On May 4, 1990, 56-year-old Lee Roy Young, a male resident of Scottsdale, Arizona, was seen for the last time. He was having lunch at a Coco's restaurant located at 4700 North Scottsdale Road around 12:30 p.m. Following this last confirmed sighting, he vanished without a trace. The circumstances surrounding his disappearance quickly pointed towards a grim scenario, as his plum-colored Lincoln Town Car was discovered the very next day, engulfed in flames in a desolate desert area in Pinal
County, near Oracle, approximately one hundred miles south of Phoenix. The intense fire destroyed much of the potential evidence within the vehicle.
The investigation into Young's disappearance uncovered several alarming details that suggested foul play was involved. A few hours after he was last seen, at approximately 3:00 p.m., several calls were made from his car phone. At least one of these calls was traced to a payphone, and another was made to a woman who later denied having spoken with Young. This unusual activity with his phone, coupled with the violent destruction of his car, led authorities to suspect he had met with a sinister fate. The case was further complicated by the fact that Young's wife was out of state attending a funeral at the time of his disappearance and was expecting him to pick her up from the airport that Sunday, a reunion that tragically never occurred.
Two primary theories emerged regarding the motive behind Young's presumed abduction and murder. One possibility was that he was the victim of a robbery gone wrong. Young was known to buy and sell jewelry as a side business and frequently carried large sums of cash for these transactions. However, this theory was somewhat contradicted by the discovery of thousands of dollars worth of jewelry left untouched in the trunk of his burned car, although his personal Rolex watch was missing. A more compelling theory, and one that his wife believed, was that his disappearance was connected to his work as a bank executive and fraud investigator. Shortly before he went missing, Young had contacted federal authorities with suspicions that the bank he worked for was being used in a money-laundering scheme with possible links to a Colombian drug cartel. The only item known to be missing from his car, other than his watch, was his briefcase which contained files related to his investigations. This has led to the strong suspicion that he was silenced to prevent him from exposing the criminal operation. Despite the Scottsdale Police Department's ongoing investigation, no suspects have ever been publicly named, and the case of Lee Roy Young's disappearance remains unsolved.Last Seen: May 4, 1990
