On the night of December 29, 1999, 16-year-old Ashley Freeman spent her birthday with her best friend Lauria Bible at the Freeman family mobile home in Welch, Oklahoma. By the early morning of December 30 both girls were missing. A passing motorist reported a fire at about 5:30 a.m.; firefighters found Kathy Freeman dead of a gunshot wound and, after the blaze, Danny Freeman’s body was discovered in the smoldering rubble the following day. Initial confusion included a brief, incorrect theory that Danny had fled with the girls.

The case remained cold for decades amid false confessions from two convicted killers who later recanted, and tensions with the local sheriff’s department complicated early inquiries. In April 2018 authorities arrested Ronnie Dean Busick and linked him, along with two men later found deceased, Warren Phil Welch and David Pennington, to the murders and the girls’ disappearance. Witnesses later said the men boasted of kidnapping and harming the teens and that Polaroid photos existed showing the girls bound and gagged. Busick pleaded guilty in 2020 to accessory to first-degree murder in exchange for information leading to searches; despite that, the girls’ remains have not been recovered. Ashley was declared legally dead in 2010.

Does anyone who knew Ashley or Lauria have information about their last night or about anyone who might have seen them after December 29, 1999?