Still Missing: Rethinking the D.B. Cooper Case and Other Mysterious Unsolved Disappearances (7 page)

LISA: Around 11.

ATTORNEY: Can you recall your father specifically?

LISA: Very well.

Lisa Lepsy and her father, Dick Lepsy, before her first communion.

ATTORNEY: Even though you were only 11 years old, do you remember the relationship that your mother and father had? 

LISA: Yes.

ATTORNEY: Was there ever any ashtray throwing and yelling and screaming in the house?

LISA: No, not at all, they were very loving in front of us. If they had something to discuss, it was discussed and they went and had a private discussion to solve things. It was between them. We never were brought into anything.

ATTORNEY: Did you have a reasonable relationship with him?

LISA: I thought I had a nice relationship with him, a very special one.

ATTORNEY: Why do you think it was special?

LISA: I think it was special because I was his only little girl, and he had three sons to divide his time with, but I was his only daughter.

ATTORNEY: Would he do things with you on a private basis, just the two of you?

LISA: He did things with all of us.

ATTORNEY: Were there times when the entire family would go to different museums into Detroit, and this sort of thing?

LISA: Yes, frequently, the museum in Chicago, to Grand Rapids, they would take us on vacation with them sometimes when they went to get us kids exposed to some cultural and some civic things.

ATTORNEY: Did you know your father’s mother?

LISA: Yes, very well.

ATTORNEY: Did she have a close relationship with her son?

LISA: From what I saw and what I perceived yes, very much.

ATTORNEY: Prior to the time of his disappearance, did your grandmother come up to the home that you were then living in in Grayling?

LISA: Yes, at least once a summer, she always came at least once a year to spend time with us.

ATTORNEY: Did you also go down to see her in Chicago?

LISA: Myself, I went I think more than the other kids probably, but I used to go quite frequently and spend time there.

ATTORNEY: Did this relationship continue after your father’s disappearance?

LISA: Yes, up until my grandmother’s death.

ATTORNEY: How long ago was it your grandmother died?

LISA: About two years now, maybe a little more.

ATTORNEY: Were you there shortly before her death?

LISA: I was there about a month and a half before she died.

ATTORNEY: Was she aware at that point in time that she was in the process of dying?

LISA: Yes.

ATTORNEY: You were also aware of that fact?

LISA: Yes.

ATTORNEY: Did you ever have any discussion with our grandmother about the disappearance of you father?

LISA: Yes.

ATTORNEY: And what did these discussions revolve around?

LISA: Just the amazement that no one had ever heard from him and she was quite upset because she was going to die and that was something that she’d always wanted to find out, whatever did happen to him before she had died for her peace of mind, I guess.

Lisa’s flowering description of her dad as a loving father and husband mirrors the impressions of most who knew Dick Lepsy and saw him interact with his loved ones. The testimony of all those involved seems to reflect that Dick Lepsy was a good man with solid morals, and almost incapable of abandoning his family. The life insurances companies finally settled for less than full value of the policies, but Jackie had to sign a document requiring her to pay back all of the settlement money if Dick ever showed up or was proven to be alive.

The 1980s crept by, and one by one, the Lepsy children graduated from high school, Grayling High School to be exact, the alma mater of their parents. One by one they drifted off to college or the service. And one by one they married, produced Lepsy grandchildren and moved on in their lives. All of the children thought less and less about their father and each developed their own personal thoughts and feelings about his disappearance, and each one dealt with it in his, or her, own special way.

In the mid-80s, Lisa would waitress and bartend around town on the weekends, like many industrious Grayling girls, for extra money. One Saturday night, while serving drinks at Grayling’s Chief Shoppenagon’s Motor Hotel, she ran into her father’s old friend and co-worker, Jay. Over the years, many of Dick Lepsy’s family and coworkers suspected that Jay was somehow involved with his disappearance, but nothing was ever substantiated. Lisa was shocked to see that the once vibrant Jay was wheelchair bound, missing both of his legs.

Jay explained to Lisa that when he was leaving a bar in Kalkaska, he was hit by a truck and his legs were “torn off.” He shared that he had to use his own belt as a tourniquet around the stumps of where his legs used to be to stop the bleeding until emergency personnel arrived. Jay was very close to death that night and he claimed he had a religious experience; a “come to Jesus” moment, if you will. In between drinks, he went on to tell Lisa that he had changed his life now, and was “walking” the straight and narrow.

Eventually that night, Lisa cornered Jay and asked him bluntly, looking him dead in the eyes, “What happened to my dad, Jay?”

Jay answered, “Lisa, I don’t know. I just don’t know what happened to him. It’s always been a mystery to me.”

Lisa looked deep into his eyes and asked, “Are you sure?”

“I swear, if I knew anything, I would tell you,” Jay insisted.

When Jay wheeled himself out of the bar that night, that was the last Lisa Lepsy ever saw of him, but it wasn’t the last time she thought of him. She still had her suspicions.

On September 17, 1986, Jackie and Lisa Lepsy appeared on an episode of the Sally Jessy Raphael Show. Lisa had written a letter to the show’s producers in hopes of spreading the word of her father’s disappearance by broadcasting details about the case. The story of Dick Lepsy’s disappearance was actually the lead story of that episode of the show.

Sally Jessy Raphael, the host of the show, opened the show by saying, “Please meet Jackie and Lisa Lepsy, 17 years ago this man walked out of their life. He was Jackie’s husband and Lisa’s dad. Jackie, what happened?”

“Well one afternoon he just called me up and he said ‘I’m going to go for a ride Jackie.’ and that wasn’t unusual, and he never came back.”

“Did he have a car?”

“Yes, he had a company car. They found that an airport about an hour from our home.”

“How long after did they find the car?”

“About two days I had to wait 24 hours, you know, before I reported him missing. “

Now had he ever given you any hint or indication that he might do something like just disappear?

“No.” Jackie quickly responded

Sally then asked, “When he left you, where were you? How old were you? How many children did you have? What was your life like?”

“Well, I was 33, I had four children from 7 to 13.”

“Whoa!” Sally exclaimed.

“Yeah, hard.” Jackie gently replied.

“Were you working? “

“Yes, Part-time at our county courthouse.”

“Okay, when this man disappeared without any warning whatsoever, have you heard from him in 17 years?”

“No.”

“Have you had any trace, or any clue, or anything in 17 years?

“No.”

“Disappeared off the face of the earth?”

“Exactly.”

“And you’re the daughter? How old were you when this happened?” Sally asked, turning towards Lisa.

“I was just turning 13 and so that was really a formative time in my life to lose somebody like that.” Lisa responded.

“Why do you think he left?”

“Well, we talked about that but we really don’t know.” Jackie acknowledged.

“I personally think that he left because he got to the point in his life that he just couldn’t handle it anymore.” Lisa asserted, “I think there must’ve been a breaking point, and for him, instead of putting a gun to his head perhaps or something, that was the point that he broke at and decided that that was the avenue to take. “

“I hate to say this,” Sally queried, “but it must occur to you y that maybe, you know, he died or something?”

“Well, that did go through our minds also, but I really don’t think he’s dead,” Responded Jackie.

“You think he’s out there?”

“I think he is.”

“I think he’s alive. I have a lot of good feelings about that” Lisa added confidently.

Stating Dick was alive was completely opposite from the family’s opinion and testimony that was given just a few years earlier during the insurance companies’ depositions. The thing to consider in missing person cases is that there is no closure. There are no hard facts to wrap one’s mind around. There are empty spaces in family’s heart and minds, and those spaces are filled with all kinds of feelings and scenarios. It’s easy to see where the opinions of the “not knowing” could change from year to year, or even day to day.

“How have you survived, as a woman with four kids and just part-time income? It must be tough?” asked Sally.

“She’s super woman!” responded Lisa, emphatically.

“She has to be super woman!” Sally reaffirmed.

The quiet and reserved audience erupted in applause, finally giving Jackie some of the recognition she so deserved. All those years of struggling on her own, heartbroken, yet determined had taken their toll. Jackie’s humble smile showed gratitude, and she took it all in stride as the interview continued.

“Well,” Jackie continued, “I went back to college and 33 and resumed a career that I had terminated when I got married.”

“Of what?”

“Of Nursing, I’m a nurse, because I needed that involvement with people.”

“That is fabulous!”

“Alright,” Sally continued, “do you think that people say maybe the marriage wasn’t any good, so maybe that’s why he…?”

“No, because of you were to pole our dearest friends and family they would say we had a perfect marriage.”

“See, I keep trying to come back to, why, why, why?” Sally turned toward Lisa again and asked her, “Now you’re the one who wrote us the letter and asked us to do the show.”

“Right,” Lisa replied.

“Okay, what do people say if you’re 14 years old, if your daddy dies everybody is sorry for you, but if your daddy just goes away that was be a very hard thing.”

“Oh, people bring a dish to pass, and they’re all there… You know, I would tell people that he died because it was too hard to explain good friends that I have that I did tell, they made me the victim, you know, they made me feel like it must have been my fault, I must’ve been a terrible child you know, my mother must not have been a good my wife and mother you know, and those kinds of things.”

“Children feel that kind of thing. Alright you asked to do this.” Sally said, turning back to Jackie. Will you look into that camera right there, and if you could talk to him, and talk to him. That’s something I think we ought to do.”

With tears in her eyes, Jackie proclaimed, “I have one thing to say and that is I still love you. It would be very nice if you at least call and I, I wish I knew why you did it. What great thing that we couldn’t do together to solve whatever problem. I’d like to know. I just like to know for my own satisfaction.”

“Look into the camera and tell your dad…” Sally said to Lisa.

“I would tell him to please come home and end our agony. I don’t want to die with this question you know it’s I don’t want to go to my grave wondering whatever happened to him. And I think I feel I have a right to know.”

“No, you talk to him: Sally said softly, “I’ve already been talked to.”

“If you’re there please come home” Lisa said as she turned toward the camera, tears welling in her eye as she pleaded , “all we want to know is where you went and what happened to you and it doesn’t matter what you’ve done we still love you and we would still like you to come back.”

“Alright, does that feel better?”

Jackie and Lisa nodded in unison, and Lisa said “Yeah.”

“You know what? Anything is worth a shot, isn’t it?” asked Sally.

“I hope so,” replied Jackie, softly, desperately.

“I hope so too.”

Later in the show, during the question and answers segment, a female audience member asked, “Did you consider having him declared legally dead, so you could start your life over?”

“Yeah, I did that” answered Jackie, “mainly because when you’re left like that, you know, ordinarily a woman’s name is on the mortgage, a man and woman’s name is on the car, a man and woman’s name is on this and that. If you don’t do tha,t if I were to walk out in front of a truck, had I not done that, all my children would’ve been left with nothing because there was no way for anyone to find him and that’s the only reason I did that.”

An older gentleman stood up and asked: “Lisa, was there any indication, when you look back, was there any indication that your father was leaving did he do something special to kiss you or hug you, or did he just walk out?”

“No, he was always very loving and I think that’s why it hurt so much because there was this man who bought me Valentine candy when he bought it for my mother and brought me flowers and was sweet to me and then he was just gone. I had no idea whatsoever she didn’t even tell us for a few days because she didn’t know what was going on and eventually she had to sit down and say hey I don’t think he is coming home again.”