New tips in 23-year-old missing Utah mom case suggest accidental death, body dump
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SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH (KSL) — The daughter of a missing woman said new leads in the 23-year-old disappearance case suggest her mother died “accidentally.”
Bobbi Ann Campbell vanished on Dec. 27, 1994 after leaving her then 5-year-old daughter, Stephanie Cook, at a friend’s house while she ran errands, KSL reports.
“She was going to pick up her paycheck,” Cook said. “I fell asleep waiting and she never came home.”
After a round of news reports in late December suggested that Campbell had died in an apparent accident, Cook said the family has received new tips.
“We had quite a few anonymous tips come in that lead us to believe my mom is no longer with us,” Cook said. “At this point, I just want to know where her body is.”
Jason Jensen, a private investigator retained by Cook, said the tips indicated that the individuals with Campbell at the time of her death “panicked, and that they disposed of her.”
“They didn’t reveal how they disposed of her,” Jensen said. “We don’t know if she was buried or if it was the Jordan (River).”
Campbell’s car was eventually located in 1995, roughly 8 months after her disappearance and not far from the Jordan River in a neighborhood near 240 South and 1100 West.
“It was registered under my grandfather’s name,” Cook recalled. “He got a (parking) ticket in the mail and I believe (the car) had expired plates. He drove to the location of the ticket and he found her car. It was unlocked. It still had my clothes in it, her clothes in it, Christmas presents as well as money, makeup.”
Cook said she still deals with the pain of growing up without her mom.
“My life is a rollercoaster,” she said. “My good days are really good, but my bad days are really bad. There are days where I just can’t even get out of bed.”
Cook said she was hopeful the new leads would be able to provide further answers and closure in her mother’s case.
“I just want to find my mom,” Cook said. “I want to give her a proper funeral.”
Unified Police Det. Ben Pender said Tuesday afternoon that Cook and Jensen were in the process of providing the new information to detectives, and that they would investigate the leads.
Anyone with additional information about the case was asked to contact Unified Police at 801-743-7000.
“We’re going to get someone that’s going to do the right thing, come clean with their conscience and they’re going to tell us what happened to her and give us a good idea of where we can look,” Jensen said.