She rode off on her bike one September evening and told a stranger she'd "made a new friend." Within an hour, she was gone. She'd be in her thirties now, if she's alive at all.
An Ordinary Evening
On September 16, 1997, 6-year-old Brittney Beers was playing outside her family's apartment at the Village Manor complex in Sturgis, Michigan. Around 7:30 p.m., she went out to ride her bike around the neighborhood. Her mother, Tina Stetler, left around 8:30 to run errands, passing Brittney on her bike as she went. A few minutes later, Brittney's older half-brother saw her sitting on a bench outside the building.
Around that same time, a passerby walking to a nearby store noticed Brittney talking to a man sitting in a red or brown mid-sized car. When the car drove off, Brittney rode over to the passerby and told him, simply, that she'd "made a new friend."
That was the last anyone ever saw of her.
When her mother returned around 9:00 p.m. and asked her son to bring his sister inside, Brittney was nowhere to be found. Her bicycle was discovered abandoned nearby. Police were called, and a search began that night.
A Man Who Was Never Identified
Investigators released a sketch of the man Brittney had been seen talking to — described as white, in his late twenties or early thirties, with short dark hair and a thick mustache, driving either a red mid-size car or a brown Renault. Despite wide distribution of the sketch, he was never identified. He has never been formally named a suspect — police have described him only as a witness they would very much like to locate and speak with.
A bloodhound brought in to track Brittney's scent followed a trail from her apartment to a nearby gas station, where it ended.
A Difficult Family History
In the course of investigating Brittney's disappearance, a disturbing picture of her home life emerged. The following year, a Michigan court removed her older half-brother and younger half-sister from the home after allegations of physical and sexual abuse and neglect. According to documented allegations, Brittney's father, Raymond Beers; her uncle, James Beers, who lived in the household; and Kevin Folsom, the father of one of her half-siblings, were all named in connection with abuse affecting children in the family. Folsom was convicted on a charge of criminal sexual conduct and served time in prison before his release in 2008.
A judge overseeing the custody matter was direct about the situation, reportedly stating he wouldn't return the children to the home "with James Beers around, knowing her son is afraid of him, knowing what he's done to other children."
Just days after Brittney disappeared, James Beers was separately arrested on a domestic violence charge, accused of striking Brittney's mother with a bottle. None of this established a connection to her disappearance — no one in the family has ever been charged in connection with what happened to Brittney specifically — but it became, and has remained, a difficult and unresolved thread in the broader case.
A Possible Connection, Years Later
In 2015, nearly two decades after Brittney vanished, investigators identified a person of interest: Daniel Kevin Furlong. Furlong had been arrested that year after attempting to lure a 10-year-old girl into his garage in White Pigeon, Michigan, a town roughly 16 miles from Sturgis. DNA evidence collected during that investigation connected him to the unsolved 2007 murder of 11-year-old Jodi Parrack, whom he ultimately confessed to strangling and dumping in a cemetery.
Investigators noted real similarities worth examining: Furlong's physical description bore a resemblance to the decades-old sketch of the man seen with Brittney, his home was relatively close to Sturgis, and his known crimes targeted young girls. Sturgis Public Safety Director Geoff Smith interviewed Furlong at length about both Parrack's murder and Brittney's case. Furlong denied any involvement in Brittney's disappearance. Smith described him as cold, unremorseful, and someone who couldn't be trusted to tell the truth about much of anything — concluding that he couldn't rule Furlong out, but also couldn't confirm his involvement. Furlong is currently serving a 30-to-60-year sentence for Parrack's murder.
A Case That's Stayed Open
Brittney's case has never been closed. The FBI's Kalamazoo office and the Sturgis Police Department both continue to list it as an active investigation, and missing-child organizations including the Doe Network, NCMEC, and the CUE Center for Missing Persons still carry her case profile, complete with an age-progressed image showing how she might look today.
Every year, a small group gathers at the Village Manor Apartments to mark the anniversary of her disappearance — a tradition her grandparents, who traveled from Texas most years, kept for a long time. The bench where she was last seen is long gone, but the gathering has continued regardless.
Detective Sergeant Geoff Smith, who has stayed close to the case for decades, has been honest about where his instincts land after all this time: "My gut tells me that she is probably not alive. I hope she is. But this many years out, it is hard to keep up that hope."
If you have any information about the disappearance of Brittney Ann Beers, you're encouraged to contact the Sturgis Police Department at (269) 651-3231 or the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children at 1-800-THE-LOST.
Sources
The Tragic Life & Disappearance of Brittney Beers — Morbidology https://morbidology.com/the-tragic-life-disappearance-of-brittney-beers/
Inside Brittney Beers' Kidnapping — Grunge https://www.grunge.com/801148/inside-brittney-beers-kidnapping/
Brittney Beers still missing nearly 25 years after vanishing — Front Page Detectives https://www.frontpagedetectives.com/p/brittney-beers-missing-michigan-child-vanished
Brittney Ann Beers — The Doe Network https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/1893dfmi.html