Chris Bates' sister-in-law Sidonee Bates puts up a flyer on February 21, 2018. Photo / Otago Daily Times
Chris Bates' sister-in-law Sidonee Bates puts up a flyer on February 21, 2018. Photo / Otago Daily Times
Christopher Bates' parents want someone to remember something that leads them to their son. There has been no sign of the Alexandra man since he disappeared almost three and a-half years ago, and his case has been referred to the coroner.
A body.
Chris Bates' parents, Trish and John, gentlyskirt around this term when discussing their son's disappearance on February 11, 2018.
Likewise, the officer in charge of the investigation, who retired on Wednesday.
Referring Chris' case to the coroner is something his parents and Detective Sergeant Derek Shaw, of Central Otago Criminal Investigation Branch, describe as "procedural".
Chris' parents are no longer together but are unified in making that decision, although it offers them nothing in terms of answers.
"What we know is Chris left his family home on Sunday, February 11, and we never saw him again.
"The intervening period has been painful as we have all continued with our lives and struggled to come to terms with the probability that Chris' life did not continue."
"It has got to the point where we need to move it on for a coroner to consider," Shaw says.
Chris has missed birthdays, Christmases and his brother Jonathan's wedding in the interim.
For Trish, John and Shaw, the coroner is just the next step in a mystery that remains just that — a mystery.
Chris left the family home in Alexandra on February 11, 2018, 10 days after his 22nd birthday, and never returned.
His disappearance was reported to police four days later, sparking the investigation that continues.
"We don't know what his plans were. He headed away to catch up with some mates or go for a swim ... he bought some cigarettes," Shaw says.
Those cigarettes represented the last proven sighting of him, when he was captured on CCTV footage after buying a pack of John Player Special at the Z fuel station in Tarbert St, several blocks south of his home at 3.51pm.
That brand of cigarette would later spark a potential lead in the case — more on that later.
These cigarette packets, the same brand Christopher Bates smoked, were found during searches. Photo / ODT
"He was positively identified and was travelling on foot by himself," Shaw says.
Chris entered and exited the then-staffed service station — it has since become self-service — from Fox St.
"It's largely a mystery after that."
What has been established is Chris returned home at some point and left his wallet, containing the bank card he used to buy the cigarettes, in his room.
No-one was home at the time to see when he came and went.
"It [the phone] was always cutting out. He couldn't ring his mates because his phone wasn't working."
Initial searches focused on the area triangulated from a cellphone tower, with much of the open terrain ruled out.
Efforts in the weeks and months that followed involved search and rescue teams from across Otago, Southland and Canterbury, and concentrated on part of the area, one of dense vegetation and swamp near the Manuherikia River.
As Shaw tells it, the Clutha River from Alexandra to the Roxburgh Dam, and other possible sighting locations throughout the country were checked, but search efforts kept returning to the same spot.
Two floods swept through that area between initial and subsequent searches.
A Fiordland Search and Rescue team takes part in a search near the Manuherikia River a year after Christopher Bates disappeared. Photo / Otago Daily Times
The discovery of John Player Special cigarette packets across the Manuherikia River on the lower slopes of the Knobby Range and above the Otago Central Rail Trail sparked some interest, Shaw says.
"We had those tested at the same kind of forensic level you'd apply to a homicide case.
"Male DNA was detected but it was an inconclusive match with Trish."
For Chris' family, it was the search efforts that sustained them in the beginning.
Those efforts would be bolstered by Chris' mates from Dunedin, John says.
Shaw says the search effort continued in earnest until April when plans to drain the Manorburn Dam were deemed unfeasible.
