Daniel Cornelius Robinson, disappeared June 23, 2021, near Buckeye, Arizona.

Revised October 2023

The hydro-geologist, Daniel Robinson, was last seen by a fellow worker and pump technician, Ken Elliot, whilst assessing a remote drill site in the Arizona desert on June 23, 2021, around 9.15-9.30 am. It was located near Buckeye in Arizona, near Sun Valley Parkway and Cactus Road, and it was Daniel’s second job of the day.

Soon after, Daniel drove off into the desert and has not been seen since. His Jeep turned up around a month later containing his belongings, including his clothes, in an area previously searched, and one of his boots was lodged under his vehicle.

As of late 2023, investigations are still ongoing to try and locate Robinson, but the family and a private investigator believe this case has troubling aspects. Was it suicide, foul play, or misadventure in the Arizona desert? The search for Daniel continues.

Who is Daniel Robinson?

Daniel Robinson, 24, the youngest of four children, grew up in Columbia, South Carolina. He was a keen outdoorsman, musician and traveler who was always close to his family and constantly connected with his parents and siblings.

He graduated from the College of Charleston in 2019 with a major in archaeology. He then attended a course in Tucson and soon after was offered a job by the engineering firm Matrix New World.

Daniel was described as a 5’8 African-American man weighing 165 pounds with black hair and brown eyes. Part of his right forearm and hand were missing as a result of a birth defect.

The disappearance from the well site

Ken Elliott said Daniel was initially fine as they discussed the weather and the job. It was an abnormally cool day for the area, and Ken had never met Robinson before; they were to work on a deep well. But within a short period, Robinson became distracted.

Elliott said, “He was just looking off into the desert; he had a very, very distant look in his eyes. Whenever he’d turn around again, I would look at him and look into his eyes – the first thing I thought was maybe it was drugs or something ... [but] his pupils were not dilated. From that standpoint, everything appeared to be normal. Then I thought this was a medical condition or something. I wasn’t too sure. I kept watching him, but he just kept turning around and looking off into the desert. Then he just turned around and walked back over to his Jeep, and I just assumed he was going to get something out of his vehicle. And he opened the door, got in, sat down, put on his seatbelt, then he looked at me and just waved at me and backed up and took off.”

At that point, Robinson drove off in his blue Jeep Renegade. Elliott told his coworkers by phone about what had happened, assuming that Daniel wasn’t feeling well and would call in sick. However, no one heard from Daniel after that. He was reported missing to the Buckeye Police Department the same day.

Elliott followed Daniel’s Jeep tire tracks in the rain-soaked dirt road and found that Robinson turned right deeper into the Sonoran Desert instead of driving left at a T-junction to return to Phoenix.

The search

The search was led by the Buckeye Police Department, using UTVs, cadaver dogs, searchers on food and drones flying overhead, along with assistance in the air from Phoenix Firebird helicopters and civil air patrol.

While Tempe Police were dispatched to check Robinson's apartment on June 24, they did not go inside. Police did not enter Robinson's home until July 7, nearly two weeks after he was reported missing. Civil Air Patrol, comprised of volunteers who do air searches, was not contacted by police until July 7.

Family members traveled from the East Coast to Arizona to join the search, covering 70 square miles.

Detectives said they obtained a ping from Daniel’s phone but could not track it because it was off or out of range. After receiving his call records, they learned he had not made any calls or texts after leaving the job site. BPD detectives and Daniel’s family worked to obtain phone and financial information but did not locate any information that would aid in finding him.

His family, friends, and co-workers said that in the days before his disappearance, he was not like himself but said, "There is no indication that he wished to harm himself or leave the area.”

Several mine shafts were searched in the area, but there was no sign of Daniel.

The Jeep is found

Finally, on July 19, 2021, almost a month after Daniel disappeared, a rancher called Brandon Shelton found his 2017 Jeep Renegade with license plate NLA2CMA in a ravine. It was just four miles from the work site where he was last seen. But Daniel was not at the scene.

The Jeep had landed on its side with significant damage. Police said a seatbelt had been worn at the time, and the airbags were found deployed. One of Robinson's size 11½ Red Wing work boots was stuck under the truck.

Shelton, whose cattle graze 14,000 acres in the Buckeye area, is convinced the car had only been in the ravine that leads to the Hassayampa River a short while when he came across it, saying, “It was clean, and my cows would have found it. Cows are inquisitive creatures and would have licked it.”

The Jeep was found in an area that had already been searched, with Police saying, "Because of the rough terrain, the vehicle was not clearly visible to crews searching by air and foot”.

The vehicle contained Robinson’s clothes, phone, wallet, keys, and bottled water. A T-shirt, jeans turned inside-out, shorts, an orange work vest, boots and two mismatched black socks were all located. One of the socks was Nike, and the other was Adidas.

The ravine was searched on the ground by foot and in the air by the Department of Public Safety Ranger helicopter, but they found no trace of Robinson. There was no blood found in the car, and there were no indications of foul play.

On July 31, a human skull was found, but further investigations proved it was not Robinson, and its identity remains unknown. Other remains recovered during searches were determined to be animal bones.

Private investigator

Around the end of July, the family hired a private investigator, the former police officer Jeff McGrath, who specialized in accident investigations. Based on GPS data, he discovered that the Jeep had gotten into multiple accidents after Daniel’s disappearance but before it fell down the ravine.

Evidence from the vehicle showed that it crashed, the airbags deployed, and the driver drove another 11 miles and was involved in another crash. The first collision was four hours after Daniel went missing, while there was also some "paint transfer" from the vehicle.

After that first accident, it’s unknown where the vehicle was taken next. McGrath said that after the airbags were deployed, the ignition was turned on at least 46 more times during the extra 11 miles driven.

What happened to Daniel Robinson?

Investigators believed something triggered Robinson into the desert, where he stripped off and wandered away from his car.

Jeff McGrath said that theory made no sense, “If you were delirious and ripped off all your clothes and wandered into the desert, you wouldn't stick one of your shoes under the car. My personal theory is that someone deliberately wrecked that vehicle out there.”

McGrath believes Robinson was upset about a woman's rejection and went on an all-night video game binge. A Buckeye police report states that Daniel met a woman named Katelyn while he was making deliveries for Instacart and dropped off an order at her home. Katelyn said she and her friend were drunk and invited Robinson inside, and they later exchanged numbers. Within a week, he arrived at her house unannounced and began sending her texts saying, “I couldn't stop thinking about you' and 'I love you.” She tried to rebuff him, “Honestly, you showing up at my house unannounced made me extremely uncomfortable. I don't see us hanging out any time soon.” The next day, he turned up at her house again. “Do you hate me?” Daniel replied. “I don't hate you, but please leave me alone”, Katelyn texted back. He took 15 hours to respond with his final text to her. Eighteen hours after that, he disappeared.

After he drove off, McGrath said of the events, “At that point, I think somebody, not a good person, found him. I can't imagine what they did with him, but I believe his vehicle was crashed a couple of times, and then its final rest was at the bottom of that ravine.”

McGrath found another black Nike sock three miles away in the desert. He cannot explain it, but it is another reason he believes there is more to the case than meets the eye.

McGrath and Daniel's family believe Buckeye Police did not thoroughly investigate Robinson's mysterious disappearance. They pointed out that Daniel's clothes, possessions, and car were handed over to his father when he arrived in Arizona from South Carolina.

Robinson's brother Roger Cawley-Robinson believes police are doing what they can to find him now, but he fears it's too little, too late, "Had they been quick about it in the beginning, you know we wouldn't be here three months later still searching for my brother and still looking for answers.”

Update May 2023

Multiple searches of the area where Robinson vanished have come up empty. On January 7, 2023, a skull and bones were found in the desert, but Robinson’s father said it wasn’t his son. In November 2021, a skull was found as a search party was looking for the missing geologist, but DNA results showed it wasn’t him.

On January 27, officers received a tip that there were human remains inside a well half a mile north where Robinson was last seen, but no remains were actually at the well. On February 18, Buckeye police and Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office deputies did another search with dozens of personnel and K-9 teams but found nothing.

On May 31, the Buckeye Police Department released an updated missing persons report.

They said that using advanced data extraction, detectives uncovered location data in Daniel’s cell phone, placing the phone at the crash site at approximately 10.05 a.m. the morning he went missing.

Tempe Police assisted the investigation in forensically processing Daniel’s electronic devices, including personal computers, a work computer and an iPad. Preliminary findings did not reveal information that could help locate him. Buckeye police detectives continue to analyze the raw data.

Buckeye police provided a case briefing for the incoming Special Agent in Charge at the FBI Phoenix Field Office. This was the second FBI briefing.

They also investigated a sighting reported by an individual who claimed to have had a brief encounter with Daniel in the Hassayampa river bottom the day he went missing. Digital evidence from Daniel’s vehicle systems and electronic devices did not align with the information provided by the reporting party.

"The Daniel Robinson missing person case is open and active. Therefore, the record being released at this time is not to be considered complete. The investigation is ongoing," Buckeye PD said.

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