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Real Name: Morgan Chauntel Nick
Nicknames: No known nicknames
Location: Alma, Arkansas
Date: June 9, 1995

Bio[]

Occupation: Minor
Date of Birth: September 12, 1988
Height: 4'0"
Weight: 55 lbs.
Marital Status: Single
Characteristics: White female with blond hair and blue eyes. Morgan has a protruding purple vein on the lower left side of her rib cage. Her teeth are crowded, and she had five visible silver caps on her molars at the time of her disappearance. When she vanished, she was wearing a green t-shirt bearing the Girl Scouts of America emblem, blue denim shorts, and white tennis shoes.

Case[]

Details: Six-year-old Morgan Nick of Ozark, Arkansas was the oldest child of John and Colleen Nick. She was a quiet and shy girl who loved cats and bubble gum. She was a Girl Scout who according to Colleen, preferred making crafts inside to running outside and "getting sweaty." On the night of June 9, 1995, a family friend invited them to a Little League baseball game in Alma, Arkansas, thirty miles from their home. Morgan and Colleen decided to go together, just the two of them, to have a "girl’s night out." It was the first time they had ever been there. Colleen remembers that it was a warm, close, and fun night for them. It was an evening of shared joy between them – with no hint of the nightmare about to unfold.
Throughout the evening, Morgan's friends, two local girls aged eight and ten, asked her to come play with them. Initially, she wanted to stay with Colleen. However, at around 10:30pm, she asked Colleen if she could go with them to a nearby field and catch fireflies. At first, Colleen said no. Morgan and her friends begged Colleen to let her go with them. Colleen’s friend told her that local kids played in the field often and that it was safe. Finally, against her better judgment, Colleen told Morgan that she could go and play. Morgan gave her a big hug and a kiss on the cheek; she then left with her friends. As they left, Colleen told her to "stay where I can see you."
Initially, Colleen could clearly see Morgan and her friends playing in the field, which was about fifty yards away. The last time she turned to look, Morgan was running back and forth and playing. But when the baseball game ended at 10:45pm, her friends returned from the field without her. When Colleen asked where Morgan was, they said that she was by a car getting sand out of her shoes. She asked which car; they were not sure, but assumed it was Colleen’s car. However, Colleen could see her car from where she was standing, and Morgan was not there.
Colleen went over to her car, a Nissan Stanza, and looked around the outside of it. She then opened the doors and looked inside, assuming that Morgan had gotten in it. She even looked underneath the car. However, Morgan was not there. She knew that Morgan would not have gone anywhere by herself; in fact, there was nowhere else to go (there were no concession stands or bathrooms there). Within a couple of minutes, nearly all of the people at the game had left in their cars. It was clear to Colleen that Morgan was not there.
As the parking lot emptied, panic began to overwhelm Colleen. One of the baseball coaches arrived and questioned Morgan's friends. He asked them if they were alone when they were in the field. They remembered a man who they described as "creepy" talking to them while they were in the field. They also remembered seeing a red pickup truck parked nearby. It left around the same time Morgan was last seen. The coach had a cell phone; he immediately called 911 to report her missing. Within six minutes, law enforcement arrived and began an immediate and massive search for her.
But the initial search failed to find Morgan. Evidence found in and around the field, such as cigarettes and bottles, was collected. The media was alerted, and flyers were posted. The state police and FBI soon became involved. For six weeks, Colleen stayed at a volunteer fire station next to the Alma Police Department. She wanted to stay close to the place where Morgan was last seen. Weeks stretched into months and finally years, with no sign of her. Colleen says that having a child go missing is the worst terror that any parent can ever feel. She says that the whole situation did not feel real initially. It did not seem possible that Morgan could be missing, that someone could have taken her.
For years, Colleen has searched for Morgan. Faced with the same circumstances, many people would have given up hope – not Colleen. In fact, her personal tragedy has led to a remarkable transformation. The once shy mother has become a leading activist for missing children all across the country.
In the months following Morgan’s disappearance, Colleen successfully lobbied the media to turn the case into a national news story. It was then that she discovered she was not alone in her grief. She began to receive calls from other parents who had heard about Morgan, whose own child was missing as well. They wanted to know what they could do, where to turn, and what resources were available. From that, she began to get involved in the "bigger picture" of missing children.
In 1996, one year after Morgan’s disappearance, Colleen established the Morgan Nick Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to assisting families with missing children. She wants to help prevent other families from going through what she has gone through. The foundation focuses on intervention, education, and legislation regarding missing children. It has done presentations with thousands of children about cyber safety, sex trafficking, stranger danger, and more. It has been instrumental in bringing several children safely home. Also in 1996, Arkansas's missing child alert system was named in honor of Morgan.
In 2001, Colleen was informed by a national missing children’s agency about the abduction of five-month-old Jacqueline Vasquez. The foundation sprang into action. They created posters, sent out Jacqueline’s information via email, and counseled her family.
On June 25, 2001, Colleen traveled to Avondale, Arizona, to meet Jacqueline's mother, Olivia, for the first time and console her in person. Olivia blames herself for Jacqueline’s abduction. However, she was comforted to know that she is not alone in her suffering. She says that since Colleen also had her child taken from her, she knows what Olivia is feeling. She says that it is nice to talk to someone that knows what she is going through.
Colleen has found that that is the greatest need that a family has – just to be able to look someone in the eye and know that there are other people who have not given up hope, to know that they are going to survive and get through this, and that hopefully their child is going to come home. She says hope and reassurance is what she tries to bring to families the most.
The selfless work Colleen performs on behalf of families with missing children has not detracted from her primary goal: to find Morgan. She believes that, someday, she will look Morgan in the eye and say, "I fought for you every day as hard as I could, and that is why you are home today." She says that every day, she gets up and hopes that that is the day that Morgan comes home. Every night that she goes to bed and Morgan is not back, she knows that she is one day closer to getting her back.

Suspects: Police would like to speak to the man seen in the field that night in connection with Morgan's disappearance. He is a White male described by the other girls as "creepy". Other witnesses reported seeing him in the field watching Morgan and the other girls. In 1995, he was between the ages of twenty-three and thirty-eight, 6'0" tall, with a medium-to-solid build, weighing about 180 pounds. He had curly, slicked back, black or salt-and-pepper hair, a mustache, and a one-inch beard. He also had a hairy chest. He wore cut-off blue jean shorts and no shirt or shoes. He spoke with a "hillbilly"-type dialect or accent. He has never been identified.
A dull-red, older Ford pickup truck with a white camper shell was seen parked near the field around the time Morgan disappeared. The camper is possibly damaged at the right rear and was described as four or five inches too short for the truck. The truck itself has a short wheelbase and paint dulled by age. The windows were covered with curtains. It is believed to have Arkansas license plates. It has not been located.
It is suspected that Morgan's case may have been related to two attempted abductions that happened around the time of her disappearance. On the morning of June 9 (the day of Morgan's disappearance), a four-year-old girl was pulled into a truck outside a laundromat in Alma; fortunately, her mother heard her screams and was able to retrieve her. The abductor resembled the suspect in Morgan's case, and the truck resembled the suspicious one seen at the field.
On June 10, a man tried to force a nine-year-old girl into the men's restroom at a convenience store in Fort Smith, Arkansas, fifteen miles from Alma. He let her go when she resisted. He also resembled the suspect in Morgan's case. Authorities are certain that the two attempted abductions involved the same man. They believe the man may be responsible for Morgan's disappearance as well.
Police also looked into the possibility that Morgan's disappearance was related to the abduction and murder of nineteen-year-old Melissa "Missy" Witt. She was abducted from a bowling alley parking lot in Fort Smith on December 1, 1994. She was found dead in the Ozark National Forest on January 13, 1995. She had been strangled. However, it is not known if the two cases were ever linked.
However, since 2021, convicted pedophile and sex offender Billy Jack Lincks is now considered the primary person of interest due to numerous circumstantial evidence.
Extra Notes:

  • This case first aired on the August 28, 2001 episode, along with Jacqueline's.
  • The show incorrectly stated that Morgan disappeared on July 9.
  • It was also profiled on America’s Most Wanted, The Oprah Winfrey Show, and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. In the latter episode, Morgan's family received a new home after their old one was damaged in a water heater explosion.
  • This case was one of the missing children featured in a slideshow at the end of 7th Heaven episode, Lost. Reuben Blackwell Jr. was also one of the missing children featured.
  • Some sources state that the unidentified man was either next to or in the red pickup truck when he was talking to Morgan. Some also state that the friends Morgan went to play with were a boy and a girl. Others state that they went to play either in a "sand pile" behind the bleachers or in the baseball field's parking lot.

Results: Unsolved - In January 2002, police received a tip that Morgan was buried on property near Booneville, Arkansas. They spent several hours digging up the land; a police dog was also used in the search. However, no trace of her was found. In June 2012, convicted felons Tonya Smith and James Monhart were arrested for computer fraud after attempting to assume her identity. Smith allegedly tried to purchase vital personal documents belonging to Morgan, including her birth certificate. However, police do not believe they were involved in her disappearance.
On December 18, 2017, police received a tip about Morgan's case that led them to a property in Spiro, Oklahoma, twenty-five miles from Alma. The FBI, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, and local police were involved. Investigators honed in on a well on the property after a cadaver dog alerted them to it. However, after several hours of digging and searching, nothing was found. Interestingly, police had previously searched the same property in connection with Morgan's case in 2010. It reportedly belonged to a man who had been a person of interest since the beginning. He is currently in prison on unrelated charges but refuses to discuss this case.
In April 2021, the documentary Still Missing Morgan aired in Arkansas about her case. It was made in hopes of bringing up new leads. It included information and videos that had never been previously released to the public. As a result of the documentary, over 300 leads came into the Alma Police Department, some of which were very credible and had never been reported before. Colleen said that she felt encouraged by the documentary and the leads; she maintains hope that Morgan will be found. In February of 2023, Still Missing Morgan was released nationally on Hulu and included updates in the case since the documentary first aired locally in Arkansas in 2021.
During the documentary, a picture of a red truck with a white camper shell was featured (shown above). The picture was actually a still taken from a home video of the baseball game that Morgan attended. Unfortunately, the driver is not visible in it. It is believed that the truck was the suspicious one seen on the night of her disappearance. The picture had never been released to the public before; the truck is believed to be a Chevrolet, possibly a Silverado or an S10. Its owner has never been identified.
On November 9, 2021, convicted felon and Arkansas native Billy Jack Lincks was named a primary person of interest in this case. In 1992, he was charged with sexual abuse of a young girl. In 1993, he pleaded no contest in that case and was given a suspended sentence. On August 29, 1995, two months after Morgan's disappearance, he attempted to abduct an eleven-year-old girl at a Sonic Drive-In restaurant in Van Buren, Arkansas, approximately eight miles from where Morgan was last seen.
That night, the girl went to the restaurant with her brothers. Lincks, who was drunk at the time, pulled up in his red 1986 Chevrolet pickup truck and began making sexual comments to her. He then started waving money around and told her she could have it if she got in his truck and went with him to his house. In response, she screamed and ran away from him. He drove off, striking a utility pole along the way. Police were notified soon after. A witness wrote down his license plate; police determined the truck belonged to Lincks and went to his home. They found the truck parked outside with a mark on it (from hitting the pole). When they met with him, he was still intoxicated. He was arrested and charged with sexual solicitation of a child.
The truck Lincks was driving at the time was similar to the suspicious one seen on the night of Morgan's disappearance. A neighbor told police that they thought Lincks' truck had a camper shell on it about two months before the disappearance. Lincks also lived just a few miles from where she disappeared. Shortly after his arrest, Arkansas State Police and the FBI tried to interview him about her case. However, he immediately "lawyered up" and refused to speak to them about it.
A week after Lincks' arrest, investigators searched his truck. Several items of interest were collected, including: hair and fibers on the seat and floorboard; a machete; rope; a tarp; duct tape; and blood in one of the seats. The blood and hair samples were saved for future testing. However, it is not known if any testing was done at the time. In 1996, he was convicted of sexual indecency with a child and was sentenced to six years in prison. In 2000, he died there at the age of seventy-six.
Police noted that they decided to name Lincks as a person of interest in Morgan's case because evidence they gathered "pointed" towards him. FBI agents are currently trying to learn more about his life, associates, and activities. They would like to speak to anyone who knew him to determine if he is connected to Morgan's case. He was born in Crawford County, Arkansas, served in the U.S. Army during World War II, and worked for Braniff Airlines in Dallas, Texas, between 1962 and 1974. He moved to Van Buren in the late 1970s. He may also have ties to Tennessee and Oklahoma.
Former Arkansas prosecutor Kelly Ward and other activists are pushing for the items found in Lincks' truck to be tested for DNA. In February of 2023, it was announced that shirt fibers that were similar to the Girl Scout shirt Morgan was wearing that night and blonde hairs were also found in Lincks’ truck.
Over the years, there have been several reported sightings of Morgan throughout the United States, leading her parents to believe that she is still alive. She would now be in her thirties.
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