Do you know who murdered Amber? Amber Nicole Drummond was a 12-year-old Black/African American girl whose disappearance in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in the spring of 1994 ended in an unsolved homicide. School personnel at Grove Elementary School reportedly last saw Amber on March 30, when her mother, Priscilla Toussaint, removed her from class. The family had moved to Tulsa from Youngstown, Ohio, the previous year and was living in the 8100 block of East 63rd Street.
According to accounts of the investigation, Amber's mother later told authorities that she sent Amber to a store for cake mix on April 1 and that the child never returned. That same day, Amber was reported missing.
For several days, Amber's whereabouts remained unknown. The search came to a devastating end on April 5, 1994, when employees of the City of Tulsa discovered her body on city property near the water towers at approximately 6100 South Sheridan Road. Tulsa police records state that Amber died from asphyxiation. More detailed accounts of the case report that duct tape had been placed over her mouth and nose and that investigators believed her body had been at the location for roughly 24 to 48 hours before it was discovered. The recovery site was only a short distance from her home, making the circumstances surrounding how she left the neighborhood and reached the location a central unanswered question in the investigation.
Those who knew Amber remembered her as an intelligent child who enjoyed reading and athletics. Accounts of the case indicate that she had been taught not to get into vehicles with strangers, a detail that raised the possibility that whoever was responsible may have gained access to her through circumstances that did not immediately appear threatening to her. Publicly available information, however, does not establish exactly when Amber encountered her killer, where she was killed, or whether she was taken somewhere before her body was left near the water tower. Investigators have never publicly released a complete reconstruction of her final hours.
The investigation eventually focused attention on Amber's mother, Priscilla Toussaint. A published account of the cold case states that law enforcement identified Toussaint as a suspect in Amber's killing but concluded there was not enough evidence to prosecute her. Being named or considered a suspect did not result in a murder charge, and the available record does not establish that Toussaint was ever arrested, tried, or convicted in connection with Amber's death. The distinction remains important because the homicide has never been judicially resolved and no court has determined who killed Amber.
Public accounts also describe developments involving Toussaint after Amber's death. In 1996, she was reportedly sought in connection with the disappearance of a toddler, Aurienn Jones, from Youngstown, Ohio. Reports summarized in the available cold-case material indicated that Toussaint was related to the child and was believed to have boarded a bus after taking him from his home. That later episode drew additional attention to her, but the publicly available material does not establish that it produced evidence sufficient to charge her with Amber's murder. It therefore should not be treated as proof of responsibility for what happened to Amber.
Another consequence of the homicide was that Amber's younger brother, Samuel, was reportedly taken into state custody after Amber's death. Public accounts do not explain the specific reason authorities made that decision. The limited information released about this aspect of the case leaves substantial gaps concerning the family's circumstances during the original investigation and what information investigators may have gathered privately but never disclosed publicly.
Despite the passage of more than three decades, no publicly documented arrest, murder charge, trial, or conviction has resolved Amber Drummond's killing. Tulsa police continue to classify her death as a cold case. The department's current case information confirms that Amber was reported missing on April 1, that her body was discovered by a Tulsa water crew on April 5 near the South Sheridan water towers, and that she died from asphyxiation. The case remains assigned to the Tulsa Police Department Cold Case Unit, which continues to request information from anyone who may know what happened.
Amber's case has endured because several of its most important questions remain unanswered: what occurred after she was reported missing, how she came into the control of the person who killed her, where the fatal asphyxiation took place, and who transported or left her body near the water tower. Although one person was publicly described as a suspect, investigators never developed a case sufficient to bring a murder prosecution. As a result, Amber Drummond's April 1994 killing remains an unresolved Tulsa homicide, with no person convicted of taking her life.
