CA CA - Tera Smith, 16, Redding, 22 August 1998

monkalup said:

Another forty articles or so can be found here
http://z10.invisionfree.com/usedtobedoe/index.php?showtopic=10903

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dreamweaver said:

http://www.redding.com/news/2008/aug/22/10-years-without-tera/
10 years without Tera

Questions remain about teen who vanished a decade ago

By Jim Schultz (Contact)
Friday, August 22, 2008
Photo by Jakob Schiller / Record Searchlight
Marilyn and Terry Smith are the parents of Tera Smith, the 16 year-old Central Valley High School student who disappeared in August, 1998 and was never found. Jakob Schiller/Record Searchlight

Tera Smith as she looked about 10 years ago.

Photo courtesy of National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
A time-enhanced photograph shows how Tera Smith might have looked three years ago when she would have been 23.

With the face of an angel, Tera Lynn Smith still continues to haunt north state residents.
It was 10 years ago today that the former Central Valley High School homecoming princess disappeared into the unknown.
Smith, who was 16 when she vanished Aug. 22, 1998, may be gone, but she’s not forgotten.
Still, the memory of her fades just a little bit with each passing year.
There are no formal observances to remember today’s bittersweet anniversary, said her 48-year-old-father, Terry, the owner of the Oasis Fun Center in Shasta Lake.
The family will remember her in their own quiet way, he said.
Smith, who has long ago come to the realization that his beautiful daughter is dead, said the pain of her disappearance remains with him.
But it has dulled with time.
“It’s not nearly as sharp as the first couple of years,” he said.
The frustration, however, has not abated.
Smith, who admits to watching on TV an inordinate number of so-called cold case murder investigations, is still hopeful that the entire story will someday come out.
But he’s not overly optimistic. >¦“It becomes less and less likely with time,” he said.
Shasta County Secret Witness is still offering a reward of up to $20,000 for information leading to locating Tera, and the Virginia-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children also continues to ask the public for help in finding her.
Tera, who would now be 26, disappeared during the early evening hours after leaving her rural Tarcy Way home dressed to go jogging.
Her then-martial arts instructor, Troy Zink, who is now 39, reportedly told authorities on the night of her disappearance that she had called him at work on her cell phone and asked to meet near her home.

Zink, who has denied any involvement in Tera’s disappearance, told sheriff’s deputies that she asked him for $2,000. When he refused, the teenager became upset and asked for a ride to the intersection of Old Alturas Road and Old Oregon Trail.
It was there, Zink told deputies, that he dropped her off and then drove alone to Hang Glider Hill, west of Shasta Dam, to pray. He claimed he returned to his Redding home about 11:30 p.m., deputies have said.

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Smith, as well as countless others, doesn’t believe that story.
“We know what happened,” he said.
Based on journal entries and letters found in Tera’s room after her disappearance, Smith has said he believes his blond-haired, blue-eyed daughter asked Zink to meet her so she could end an affair with him.
Zink, who pleaded guilty in the 1990s to rape and later served a four-year prison sentence for being a felon in possession of firearms, has never been named a suspect by the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office and has never been charged in Tera’s disappearance because of a lack of sufficient evidence.
He has also refused to be questioned by investigators after his initial interview with sheriff’s deputies,
Chuck Zink, Troy Zink’s father, referred a telephone call earlier this week from the Record Searchlight about the 10-year anniversary to Redding attorney Jerrald Pickering II.
Pickering said that he would speak with the family, but did not return the telephone call and was unavailable Thursday for comment.
It’s been a frustrating 10 years for investigators with the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office, who continue to investigate tips and leads in hopes of solving the case.
Smith, who believes sheriff’s investigators have exhausted every lead in the case, noted that he contacted detectives in June after receiving a tip that construction workers came upon what appeared to be a grave in the Shingletown area.
The tip was investigated, but it was only a canvas tent and assorted trash that had been buried at the site.
Shasta County sheriff’s Sgt. John Hubbard said Thursday that “hundreds and hundreds” of tips have been investigated since Tera’s disappearance and that three or four tips, or suggestions, were followed up within the past year.
But none panned out.
“It’s a frustrating case,” Hubbard said, adding that his heart breaks for Tera’s parents. “If I could pick a case to be solved, this one is it.”
Despite the dead ends, Smith remains hopeful that evidence might someday be uncovered to reveal the truth.
In the 10 years since his daughter disappeared, his other three children, Trevor, Sierra and Kyra, have married and started families of their own, he said.
He and his wife, Marilyn, now have two grandchildren with a third on its way.
“We’re quietly going ahead with our lives,” Smith said.
But not seeing Tera grow into adulthood is a painful truth, and he admits he sometimes has a difficult time remembering her voice, as well as her smile.
“The memories are fading,” he said. “ And I hate that.”
Reporter Jim Schultz can be reached at 225-8223 or at jschultz@redding.com.

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...Zink, who has denied any involvement in Tera’s disappearance, told sheriff’s deputies that she asked him for $2,000. When he refused, the teenager became upset and asked for a ride to the intersection of Old Alturas Road and Old Oregon Trail.

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girlfromredding said:

Does anyone know what Tera Smiths regular jogging routine was? I'm interested to know how it might relate to the Sherri Papini case.

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