The family of Christopher Virdell has launched a new fundraising effort through GoFundMe.com (http://www.gofundme.com/missing-chrisvirdell) to help raise money in the continuing search for the young Spanaway man who disappeared on Feb. 9, 2012.
“We started this so we can keep searching for him,” Paul Virdell said. Virdell said he feels that his son is dead, and he is hoping his body will be found so that the youth can be properly laid to rest.
“We still have no idea where they disposed of Chris’ body. I just want to find him so I can lay him to rest properly in California next to his grandmother.”
Christopher’s family continues to post flyers around town and staffing informational booths at community events to keep the search alive. The family is also looking to replace large vinyl banners they had hung near the site of Chris’ disappearance at 224th Street East in Spanaway asking the public’s help in finding Chris. “It was like somebody didn’t want us to tell people anything out here,” Paul Virdell said of the banner thefts, which is also reflective of the overall lack of real leads in the case. Private investigators, the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department and other local authorities continue to work the case, and Paul Virdell said the FBI and DEA have also been brought in to help. At the time of his disappearance, more than 100 of Christopher’s friends, family and co-workers were interviewed, but with no solid leads resulting.
“Everyone has heard something, and no one knows anything. It is fairly obvious that the right people who know aren’t talking,” said Pierce County Detective Ed Troyer in an earlier interview. “What we do know is that he walked onto 224th to get a bus, and he evaporated. And it is probably not on his own accord.”
Getting reliable information on Christopher’s whereabouts were further hampered when one person of high interest in the case, Michael Bourquin, was fatally shot by a Pierce County sheriff’s deputy on Feb. 1 of this year. According to KIRO News, Bourquin was the prime suspect in the Virdell case, but he died during a struggle with sheriff’s deputies who had attempted to arrest him on a drug and identity theft warrant.
Christopher Virdell was 18 at the time of his disappearance and was last seen around 10 a.m. on Feb. 9, 2012, when he was leaving his friend’s house along 223rd Street East in Spanaway to catch the bus to his job at the South Hill Safeway. He was reported missing later that day, when he failed to show up for work, something he had never done in the more than two years he worked there.
To stay up on the search for Christopher Virdell, people can “like” the “Help Find Chris Virdell Family Page” on Facebook.