, often worn in braids but pulled back into a ponytail that day, and hazel eyes.
Later that evening, he was captured on surveillance video in the parking lot of a nearby Speedway gas station. This would be the last confirmed sighting of him. At the time he went missing, Lonnie was wearing a black spring jacket, a polo shirt with red and white horizontal stripes, gray pants, and flip-flops.
In the days that followed Lonnie's last sighting, the path of his life went cold. There was telephone contact with him two days after he was last seen, on April 27, but he was not heard from again after that call. A significant amount of time passed before he was officially reported as a missing person to the Pittsfield Township Police Department on May 16, 2014. This delay occurred because some of those close to him initially thought he might have left voluntarily. Lonnie has a distinct tattoo on his left inner forearm of an RX symbol accompanied by stars, a personal marking that his loved ones hoped would help identify him. He stood between 5'1' and 5'6' and weighed approximately 150 to 160 pounds.
As weeks turned into years, the lack of answers has been a heavy burden for those who care about Lonnie. Investigators from the Pittsfield Township Department of Public Safety have sought information from the public, hoping for a lead that might shed light on what happened after he was seen in the gas station parking lot. The circumstances surrounding his disappearance remain unknown, and his case is still considered unsolved. The overview of this case is one of profound uncertainty; a young man vanished during what seemed to be a routine evening. The initial belief that he had left on his own gave way to the painful reality that he was gone without a trace, leaving his family searching for answers about the fate of their loved one.Last Seen: Apr 25, 2014
