Timothy B. Baker was 47 years old when he was last known to have been in Paducah, Kentucky, on March 5, 2004. He was a White/Caucasian man with brown hair and brown eyes, described as approximately 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighing about 220 pounds. At the time he disappeared, he was reportedly wearing a yellow and blue striped shirt with blue jeans or slacks, and he had a Timex watch with him. His case was later entered into NamUs as missing person case MP9749, with the McCracken County Sheriff’s Department listed as the investigating agency.
The known circumstances are deeply troubling and heartbreaking. Timothy was reported to have jumped from the Interstate 24 bridge at the Kentucky-Illinois state line into the Ohio River. His vehicle was found on the bridge, and a note was reportedly located inside. The Ohio River is wide, powerful, and unforgiving, and the area around the state line would have presented immediate danger to anyone entering the water.
The details publicly available do not describe a recovery, and the case information does not list him as found alive or deceased.
Although Timothy’s last contact was recorded in 2004, the case was formally reported to the McCracken County Sheriff’s Department in 2006 under agency case number 04-5034. His missing person record was later created in NamUs in 2011. The passage of time in a case like this can be especially painful for loved ones, because the central questions remain unresolved: what happened in Timothy’s final known moments, whether he entered the river as reported, and why no definitive resolution has been publicly recorded.
Investigators also documented that family DNA reference samples were collected from Timothy’s mother and father and submitted through the UNT Center for Human Identification, with records indicating the DNA information was available at the national CODIS level. This kind of family reference testing can be important in long-term missing person cases, especially when authorities need a way to compare unidentified remains recovered later with a missing person’s family profile. In Timothy’s case, the presence of those samples shows that efforts were made to preserve a pathway toward identification if future evidence emerged.
Timothy Baker’s case remains a somber missing person case centered on a reported incident at the I-24 bridge near the Kentucky-Illinois line, a vehicle left behind, a note, and a man who vanished from the Paducah area without a publicly documented recovery. He was a 47-year-old man with identifiable clothing and personal items, a case file maintained by the McCracken County Sheriff’s Department, and family DNA available for comparison. The available record tells the story of a man last associated with the Ohio River on March 5, 2004, and of an unresolved disappearance that continues to leave behind uncertainty, grief, and the hope that clearer answers may one day come.Last Seen: Mar 5, 2004
