TIMEKA PRIDGEN - 16 yo (2001) - La Grange (E of Goldsboro) NC

Nine years later and there are
still no answers about the disappearance of a Lenoir County teenager,
whose mother says appears to have just vanished into thin air.
It was May 12th of 2001 when 16
year old Timeka Pridgen of La Grange went missing. She has never been
heard from or seen again.
Her mother, Cosandra Best, says she was taking a nap, waiting for her
boyfriend, a relationship she was about to end...the night her daughter
disappeared. She says her daughter brought her the phone and said he
would be there in five minutes. That's when Cosandra says she drifted
back to sleep. "The next thing I heard was a door closing and a car driving off."


When Cosandra woke up her daughter
was nowhere to be found. "She, um left her shoes, her purse and it
had money in her purse. This evening it rained and was cool and I knew
she would not have walked out without her shoes on."
Cosandra says Timeka had no
reason to runaway. She describes her as a typical teen who had a love
for drawing and her friends...friends who didn't know where she was.
Neither did Cosandra's soon to be ex-boyfriend, who claims he was never
there that night. Cosandra says, "My first gut instinct was he
definitely knew what happened."
But Cosandra says neither he, or
anyone else, would be an immediate focus for police. Cosandra believes
the investigation into her daughter's disappearance was hindered
because of the outcome of a missing persons case weeks earlier,
involving a classmate of Timeka's. "And lots and lots of resources were
poured into that and it turned out to be a hoax."
Cosandra says it wasn't until a
year later, at the insistence of an advocate on her behalf, that an SBI
agent was assigned to the case.
Nine years later Cosandra says she
would like to talk to her former boyfriend again about her daughter's
disappearance. He no longer lives in La Grange, but she knows how to
get in touch with him. He's in a North Carolina prison.
Eric Mercer Moore was convicted in
2006 on attempted second degree sexual offense. He's serving twelve
years behind bars. State records show years before Timeka went
missing...he was convicted of second degree sex offense and kidnapping,
served time and was released.
Just like Timeka's disappearance, whether Moore has any information that could help in this case will
remain a mystery. Cosandra continues to hold out
hope that her daughter is still alive. As she reminisces over those
drawings of hers, she hopes that one day, Timeka just might be able to
finish the one she was working on when she vanished. "Everyday I miss
her and I want so badly to know where she is and what happened."
If you have any information that
may help in the case you can call the SBI at 1-800-334-3000 or click on
the link below to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Posted: January 2, 2011
2001 disappearance of Lenoir teen still unsolved



La Grange, N.C. — Investigators and relatives are stumped more than nine years after a 16-year-old girl disappeared from her home in Lenoir County.

Cosandra Best last saw her daughter, Timeka Pridgen, at their home in La Grange, east of Goldsboro, on May 12, 2001.

Best said she came home to rest and wait for her boyfriend. She dozed off and woke up around midnight to find that Timeka was missing and her boyfriend, then 31-year-old Eric Moore, had never showed up.

"I started looking around to see if anything was missing, and I saw that the shoes that she was wearing was still there (and) her purse. That's when the panic set in," Best recalled.

There were no signs of forced entry or a struggle at the home. Investigators determined that Timeka had been on the phone with a friend, who told them the call ended after she heard a knock at the door.

"There have been a number of searches around LaGrange, as well as the Goldsboro area," said Anthony Jernigan, assistant special agent-in-charge with the State Bureau of Investigation.

Best said that her gut instinct points to Moore.



"I know people don't just vanish. I do know that my first gut instinct on the situation was a person I was dating at the time," Best said. "I really felt strongly that he knew what happened to her. I could be right or wrong, but I just feel that way."

After her daughter disappeared, Best learned from police about her boyfriend's criminal past: convictions for a sex crime, kidnapping, assault and theft.

"I had no idea. All I knew about his past was what he had told me," Best said. "It was actually the chief of police who asked me how much did I know about his background. I was blown away."

In 2006, Moore was convicted of a sex crime that happened two years after Timeka's disappearance. He is serving a minimum nine-year prison sentence and is scheduled to be released in 2015.

Moore did not respond to NC Wanted's requests for an interview.

Investigators won't say whether he's considered a suspect in Timeka's disappearance.

Best said that she still yearns to find out what happened to her daughter.

"I go day to day with my faith and my hope that everything is going to turn out OK," Best said. "I really feel that he knows what happened to her. But I cannot accept that she's no longer with us without solid proof of that."



http://www.wral.com/news/local/story/8866192/