Episode 138: Stevie Bates

January 20, 2025

When a young activist on her way home suddenly vanishes, her family must fight for answers. What happened to Stevie Bates?

Episode Media
Stevie Danielle Leatha Bates (FindStevieBates.com)
Stevie in the months before she disappeared (Facebook)
Stevie at Zuccotti Park in November 2011 (Daniella Zalcman, Wall Street Journal)
Stevie on the subway in April 2011 (YouTube)

Last known sighting of Stevie Bates at Port Authority on April 28, 2012 (Yonkers PD)

Episode Sources
Episode Transcript

Welcome back to Bite-Sized Crime. This week I’m bringing you a case that went years without any answers, one that still needs that final piece of the puzzle. This episode discusses sensitive topics, so listener discretion is advised.

Stevie Danielle Bates was born in December of 1992 to parents Steven and Vivian Bates. Stevie grew up in the Bronx, the northernmost borough of New York City, and she was a city girl through and through. Young Stevie was vibrant and outgoing. Her family described her as “loaded with personality, charm, and character.” Stevie was a gifted student, excelling academically while also engaging in a variety of artistic pursuits. She threw herself into every challenge that came her way, always giving one hundred percent of herself. In 2010, Stevie graduated from the Bronx High School of Science as a National Achievement Scholar. She received several scholarships, including a full ride to the University of Arizona.

After graduation, Stevie decided to hold off on going to college. According to her family, Stevie just wasn’t ready to be that far from home. In the months that followed, Stevie lost two close friends, one to suicide and one to a drug overdose. She fell into a depression, struggling to process so much loss at such a young age. Her family rallied around her, allowing her to grieve and helping her heal as best they could.

In the fall of 2011, Stevie enrolled in the art program at Hunter College in New York City. During her first semester, Stevie signed up for a political science class. It was in that class that she was introduced to the Occupy Wall Street movement.

In September of 2011, thousands of people gathered in Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan to protest corporate greed, economic inequality, and the influence of money in politics. What began as a school project for Stevie soon turned into a passion, a call to activism. Stevie joined the protests, living in the tent city for months. On November 15th, when the protesters were forcibly removed from the park by the New York City Police Department, a photographer with the Wall Street Journal captured an image of Stevie sitting on an overturned newspaper stand, tears streaming down her face. It was clear that the young woman in the photograph believed in the movement with her whole heart.

During her time in Zuccotti Park, Stevie’s shining personality and gregarious nature endeared her to the other protesters. She made many new friends and became a sort of leader in the encampment. She also met 28-year-old Brandon Klosterman, a fellow protester from Ohio. Stevie and Brandon eventually began dating, connected by their mutual passion for the Occupy movement. According to Stevie’s family, they didn’t really approve of Brandon, concerned about the ten-year age gap and his history of drug use.

The family was also concerned about Stevie’s mental health. Although she had found community and acceptance in the Occupy movement, she seemed to be withdrawing from her friends and family and was making some changes that they felt were pretty drastic. She bleached her hair and began wearing it in dreadlocks, and her constant communication began to dwindle. She went from calling her family every day to going days at a time without any contact. She began skipping class and didn’t want to hang out with her friends anymore. She decided not to go back to Hunter College for the spring semester. Her family worried that she may have been sinking back into the depression that had held her for so long.

During this time, Stevie was still very involved in the Occupy movement, attending meetings and protests in the city, something she truly enjoyed and felt passionate about. In March of 2012, Stevie and Brandon broke up, and her family was relieved. Stevie moved in with her sister Sherina in Brooklyn, and it seemed as though things were getting better.

In April, Stevie and some friends decided to take a cross-country road trip, driving all the way from New York to California. She assured her family that she had enough money for the trip and promised to stay in touch with them along the way. On April 17th, the gang hit the road, deciding to go south to Florida first so they could attend a concert. Stevie called her mom and told her they were having a great time, everything was just fine. But two days later, she called her mom from Virginia and told her that she’d lost her cell phone and was borrowing a friend’s. On April 23rd, she called her mom again and said that their car had broken down in North Carolina. Stevie and her friends decided to change course, leaving the car behind and hopping a bus to Arkansas.

But after ten days of traveling and unexpected delays and frustrations, Stevie was done. She called her mom and said she wanted to come home. Vivian told her daughter that she would buy her a bus ticket home, so on April 26th, Stevie boarded a bus in Hot Springs, Arkansas, and began the long trip back to New York. On the 27th, she called her mom from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, letting her know that she was about to get on the final bus and would be back in the city the next morning. Vivian offered to pick her up from the bus terminal in Manhattan, but Stevie told her mom not to worry about it. She was going to stop by Brandon’s place in Brooklyn to pick up some of her things and would come up to her mom’s house in Yonkers on the 29th.

But the 29th arrived and Stevie didn’t show up. At first, Vivian wasn’t worried. She figured her daughter had changed her mind about coming to visit. But as the hours passed and Stevie didn’t call, Vivian grew more and more concerned. She started calling around to Stevie’s friends, asking if anyone had seen her. Stevie’s sister Sherina said she hadn’t made it back to their apartment in Brooklyn.

Getting desperate, Vivian decided to head into the city, checking out some of Stevie’s favorite hangouts. As she walked around Union Square, she ran into Brandon Klosterman. But her sense of relief dissipated when Brandon told her that he hadn’t seen Stevie since she left for her road trip and didn’t know anything about her plans to come see him. Vivian wasn’t sure if she believed him, but she didn’t have any other options.

Finally, Vivian decided to call the police. But the NYPD told Vivian that since Stevie was an adult, she couldn’t file a missing persons report for 72 hours. They told her that she should contact New York City Port Authority to see if Stevie had made it back to the city. However, when Vivian called them, they said she needed to contact Pennsylvania Port Authority since that was where Stevie had last been heard from. Pennsylvania told her to contact Arkansas, who confirmed that Stevie did get on the bus to Pittsburgh and told Vivian to contact Pennsylvania again. Pennsylvania finally confirmed that Stevie had boarded a bus to Manhattan and told Vivian to call New York. Vivian spent days going back and forth between agencies, trying to get answers, all the while hoping and praying that her daughter would show up.

When the New York Port Authority told Vivian to contact the NYPD, which she had already done at the beginning, she felt like she was being sent on a wild goose chase. Even though she had confirmation that Stevie had boarded the bus to New York, the NYPD told her that she had to contact the police in Yonkers since that’s where she lived, never mind that Stevie herself lived in New York City and had gone missing from a Manhattan bus station. Vivian was frustrated and angry, but determined to find her daughter.

Stevie’s family knew that they couldn’t rely on law enforcement to help. They began organizing their own search parties, papering the city with missing flyers and talking to anyone who might have seen Stevie. But as the days passed and they didn’t make any progress, they knew they had to get the police involved.

Vivian filed a missing persons report with the City of Yonkers Police Department on May 9, 2012, twelve days after she last heard from her daughter. Unfortunately, it would be even longer before the Yonkers police did anything about it. When they finally contacted the New York Port Authority, much of the surveillance footage from the city’s subways and bus stations had been taped over or deleted. They did manage to find footage of Stevie at the Manhattan bus terminal at 8:51am on the 28th, proving that she had made it to New York. In the grainy video, Stevie could be seen riding up the escalator and looking around as if she wasn’t sure where to go next. After a few seconds, she walked in the direction of the lobby and disappeared from the screen.

Vivian told detectives about Stevie’s plan to visit her ex-boyfriend in Brooklyn after leaving the bus terminal. Some of her last communication was on Facebook, where she messaged back and forth with Brandon on April 26th. In late May, detectives brought Brandon in for questioning, and he told them the same thing he’d told Vivian – he hadn’t seen Stevie since before her trip. His answers must have satisfied the detectives, because they told Vivian that Brandon wasn’t considered a person of interest. There was no proof that Stevie had been the victim of foul play or that Brandon Klosterman was involved in her disappearance.

Then, on May 26th, someone uploaded a video on YouTube showing a man performing on the subway. In the background, clear as day, was Stevie Bates. Next to her sat a man who strongly resembled Brandon Klosterman. The video was only a minute long, but it was enough to give Stevie’s family hope.

Unfortunately, that hope was short-lived. The owner of the video said that it had been filmed on April 11th, a week before Stevie left the city. It wasn’t going to be helpful after all.

After that, Stevie’s case lost momentum and the leads dried up. There was no proof that she had made it to Brooklyn, and no proof that she hadn’t. It was as if she had walked off the screen of that surveillance footage and disappeared into thin air.

Stevie’s family continued to hope that she would come home. They checked hospitals and rehab centers, hung posters in local businesses and transportation centers. They handed out thousands of flyers in Times Square and searched homeless encampments in the city. They started raising money to hire a private investigator and posted a cash reward for information. They even reached out to local news stations to try and get Stevie’s picture on television, but there wasn’t much interest.

In January of 2013, Stevie’s story aired on an episode of “Find Our Missing,” a documentary series from the Black and Missing Foundation. Stevie’s family spoke about the case, highlighting the surveillance footage and asking the public to call in with any information.

But months passed, then years. Stevie’s case went cold, and her family tried to find closure. All they wanted was for Stevie to come home.

In September of 2020, a construction crew excavating an abandoned building in Queens discovered skeletal remains wrapped in a blanket. It appeared they had been there for years. The remains were sent to the medical examiner, and in March of 2021, they were officially identified as belonging to 19-year-old Stevie Bates.

In an emotional statement posted to social media, her family said, “There are no words to describe the void that [Stevie’s] absence has opened in our hearts. This tragedy has left her family in pieces. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of being in Stevie’s presence, you’d know how truly remarkable she was and can begin to understand what we are feeling as we navigate this world without her.”

Stevie’s family held a memorial service in April of 2021, nine years after Stevie disappeared. Friends and family gathered to share their memories of the bright, vibrant young woman who had brought so much joy into their lives.

Although there was some comfort from knowing where Stevie was, her family was still determined to know the truth of what had happened to her. Vivian told WABC that she believed Stevie had gone to meet Brandon after leaving the bus terminal, that the construction site on Cypress Avenue where her remains were found was the same building where Brandon had been living as a squatter in 2012. She remembered Stevie telling her that it was across from a cemetery. “It was there, at that house. At that building. That’s where she met him.”

As of this recording, there appears to have been little to no progress in finding Stevie’s killer. No arrests have been made, no suspects named. As Vivian told WABC, “Now we’re just praying for a miracle, for someone to come forward, for justice to be served. For Stevie.”

If you have any information about the death of Stevie Bates, please contact the NYPD Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-8477. All calls are confidential. Let’s get justice for Stevie.