Dale and Crystal Taylor Missing

Oxford Eagle, February 6, 1998

Figure Skating Duo Dale and Crystal Taylor Missing
Parents say pair never checked into Colorado Springs hotel

Loretta Winston
STAFF WRITER

Oxford Olympic hopefuls Dale and Crystal Talyor are missing, Yoknapatawpha Sheriff's Department officials stated yesterday. Their parents, Jim and Sandy Taylor of Oxford, reported them as missing to Yoknapatawpha County Sheriff's Department officials late yesterday, after not hearing from the duo for three days.

The brother-sister figure skating team from Oxford, once favored to make the Olympic team for Nagano this year, were supposed to check into the Broadmoor Inn in Colorado three days ago, but staff at the famous resort say the couple never arrived.

The Taylors were supposed to arrive in Denver on an American Airlines flight on Monday afternoon, but American officials stated that although two tickets were sold in the name of Dale and Crystal Taylor, they have no record of the brother or sister checking in at the airport counter or getting on the flight in Memphis to take them to Colorado.

The Taylors' older brother, Shane, is evidently the last person to have see the pair. He stated to officials that he dropped his brother and sister off at the Magnolia Transit drop-off point at the Eastgate Shopping Center on University Avenue near Highway 7at 3:30 a.m. on the morning of Monday, February 2, and was back at his parents home in downtown Oxford at 3:45 a.m. The Taylors were supposed to leave on the 4:16 bus for the Memphis airport.

The airport bus, Magnolia Transit officials stated, is a special bus that only runs once a week, on Monday morning, and the Taylors tickets were paid for in advance of the trip.

Dale and Crystal Taylor were favorites to make the 1998 U.S. Olympic Team in ice dancing that will compete in the upcoming weeks in Nagano, Japan, but failed to make the team to to an upset in a late qualifying rounds of the qualifying series. Insiders reported that the couple were devastated by their failure, and after a 7th-place finish at the U.S. Championships in Philadelphia last month were considering retiring from professional skating to earn college degrees.

After coming home to Oxford and retreating from the press for a couple of weeks, they decided to go to the Broadmoor club in Colorado Springs to work with famed coaches Peter and Kitty Caruthers, who are in residence there for six months and taking on a small number of couples for private instruction. The Taylors planned to stay in Colorado from February 3rd to February 17th, at which time they would return to Oxford to train on home ice for the 1998 Nationals on April 16-19.

Anyone with information regarding the Taylors is encouraged to call Yoknapatawpha Sheriff Taylor Sheldon or Detective Terrence Nelson at the Yoknapatawpha County Sheriff's Department.