An Amber Alert for adults: Mother's loss drives push for change to missing person probes
Apr. 9—FOWLERVILLE — Belinda Pierce says the pain of her daughter's death has been exacerbated by the way authorities have handled the missing person investigation that took a turn two months ago when police found Kayla Pierce's body in Detroit.
As the Fowlerville resident deals with the grief from her 29-year-old daughter's fatal drug overdose, and steels herself for the scheduled court hearings involving the man accused of hiding the body, Pierce is advocating for changes in the way police investigate missing person cases.
Among her complaints: That Livingston County sheriff's detectives waited more than two weeks after she reported her daughter's disappearance to issue a press release asking the public for help.
According to Detroit police, a cadaver dog indicated a body had been inside Kayla Pierce's car, but Livingston County detectives waited two months before alerting the Detroit department of the hit and asking for help searching the home of the man who had been arrested in the city while driving the vehicle around the time she disappeared.
When police finally searched Dowan Knighten's home on Detroit's west side, they found Kayla Pierce's body behind the garage, wrapped in a tarpaulin.
"It is alleged that she died, and he took the lifeless body of Ms. Pierce and left it in the area near his garage," Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Maria Miller said in an email.
The proposed "Kayla's Law" being floated by Pierce and her supporters would require law enforcement agencies to share information when adults are reported missing, along with "more vigorous pursuit by law enforcement for missing persons," according to a petition on change.org. As of Thursday, the petition had garnered more than 800 signatures.
"I feel if the different police departments involved in this case would have communicated better, maybe we could have gotten Kayla some help, and maybe she'd still be alive," Pierce said. "They have Amber Alerts for kids; they should have them for adults, too."
Livingston County Sheriff's Lt. James Lynch said his detectives did their best to locate the mother of two, who had bipolar disorder, after Pierce reported her missing Nov. 28.
"We conducted an investigation and determined she was a voluntary missing person," Lynch said. "We didn't have a criminal investigation pending in this case."
But Detroit Police Cmdr. Darrell Patterson said Livingston County detectives on Dec. 10 ordered a cadaver dog that alerted them that a body had once been in the backseat and in the trunk of Kayla Pierce's 2013 Chrysler 200.
Patterson said two months went by before Detroit police were told about the cadaver hit and were asked to help search the 47-year-old Knighten's house. On Feb. 11, officers from Detroit and Livingston County raided the home on Heyden Street on Detroit's west side.
After the body was found, Knighten was arrested and booked for homicide, Patterson said.
But when a Wayne County Medical Examiner's autopsy revealed Kayla Pierce had died of fentanyl and methamphetamine toxicity, Knighten was charged Feb. 14 with disinterment or mutilation of her body, a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison, among other charges.
Knighten was released March 25 from the Wayne County Jail on $50,000/10% bond, court records show.
Patterson said Detroit police didn't become involved in the investigation until the search of Knighten's house and said he didn't know why it wasn't conducted earlier.
"I don't want to speculate, and I'm not going to point the finger at anyone; I'm just letting you know what our involvement in the case was," he said.
After an initial interview with The Detroit News, Lynch did not return phone calls to explain why his department's detectives waited two months after the cadaver dog hit before searching Knighten's home or how investigators had determined the disappearance had been voluntary.
In an earlier conversation, when asked why county detectives had ordered Kayla Pierce's car towed if they didn't have a criminal investigation open, Lynch said: "I'm not going to get into the specifics. ... I can't get too detailed because the case is still open."
Car becomes a clue
Knighten's Feb. 11 arrest followed an earlier arrest on Nov. 28 — the night Kayla Pierce was reported missing. Knighten was driving her car about a mile from his home when he was pulled over by police, Patterson said.
Patterson said he wasn't sure why officers stopped Knighten, but when they ran his name into the computer, it showed he had an outstanding warrant for violating probation after pleading guilty in 2019 to drug possession in Romulus.
Officers arrested Knighten and, per department policy, left his car in a legal parking spot, since it wasn't to be towed as evidence, Patterson said.
Pierce said if police agencies had been required to share information about missing persons, her daughter's car might have been flagged as part of the case, and the Detroit officers might have dug further.
"If they'd have done an investigation, who knows what might have happened?" Pierce said. "Would my daughter still be alive?"
But Patterson said there was no reason for Detroit officers to delve into Kayla Pierce's disappearance the night they stopped Knighten.
"At that point, we didn't even know she was a missing person," he said.
Despite being on the lam for more than a year after violating the terms of his probation and having a criminal record stretching back 30 years, Knighten was freed the day after his arrest on a $2,000 bond in the Romulus narcotics case, court records show.
Knighten's attorney, Timothy Wrather, did not return phone calls and a text message seeking comment.
Patterson said Livingston County detectives contacted their Detroit counterparts on Dec. 3 regarding Kayla Pierce's Chrysler.
"They told us they knew where the vehicle was, and we were told to leave the vehicle alone," Patterson said. "I have no idea why our detectives were told to leave it alone.
"The very next day, Livingston County calls our detectives back and asks us to impound the vehicle. I can't speculate as to why they wanted it, but acting in good faith, we recovered the vehicle. That's the only direction the officers had.
"As the officers were impounding the vehicle, Mr. Knighten came out and hands them the keys and says Livingston County told him to surrender the keys to police," Patterson said. "And so they impounded the car and took it to the evidence yard."
Pierce provided The News with a screenshot of a Dec. 4 email she said was sent by Livingston County Detective Sgt. Gary Childers, which says: "(Knighten) claims (Kayla Pierce) let him use the car down in Detroit and was supposed to be right back and did not return."
"They just took his word for it," Pierce said. "This is a guy with a long criminal record, and they arrest him driving a missing woman's car, and they just believed him when he said she loaned him the car."
On Dec. 8, Patterson said the Chrysler was transported to Livingston County. Two days later, the cadaver dog detected a scent inside the vehicle of a body, according to Patterson.
'A follower'
Pierce said her daughter was "a follower. She wasn't her own leader; she always wanted to be someone's helper — she wanted to rescue people."
Kayla Pierce was bipolar and was being treated with medication and counseling, her mother said. Pierce is the guardian of her 3-year-old granddaughter, Kaylynn, and grandson Kayden, 10.
Pierce acknowledged her daughter had dabbled with street drugs.
The last time Pierce saw her daughter alive was Nov. 23. "She dropped off Christmas gifts and said, 'I'll be back later.'"
After her daughter didn't return, Pierce called and left text messages. "I figured her phone was out since she'd never been out of contact like that before," she said. "But she never got back to me."
Pierce said she eventually went to her daughter's house in Handy Township, near Fowlerville. The lights and television were on, and her cigarettes were still on the table.
"It's like she just left to go to the store, planning to be right back," she said.
Two days after her daughter failed to show for Thanksgiving dinner, Pierce filed a missing person report with the Livingston County Sheriff's Office — but deputies waited 16 days before issuing a press release on Dec. 15, according to Pierce and the sheriff's website.
"They obviously weren't making this case a priority," Pierce said.
A group of friends printed fliers and distributed them throughout the area, while Jessica Nichols, a family friend who lives in the Upper Peninsula, called police stations.
She hit paydirt when Det. Jessica Johnson of the Detroit Police 8th Precinct told her about officers arresting someone after he'd been pulled over while driving Kayla Pierce's car.
"I asked who it was, and she said she couldn't tell me his name; it's a known felon," she said.
Pierce and friend Shelly Long then drove to the 8th Precinct on West McNichols near Grand River and met Johnson in the parking lot.
"We weren't able to go in (because of COVID restrictions), but she came out and said they had Kayla's car," Pierce said.
Pierce and her friends peppered the 8th Precinct with fliers. Long's niece, Summer Moore, who didn't know Kayla Pierce, came from her home in Palm Harbor, Florida, to help with the search.
"I was up here for seven days," Moore said. "At one point, my cousin looked at me and said, 'she can't be alive; we've looked everywhere.'
"It's ridiculous that Belinda can't get any answers," Moore said.
The Detroit Board of Police Commissioners' Office of the Chief Investigator last week opened an investigation into Pierce's complaints.
"They did not look for my daughter or respond to my complaint at the 8th Precinct," Pierce said.
Patterson said that isn't true. "Detective Johnson was working on this case while she was on vacation," he said.
Lynch also insisted his detectives worked hard to find Kayla Pierce.
"It's a heartbreaking situation," he said. "At some point, we'd love to sit down with the family and show them all the work we Livingston County sheriffs did to locate Kayla. But that'll have to wait until the investigation is over."
Knighten waived his preliminary examination in Detroit's 36th District Court on March 25, and the case was bound over for trial. An arraignment on information hearing is scheduled for April 15 in Wayne County Circuit Court.
A Wayne County Prosecutor's Office victim advocate notified Pierce about Knighten's decision to waive his exam. But she says it's been difficult getting any other information about the case.
"I realize they don't want to say too much because the case is still going on, but you'd think I could get basic information," Pierce said.
Pierce says her family wasn't notified that her daughter had died of a drug overdose until last week after The News asked the Wayne County Medical Examiner's Office about the cause of death.
"It's ridiculous that I can't find out any information about my daughter's case," she said. "Everything about this case has been messed up from day one."
