Mysterious Disappearance Of Mekayla Bali

Mekayla Bali disappeared on April 12, 2016, from Yorkton, Saskatchewan. She was possibly spotted in Edmonton earlier this year.

 

Timeline

 

April 12, 2016:

 

 

According to Mekayla's family, the morning started fully ordinary. Bali woke up that morning, did her hair and makeup, talked to her mother, Paula, and said goodbye and I love you to her aunt, Rhonda.

Bali attended Sacred Heart High School. On April 12th, she did attend school, but she never attended class.

8:24 a.m. - Bali leaves Sacred Heart High School.

8:51 a.m - She is seen on management at TD Bank, where she withdraws $55 before departing.

9:00 a.m. - She is seen at Terry's Pawn and Bargain. Here, it is reported that she tried to pawn two silver rings, but the shop did not take them.

9:10 a.m. - She is seen on surveillance at the Yorkton east Tim Horton's restaurant. She got a coffee, sits down alone, and can be seen using her phone. She can be seen looking around and looking at doors.

9:17 a.m. - She gets up to leave, turns around, walks back through the restaurant, and then walks outside.

9:49 a.m. - She is seen entering the same Tim Horton's once again and she appears to be making a phone call. She texts a friend "Hey I need help" but it was immediately followed up with "nvm. I figured it out". The friend did not see the messages until later.

10:25 a.m. - She walks out of the restaurant once again, but returns 2 minutes later to the exact booth and once again appears to be talking on the phone.

10:43 a.m. - Mekayla is seen speaking to an older lady sitting at a table nearby, where she reportedly asked the lady for help renting a hotel room. The woman refused.

10:44 a.m. - Mekayla leaves the restaurant.

She is seen walking westbound down Broadway Street on video surveillance and then returning to Sacred Heart High School at 11:59 a.m. She reportedly says two other students that she was going to take a bus to Regina for a holiday.

12:02 p.m. - Mekayla leaves the school again and is seen walking eastbound down Gladstone Avenue.

*at some point during 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m., she is reported to have been at the Yorktown Bus Depot investigating a bus to Regina.

 

She purchases poutine at the Trail Stop restaurant, which is related to the bus station, and is last seen at the Yorktown Bus Depot between 1 p.m. and 1:45 p.m. She never bought a bus ticket.

6:51 a.m. the following morning, April 13, 2016, her phone is shut off.

NOTES

 

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Mekayla was reported missing after her grandmother came to Sacred Heart High School to pick her up that evening, but Mekayla was nowhere to be found.

Though she is seen on the phone multiple times by surveillance, no phone calls were recorded from her phone that day. She can be seen playing with her phone at the Tim Horton's as if she's taking it apart and putting it back together. She could be changing the SIM card, which could clarify the lack of recorded phone calls despite her being on the phone multiple times. She could have also been using an app such as Whatsapp to make the phone calls.

A Snapchat that was sent to her by a friend was marked as open around three months after her missing, though it has not been confirmed if someone viewed it, or if that person was Mekayla. Another Snapchat was sent to her around her graduation, which has not been opened. This leads me to believe that someone, Mekayla or someone with access to her accounts, did indeed open that Snapchat. There are also theories that the police may have opened it.

Her father was not a part of her life. She had visible self-harm scars and was maybe suffering from depression. She had used alternate names online. I think she had multiple Instagram accounts as well. There is one public account I remember seeing (I will edit with the username when I remember it) where the post history involves a lot of talk about self-harm and suicide.

She had skipped school in the past, so that was not as out of the ordinary as the family makes it out to be.

Mekayla was by all accounts a shy, sweet, and decent girl. She was mature but very innocent.

Here is a post by another user that talks more about the strange aspects of the case.

 

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POSSIBLE SIGHTINGS

 

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There was a reported sighting of her at a casino in Calgary, but I can not find a source. If anyone has a link to that particular sighting, I will edit it.

 

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Now, for the one, I'm the most interested in. A man maybe spoke to Mekayla in Edmonton earlier this year.

 

Paula Bali, Mekayla’s mother, said a man called her on Aug. 8 and said he believes he spoke to Mekayla outside the Highrun Club in Edmonton back in March. He didn’t know Mekayla was missing until he came across a recent social media post about her. Knowing the incident, he called the tip line on the post and spoke to Bali.

 

“She was just outside. He had spoken to her for a few minutes,” said Bali, recounting what the man had told her. “I think part of what stuck out to him was that she didn’t seem like … a girl that should be in that area. He felt like she looked very sweet and naive.”

 

It was this description of the woman’s personality more than a description of her physical appearance that makes Bali hopeful the woman was Mekayla.

“When he defined the person she was, I was kind of like, ‘Yeah, that sounds like Mekayla,” she said. “She is a very gentle soul and she comes across that way.”