Tara Calico - The Photograph

The Photograph

On June 15, 1989, a Polaroid photo of an unidentified young girl and boy, both bound and gagged, was found in the parking lot of a convenience store in Port St. Joe, Florida. It was theorized that the girl in the photo was Tara and that the boy was Michael Henley, also of New Mexico, who had disappeared in April 1988. The book that is next to the girl in the photo is the gothic horror novel "My Sweet Audrina" by V.C. Andrews, which was published in 1982. According to investigators, the picture had to have been taken after May 1989 because the particular film used in the photograph was not available until then. Despite much conjecture, the identification of the boy in the photograph as Michael Henley seems unlikely because his remains were discovered in 1990 in the Zuni Mountains where he had disappeared. Police believe that Michael wandered away from the site and died of exposure. The Zuni mountains are about 75 miles from where Tara disappeared. Nonetheless, her mother believed the girl in the photo was indeed her daughter due in part to what appeared to be a scar on the girl's leg, similar to one Tara received in a car accident. Scotland Yard analysed the photo and concluded that the girl was Tara, but a Los Alamos National Laboratory analysis determined that it was not her. An FBI analysis of the photo was inconclusive.

Two other Polaroid photographs, possibly of Tara, have surfaced over the years, but they have yet to be released to the public.

There were several reported sightings of her in 1988 and 1989, mostly in the southern half of the United States, but none of these sightings could be confirmed.