S02.E01: Gone (Altus, OK)

[Null 302]

Tracy Lynn Allen was known as a free spirited and spunky gal - she worked as a care giver at a nursing home, liked to collect Indian art, and was a devoted mother to her two young daughters, ages three and six. Tracy had recently gotten out of a volatile marriage with Garland Allen, but after their divorce the two remained in close contact. One early evening, in May of 2001, Tracy went out, while her neighbor baby-sat for their two young daughters. Later that night Garland arrived at the neighbor’s front door - he told her that Tracy was back at his house, and she had asked him to pick up their daughters. Garland then drove off with the girls, and dropped them off at his mother’s house. He told his mom that Tracy had run away with another man and had left him with the young girls. A few days later Garland surrendered custody of his kids to his mom, and then left town. It has been over 12 years since Tracy’s disappearance and no one has ever seen or heard from her again. They say the first 48 hours after a disappearance are the most crucial for police. The chances of finding the missing person drop dramatically after that. This case isn't cold - it’s frozen. It will be one of the most difficult cases Kelly, Yolanda, and team has ever taken on - as they hope to help the tenacious Detective Bill Perkins from Altus PD, find out what truly happened to Tracy - and hopefully bring some answers and closure to her family.

 

 

I just re-watched this one because I'm familiar with the town. Two personal observations.

 

First, the editors were careful to show shots of only the most rundown, raggedy-*ss parts of town, except the outside of the city office building. You'd never know from watching this show that Altus isn't some godforsaken near-ghostown crossroads spot. It's a town of about 20,000 with an Air Force Base, decent motels, nice homes, a state college, and so forth. I bet the town fathers (and mothers) who saw this episode were mortified. Or indignant.

 

Second, Kelly mispronounced the town's name throughout. It's not "Ahl-tus," it's "Al-tus." Short "a" sound, not an "ah" sound.

 

About the show, it was interesting that an Altus cop would care about solving a "so cold it's frozen" case involving a woman from the wrong side of the tracks. I'm glad to see that.

 

It's good that Kelly and Yolanda and their team helped solve the case. The bully-boy abusive husband did it, which I think everybody suspected, but it took work and a little luck to build the case. Of course, when they finally caught him and he knew he was cornered, he changed from big bad bully who kept everybody in line by fear, to a whimpering self-justifying little rat. OK, maybe that was harsh. By which I mean, it's an insult to rats everywhere.

 

I hope the daughters get some counseling and have some good strong people in their lives who care for them. Because they've been dealt a bad hand in life.

Edited July 20, 2014 by Suz at Large

[Portia]

First, the editors were careful to show shots of only the most rundown, raggedy-*ss parts of town, except the outside of the city office building. You'd never know from watching this show that Altus isn't some godforsaken near-ghostown crossroads spot. It's a town of about 20,000 with an Air Force Base, decent motels, nice homes, a state college, and so forth. I bet the town fathers (and mothers) who saw this episode were mortified. Or indignant.

Classic move. Frustrating, but classic. I used to live in West Memphis, AR, and when the first Paradise Lost documentary came out about the WM3 murders, I was livid that the filmmakers made the town seem isolated and backwards. It is a small and modest town, but it does have some bustling streets, businesses, nice residential areas, and a really impressive community college...plus it's just across the river from the good-sized city of Memphis. Hollywood thinks the stereotypical hick town makes for a better story, I guess. I especially go crazy when TV and movies about small Southern towns depict everyone as being sweaty all the time; I've been known to scream at the screen, "It's 2014, y'all. We have air conditioning!" 

[4leafclover]

Try living in Texas--contrary to popular TV/movie depictions, in the larger cities we do not own cows and no one rides a horse to work.  Not all of us wear cowboy hats or boots (unless its rodeo time in Houston) and some of us actually drive cars instead of Ford pick-up trucks.  We have museums, upscale restaurants, colleges, universities, a world-renown medical center and a first class symphony orchestra.  Many of us do not use "ain't" and double negatives.  Whew!  Glad to get that off my chest!

[torqy]

I just re-watched this one because I'm familiar with the town. Two personal observations.

 

First, the editors were careful to show shots of only the most rundown, raggedy-*ss parts of town, except the outside of the city office building. You'd never know from watching this show that Altus isn't some godforsaken near-ghostown crossroads spot. It's a town of about 20,000 with an Air Force Base, decent motels, nice homes, a state college, and so forth. I bet the town fathers (and mothers) who saw this episode were mortified. Or indignant.

 

Glad you commented on this. I have seen many reservation towns (Mrs. Torqy is Native American) and we thought Altus was a res town from the way it was shown.

One could infer that our home town is a dump if only certain parts are shown.

[KHenry14]

Well, the husband got sentenced recently for this crime. http://www.texomashomepage.com/story/d/story/altus-man-accused-of-cold-case-murder-is-sentenced/40841/hFM6WlVltkCj9sxgtHSaWA#.VCYhOJk-87E.twitter

He wont be seeing the outside of jail anytime soon.