The Springfield Three Mystery
Almost eighteen years after the Missing Trio case of Fort Worth, 760 km north-east of this town in Texas , three other women have disappeared. They evaporated together one night from a house in Springfield, Missouri. This new enigma, just as mysterious as the Cold Case of December 23, 1974, remains one of the most known in the United States.
The similarities between the two cases are limited but they do exist. A disappearance of three people, two young girls and a girl in one case, two young girls and a woman in the other. The place is located in the immediate vicinity of an intersection with a major South-North traffic route, a context of phone calls with sexual connotations and no body was found in either of these two cases.
On Saturday afternoon, June 6, 1992, two lifelong friends, Suzanne “Suzie” Streeter and Stacy McCall, had just graduated from Kickapoo High School in Springfield, Missouri. Suzie Streeter is 19, and Stacy McCall is 18.
Graduation ends around 6 p.m. Later, the girls plan to mark the occasion with their classmates by going from party to party around town. Suzie’s mother, Sherrill Levitt, decided at 6:15 p.m. to return to her home, a house on East Delmar Street where she and her daughter had recently moved. Sherrill Levitt is fixing up the house after her working hours. She is 47 years old, a hairdresser, a very successful hairdresser, and has saved up enough to buy this small but nice house and on this day after graduation ceremonies she simply went home to wallpaper.
With the graduation ceremonies over, Suzie and Stacy also each went home in their cars to change and pack. Between 6:30 and 8:00 pm the families each have their own dinner. After the meal Suzie leaves with her car. Suzie’s mother knows that her daughter will not be coming home all night, nor the next morning*. What is planned, probably without a real measure of time, is that after the parties in the city of Springfield her daughter will go with other young people to a place with many attractions located further south in the state of Missouri, in Branson, that they will stay in a hotel and that the next morning they will go to the water park in Branson, the White Water Park. Suzie and Stacy, but also Janelle Kirby, Adina R. and a Suzie’s close friend Nigel H., will form the group.
The Front
Suzie Streeter must first join with her car Stacy McCall at the home of their common friend Janelle Kirby, who lives in a rural area southwest of Springfield, in Battlefield. She arrives at Janelle Kirby’s house at 8:15 pm. She is joined by Stacy at 8:30 pm. Shortly after, Suzie, Stacy and Janelle leave on foot to go to a party at a friend’s house, Brian, whose house is located a few hundred meters away. It is initially question that Suzie and Stacy remain at Brian’s for the night but he ends up going back on his offer. So at 10:30 p.m.** Stacy calls her mother Janis McCall and tells her that she has finally planned to stay in Battlefied and spend the night at Janelle Kirby’s. From there the girls would leave in the morning to go to White Water Park in Branson. She promised to call him the next morning before they left.
Curiously, a little later in the night, in a time range between Saturday, June 6 at 11:30 p.m. and Sunday, June 7 at 1:00 a.m., Suzanne Streeter and Stacy McCall leave the party at Brian’s house and go to another party towards the center of Springfield. The address is not far from their school. They stay there for a while and then decide to return to Battlefied. Their means of travel is unknown. Probably a person staying at Brian’s house because it is established that they leave this party at 1:50 am and are back at Brian’s house around 2:00 am. Quickly, around 2:10–2:15, they walk back with Janelle in a friend’s car to the Kirby house.
However, at Janelle’s, it turns out that the house is full with Kirby’s family and relatives. Consequently Stacy and Suzie change again their plan and decide at about 2:20 am to go to sleep at Suzie and her mother Sherryll Levitt’s house°. They agree with Janelle to call in the morning to meet again, then leave each one in their car, Suzanne Streeter the first to show the way towards the heart of Springfield.
The Aftermath
The travel time to Sherrill Levitt’s house, near the center of Springfield, is unknown. It is estimated between 10 and 20 minutes. Did Suzanne and Stacy drive their cars themselves the whole way? There is little doubt about the girls’ return. The two red vehicles were found in front of the home, stopped on the circular driveway. Suzy Streeter usually parked in the perpendicular driveway, behind her mom who parked her sporty blue car under a carport to the right of the house. Sherrill and Suzanne had moved in with their Yorkshire dog Cinnamon at 1717 East Delmar Street in April 1992, two months before they disappeared, and Stacy had apparently never been there. Stacy’s car was well behind Suzy’s and since they had to take their cars back to meet Janelle in Battlefield on Sunday morning, it is assumed that this location facilitated their departure.
In addition to the presence of the two red cars in front of the house, the girls did arrive at 1717 that night because there was evidence that they took off their makeup. Their arrival time was probably around 2:45 am. If Sherryll Levitt didn’t wake up when Suzy got home, she had her key, we can imagine the girls going to bed around 3:00. Nevertheless, as Sherryll’s room is located in front of the house and as she left the window open because of the smells of paint and varnish, we can imagine that she heard the noise of the engines and the doors of vehicles come to park under her window. Especially since she was not expecting her daughter. A discussion could have ensued, Stacy would have met Cinnamon and the girls would have gone to bed much later. For example, around 3:15.
On Sunday morning, a group of young people from Springfield and the surrounding area are scheduled to leave for Branson. Among them were Suzanne Streeter and Stacy McCall. They have been sleeping at the home of Suzy’s mother, Sherryll Levitt, in the house recently purchased by the 47-year-old hairdresser. Their cars were parked in front of the house, ready to leave for their friend’s house south of town. The plans have been changed. The reason: too many graduation festivities and not enough hours on the clock. Around 7:30, Stacy’s friend Janelle Kirby calls Sherryll’s house. Another friend, this time Suzy’s friend, Nigel Holderby, calls from her side too. They call to know if Stacy and Suzie are ready to leave for Branson. They call until 9:00 am and do not obtain an answer.
After 9:00 am, Janelle Kirby and her boyfriend Mike H. finally decide to come to Suzy’s house°° to check if the girls are really there. On the spot the couple sees the cars and this sight reassures them a little. As they move towards the house they discover that there is glass under the exterior light and no globe around the bulb, which is intact. They enter through the unlocked door and discover the dog Cinnamon inside. He seems very disturbed. Except for the dog, the house is empty. In the bedrooms the beds are unmade and appear to have been occupied. In Sherryll’s room, an open book lies on the bed and reading glasses are on a nightstand.
Suzie’s room is on the right at the back of the house, in a carport that has been converted into a living space. There are two steps down to enter the room. At the bottom of the steps, the young people can see the three handbags of the missing persons, placed side by side, as well as Suzie’s overnight bag and several personal effects. For example, Sherrill’s and Suzie’s keys and cigarettes and Stacy’s keys and migraine medication are in or near the purses.
At 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, June 7, Stacy’s mother was concerned that she had not received her daughter’s call and called the Kirby residence. She learns that the girls have spent the night at Sherryll Levitt’s house. At the end of the afternoon, having still no news of her daughter, Janis McCall arrives at 1717 East Delmar Street. The women are still missing. Several people from both families arrived inside the house in the previous hours and the facts were reported to the police much later.
*This theory is not proven **Or 10:00 pm. °Mrs. Kirby, Janelle’s mother, looked at her alarm clock at 2:20 a.m. and heard her daughter, Suzy and Stacy talking outside her house. °°Probably at noon.
The sources, exclusively in the USA, plus one in the UK, are too numerous and varied to be quoted here.
