Where's Beaner?

Chisolm stands in the heart of the “iron range” in southwestern Minnesota. It’s a relaxed Midwestern town with about 5,000 residents.

On June 14, 2003, Leeanna Warner, 5, was reported missing by her parents. Nicknamed “Beaner,” she walked to a neighbor’s home to play with a friend but never returned. Two neighbors noticed her leaving the home but no one saw what happened after that.

Beaner was wearing a sleeveless blue denim dress and no shoes. Only three-feet-two-inches tall, she weighed 48 pounds. Her mother said that at about 4:45 she asked to go to the neighbor’s home. Thirty minutes later, she was gone.

At first, police thought the child had wandered away. Their immediate efforts were to search nearby lakes and ponds. After finding no evidence that she’d been the victim of an accident, investigators concluded that Beaner had been abducted.

Her father, Chris, and mother, Kaelin, were quickly eliminated from suspicion.

Neighbors claimed that a strange man had been lurking nearby. He was said to be of medium height and weight and had a dark-colored tattoo on his right arm. The tattoo resembled a “star” or maybe the “sun.” Police never identified this man.

A few months later, a local resident, Matthew James Curtis, 24, was arrested when police found child pornography on his computer. Although the charges were unrelated, detectives interrogated Curtis about Beaner’s disappearance. After being released, Curtis drove to a gravel pit and used a plastic bag to suffocate himself. Further investigation concluded that he had no involvement in the case.

The case went stagnant until 2005 when Joseph E. Duncan III was arrested in Couer D’Alene, Idaho. A child predator and serial killer, he was charged with kidnapping nine-year-old Dylan and eight-year-old Shasta Groene after murdering their mother, stepfather, and brother. Duncan later shot-gunned Dylan to death in a remote Montana campground. Shasta survived weeks of horrendous sexual attacks before being rescued. When investigators deciphered an incripted document on Duncan’s computer, they found a reference to Beaner’s disappearance. However, a timeline of the killer's life led police to conclude that he had not been in the Chisolm, Minnesota area at the time of Leeanna Warner’s disappearance. Duncan was later convicted of numerous charges unrelated to Beaner's disappearance.

In truth, police have had no real solid leads in this case.

It’s as if Beaner vanished from the face of the earth. The little girl who loved playing with dolls and riding her bicycle is simply gone. For six years, residents of Chisolm have endured an emptiness that won’t go away.

Where’s Beaner?