He Vanished After Driving Off With A Coworker: His Car Was Later Found With A Puppy Inside And Lipstick On The Window

On January 2, 2000, 18-year-old Zebb Quinn went to work at a Walmart in Asheville, North Carolina. After his shift was over, he drove off with a coworker and was never seen again.

At around 9 p.m., he met up with Robert Jason Owens, another employee at Walmart, after work to look at a car Owens told him about. Quinn got into his own car and followed Owens to the nearby town where the vehicle was.

Quinn was last seen at about 11:15 p.m. Surveillance footage showed them buying sodas at a convenience store, but then Quinn disappeared shortly after.

He has been missing for over two decades. In 2017, Owens was charged with Quinn's murder, but the details of what exactly happened to the teenager are still unclear.

Zebb Wayne Quinn was born on May 12, 1981, in Asheville, North Carolina. His family described him as a kind and caring person. He was in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) and aspired to become a commissioned officer in the armed forces.

In the meantime, he was working at Walmart to save up money for a new car. At the time, 22-year-old Owens told him about a car for sale nearby.

When Quinn's shift was over, they met up in the Walmart parking lot and drove separately toward the town. They were spotted at a convenience store together, but after that, Quinn was gone.

The following day, Quinn's mother reported him missing. On January 6, his car was found in the parking lot of Little Pigs Barbecue.

The headlights were on, and there were lipstick drawings of a mouth and an exclamation point on the back window. Also, a live puppy was inside the vehicle!

Facebook - pictured above is Zebb

Sign up for Chip Chick's newsletter and get stories like this delivered to your inbox.

In addition to the puppy, police found several bottles, a jacket that didn't belong to Quinn, and a keycard from an unknown hotel. Witnesses had seen a mysterious woman driving the car around.

Based on witness reports, police were able to put together an image of the driver and discovered that the image resembled Misty Taylor, whom Quinn had supposedly been pursuing romantically. But she had an allegedly abusive boyfriend named Wesley Smith.

Robert Owens was the last person to be seen with Quinn, so he was the first to be questioned. He claimed that Quinn had received an urgent page right after they left the convenience store and needed to return the call from a nearby payphone.

According to Owens, he seemed frantic after making the call, canceled their plans, and raced off.

Owens also claimed that Quinn rear-ended him in his rush to leave. Hours later, Owens admitted himself to the hospital for a head injury and multiple fractured ribs from another car crash he was in that night. But police never found evidence of the accident.

On January 4, someone claiming to be Quinn called in sick from Walmart. Quinn's supervisor noted that the voice sounded nothing like Quinn's. When she called the number back, she was connected to the local Volvo plant, where Owens worked a second job.

Owens admitted to making the call, but said Quinn asked him to do it. Quinn's family did not believe his story. Police also traced the page that Quinn received and determined that it came from his aunt's house.

His aunt, Ina Ustich, denied making the call. She had been having dinner at her close friend Tamra Taylor's house, the mother of Misty Taylor.

Quinn met Misty Taylor a few weeks before he disappeared, and they struck up a friendship. When word got back to Taylor's boyfriend, Wesley Smith, he threatened Quinn to stay away from his girlfriend.

Taylor and Smith were both at Taylor's mother's house at the time of Quinn's disappearance.

When Ustich returned home, she reported that her house had been broken into. Police couldn't find any evidence, so the case went cold.

Fifteen years later, on March 17, 2015, Owens was arrested for the murder of Food Network Star contestant Cristie Schoen Codd, her husband, and their unborn child.

Police took the opportunity to search his property and investigated a "fish pond project" that Owens had started and quit soon after Quinn vanished.

They found fabric, leather materials, hard fragments, and plastic bags filled with a lime or mortar mixture. On July 10, 2017, Owens was charged with the murder of Zebb Quinn.

Taking to Facebook, Zebb's sister Brandi wrote, "Zebb came to me in a powerful dream long ago, and I’d like to share it with you in hopes that you can also find peace in this impossible tragedy. I was walking on the beach- my happy place- feeling overwhelmed by grief when I’m the distance I saw him."

"It was surreal. I ran to him almost in slow motion. I threw myself around him -embracing him with all the emotion you can imagine. As I stepped back, I looked at his face- something I never see in my dreams- but his was so clear. He smiled that smile that those of you who knew him know was the most joyful, loving, innocent smile."

"Then he said to me, “It’s ok. Let it go. I’m ok.” I was so confused. How could he expect me to let go of the fury, the immense hatred for a psychopath, the pain of losing my only sibling? Then he backed away from me, still smiling, and vanished as I dropped to my knees."

"This is who he was. This is who we all loved. The gentle, kind, complete example of grace. From this dream, I was able to find my own “closure,” if you will. My brother gave me that, not a prison sentence, not a confession that will never actually be truth, not feeling like justice has been served. In that moment, through his words, HE gave me that peace."