Sandra Lemire went missing on May 8, 2012, authorities said. (Inset: Florida Department of Law Enforcement; screenshot of minivan: Sunshine State Sonar)
A sonar team in Orange County, Florida, found a minivan and remains believed to be connected to a missing mother.
Sunshine State Sonar says they discovered Sandra Lemire, who went missing at age 47 on May 8, 2012.
“We can confirm that the red vehicle located in the water on World Drive is linked to the missing person case of Sandra Lemire,” the Orlando Police Department said in an email to Law&Crime. “Detectives have been in contact with the family. FDLE is working on identifying the remains that were located in the vehicle.”
Officers said volunteer divers reported a vehicle submerged in a body of water on World Drive and unidentified remains had been found.
“Deep in my heart, I always thought this was a foul play case,” Mike Sullivan of Sunshine State Solar told Orlando NBC affiliate WESH. “And it turned out to be just a bad, terrible car accident. I’m just so proud of our team.”
He said he checked the license plate to confirm if the vehicle belonged to Lemire.
The organization said that they received information prompting the new search.
“With the new information, one of our incredible team members, in Virginia, started mapping new locations, which included a variety of highway locations,” they wrote. “At approximately 1:30 PM on December 30, 2023 we got a hit on sonar in a small retention pond at the Disney World exit on I4. We located what appeared to be a minivan submerged in 14 feet of water. Our team quickly suited up and dove on the vehicle to make the license plate confirmation.”
With his namesake father at his side, Sandra’s son, Timothy Lemire Jr., voiced “mixed emotions” about the discovery. They have been thinking it was a murder and kidnapping for all these years, and he said he was glad this was not the case.
“There’s this one video where you can see the van on the tow truck and the truck pulling off. And [Sullivan] said, ‘Timothy, we’re finally bringing your mother home,”” he said. “And that destroyed me when he said that. After all these years.”
Sunshine State Sonar said Lemire had left her grandmother’s home on May 8 to meet a man she had been communicating with on an online dating site.
“She was driving her grandmother’s red 2004 Ford Freestar minivan with the Florida license plate number J36-8ZE,” they wrote.
She was last seen driving the minivan from a Denny’s restaurant in Kissimmee.
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