CAMAS, Wash., July 8 (UPI) -- Police are searching for a missing teen from the Washington side of the Portland suburbs who left cryptic messages for her loved ones before disappearing.
In a letter to her family, 17-year-old Angelic Dean warned "If you're reading this, I'm either missing or dead," adding "When or if you find me, I'll be all used up or dead."
Dean was last seen leaving her house around 10:30 p.m. on June 23, six hours after being dropped off by an unknown man driving an older model blue Volvo with a squared back. Family assumed she was with her boyfriend, but quickly realized that was not the case.
"She has never been out on her own for more than a day," Dean's mother, Lynda Jorgensen, told reporters.
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"We assumed she was with her boyfriend, or something like that ... The moment we found out she wasn't with him, that's when we really started freaking out because we had no idea where she was."
Dean's boyfriend is cooperating with police, having turned over a series of text messages with similarly disturbing implications as the notes to her family.
"I've been in something for a long time and I haven't told you," Dean texted before disappearing.
"They were going to kill you and my family."
In the months leading up to her disappearance, Dean echoed this sentiment to teachers and counselors, alluding to being involved in something she could not get out of.
"She had been telling some people for a while that she was involved in something, that she was in over her head, that she was scared," her mother explained. "But, they couldn't get any more information than that out of her."
Police fear Dean has been lured into a human trafficking situation, saying all signs indicated that she did not choose to run away.
"In this particular case, the time line of events, and the evidence that [Dean] has left in a trail of crumbs, per se, has led all of us to believe that she is in danger," said Michelle Bart of the National Women's Coalition Against Violence and Exploitation.
"What we see traditionally is if you're running away from home because you don't like the rules or you're running away from something, that's not against the law, but those types of individuals will take something with them. If you're being lured away, you are told to leave things behind so that nobody can track you. That's the difference."
