Angie Barlow

“While everyone else was enjoying Thanksgiving and Christmas, whoever did this was celebrating with their families, she lay in a pile of dirt with a hole in the ground. That is unforgivable. How do you sleep at night? You are a monster.”

-Christina Kramer

It was the 26th of October 2016. A Wednesday. Twenty three year old Angie Barlow had plans for that night. She was due to dance at a party at 7000 block of Harcourt at the Landmark Apartments & Townhomes in Indianapolis, United States. Angie worked as a dancer at local bars in the area and occasionally did private dances but this one was different. She had received a request via text message from an unknown number:

"Hi, do you do private parties?"

Angie believed the text message was from a woman but the woman never provided her name. The only information Angie received was that the dance was an anniversary surprise for the woman's husband, that the request was for her to wear matching panties and bra in either black or red, the address and the code for the gate of the apartment complex.

Angie Barlow

After spending a lot of money having great fun on vacation in Miami, Angie needed the cash and that is why she agreed to do it. Angie lived with her friend Mona and needed a little extra to cover the rent. 

Angie wasn't someone who was afraid to do things alone. She was fiercely independent and took each and every opportunity as and when it arose. Just before she left for the private party that night, she sent Mona a text message:

“Doing a private party at this address just in case I go missing lol.”

She included a screen shot of the address where the party was. Angie drove to the party and put up a Snapchat at 11.45pm that night. She appeared to be at the party and seemed happy. She was smiling. 

Angie Barlow

The next day, nobody could reach Angie. Her friends and family tried to contact her by texting and calling but there was no answer. Christina Kramer, Angie's mother, went to Angie's apartment. It was clear that she hadn't spent the night there and her dog, her beloved little Yorkie Pablo, was left with no food or water which wasn't like Angie at all. That caused real concern and Angie was reported missing.

Mona went to the apartment where Angie told her she was dancing at the night before. She tried the code for the gate to access the apartment complex that Angie had provided to her via the screenshot but it didn't work. Mona climbed over the gate and went to the apartment. There was nobody there. 

Police requested the surveillance footage from the apartment complex and received a copy of it. At 3.29am, the morning of the 27th of October, the surveillance footage showed Angie's car, a blue Pontiac G6, leaving the apartment complex. A second car, a black car, is seen driving out of the complex directly behind Angie's car.

A still shot from the surveillance footage

The footage was grainy and it was not possible to see who was driving either car but police managed to identify the second vehicle's license plate. The car was registered to a Raven Miller.

Police discovered the hosts of the private party that night were Raven Miller and her boyfriend Baron McCullough. Angie knew both of them. She knew them from dancing at the local bars and had even briefly dated Baron. But things between them were not good and Angie's friends and family believe that if she knew who was hosting the party, there would be no way she would have gone there that night. Police believe that they may have had somebody else answer the door that night when Angie knocked so that she didn't know they were involved.

Raven and Baron

Police questioned both Raven and Baron. According to them, they were still in the apartment after Angie left. They said she was there that night but left with someone else. Inexplicably, police believed there was nothing further they could hold them on as there was no direct evidence linking them to Angie's disappearance and they were not questioned further.

Shortly after that, they both left Indianapolis and moved to Phoenix in Arizona. 

From the moment Angie's friends and family discovered she was missing, they searched for her all around Indianapolis. As soon as Mona contacted Angie's parents, Christina and Stephen Kramer, they immediately made the sixty mile journey from Muncie to Angie's home. They organized a search party and handed out missing posters everywhere. Her parents put up digital billboards all over Indianapolis and posted a $5,000 reward.

Twelve days after Angie went missing, her car was found. It was found abandoned just a little over eight miles from the apartment where she was last seen on the east side of Indianapolis. The car was badly damaged. There were marks on the exterior of the car and cracks on the window. But there was no sign of Angie. DNA swabs from a liquid substance found inside the car were taken. 

In Angie's hometown of Muncie in Indiana, there was a strange incident which happened in the months after Angie's disappearance. Around $8000 was withdrawn from the bank account of Angie's grandmother Sharon Barlow. Police wondered if the fraud was connected to Angie's disappearance. Police arrested four people in relation to that matter but there was nothing found at that time that linked that matter to Angie's disappearance.

Just four weeks later, police received an anonymous tip. They were told that Angie was dead and were provided with the exact location of her body. Police went to the address provided. A man lived there but had only recently moved in and police believed he was not involved in the matter. The house had been derelict for a lengthy period before he moved in and was once rented by one of Baron's relatives. It was less than ten miles from where Angie went missing. 

Police found remains in a shallow grave in the back yard. Due to the decomposition, Angie had to be identified via her tattoos. 

Since Angie's remains were found, there has been little progress in the case. Her mother is desperate for answers. There are many questions she has that she wants the answers to:

“The main thing I want to know: Why? “That’s just something we can’t wrap our heads around, you know,” she said. “Why did our daughter have to die? Was it jealousy? Was it, was she set up to be robbed? Was she set up to be sold?”

Police believe that Angie may have been murdered at the apartment that night and her body was possibly driven away in her own car. They have not revealed the cause of death. This is a case where more than likely, multiple people know what happened and it's time they started talking. The very least that Angie's family and friends deserve is to have all their questions answered.