The Trail Went Cold - Episode 418 - LaQuanta Riley and Tarasha Benjamin

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 12 February 2025

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

December 7, 2003. Montgomery, Alabama. 19-year old LaQuanta Riley stops off at her mother’s residence to borrow a jacket from her brother. He sees LaQuanta leave in a dark green car being driven by an unidentified man, but she subsequently goes missing. A few weeks later, LaQuanta’s mother receives a garbled message on her answering machine from a panicked woman whom she believes is her daughter and a male voice can be heard in the background. Even though a number of leads are explored, including LaQuanta’s name showing up on an apartment rental in Georgia, no trace of her can be ever found. June 26, 2010. Selma, Alabama. 17-year old Tarasha Benjamin leaves her mother’s home to go shopping at the Selma Flea Market, but never returns. Tarasha is seen driving an SUV which she borrowed from a friend, but later that day, the abandoned vehicle is found alongside the Cecil Jackson Bypass with a broken door handle and two windows missing. While it is suspected that Tarasha was the victim of an abduction, there are very few leads to work with and Tarasha remains a missing person. On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore two unsolved missing persons cases involving young women from Alabama. Additional Reading: https://charleyproject.org/case/laquanta-nachelle-riley https://discover.hubpages.com/family/Missing-LaQuanta-Nachelle-Riley https://www.al.com/news/montgomery/2014/04/where_is_my_daughter_decade-ol.html https://www.waka.com/2018/06/25/15-years-later-mother-of-missing-woman-still-searching-for-answers/ https://www.al.com/news/montgomery/2019/05/search-continues-for-teen-who-disappeared-in-montgomery-15-years-ago-11000-reward-offered.html https://elmoreautauganews.com/2021/02/26/missing-since-2003-officials-release-age-progressed-photo-of-laquanta-riley-today-is-her-birthday/ https://charleyproject.org/case/tarasha-benjamin https://www.newspapers.com/image/570741799/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/570741847/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/570741897/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/570817130/ https://www.wsfa.com/story/36273263/selma-family-pushes-to-uncover-clues-in-womans-2010-disappearance/ https://www.wsfa.com/story/15670452/exclusive-missing-selma-teens-mom-finds-new-hope/ “The Trail Went Cold” will be appearing at the AdvocacyCon, taking place at the Indianapolis Marriott East in Indianapolis on March 28-30, 2025. To get a 10 % discount on tickets, please use our specialized promo code, “TRAIL10”, by visiting https://www.advocacycon.com/. “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	December 7th, 2003. Montgomery, Alabama.
0:06.3	19-year-old Laquanta Riley stops off at her mother's residence to borrow a jacket from her brother,
0:11.6	who sees Laquanta leave in a dark green car being driven by an unidentified man.
0:16.8	Laquanta goes missing, and a few weeks later, her mother receives a garbled message on her answering
0:21.6	machine from a panicked woman whom she believes is Laquanta and a male voice can be heard in the background.
0:28.1	Even though a number of leads are explored, including Laquanta's name showing up on an apartment
0:32.9	rental in Georgia, no trace of her is ever found. After that, the trail went cold. I'm not going to be. I'm going to and the
0:55.0	I'm
0:56.0	the
0:57.0	I'm Hello everyone, and welcome to our latest episode of The Trail Went Cold.
1:20.7	I'm your host Robin Wartner, and on this episode, we're going to be exploring a pair of
1:25.0	unsolved missing persons cases from Alabama. The 2003 disappearance of Laquanta Riley and the 2010 disappearance of Tahrasha Benjamin.
1:33.3	I've received requests to cover both of these cases,
1:36.3	as both victims were young African-American women,
1:39.3	and I thought it might be appropriate to feature them on the same episode together
1:43.3	since Taraisha Benjamin went missing from Selma and Laquanta Riley went missing from the state capital
1:48.5	of Montgomery. And of course, it was 60 years ago next month, when the iconic Selma to Montgomery
1:54.3	protest marches led by Martin Luther King Jr. took place. As for the two victims, Laquanta Riley was a bright 19-year-old who had plans to
2:03.0	attend college, but went missing after she was last seen climbing into a dark green car being
2:08.2	driven by an unidentified man. However, evidence would soon surface to suggest that Laquanta may
2:13.9	have been alive for a period of time after she disappeared, as her mother received
2:18.2	a panicked message on her answering machine from a woman she believed was Laquanta, and she sounded
	...

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