CA CA - Bryce Laspisa, 19, Castaic, 30 Aug 2013 - #3

[kevsrebla]

mmmmm, no truck stop in Castaic? I see two on a google search

Castaic Truck Stop
31611 Castaic Rd, Castaic, CA ‎
(661) 295-1374

Pilot Travel Center
31642 Castaic Rd, Castaic, CA ‎
(661) 257-2800

link to pic of my google search

http://crazylife98.tumblr.com/image/62078689097

I counted at least 90 between the two truck stops, not including those parked on the street. In my hitching days I would have considered this a gold mine of rides. I was never one to stand along side a hwy, I always worked the truck stops asking for rides. Meet people including truckers face to face was the best way to get rides. Some truckers at first would turn me down then later would come up to me and offer a ride. Gave everyone involved a chance to meet me/get to know me before they considered giving me a ride. I think it is very possible BL hitched out of Castaic. If he was confused or disoriented he may have taken the first offer he got and it would matter if what direction the ride was heading.

 

[cluciano63]

For those of you who know truckers, would they pick up someone if they appeared disoriented, possibly bloody, possibly drugged, carrying nothing, and if so, what would they do with the person? I mean, would they just give them a ride, or would they report it or take them someplace like a hospital?

 

[PoirotsGirlFriday]

Given time and distance to date, would that potentially put Bryce between Salem and Portland Oregon moving towards the Washington State Line....if the sightings hold true?

That's kind of what I was thinking would be the route. I was wondering if I should start hanging posters between here (Seattle) all the way down along I-5 to OR. But I noticed on the FB page they asked people in NorCal, OR, ID, NV and maybe a few other states to be on the look out but they didn't mention WA.

So I'm wondering if they have a reason to think he was not heading north to WA? Or maybe it was just an oversight... But if it was, it's an odd one. If he left CA and ended up in OR, and he's seen near I-5, then it seems to me that it only makes sense he's heading north along I-5 and would ultimately end up in WA. (IF this was him).

 

[PoirotsGirlFriday]

For those of you who know truckers, would they pick up someone if they appeared disoriented, possibly bloody, possibly drugged, carrying nothing, and if so, what would they do with the person? I mean, would they just give them a ride, or would they report it or take them someplace like a hospital?

I dated a trucker for awhile. And even rode with him in his truck a few times. He never picked anyone up, he was a little too cautious for that.

But I feel POSITIVE he would have called 911 had he seen such a person walking along the freeway. If he had spotted them at a truck stop, he would have asked the person if he was okay or needed an ambulance.

Another thing my former bf would do A LOT of was talk to other truckers over the CB. Maybe I'm wrong, but seeing a young man looking befuddled or needing help seems like something a trucker would tell the others about. Either as a "hey, keep an eye out" or just as an anecdote of something interesting they saw that day.

There is always that chance that Bryce wasn't bloodied, confused, etc., too. In which case, his chances of being picked up by a trucker would increase. It's not uncommon for people Bryce's age to hitchhike. My brothers have done it before, and had no problem being picked up by a trucker who just wanted some company and thought they looked like nice high school/college kids without a car, not dangerous or suspicious.

This is kind of O/T but has anyone seen the movie "Craigslist Joe"? It's about a young man who made it coast to coast (and in between) just on rides from strangers he found over Craigslist. I'm not saying this is something Bryce would do. But I have noticed a growing "trend" among young people, of ride sharing to go over long distances.

 

[edwin]

For those of you who know truckers, would they pick up someone if they appeared disoriented, possibly bloody, possibly drugged, carrying nothing, and if so, what would they do with the person? I mean, would they just give them a ride, or would they report it or take them someplace like a hospital?

BBM

Head wounds (**if it was indeed a head wound**) bleed a lot, proportional to other wounds.

"Minor cuts on the head often bleed heavily because the face and scalp have many blood vessels close to the surface of the skin."

(source here) http://firstaid.webmd.com/tc/how-to-stop-bleeding-from-a-minor-head-wound-topic-overview

If there were really only a little bit of blood in the car (it was reported as such), then the cut could be positively tiny, and possibly unnoticeable. KWIM?

 

[gitana1]

I wanted to post this about the form of amnesia I'm thinking about:

Dissociative fugue, formerly called psychogenic fugue, is one of a group of conditions called dissociative disorders. The word fugue comes from the Latin word for "flight." People with dissociative fugue temporarily lose their sense of personal identity and impulsively wander or travel away from their homes or places of work. They often become confused about who they are and might even create new identities. Outwardly, people with this disorder show no signs of illness, such as a strange appearance or odd behavior. http://www.m.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/dissociative-fugue#

The link discusses much more about the condition, such as it can be brought on by stress or trauma.

Of note is that sufferers don't appear outwardly odd or strange.

 

[edwin]

Fascinating, gitana1. That condition, as explained by the article, would explain SO much.

 

[cluciano63]

I am not saying he WAS bloody, etc...just wondered what a trucker would do if he was.
I doubt he looked "fresh as a daisy" in any case, as it sounded like he had a rough twenty or so hours, if not more. His clothes may have been dirty, disheveled, etc...in any case, I also thought the CB's would be a factor if a trucker picked up or had contact with such a person, as a kind of BOLO or whatever.

 

[gitana1]

I am not saying he was bloody, etc...just wondered what a trucker would do if he was.
I doubt he looked "fresh as a daisy" in any case, as it sounded like he had a rough twenty or so hours, if not more. His clothes may have been dirty, disheveled, etc...in any case, I also thought the CB's would be a factor if a trucker picked up or had contact with such a person, as a kind of BOLO or whatever.

Man, I can't imagine picking anyone up period. It's so scary. And I get that truckers get lonely but with the rules against picking up hitch hikers, if we add a confused or bloody or acting bizarrely, I can't imagine too many people picking such a person up.

 

[cluciano63]

Man, I can't imagine picking anyone up period. It's so scary. And I get that truckers get lonely but with the rules against picking up hitch hikers, if we add a confused or bloody or acting bizarrely, I can't imagine too many people picking such a person up.

No, I sure wouldn't pick anyone up. I would even be scared to pick up a woman and child, for fear it was a ruse and a dangerous gang was hiding, lol. But a lot of posters seem to think maybe he got all kinds of rides and if so, I was wondering if not even one such driver would report odd behavior or whatever, or maybe that is reaching. I don't know. But I feel like if he walked away from the situation at the lake, he probably was not looking/acting his best. JMO

 

[edwin]

I am not saying he WAS bloody, etc...just wondered what a trucker would do if he was.
I doubt he looked "fresh as a daisy" in any case, as it sounded like he had a rough twenty or so hours, if not more. His clothes may have been dirty, disheveled, etc...in any case, I also thought the CB's would be a factor if a trucker picked up or had contact with such a person, as a kind of BOLO or whatever.

I hear you, and I agree that he could have looked pretty rough. I was not trying to start an argument or pick nits...I just was thinking aloud, based on what your post made me consider--that head wounds bleed a lot, that the small amount of blood in the car would likely mean a small head cut if there's a head cut at all, and that if he has a head wound, that a lot of damage can be done even without the bleeding.

Friendly hand extended...

 

[LinasK]

I'm really hoping the sighting of Bryce in Oregon somehow pans out. It just doesn't seem likely to me. While his disappearance has reached at minimum almost 12k people, and many differerent states. For some reason it seems hard for me to believe he was spotted in another state by someone who happened to see him and his story. While it is possible it just seems unlikely to me.

I feel like his very fair skin and red hair are so uncommon that it is easy to mistake him for someone else. I hope that from now on if people are spotting someone that looks like Bryce, that they are able to confirm the large tattoo.

The other thing I wanted to mention and I'm sure will probably anger a few people, are the updates. Many of us have spent countless hours daily volunteering and trying to bring Bryce home. At the very least we should be getting more updates. I feel like the less we are hearing the more the attention will die down. Even if there are no updates, that's an update in itself. There's still a lot of questions left unanswered and I feel like the community should be hearing some sort of update rather than a generic we need your help.

Just my 2 cents.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

I think so, but for the exact opposite reason. Redheads are NOT rare in California, they said the same stupid thing in Linnea Lomax's case- that blondes are rare in Sacramento. Nothing could be further from the truth!!! I am a Native Californian who has lived up and down the state my entire life. If anything, I am a very dark brunette, and I stand out far more than all the blondes are redheads around me in the state!!!

 

[lillygator]

wow so these sightings may be a real possibility....still hoping.

 

[gitana1]

Fascinating, gitana1. That condition, as explained by the article, would explain SO much.

Here are some case studies:

This one tells about a woman missing for 19 days, with no money or ID. It explains how she survived.

On Aug. 28, a Thursday, a 23-year-old schoolteacher from Hamilton Heights named Hannah Emily Upp went for a jog along Riverside Drive. That jog is the last thing that Ms. Upp says she remembers before the deckhands rescued her from the waters of New York Harbor on the morning of Tuesday, Sept. 16.
Rumors and speculation abounded about what befell Ms. Upp. She disappeared the day before the start of a new school year at Thurgood Marshall Academy, a Harlem school, where she taught Spanish. She left behind her wallet, her cellphone, her ID and a host of troubling questions.
It was as if the city had simply opened wide and swallowed her whole —

Was she suffering from bipolar disorder? Running away from an overly demanding job? Escaping from a city that can overwhelm even the most resilient?
Other questions lingered. Did she forage for food? Where did she sleep? Most baffling of all, how did she survive for so long without money or any identification in one of the world’s busiest and most complex cities? http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/nyregion/thecity/01miss.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Here's one about a man who repeatedly disappears:

An amnesia sufferer who had been searching for his identity for more than a month was back in Washington state with his fiancee on Tuesday, but he still doesn’t remember his past life or what happened, his mother said.
Jeffrey Alan Ingram, 40, was diagnosed in Denver with dissociative fugue, a type of amnesia.
He has had similar bouts of amnesia in the past, likely triggered by stress, once disappearing for nine months. When he went missing this time, on Sept. 6, he had been on his way to Canada to visit a friend who was dying of cancer, said his fiancee, Penny Hansen.
“I think that the stress, the sadness, the grief of facing a best friend dying was enough, and leaving me was enough to send him into an amnesia state,” Hansen told KCNC-TV.
When Ingram found himself in Denver on Sept. 10, he didn’t know who he was. He said he walked around for about six hours asking people for help, then ended up at a hospital, where police spokeswoman Virginia Quinones said Ingram was diagnosed with a type of amnesia known as dissociative fugue.
People with dissociative fugue typically appear fine but have temporarily lost their sense of identity, are confused and impulsively travel away from home. Experts say it is rare and typically linked to severe stress. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15373503/...amnesia-reunited-family-friends/#.UkCmEH-5jTo

Here's a video about a man who developed this in the UK: THE MAN WITH NO PAST - YouTube

Here's one about a woman who was wandering for 5 days:

Jane Dee Williams says she remembers nothing before the day in May 1985 when she was found wandering in an Aurora, Colo., mall, with a green coat, a Toyota key, a copy of ``Watership Down,'' two green pens, a notebook and no clue who she was.
She was Jody Roberts, and she had disappeared from her home in Wauna, Wash., and her job as a reporter in Tacoma five days earlier.
She went to Aurora police for help and ended up at the Colorado Mental Health Institute at Fort Logan with a diagnosis of psychogenic fugue - an extraordinarily rare mental illness and a form of amnesia.
Now, while television reporters speculate that she may be faking lost memory, experts who treat it say it is entirely possible that she has amnesia and that it has lasted 12 years.
Among them are Dr. Robert Miller, professor of forensic psychiatry at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. Miller, a nationally recognized expert on amnesia, said that while criminals often fake amnesia, ordinary people rarely do.http://juneauempire.com/stories/071797/amnesia.html

Here's one about a man who has had repeated episodes and has traveled extremely long distances during some of them:

On the surface, Fred Knerr appears to lead a normal life. The 34-year-old is married, has three children, owns a modest three-bedroom home in San Bernardino and earns a living at a fire extinguisher company in Los Angeles.
Ask him about his childhood, and he will proudly speak of loving parents, the Mormon church and life as a track and field star at El Monte High School.
Ask him about the first time he met his wife, Trina, and those crystal blue eyes twinkle, his mouth blossoms and the room is filled with details of d

Even ask him about last night's dinner or what bedtime story he read his youngest child Gabe, and Fred will answer with glee.
But, ask Fred why he has abandoned jobs, his wife and three children six times in the past eight years traveling as far as Florida and find that he is not so normal after all.
Doctors say Fred suffers from dissociative fugue a rare, but serious, mental disorder that has left him wandering Utah highways bruised and bloodied, slumming on south Florida beaches and sleeping in a Las Vegas hotel sports lounge with little recollection of his whereabouts or identity. http://www2.dailybulletin.com/news/ci_2980005#ixzz2fkcJGfWj

Here's one about a very old case where a guy was missing for two months:

"On the 15th of March, about five in the morning, he heard an explosion like a gunshot, and woke to find himself in a strange bed in a town he did not recognize."
No, this is not the story of the fictional amnesiac Jason Bourne of "The Bourne Ultimatum," which opens this weekend.
It is the story of another Bourne: The real 19th century Ansel Bourne that most likely served as inspiration for the super spy's name.
[O]ne day a man calling himself A.J. Brown arrived in Norristown, Pa., and opened a small shop.
Nearly two months after his arrival on the morning of March 15, the man who had been calling himself Brown opened his eyes and had no idea where he was. Frantic, he ran to the neighbors and was astonished to learn he was in Pennsylvania.
Even more awestruck were the neighbors, who learned that the man's name was not Brown, but Ansel Bourne and that he was an evangelical preacher who lived in Rhode Island. Ansel couldn't remember anything after he set out to visit his sister's house two months before.
Ansel's "Bourne Identity"-like case was one of the first documented instances of a rare disorder known as dissociative fugue.

"[Dissociative fugue] is a state in which an individual has lost their identity," explained Daniel Schacter, a psychology professor at Harvard. "They don't know who they are, and they've lost all information about their past. They go on functioning automatically."
According to Elisabeth Moes, associate professor in the psychology department at Suffolk University, dissociative fugue can be brought on by traumatic events, "usually after a physical injury together with a lot of stress. At that point they can become amnesic."
Then the victim enters a "fugue state" in which he or she functions completely normally, even though there is no recollection of who he or she is.
Unlike the fictional Jason Bourne, who immediately tries to find his identity, victims in the fugue state don't even realize anything has gone wrong, Schacter told ABCNEWS.com. Rather, they can take on a new name and occupation, as if they've never missed a beat in their new life.
"That's typically the kind of thing you hear about," said Scott Lilienfeld, a psychology professor at Emory University. "A person disappears, and then shows up in a new area under a new identity with a new job and new friends."http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=3445059&page=1

Except for one case above (I think Ingram), all of these case are new ones I'm citing. I have linked to various other, similar cases in earlier posts.

 

[PoirotsGirlFriday]

No, I sure wouldn't pick anyone up. I would even be scared to pick up a woman and child, for fear it was a ruse and a dangerous gang was hiding, lol. But a lot of posters seem to think maybe he got all kinds of rides and if so, I was wondering if not even one such driver would report odd behavior or whatever, or maybe that is reaching. I don't know. But I feel like if he walked away from the situation at the lake, he probably was not looking/acting his best. JMO

IF that's him in OR, then that could actually be just one ride. (I think?) Which seems much more likely as far as it not being reported. There are some truckers (such as the case of the one I knew) that work independently for family owned farms. And there are a lot of farms in the OR and WA area. In such a case these drivers, although held to the same driving regulations, don't necessarily have any rules about picking up hitchhikers or have to report to a boss. They often own their own trucks and are their own boss.

However, I still believe they would report to LE about a young man exhibiting strange behavior or appearing injured. Which leads me to believe one of two things...

1. Bryce appears completely healthy and normal and coherent.
2. Bryce did not get a ride with anyone (trucker or otherwise). Which in my opinion, probably means he is still around the Castaic area. I can't really see him getting to OR (or anywhere else) on foot, only. JMO though, JMO.

 

[gitana1]

No, I sure wouldn't pick anyone up. I would even be scared to pick up a woman and child, for fear it was a ruse and a dangerous gang was hiding, lol. But a lot of posters seem to think maybe he got all kinds of rides and if so, I was wondering if not even one such driver would report odd behavior or whatever, or maybe that is reaching. I don't know. But I feel like if he walked away from the situation at the lake, he probably was not looking/acting his best. JMO

I think it is very possible that he got rides. Even though it's hard for me to imagine picking up a hitch hiker, I have cited to so many cases of people who have gone missing but survived and traveled long distances, while in a confused or amnesiac or or other odd state. So I know it's possible.

Also, I don't necessarily think Bryce is/was covered in blood, disheveled or acting odd. There's no evidence that he suffered intense blood loss. And according to the articlesw I have linked, although some people with this fugue disorder act confused, many others can appear quite normal, function well and not, apparently set off any red flags.

As far as being able to get several rides from people, if he appeared normal, I'm guessing it's possible, especially based on some of the comments from people familiar with truckers who say they like company so they pick up hitchers.

Again, I know what the odds are in cases like this. I know what's probable. But if we aren't here coming from the standpoint that Bryce may be alive and have survived and needs to be found, what the heck are we here for? Waiting morbidly for his corpse to show up so we can say, "I told you so?" I mean, there's not even a body that needs to be id'ed for goodness sake.

I'm just not going to do that. When I'm pretty positive or determined that there is no hope and it there is no current fight for justice, I just leave a thread. To each his own. But, in this case, I have reason to hope. It may not be in accordance with stats so I get the doubt. But while the doubt is certainly logical, I think the hope is logical as well, even if it's not probable. So I'm going to keep sleuthing with the positive attitude that Bryce is alive. Cause' if he is, arguing about how remote the possibility of his survival is can only hurt him.

 

[PoirotsGirlFriday]

Except for one case above (I think Ingram), all of these case are new ones I'm citing. I have linked to various other, similar cases in earlier posts.

RSBM for space.

Thanks for the links. Intriguing stories, but very troubling. Many pages back I had posted a link to a page describing dissociative disorders. I will post it again for any of the new readers/posters we have. I agree, out of the different types of disorders, Bryce's case would seem to fit under dissociative fugue. If something like this would be at work here.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/dissociative-disorders/DS00574/DSECTION=symptoms

 

[sclemens]

Man, I can't imagine picking anyone up period. It's so scary. And I get that truckers get lonely but with the rules against picking up hitch hikers, if we add a confused or bloody or acting bizarrely, I can't imagine too many people picking such a person up.

I'm on the same page as you about picking up anyone. But, truckers do, as we all know, and I imagine Bryce's clean-cut appearance and guileless face (from what I've seen in his pics) would disarm many a would-be ride offerer. (-;
Plus, he's still a kid and looks like one.

 

[2Hope4]

There's two cases that I know of on here... one is a lady that married, and after she died the family found out she wasn't who they thought she was. She could have suffered the same illness.

 

[cluciano63]

I wonder, was he under more stress than the average college-aged person? Some particular stressful event? I know he likely had stress for good grades, etc. But was something else going on?