Tim Miller awoke to a nightmare one day in 1984, his daughter Laura, 16, was missing, her mother left her talking on a pay phone at a convenience store only a half a mile from their home, she didn't want to leave her, but Laura insisted she'd be fine. That night when Laura's boyfriend showed up at their house with no Laura, the Miller's began their at first calm search through the neighborhood, by morning they were frantic and at the police station.
In 1984 missing person cases were not looked at as seriously as they are now, maybe because of people like Tim things have changed. Back then when the Millers arrived at the police department they were told that Laura likely ran away. When Tim protested that she would not run away and that she often had seizures and needed medication, he was told she was old enough to make her own way out on the streets, he should give her a few days to turn up.
Tim was amazed and he and his wife tried to find Laura themselves, he did not know how to make the police help him. He soon found out another girl about Laura's age was found murdered six months before and so he took this information back to the police, who assured him that this other girl worked at a bar and had a risky "lifestyle". Tim later found out the girl lived only 3 blocks from the Miller home. He begged the police to please tell him where the other girl's body was found so that he may go search this area himself.
They refused.
After a week of Laura being gone and the police not helping, Tim was distraught and in pain, he knew she was dead. He lost his job, his marriage was suffering and he was drinking.
For a year an a half there was no news of Laura. He thought about suicide and ended up checking himself into a hospital where finally he received news in the form of a news article that mentioned a body being found in a field along side two sets of skeletal remains. A serial killer was dumping his victims in this field and one of them ended up being the bones of Laura Miller.
This filed was the same location the police had found the other dead female and the same location Tim originally begged them to give him so that he could go search it. He would have found his daughter and her body would have been laid to rest. By this time there was no evidence and because of the time that had passed her killer was never caught.
Tim Miller began and founded Texas Equusearch, a search and rescue team that will work along Law Enforcement or work alone if they have to in order to never let other parents experience the pain Tim and his family felt when Laura's case was ignored and she was left there in that field alone for almost two years.
Tim Miller almost never gives up, he will search and search some more and even when law enforcement calls off their own search because of funding or lack of resources, Tim finds a way to keep his volunteer searches going as in the case of Teketria "Teeky" Buggs, a 12 year old who went missing from her home in 2005, after a week of searching with Tim's team side by side, law enforcement called off their search, but Tim refused and continued on through muddy waters, woods and rivers.
The weather almost killed them, it was extremely dangerous, but he kept going, bringing in volunteers with cadaver dogs and sonar equipment. After days went by with nothing and most told Tim to give up, he did not, his policy is to keep going, he once searched for 18 months for a missing person and finally found them, delivering them to their family.
After two weeks of searching, a rain storm, countless hours of helplessness, Teeky was found in the river by Tim and his team, she had been murdered and her body now brought back to rest peacefully as it should be.
Tim and his team has participated in over 500 searchers and counting. The organization is funded solely by donations, sometimes they have no money to operate and continue on with no money at all, because telling a family he can't help them because of lack of funds is too painful for him.
Today the organization is operating all over the United States and even in Aruba searching for Natalee Holloway. There is a very sad side in that he is unable to help every single family that needs him and so at times they do their best to cover cases on their website too. They have a 72% success rate in finding either a body or a live person and have delivered 100 missing children and adults safely home alive.
Right now Tim Miller is in Orlando Florida assisting in the Caylee Anthony case. He arrived at the request of Cindy Anthony, who heard about Tim and called him and what I assumed was an excellent first step in her redeeming herself and actually making moves to seriously find Caylee.
I was wrong.
I recall the day Tim arrived, there was a webcam stationed outside of the police department and it showed Cindy and Tim talking in the parking lot, he was holding her shoulder and smiling and seeming so kind and gentle and then he hugged her and they departed. I felt so good about it and was happy he was there to show his support.
By the second day we were hearing about a low volunteer turn out and how Tim was meeting with Cindy and the family at home to go over details. Casey again repeated her story about leaving Caylee with a babysitter who police have been unable to confirm even exists. Tim seemed distraught, he tried to make sense of where to look.
By the third day Tim was saying he did not believe Caylee was alive and was asking volunteers to gather to search the woods. Cindy Anthony went on national television and claimed he was wasting his time and that volunteers where not turning out because they believe Caylee is alive.
Tim again insisted he was following all leads, but wanted to search the woods. Cindy Anthony was no longer cooperating with Tim and Equusearch, she was not participating in searches nor pleading for the volunteers that were desperately needed as most families do when their loved one is missing, instead she decided to make horrid accusations about Tim only wanting to be in the media spotlight, about Tim only wanting to profit off of her missing granddaughter.
It was exposed that Cindy alerted Tim and his group to a sighting that was reported to her about Caylee being seen in Texas and she wanted Tim and his team to go back home to Texas to search for a LIVE Caylee.
Tim refused to leave. The tip was not credible, but still he sent members of the group to seek it out.
She then released a statement accusing him of wanting funding and exposure for his organization, you know, the NON-FOR PROFIT Equusearch who has helped hundreds of families in need and who are forced to turn families down because of the high rate of missing cases. The Anthony family is obviously horribly ignorant about Tim and what he does and how privileged they are to have him there to assist them.
I feel sick and sad to know that Tim has a new challenge which is to find a child that belongs to a family who only wants to find her alive and does not care to bring her home either way. I feel sick to know that he had to look in Casey Anthony's eyes and that she in turned looked at him and told him lies.
But he is Tim Miller a hero to many families, he is not famous, or rich, he actually filed a lawsuit against the police department for $16 million dollars after they did not return all of his daughter's remains and instead without consent sent them to a lab for testing, and instead of taking the money, he just asked that her complete set of bones be returned so that he may bury his baby girl.
He got her back and he buried her peacefully after almost 3 long years.
Cindy Anthony could learn a few things from Tim Miller.
Here is a direct quote from Tim regarding the search for little Caylee Athony.
Tim Miller responded to Cindy’s statement saying,
“This is about Caylee, period, the end. And I would hope if something has
happened to Caylee, I would hope Cindy would want us out here finding her body
too. If Cindy wants us to stop looking for her body, guess what – we are not
going to.”
