CA CA - Tara Lossett Cossey, 12, San Pablo, 6 June 1979

http://doenetwork.org/cases/834dfca.html

Tara Cossett Cossey
Missing since June 6, 1979 from San Pablo, Contra Costa County, California
Classification: Endangered Missing



Vital Statistics

• Date Of Birth: August 24, 1966
• Age at Time of Disappearance: 12 years old
• Height and Weight at Time of Disappearance: 4'11; 65 lbs.
• Distinguishing Characteristics: Native female. Black hair; brown eyes. Dark complexion.
• Clothing: Cutoff Levi's jeans, a blue tank top and thong sandals.
• Dentals: Not available

Circumstances of Disappearance
Cossey was last seen in San Pablo, California on June 6, 1979. She was walking to Pirelli's Liquor Store to purchase a bag of sugar for her mother at the time of her disappearance. Cossey never returned to her family's residence and has not been heard from again.
Authorities announced that a suspect had a possible connection to Cossey's case, as well as the disappearances of Michaela Garecht, Ilene Misheloff, Amber Swartz-Garcia and Amanda Campbell.

The first post in this thread indicated that:
>>Authorities announced that a suspect had a possible connection to Cossey's case, as well as the disappearances of Michaela Garecht, Ilene Misheloff, Amber Swartz-Garcia and Amanda Campbell. <<

There is no further amplification, but below is a little more information on those cases that are supposedly related to Tara's 1979 Disappearance:

Amber Jean Swartz-Garcia, 8, Pinole, CA Missing 3 June 1988

Michaela Joy Garecht, 9, Hayward, CA Missing 19 November 1988

Ilene Misheloff, 13, Dublin, CA Missing 30 January 1989

Amanda Nicole "Nikki" Campbell, 4, Fairfield, CA Missing 27 December 1991

In the case of Michaela, there is a sketch of a man believed to be her abductor. But the suspect that is referred to would have to be a guy named Tim Bindner.

Tim Bindner (born about 1953), a former cemetery worker and crematorium operator would visit graveyards four or five evenings a week. In 1986, this Berkeley Graduate lost his job at the Social Security Administration because he was (by his own admission) sending unsolicited gifts of money and birthday cards to some girls in Colorado whose names he got from their Social Security files. More on him later...

I have a book about the missing girls' cases and Tim Bindner's connection to them, and Tara Cossey isn't even mentioned. All the other girls were Caucasian and, except Ilene, fair. The book said Ilene's case probably wasn't connected to the others because she was a teenager and the others only children -- Nikki Campbell was just 4.

Tara Lossett Cossey Missing Since: June 6, 1979 from San Pablo, California
Classification: Endangered Missing



Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance

Date Of Birth: August 24, 1966
Age: 12 years old
Height and Weight: 4'11, 65 pounds
Distinguishing Characteristics: Native American female. Black hair, brown eyes. Some agencies may spell Cossey's middle name "Cossette."
Clothing/Jewelry Description: A blue tank top, cutoff Levi's jeans and thong sandals.

Details of Disappearance

Cossey was last seen in San Pablo, California on June 6, 1979. She walked to Pirelli's Liquor Store to purchase a bag of sugar for her mother during the day. Cossey was last seen inside the Montalvin Shopping Center. She never returned to her family's residence and has not been heard from again.

Some agencies may list June 10, 1979 as the date of Cossey's
disappearance. Her age is occasionally listed as 11 years old.

Authorities announced that Timothy Bindner had a possible
connection to Cossey's case, as well as the disappearances of Michaela Garecht, Ilene Misheloff, Amber Swartz-Garcia and Amanda Campbell.

A photo of Bindner is posted below this case summary. He
maintains his innocence and successfully sued Campbell's hometown of Fairfield, California in 1997 for defamation of character. Bindner, a married sewage treatment plant worker, came to authorities' attention after he began sending birthday greetings to young girls in the East Bay area.

One child's parents contacted authorities and handed over a letter
Bindner had written to their daughter. The note was printed backwards and could only be deciphered by holding it up to a mirror. Bindner claimed he sent the cards as a kind gesture because the girls were "lonely."

Bindner also visited the Oakmont Cemetery gravesite of Angela
Bugay, a five-year-old girl girl who was abducted and murdered in Antioch, California in 1983.


Bindner was never considered a suspect in her murder and another man has since been arrested in that case. Bindner approached many of the mothers of missing girls from the East Bay area offering his assistance, including Amber and Garecht's families. He introduced himself to Kim three days after Amber vanished.

Investigators asked her to maintain a quasi-friendship with Bindner in hope of learning if he was connected to any of the girls' cases. She and authorities agreed that Bindner appeared to playing mind games with victims' loved ones and law enforcement.

Many people theorize that he enjoyed taunting families into thinking
that he may have been involved in the presumed abductions. He was once arrested for annoying two little girls whom he was trying to lure into his van, but the charges were later dropped.

Bindner often drove around in a light blue Dodge van with a license
plate that said "Lov You." Inside the van was wallpapered with many pictures of children. A photograph of the van is posted at the link below this case summary.

Bindner refers to himself as a "good Samaritan." He asked Linda Golston, a reporter for The San Jose Mercury News, to interview him at Oakmont Cemetery at 4:30 a.m. He played his favorite song on her car stereo, "Jesus, Here's Another Child To Hold."

Bindner told Goldston that he thought of the missing girls as "his
children." She asked him how he believed the abductions occurred and he said one child was submissive, but another fought back against her assailant. Bindner added that he was "guessing" about the girls' reactions.

Bindner wrote a letter to a law enforcement agency in the late 1980s, stating that he believed the next girl who would be abducted from the area would be nine years old. Garecht disappeared shortly thereafter; she was nine at the time of her abduction.

Bindner also sent a holiday card to a profiler for the Federal Bureau
Of Investigation (FBI) in 1990. The card depicted an image of a young girl holding up four fingers. Campbell vanished in 1991 at the age of four. Search dogs traced Campbell and Swartz-Garcia's scent to Bugay's grave. Authorities never had enough evidence to prove Bindner was connected to their cases, although he was known for visiting the cemetery on occasion.


Bindner was given a heroism award by the California State Patrol after assisting victims in the 1989 San Francisco earthquake. He has never been charged in any of the cases. Cossey's disappearance remains unsolved.


Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department
925-335-1582
OR
925-313-2600
OR
925-646-2441


Source Information

California Attorney General's Office
ABC News
The North County Times
The San Francisco Chronicle
Amber Foundation For Missing Children
The National Center For Missing and Exploited Children
The Charley Project: Tara Lossett Cossey

LINK:

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/c/cossey_tara.html

I guess there was an old thread on Tara, but it has not been posted to in a long time. Middle name spelled differently. Here is a link to it:

Tara Cossey, missing since 1979 - Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community

LINK:

http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34834&highlight=Cossey

Also, here is an updated link to the Doenetwork file on her:

http://doenetwork.us/cases/834dfca.html

Here's a link to an article about a book that an FBI profiler wrote about Bindner:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1997/08/30/MN10685.DTL

I found the suggestion he made about the method of burying the girls' bodies in graves that would be used the next day very interesting, especially considering the fact that he worked in graveyards.

I wonder if ground-penetrating radar is specific enough to be able to tell whether anything is buried under a grave? I found this website: www.geomodel.com - that talks about using it to identify actual grave sites because of the cavity that would exist where a coffin was buried, but I wonder if a similar cavity would show up under the coffin if bones with no enclosure were buried there.

I can't believe the guy was able to sue the city and win!

This unsolved case is 30 years old and Tara is still missing.

http://doenetwork.org/cases/834dfca.html

http://doenetwork.us/cases/834dfca.html

Bumping up.

bumping case up...

I grew up in the community (Montalvin Manner) where this happened. I was six at the time, but Tara still frequently comes up in discussions with people who lived there at the time. She is not forgotten.

One detail I have heard but I have not seen published so I do not know if it is true, the police apparently found the bag of sugar that she had purchased before the kidnapping.

With respect to Bindner, I think he is a sick man who may have been involved in other kidnappings or at least knew people involved, but I do not think he was involved in this one.

It is my prayer that whoever did this is caught, that someone who knows something will finally come forward.

If anything Binder is only 1 step above a child murderer in the sense that he played with people and interjected himself into the investigations. I loath the man but that is My own opinion.:banghead:

His comments about the graveyard are about as sick as they come and makes you think "what kind of animal would think of that?"

He took resources away from the investigation and for that alone I think he should have done 20 years at Pelican bay!

:bump: for Tara, missing 34 years this month. She would be turning 47 this August.

Snipped:

Tara was last seen in San Pablo, California on June 6, 1979. She walked to Pirelli's Liquor Store to purchase a bag of sugar for her mother during the day. Tara was last seen inside the Montalvin Shopping Center. She never returned to her family's residence and has not been heard from again.

Click to expand...

:bump: Bumping for Tara.

I wonder if she is related to any of the Bay Area girls and their disappearances (Michaela, Ilene, Amanda and Amber). She is often left out of discussion with these girls (I think it's not so much to do with race or age but maybe the time? She went missing in 1979 and the others girls went missing between 1988-1991. That's 9 years between them), but I think it has to be related to at least one of them. Makes me wonder if there was/is some kind of Ariel Castro in California at the time.

I hope police are still working on her case and she is brought home one day.

The book "Stalemate" by John Philpin discusses the Binder links to the other four cases but not the Tara Cossey case. There was some circumstantial evidence that linked Bindner to the Michaela Garecht case (he was in Hayward the day she was abducted) and the Amanda Campbell case (there was a connection between Bindner and Amanda's neighborhood) and Amber Swartz's mother thought Bindner's interest in Amber was "creepy" but there was no forensic evidence against him and he was rather thoroughly investigated and nothing was found. (there was really nothing linking him to the Ilene Misheloff case except the time frame).

In the end, it is a sitution where Bindner can't be ruled in and and can't be ruled out; hence a Stalemate.

Today marks 35 years since Tara Cossey was abducted as she was walking to the store to purchase a bag of sugar for her mother. Sadly, I could not find any anniversary articles on her.
I found an older article about her disappearance by ABC news featured with the disappearance of Amber Swartz-Garcia and Angela Bugay, who was found murdered.
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=132655

Please don't forget about Tara.

Bumping for Tara. I do wonder if her disappearance is connected to the disappearances of Amanda, Eileen, Michaela, Amber and perhaps many other little girls and young women.

I wonder the same thing as well. I've always believed there's a connection to at least a couple of these disappearances-especially between Amber & Amanda.

amber1 said:

I wonder the same thing as well. I've always believed there's a connection to at least a couple of these disappearances-especially between Amber & Amanda.

Click to expand...

According to the book Stalemate, Amber and Amanda were both wearing the same colors when they disappeared; purple and pink. Stalemate is a good read IMO and packed with useful information but I don't think Bindner is anything more than a confused and lonely man; not a babykiller. Because he was watched and followed by LE for a long time , I think evidence against him would have been found if there were any to be found.

Bumping; this beautiful child has been gone too long.

There were quite a few young girls who were abducted and their bodies concealed in California's East bay region during the 70's and 80's that have not been solved. Curtis Dean Anderson was convicted of the Xena Fairchild killing and is generally believed to have killed Amber Swartz. He may have been involved in others. He would have been 17 and lived over 100 miles away in 1979 so he is probably not involved in Tara's case.