On January 26, 2022, 24-year-old Alexis Gabe vanished from her hometown of Oakley, California. By the following day, her family knew something was terribly wrong. Unanswered calls and unreturned messages quickly turned into a sinking sense of dread, and when her vehicle was found abandoned nearby with no sign of Alexis inside, a massive search effort launched across Northern California.
Investigators soon focused on the last person known to have seen her: her former boyfriend, Marshall Curtis Jones. On the evening of her disappearance, Alexis had gone to Jones’ home in neighboring Antioch to exchange belongings. She never returned.
For months, Alexis’ family and volunteers distributed flyers and scoured roadsides, wooded areas, and remote terrain, holding out hope that she might be found alive. Behind the scenes, however, surveillance footage and digital evidence were painting a far darker picture for law enforcement.
On June 2, 2022, Oakley police officially reclassified the case as a homicide, identifying Jones as their prime suspect. By that time, Jones had fled California. Authorities tracked him to the Seattle, Washington area, where officers moved in to serve an arrest warrant. During the encounter, Jones brandished a knife and advanced toward officers. Police opened fire, killing Jones and leaving the mystery of Alexis’ whereabouts unresolved.
Despite the suspect’s death, detectives pushed forward. A crucial breakthrough came when investigators recovered handwritten directions believed to have been written by Jones. The notes detailed specific landmarks, travel times, and turns leading into the rural foothills of Amador County near Pioneer.
Search efforts immediately shifted from the East Bay to the Sierra Nevada region. The family endured months of grueling searches and agonizing false leads—including a moment when bones discovered by volunteers were analyzed, only to be identified as animal remains.
The true breakthrough finally came in November 2022, when a resident near Plymouth, California, spotted human remains off Jackson Road. Dental records confirmed the heartbreaking truth: Alexis Gabe had finally been found.
At the site, investigators also recovered items that added a chilling layer to the case—including Alexis’ personal belongings, pieces of black garbage bags, and duct tape, cementing the tragic reality of her final hours.
