[narrator] Daniel Robinson disappeared
on June 23rd, 2021.
[David] Daniel's never been the person to go to work
for a few hours and just leave.
The red flags were going up for sure.
[Ken] When I got to that intersection,
my heart sank.
Daniel's tracks didn't make a left toward home,
they made a right-hand turn out in the desert.
[narrator] His family is desperate for answers.
[David] I just knew my son was in trouble.
If he's out there riding around in that heat out there in that desert,
that's very dangerous.
I know the desert is just a place where
bad things happen.
[narrator] This episode of Disappeared retraces
Daniel's last known steps.
[David] The Buckeye Police Department called and told me, "Hey, look.
We didn't find Daniel. We just have his vehicle."
[Melissa] The car being wrecked...
In my mind I'm thinking, "What if he's hurt?"
I was at a total stage of panic.
Scared beyond anything I ever felt in my life.
I just want my son back.
[narrator] The more people who know Daniel's story,
the greater the chance of bringing him home.
[narrator reading]
Help find him.
Have you seen Daniel Robinson?
[David] I'm David Robinson.
I'm the father of Daniel Cornelius Robinson,
who went missing on June the 23rd of 2021.
Daniel graduated from the College of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina.
He came out to Phoenix, Arizona
where he landed his job with Matrix New World
as a field geologist.
He really enjoyed being here in Arizona
'cause he'd get to expand his horizons.
He's a special child.
When my son was born,
he was missing his right hand.
The way he grew up, his mentality,
he taught himself how to play the trumpet.
Some people thought that it was impossible.
He did the French horn.
He even did a little bit of the trombone.
He played a little bit of football,
doing sports like that, basketball.
Everything he tried to accomplish, he did that.
He was used to people saying, "Why were you born like that?"
And he'd just say, "That's the way God made me."
That's what makes him so special.
He would not let anyone tell him
what he couldn't do.
With his prothesis,
he wore it until high school.
When he got to college he says, "I'm done with it.
This is me. I love me.
And whoever doesn't like what they see, oh, well."
And he just loved his friends.
But he really wasn't dating.
He said, "There's nobody like my mom."
And I was like, "Okay."
What compelled Daniel to become a geologist
is climate change.
And he wanted to make a difference.
In Arizona, they have to drill for water sources
because it's so dry and, you know, hot out there.
He tests the soil to see
if the water would be drinkable,
if it had parasites.
And he'd been working in remote deserts.
And sometimes I was wondering
if he didn't go to Arizona, would he be missing?
[Ken] My name is Ken Elliott.
I'm a pump technician for Weber Water Resources.
On the morning of June 23rd,
we arrived at the jobsite at 9:30.
And I walked over to Daniel's jeep
to introduce myself.
We spoke about a few technical aspects of the job
and where we were at on the development phase of this well.
It was raining fairly hard at that point.
I had asked him whether or not he wanted to just hang tight
and let this storm cell pass overhead before we started
so we wouldn't get all of our paperwork wet.
This is where things started to become odd.
When I looked up,
Daniel was staring off into the desert.
He had a very, very distant look in his eyes.
That's when he got in his jeep and left.
It must have been around 2:30.
The principal of the firm called me.
They had not heard from Daniel yet.
I hopped in my work truck.
The only tracks were Daniel's
'cause the storms had washed all the dirt roads clear.
When I got to that intersection,
my heart sank.
Because Daniel's tracks didn't make a left
and head east towards home.
They made a right-hand turn
and headed west out in the desert.
And I thought, "You know, he's so far out in front of me,
you know, he could be anywhere."
[phone ringing]
[David] My sister Davisha gives me a call.
Like, "Hey, Daniel's missing.
One of his friends from work came over to my apartment
and let me know that they couldn't find him."
Daniel's never been the person to give up
or to quit anything
or to just walk away.
So, for him to go to work for a few hours
and then just leave out of nowhere,
didn't say anything to anybody,
the red flags were going up for sure.
[Melissa] I'm freaking out,
and that's why I'm gonna call his phone.
I called it. He didn't answer.
Called it again. He didn't answer.
The next time I left a message saying,
"Daniel, this is Mommy. You know how I am.
I'm worried now. I'm worried about you.
I need you to pick up this phone."
He didn't pick up the phone.
I text him.
I have the texts.
I say, "Hey, son. Where are you?
You need to answer your phone."
[David] I remember exactly what I was doing on June the 23rd, 2021.
I'm retired military.
[phone ringing]
[David] I was sitting on my back porch in Columbia, South Carolina.
When I received that phone call from his sister
telling me that it was well over six hours
that he was missing from that job,
that was problematic for me
'cause I know Daniel. He would not go that long
without saying anything
to his siblings or his mother or myself.
You know, he'll let us know something.
We called Daniel's phone.
It'd ring finally go to the voicemail
until I guess it finally died.
And it goes straight to the voicemail.
We didn't hear from him that whole entire day.
That's when I knew something was wrong,
and I decided to report him missing.
I called the Buckeye Police Department.
I talked to Officer Cruz.
One of the biggest things that I was really happy about
is that he decided to take a drive down this road called Sun Valley Parkway.
He told me he was out there to look and see if maybe
he's stranded on the side of the road somewhere.
Of course they told me quickly they didn't find my son.
You know, you find out your child is missing.
Of course I'm not going to sleep.
On June 24th, I grab everything I can, threw it in my vehicle
and start heading out west to Arizona.
I'm guessing over 20-something hours.
It was the hardest drive.
It seemed like I couldn't get here fast enough.
One thing I learned out in the military is
never leave a fallen comrade behind.
One of the first things I did when I decided
to hit that road and head to Arizona to find my son was
to make my son a mission.
Of course, if your child is missing,
it can put you in an emotional state.
In the military, we learn how to put those emotions at bay.
He is my mission.
The first thing I did is went up to the Buckeye Police Department,
got more information about where he was last seen.
I found out it was in the desert itself.
[Nicole] I'm Nicole Grigg and I'm a reporter
with ABC15 here in Phoenix.
I don't think people realize that here in Arizona
we're actually one of the top five states for missing persons.
There's just so much desert
that getting lost or being stranded in the desert,
you're out there on your own.
So, it doesn't take long for dehydration to set in,
your skin burning.
The elements out there are really severe
and unsurvivable really.
The desert environment in the summer is very, very harsh.
It can get up to 110-115 degrees.
So, you clearly have to be prepared.
Food, water, plenty of provisions.
And the wildlife that you need to watch out for
are rattlesnakes.
They're territorial. They have dens.
When they come out, they're cold-blooded
so they'll typically be coiled up on a rock
or somewhere in the sun to warm up.
And they blend in with their native surroundings.
You may not even see one until you're almost on top of it.
You're not up against just the heat, the sun, the elements,
but people do go out to the deserts to recreate,
shoot off guns. We're talking rifles.
Assault rifles.
There's a risk of cartels,
drugs crossing,
people smuggling people across the border.
I know the desert is just a place
where bad things happen.
I mean, I have watched many shows of course
to know that, you know, that's not, like, a hang out area.
So, I was worried that maybe he ran into foul play.
[Nicole] On June 25th, Daniel had been missing for two days at this point.
Buckeye Police did their first aerial search
by helicopter looking for him.
They search this area all around his work site
and they weren't able to find any trace of him.
So, Buckeye Police were putting up flyers
in the desert and at the local airport
in case people passing through
may have seen him get on a plane.
[David] When someone is missing,
it's very crucial to search immediately.
You shouldn't have to wait. That makes it slimmer statistic wise
and less likely you'll recover that person.
[Nicole] If someone does die out in the desert,
bodies can decompose out there
and be left to bones and fragments pretty quickly.
Here in Maricopa County,
the ME's office has pages
of unidentified people that were in the desert
and they're still left unidentified for years.
[David] With my time in Afghanistan dealing with desert,
I just knew my son was in trouble.
If he's out there riding around
in that heat out there in that desert,
that's very dangerous.
I wondered if he had water, things like that.
So, those kind of went across my mind.
The first thing I want to do is get out there to that well site.
That was the last spot that my son was supposed to have been seen at.
But Buckeye Police Department told me not to go into the desert.
So, I would take my binoculars close to the area where the well site would be at.
My heart was racing of course.
And I tried to imagine myself as being my son,
where he was staring off to.
And I just need to understand what he was feeling,
what he was thinking at the moment.
So, while my father was there in Arizona,
I, my other sister in California,
and the sister in Arizona,
we were on social media trying to figure out
what's been happening before Daniel went missing.
He deleted all of his images off of Instagram,
so I'm thinking, "Does it mean anything?"
And it's just...
At least for me it was very upsetting that...
the police department, no one took it seriously enough
to say, "Something's not right. He is missing."
We know it may look like he just walked away,
but something's not right with this.
[Melissa] A day or so prior to him going missing,
Daniel called me and he left me a voicemail.
And that's the last message that I have from Daniel.
[Daniel on voicemail] If you're free you can call me back if you want,
but, in other words, I just want to let you know regardless
I love you and, yeah, we can talk later.
All right. Bye.
[Melissa] I didn't think about it at the time,
but I didn't like what I heard.
I didn't like him saying, "Well, Mama, no matter what I love you."
I heard it in his voice.
His voice didn't sound right.
And I beat myself up about why didn't I answer that phone that night.
When I first heard that Daniel was missing I was at work,
and I got a call from one of our mutual friends,
a kid that had also graduated with us from college.
I think it was only a day or so
after Daniel was reported missing.
It was just really weird to hear
because I had just seen him a couple days ago.
I had visited Daniel on Thursday, June 17th.
That weekend when I was with him,
everything seemed pretty normal
as far as I was concerned.
Daniel was kind of showing me around Phoenix.
I had never really explored the city before,
so he took me to a few of his favorite places.
I hadn't seen him in at least a year.
I remember he was super excited
to be able to hang out together.
I met Daniel in one of our geology classes together.
We quickly became friends because we were both guys that liked to goof around.
Daniel was a very friendly, social guy,
and the last time that I saw Daniel,
he did mention to me that he had met this girl.
He didn't go too into detail with anything about it,
but I was excited for him
because I had never known him to have a girlfriend
or anything super serious going on.
[David] He worked a second job where he met this young lady
and I think at that moment just...
was infatuated, you know, on first sight
and wanted to get to know her a little better
so they exchanged numbers at some point.
They were texting back and forth for a little bit.
I'll say, just a few weeks.
They did go on one date together.
Nothing very serious.
[Melissa] When he told me he was going out on a date with her,
I was so happy for him because I knew it was
just a while since he'd been out on a date.
So, he was quite excited.
And I think it was just
a love at first sight with him in the beginning with her.
But I told him, "You gotta remember
a woman likes to be pursued just for a little bit.
Then if the feelings are not mutual,
then it's time to back away from it."
[Nicole] So, early on in the investigation,
there was this woman who Daniel was seeing
that Buckeye Police were told to look into
and see if she has any idea on where he might be.
Police eventually track her down and she says
that she doesn't know where he is
that she hasn't seen him.
But this woman does end up sharing with Buckeye Police
her last text exchanges with Daniel.
What exactly does it mean
that "you'll never see me again?"
It kind of raised some concerns
on what was his mental state
at the time when he went missing.
[phone ringing]
[Melissa] Prior to him going missing, Daniel,
he would say stuff like, "You have to watch out for your self-being.
Sometimes you have to be able to cut people off
if they're hurting your feelings.
And don't talk to them for a while because
you have to protect your mental being
instead of having somebody always hurting your feelings."
[David] Within the last month or so prior to him going missing,
there's a big shift in his personality
just because he's been so shut off and reserved.
I didn't want to press him too hard
to have him freeze up or to, you know,
shut away from answering anything,
but we tried to gauge and see where he was mentally.
Like, if he's doing okay.
I know my child was lonely.
I know he wanted friends
to talk to on the regular.
He had no female companionship.
All he had was his sister.
And that mainly was me and Daniel's conversations prior to him leaving
is just the frustration of life and COVID.
You've been in the house for a whole year.
And, you know, all his friends are in Charleston and Colorado.
He didn't have any friends there
and he wanted friends so bad.
Just people to hang out with, talk to.
[Nicole] It's been over a week.
No signs of Daniel.
Unfortunately, his family didn't have a key to get inside of his apartment.
Police weren't able to get a warrant
because they needed a proof of crime.
So, they actually went to the landlord to get inside
to do a wellness check at this time.
His apartment was an indication
of where his mind may have been at the time.
When I enter his apartment, I seen my son's pain.
I seen the stress.
I seen the pain. I felt the sadness.
I mean, dishes in the sink.
Dishes on the floor.
Clothes on the floor.
Disheveled bathroom. Hairs on the floor.
Just chaos and misery.
I've lived with him since he was born.
Daniel's never been, like, an organized person,
but this was beyond even him.
Like, it was dirty. It was bad.
Daniel's never been the kind of person to live like that.
You can just see that he was clearly going through something
and he stopped caring about his living space.
I think Daniel just snapped.
He said, "You know what? I'm done with this.
I'm trying to be productive at my job and my life.
And every time I take two steps forward,
I get pulled five steps back.
I get off work and I work another job.
Is it supposed to be this way?
Is this how life's supposed to be for me?"
He said, "I'm tired for a moment. I need to breathe.
I don't need to worry about this right now."
But there's nothing in this world would make him
ever dream of taking his life.
I mean, Daniel never really bit his tongue on telling me anything.
If he was feeling crazy or icky about himself,
I think he'd come to me and say,
"Listen, Mama, I'm having some serious issues right now.
I really need your help."
I really do believe that he would tell me
he's having some real serious issues.
[David] I guess, like, as his older sibling,
I've always worried about my siblings,
but I don't think he would have harmed himself.
He was forward thinking
the days before he went missing.
He was suggesting that he was gonna find
another job at some point or he was gonna move.
He had plans to do something else,
so I don't think he would have harmed himself.
[David] I last spoke to my son two days prior to him going missing.
Him and his sister had plans to go hiking that weekend.
We talked about my plans to come up there in July to visit him.
Knowing Daniel, I don't think he's the type of person
that would want to run away from anything.
He had a lot of good friends and a good family,
so I think that he had a pretty good life.
[Melissa] I was in so much pain
and I didn't know how much more I can take
without knowing where my son is.
The pain and the stress of seeing Daniel in my dreams calling my name...
I said, "God, you gotta give me something."
Then we received a tip and I was excited.
I'm going to find my son.
[David] Around that time of July 7th,
I did get information from the Buckeye Police Department
telling me there was a report of somebody calling in
and saying they saw someone that fit the description of my son Daniel.
It was somebody who was also missing a limb.
[David] A woman I believe from Phoenix, Arizona
spotted someone who appeared to be my brother at a grocery store.
Just something about him drew her to him.
She went over to speak to the kid.
He doesn't look like he's homeless,
and she said that the kid said,
"Oh, I'm just on a journey right now,
something I have to do."
And she offered him a granola bar, some water,
you know, told him to be safe.
She wanted to take a picture,
like, if someone was looking for him,
but then the person declined,
"No, no pictures of me, please."
[David] It was the detective, uh,
from Buckeye Police Department
who was able to go there and check that out.
So, it disappointed me tremendously.
I just want my son back.
[Nicole] At this point, it's two weeks in,
no signs of Daniel.
Buckeye police reached out to the Civil Air Patrol.
It's a non-profit with the U.S. Air Force
to assist and do another aerial l search for him.
They showed up around 8:00 that morning.
There's gonna be a few flyovers
over the area where my son was last seen.
I was present.
They just kinda zigzagged
until they made their way up north.
They did a search for, I would say, roughly,
they got finished roughly around 11:00 that morning.
Then they gave me a map, um, of the area that they searched,
They didn't come up with anything, they came up empty.
[Nicole] Daniel's father, David, at this point,
he had nothing to go on
so, David created his own website,
pleasehelpfind danielrobinson.com
hoping he would start to get information
on what happened to his son.
This is, uh, David Robinson,
I'm the father of geologist Daniel Cornelius Robinson
who went missing in the desert of Buckeye, Arizona.
Coming out for this live to tell you all
that I have a tip line that I'm paying for,
so, please, I'm really desperate here trying to find my son.
I'm really depending on you all to help.
[Nicole] It was really his effort on social media
pushing the public to send any information
that was helping tips come in on who may have seen Daniel.
Any time somebody have leads,
I followed a lot of leads.
I've been to Sedona to Flagstaff
and a couple other places,
but I came back with a negative result, it wasn't Daniel.
Buckeye police is a smaller police department
in comparison to the surrounding cities,
and they have a lot of land to cover.
So, David posted on the website,
he asked the community for help,
he started to put together these community searches
out in the desert.
Uh, I just wanted to come out to live, uh, to tell you all
that I am having a search tomorrow.
Uh, you guys if you can, please come along.
Uh, all the information that you need will be on
pleasehelpfinddaniel.com.
I was able to start most searches that way.
We put out the information about the search to the public.
And people showed up.
I'm really grateful for you coming out here,
um, from the bottom of my heart to search for my son, Daniel.
This terrain is really huge and large,
and I can't do it by myself, so I'm really grateful,
uh, for you all coming out.
We have a mapping system,
we had those maps broken down to grids.
Said, "hey, today, we're searching down this grid."
[volunteer] I just couldn't imagine being in David's shoes,
not knowing where Daniel's at,
I can't imagine not having answers.
Keep on looking for Daniel because my heart tells me to,
and for the family.
[Lasheika Hill] I always say that if...
...I or any one of my family or loved ones ever went missing,
I would want someone to do the same thing for me.
I feel his pain,
and I feel like I know Daniel through him.
[Melissa] I thank everybody for searching for Daniel
I really, really, really appreciate it
that they took the time out of their busy schedules
to help find my son.
[lady]
They've got a bone there.
[David] Couldn't move. I was really stunned.
It was scary because then I realized
my son went missing in the area
where, um, things was happening, obviously,
so, it makes it really bad for me, it makes it tough.
[Evan Short] Um, what we're looking at
is the top of the skull right here,
and then, uh, a piece of vertebrae.
Trying to identify to see what this is...
uh, compared to the human anatomy, the app that I've got
so we can quickly identify to see if it
matches anything.
I'm gonna go ahead and upload this.
I'm gonna shoot a message over to the medical examiner,
um, and, uh, we'll have them evaluate it,
- but I'm pretty sure this is a... - Okay, thank you.
[Short] ...a small animal.
Probably a coyote.
[David] I was relieved it was animal remains,
but it's a rollercoaster.
When I go out to the desert search for instance,
everyday is like day one.
You go out there in hopes to find my son
alive out there and rescue him.
Then it gets grimmer and grimmer as the months have been passing by.
[Nicole] David and these volunteers were out there
first thing in the morning before the heat
and, sadly, all these efforts, they still weren't finding
any trace of Daniel.
On July 19th,
nearly a month since Daniel went missing,
finally, Buckeye police have a break in the case.
The Buckeye Police Department called me and told me,
"Hey, look, Mr. Robinson, uh, we've found Daniel's vehicle...
in a 20-foot ravine in a remote area of the desert."
You know, the first thing I'm thinking,
the next sentence will be that they've found my son.
[narrator] Daniel Robinson
was last seen June 23rd, 2021.
If you have any information,
please contact the Buckeye Police tip line
at 623 349-6411.
[David] The Buckeye Police Department called and told me,
"Hey, look, we didn't find Daniel, we just have his vehicle."
A rancher, uh, checking for his cattle
out in a remote area of the desert
ran into Daniel's Jeep Renegade
in a 20-foot ravine.
[Melissa] The car had been wrecked, in my mind, I'm thinking,
"What if he's hurt?"
I was at a total stage of panic.
Scared beyond anything I ever felt in my life.
[Nicole] The airbags were deployed...
...the sunroof was kicked out,
but still no sign of Daniel here.
[Melissa] When he wasn't in the car,
it's like a moment of relief,
hope and then dread at the same time.
You can be taken out quickly in the desert.
[David] I remember seeing the vehicle the first time,
the way it was,
and it was very devastating.
The detective asked me, he said, "Mr. Robinson..."
He caught me standing at a distance, said,
"You go over there and you can look inside the vehicle."
I just couldn't move, I was really stunned.
Inside the car,
all of Daniel's personal items.
His backpack, his cellphone, his keys.
And then on the outside of the car,
his clothes were scattered all around
like he threw them off.
And then his wallet was found inside his jeans
with all of his credit cards.
Is he naked in the middle of the desert in this heat?
And then we learn that in the trunk,
there were two cases of water.
You know, with his degree,
he knows and understands, you know, the desert terrain a lot.
You can only survive out there with extreme dry heat
for very long without water.
He wouldn't have left all the water
or at least if he got into the wreck,
my thought is he would probably stay in the car
where it's shaded and he has the water
and it's more safe and contained.
Daniel's car was found three miles from the well side
where he was last seen.
[Elliott] Assuming that Daniel crashed his Jeep
so close to the job site, he could have very easily
walked back to the job site in less than an hour.
[Nicole] And it just makes you wonder,
wouldn't you have seen it if you were doing these ground searches,
if you were doing these aerial searches?
And all of a sudden, here it is in this ravine
three miles away.
I think there were a lot of concerns
that how did this car get here?
It had to be placed here by someone,
it doesn't just appear out of nowhere
when we've been searching this area for so long.
It wasn't covered, it was, there were no rocks on it,
there were no debris on the car.
You know, blue-ish Jeep out in the middle
of a brown-ish red desert,
even with it being in a ravine,
I just don't believe that
they would have possibly have missed that from the air.
[David] I had a theory that was given to me by someone
at the Buckeye Police Department
of what they think happened to my son.
They felt like, you know, he escaped at a rollover
without injury 'cause they didn't see any blood in the vehicle.
He kicked the glass out of the sunroof and got out.
But they also believed that he had a severe head injury...
and once he got out of the vehicle, he shredded his clothes
because the brain injury would make you feel hot
and if you're hot, you need to shred your clothes,
and he may have walked off
and succumb to his injuries.
If he was in this accident, he was likely really hurt...
and he was out of his mind, so to speak,
and that's kind of the only explanation that we saw.
That Daniel maybe didn't have any idea
what had happened to him,
maybe that's why he left his keys,
maybe that's why he left the water,
maybe that's why he just started walking
in the middle of the desert,
but we don't know.
[Cawley-Robinson] I get maybe if you did get hot
and take your shirt off, at least,
but I don't think my brother would strip down naked
and leave all of his clothes there.
It was very upsetting because
any person whether eventually he's found or not
can't walk through that for very long and can't get very far
that you couldn't see them.
There's no way my brother would have
got within three miles of the site
and they not find any inkling that he was there.
Just doesn't add up.
[David] One thing that bothered me the most,
I had a severe head injury from IED blast.
That's the reason I'm retired from the military
and I never shredded my clothes,
and so, when they told me that, I couldn't understand the science behind it.
So, that made me wanna get my own investigator,
get a second opinion.
[Jeff McGrath] My name is Jeff McGrath,
I am a criminal private investigator.
I specialize in accident reconstruction.
David Robinson reached out to me
couple days after they found the vehicle.
He felt that there was something that wasn't right
with the vehicle and with the investigation.
The vehicle itself as I started working my way around it,
we noticed there was damage
significantly to the right front side of the vehicle.
That's probably what blew the airbags in the vehicle.
It had to have struck something fairly large,
and it had to be pretty solid to cause the damage I saw.
Where the vehicle was laid, there was nothing around it
immediately that I could see that would have caused
all the damage I was seeing on the vehicle.
It didn't make sense, so, it needed some further investigation.
The police department had turned over the report
of the airbag control modules,
some people call it the black box of the vehicle.
When I started to analyze the crash data report,
the vehicle was doing anywhere from 29
to just over 30 miles an hour
consistently all the way through to airbag deployment,
and that, again, takes me back to the terrain.
I took my vehicle out there and I tried the same thing.
I couldn't get it above 15 miles an hour.
It was absolutely just insane doing it.
It was too rough.
When you go out there and you stand out there,
you can see its ridges and valleys and it's just not possible.
And I attempted it with that as well,
and that thing I got up to just about 22 miles an hour.
To imagine Daniel's vehicle traveling that long
at that speed in the area where it was recovered,
it doesn't make sense.
It's not physically possible.
The crash data report also indicated
at the time of airbag deployment,
the, uh, vehicle had then driven
another 11 miles.
So, the 11 miles leads me to believe
the vehicle was definitely moved
after the initial airbag deployment.
And there's no doubt in my mind of that.
Based on the evidence that, um,
the private investigator gave us,
I just think that maybe Daniel wanted to get away for a moment,
and then abandoned his car somewhere in the Buckeye area,
someone or some people found his car
and just took it.
Once the newsrooms released that Daniel was missing, this is his car,
they might have dumped the car
in attempts to, like, just absolve themselves
and not be caught up in an investigation.
'Cause it doesn't make sense that a person
could survive a car crash of that nature,
rolling down a hill the way it rolled down.
There was no forensic evidence of blood.
Nothing that would suggest that Daniel was in the car
at the time of that wreckage.
So, it looks like
it was staged there like it was placed.
Who did it, we don't know.
Remember, I'm on a mission
to find out what happened to my son.
So, I'm spending my searches out to cover
the area where the vehicle was found.
Daniel's father, David, is determined to find his son.
He's been here in Arizona leading search parties
every Saturday since his son vanished,
and those search parties are making a difference.
On July 31st, a shocking discovery
by one of his father's search teams
finding a human skull and shoulder.
The team immediately alerted the Buckeye police.
I just hit the floor and I just
couldn't hold myself together.
In my mind, I'm thinking,
"Oh, my God, a body, my child is gone."
[Cawley-Robinson] I did receive a call from my dad.
They did find a skull out there.
And that was a pretty tough time.
We have, see Buckeye police have taped off the scene,
and at this point, medical examiners confirmed it,
and we don't know whose it is.
I try to keep as much hope as I can.
Try to keep my emotions at bay.
So, it makes it really bad for me and scary.
[Melissa] In my mind, I'm thinking,
"Oh, my God, a body, my child is gone."
I lost it.
I went into an uncontrollable...
cry and it wouldn't stop.
It wouldn't stop.
I hit the floor.
I mean, I woke up in the middle of the night crying
and calling Daniel's name.
I was calling people that I know
from the church to pray with me.
[Nicole] Shortly after discovering this skull,
it was determined that it wasn't Daniel.
But the medical examiners office thought they knew
who this may have been.
You know, it could be closure for another family.
You know, just to find their loved one that way.
My heart broke for someone,
but at least Daniel helped bring someone home.
So, that makes me proud.
[David] Thank you, guys, for your prayers and support.
Came, um, negative for anything that's related to my son.
So, I'm grateful for that,
so, thank you, guys, for your help and your love.
[Nicole] I can't imagine how emotional it would be for the family
to have to continue to do these searches.
Wanting to find Daniel, but at the same time,
you don't want it to be finding him in the desert
because then you know that you have to lay him to rest.
Trying to get my spirits back up, it's kinda rough today,
like I say, my spirits are down, uh, mentally.
Very hard today for me.
Uh, very depressing.
You know, uh, been a long time
searching for my son, but I'm still pushing it.
And I thank you, guys, for your support.
God bless you.
Thank you for everything you do and all your help,
so, keep it going.
The volunteers out there, they're mothers,
they're fathers, they're brothers, sisters,
uncles, you name it.
And, you know, I'll say one thing about 'em,
they're passionate.
I mean, it's hot out there and they're really looking,
that's the reason we found human remains.
They're really passionately looking, they really care.
They show empathy and things like that and stick out there with me.
[Rose Gilbert] Mr. Robinson is so dependent on volunteers,
and if I imagine it that
his son was, like, someone in my family,
that's what got me coming out, I wanna help
and bring closure to him and his family.
[Margarita Shircel] We're here for the long haul.
There's about a handful of us that come here every Saturday, so,
I'm not gonna give up. [chuckles]
As long as I'm here, you know?
I wanted to get involved any way that I could
and join them for one of the searches.
The search was pretty scary.
Just the thought of potentially finding
my friend out there in the desert,
but it was definitely
warmed my heart to see how many people had shown up.
These random strangers that had all gathered together
for this kid that they had never even met.
You know, no matter what's going on in our lives,
this is important.
We've dedicated ourselves to this
and he needs the help so we're there for him
as long as it takes.
[David] I had an aunty, and she said,
"David, when will there be a time to come to your head
to say, 'enough is enough...
I did all I can' and just move on?"
Um, that was hard for me.
That is still hard for me.
I can't even get that in my brain, you know?
There's not a time where I could actually say that to myself.
I can't even envision a date when I will say,
"Yeah, I think I did enough,
and enough is enough and it's time for me stop now."
[Nicole] In September,
Daniel had been missing for three months now.
At this time, Gabby Petito goes missing,
and you start seeing these headlines
on national outlets just asking for help in finding her.
And you see Gabby Petito's face everywhere.
Missing for weeks,
now, the family of the North Port woman
who was last heard from in August
while on a cross country drive with her boyfriend wants answers.
You see the coverage of Gabby Petito
and then you had on social media
people raising the concern
that there are people of color missing across the country
who aren't getting the same type of coverage,
and I think that's what really brought to life Daniel's case.
And Daniel's family were starting to get this national coverage
that they had been seeking.
Right now, about 600,000 missing persons are in the U.S.,
many of them are people of color
whose cases have not gotten the same attention
of those of young white women like Gabby Petito.
At that moment, I was so excited,
I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, like, someone's actually, you know, heard our story,
all of our hard work is finally getting out there
that, you know, he's missing, like, maybe this can really help us
get this going."
The attention paid to the Gabby Petito mystery
is raising questions about others who disappear
with little if any coverage.
For instance, 24-year-old geologist Daniel Robinson
vanished after work one day in Buckeye, Arizona.
His father believes people of color who go missing
are generally disregarded.
[David] Every situation should be handled the same way.
Yeah.
Uh, I think, um, the first 24, 48 hours is crucial,
um, to find someone.
We shouldn't have to depend on other stories or other cases
to push our own story.
And I just, I just want, we just want answers
just like anyone else.
I think, you know, my brother or everyone else's brother
or father, siblings, whoever they may be,
they deserve the same attention.
Look, and Daniel is a very special person.
We hope some more eyeballs on this case
might get some more answers for you,
uh, as you continue your search for him.
It was kind of that really sad feeling
knowing that everyone is seeing this
and there's still no indication on what happened to him.
We're asking for the people at home,
um, to keep sending your thoughts and prayers to our family.
This kind of thing is very difficult, very hard to go through
This is something that you see on TV and you think,
"Oh, my gosh, this would never happen to my family, we're different."
And you can't do anything really,
but just hope that we get closure.
We hope that we can bring him home to us,
so, if you see something, say something,
if you know something, pass it along.
[Nicole] I think the best case scenario right now
is just finding out what happened to Daniel.
And even if it's finding a body,
his family deserves finding that
so they can lay him to rest.
[David] Um, when I go out to the desert search,
being realistically, you know, I can't see him surviving out there
with no clothing on, you know,
so, I had to come to a point where I had to just be real
and say, "Hey, David, if you're out here looking for your son in the desert,
you know what you're looking for."
[Melissa] In the end, I feel that my son is still here.
I feel that he's still alive somewhere.
I can't move until you come home.
I won't change my cellphone, I won't move my address,
I have to, he has to just come home.
Let us help you come home.