In the late summer of 1993, a young father named Salvador Ramirez, known affectionately as Sal, vanished from Yonkers, New York, leaving behind a life filled with both promise and complications. The 28-year-old man, a native of Colombia who had moved to the United States as a teenager, was last seen on September 19, 1993. On that day, after playing in a soccer game at War Memorial Field, he set out to pick up his two-year-old daughter from his estranged wife's home in Elmsford. A friend reported seeing him driving on the Saw Mill River Parkway, but Salvador never reached his destination and was never heard from again. His disappearance marked the beginning of a long and painful search for answers for his family.
The circumstances surrounding Salvador's disappearance were complex and troubling. He was in the midst of a contentious divorce from his wife, Ruth Arriaga, and the two were battling for custody of their young daughter.
Salvador had been awarded custody, partly because Arriaga had previously taken the child to California without permission. At the time he went missing, both Salvador and his estranged wife were in new relationships and expecting children with their new partners. Complicating matters further, Salvador had expressed concerns for his daughter's well-being, even reporting his wife's new boyfriend for child abuse after noticing bruises on the child, though an investigation deemed the injuries accidental. Despite his wife's suggestion that he may have returned to his native Colombia, his family found this highly unlikely as he had left behind his passport and uncashed paychecks. The discovery of his 1980 Toyota in a long-term parking lot at JFK Airport nine days after he was last seen only deepened the mystery.
Decades have passed since Salvador Ramirez was last seen, yet his case remains an active and unsolved investigation, with foul play strongly suspected. His family remembers him as a devoted father who would never have willingly abandoned his daughter. The divorce from his wife was finalized just a few weeks after he vanished, and she subsequently moved to California with their daughter and her new husband. This has left Salvador's family not only without answers about his fate but also without contact with his child. The Yonkers Police Department continues to seek information that could shed light on what happened to Salvador, and in 2019, DNA samples were collected from his siblings to be entered into national missing persons databases in the hope of one day finding a match and bringing closure to his loved ones. The case of Salvador Ramirez is a sad story of a young father who disappeared in the midst of a difficult personal situation, leaving behind a family to grapple with his absence and the unanswered questions that still linger.Last Seen: Sep 19, 1993
