Decade-Old Mystery Echoes Laci Case
July 22 -- Like Laci Peterson, Toni Clark was pregnant with her first child and living in Northern California when she vanished mysteriously.
Toni's best friend Najuma Bannister remembers seeing her for the final time on March 16, 1990, the night Toni disappeared.
"For some reason when she left I said 'Bye Toni. I'll call you — give me a call later on tonight," Bannister said. "[I] watched her walk all the way down the stairs and it turned out to be the last time I saw her."
Toni had been visiting friends and family in a rough neighborhood of Oakland that night. Her cousin Renee Pritchett recalled that Toni had trouble starting her boyfriend's car as she was getting ready to head home.
"She tried to start it like three times and it kept cutting off on her," Pritchett said. "Then finally it started to where she could get it going."
But her car stalled on the Bay Bridge, and by the time it was reported to the California Highway Patrol, it had been hit from behind by another motorist.
Toni, however, was nowhere to be found. More than a decade later, she is still missing.
A One-in-a-Million Accident?
Police believe Toni was in front of her vehicle when it was struck, and that she was thrown into the water below. Toni's body was never recovered from the bay, even though Coast Guard rescuers began their search within six minutes of the collision.
The Highway Patrol consulted an expert who said the body would have followed the tide out to the Golden Gate Bridge, and a few weeks later the case was closed.
"I know it's a million-to-one shot that someone got hit and went over, but unfortunately in this instance, I think that's really what transpired," said Officer Shawn Chase.
Unanswered Questions, Lingering Doubts
Toni's family is not convinced. Witnesses on the bridge gave police conflicting statements about the person they saw near the car. Some remembered a black man looking under the hood. Others saw a man walking away from the vehicle. And no one actually saw a body go over the railing, only the wreckage of her car after it was struck.
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