Carla Kaylene Owens

• Missing Since 07/01/1981
• Missing From Clearwater, Washington
• Classification Endangered Missing
• Sex Female
• Race White
• Date of Birth 02/19/1967 (58)
• Age 14 years old
• Height and Weight 5'4, 110 pounds
• Clothing/Jewelry Description A light blue zip-up sweatshirt, blue jeans and thong sandals with dark blue velvet straps.
• Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian female. Brown hair, hazel eyes.

Details of Disappearance

Carla last seen in Clearwater, Washington on July 1, 1981. She lived with her parents and two siblings in Kalaloch, Washington. At 7:00 p.m., she left her family's home to babysit a one-year-old boy, the son of Katherine Tangan, at a house ten miles away. The baby-sitting job was expected to extend into the Independence Day weekend.

Carla left home with Tangan, and they were driven in a pickup truck by Kenneth Barry, a transient logger and handyman. Tangan and Barry went together to a bar in Forks, Washington, but then parted ways.

When Tangan returned home that evening, Carla was gone and the baby was asleep on the couch, evidently uncared-for for some time. There was a note saying Carla had gone back home. There were large bloodstains on the living room floor amd furniture and pieces of a broken, blood-spattered Galliano bottle, but there wasn't enough blood to indicate a serious or fatal injury had occurred there.

In spite of the blood and the fact that her baby had been left alone, Tangan didn't call the police or Carla's parents; she merely pushed the broken bottle glass over to the side of the room. Because the baby-sitting job was expected to extend into the Independence Day weekend and Carla frequently stayed away from home for days at a time, Carla's parents didn't realize anything was wrong either. Four days passed before they began to wonder where she was.

When police searched Barry's pickup truck, bloodstains and broken glass from a Galliano bottle were found. Authorities were suspicious of both him and Tangan; they stated they thought Tangan knew more about Carla's disappearance than she said, and that there were periods of time on the night Carla disappeared that Barry could not accounted for.

A witness reported seeing Barry digging a hole at a ranch site, with a wrapped bundle in the back of his pickup truck nearby. Authorities dug there, but couldn't find anything. Barry died suddenly in 1987. He was never charged in Carla's case, but is considered a suspect. Investigators don't know Tangan's current whereabouts.

Although the blood found at the scene of Carla's apparent abduction and the blood in Barry's truck were Carla's blood type, DNA testing that would have proved the blood was hers did not exist in 1981. Her disappearance remains unsolved and foul play is suspected.