Essence Owens vanished from Orlando on August 6, 2017, and for 13 days nobody could say where she went. Then a Realtor showing a vacant house in rural Groveland found her body behind the property, roughly 30 miles from where the 23-year-old had last been seen alive. The case remains unsolved, and Lake County investigators are once again asking the public for help filling in those missing days.
According to the Lake County Sheriff's Office, Owens was last seen on August 6, 2017, in Orlando, where she lived and worked. She was reported missing by family members, and as reported by the Daily Commercial, it was her cousin, Erica Owens, who filed the missing persons report with Orlando police on August 15 after losing contact with her.
A Grim Discovery Behind a Vacant House
Four days later, on August 19, 2017, a Realtor found Owens's body behind an empty house listed for sale on Douglas Road in Groveland, per the sheriff's office. The Daily Commercial's report specifies that a real estate salesperson and prospective buyers discovered the body at 16420 Douglas Road, in a remote stretch of the county far removed from the Orlando neighborhood where Owens had been living and working less than two weeks earlier.
Investigators have spent years trying to reconstruct what happened in between. Per the sheriff's office, detectives are seeking information on Owens's whereabouts and activities between August 6, 2017, and August 19, 2017, including how she traveled from Orlando to the rural Groveland site and who, if anyone, she was with along the way. The sheriff's office lists the investigation as active under case number 170117875, according to Tampa Free Press's reporting on the renewed appeal.
Deputies Ask the Public to Fill in the Gaps
Authorities have repeatedly urged anyone with information about who Owens may have been in the company of during that stretch to come forward, a point also raised in a separate report from ClickOrlando. The sheriff's office says anyone with information about Owens's whereabouts, associates, or travel in August 2017 should contact its Cold Case Team by phone at 352-343-9529 or by email at [email protected]. Tips can also be submitted anonymously through Crimeline at 800-423-8477.
The case has intersected with at least one other Lake County investigation over the years. As reported by WFTV, detectives examining a separate abduction case said they were reviewing evidence from both investigations before determining whether the man arrested in that case was also a suspect in Owens's death. Nothing in the available record indicates that review ever resulted in charges tied to Owens's case, and investigators have not named a current suspect.
Nearly a decade after Owens was found dead behind that vacant Groveland home, Lake County's Cold Case Team is still working to identify everyone who crossed paths with her during those 13 days, according to the sheriff's office listing. For her family, the renewed public appeal represents another chance that someone, somewhere, remembers something that could finally explain what happened to her.
