A man who went missing ten years ago was only alerted to the authorities three years later when his friend asked police to do a welfare check on him.
Michael Shaver, aged 36 when he went missing in 2015, wasn’t physically seen by friends or family since then but texts from his phone were sporadically sent to them in that time.
The dad had been living in Clermont, Florida, with his wife Laurie Shaver and their two children, a son and a daughter, before he vanished, reports the Mirror.
In a story that spanned years, including lies from Laurie, allegations of domestic abuse, and even the shocking claim that their daughter, aged just seven had been involved in the father’s disappearance, Michael was eventually found to be dead with a single shot to the head.
Michael and Laurie had been together since they were teens. The dad worked as a monorail technician at Walt Disney World, and was a laid-back, easy-going family man, but in November 2015, he apparently walked away from his life.
Out of the blue, Michael messaged his employer and quit his job. He said they could keep his tools, which they found odd, as he was passionate about them and had never missed a day of work before then. Shaver then told friends that her husband had left her, and the children, to start a new life with another woman. However, his vehicle was strangely still parked at the family home.
It felt out of character for many people that the devoted dad would behave like that, but when people messaged Michael, he would text back from his number with “leave me alone” or “don’t bother me”. He also replied in the same manner on Facebook messenger, and demanded that they respect his decision to cut himself off from everyone.
The last time anyone had seen him, aside from Shaver, was at a tractor show on November 7 of 2015. A work colleague saw him with his wife and kids, although they didn’t appear to be getting along. However, Michael was still messaging, so initially, there wasn’t concern. His family lived in New York, so it wasn’t unusual not to get together often.
Neighbours noted that after Michael had left the home, another man, Travis Filmer, had moved in. Travis would later testify that Shaver had told him, “It’s not that he’s missing, it’s that he’s no longer walking this Earth.”
Less than a year later, they had a “marriage ceremony” in the backyard, close to where a new large concrete fire pit had been built, but she hadn’t sought a divorce from Michael, so it wasn’t legal. But, why hadn’t she? She didn’t go to him for child support payments, and she had sold off some of his possessions.
Two years passed and Michael wasn’t in contact with his children, but in that time it appeared that Shaver’s story had changed over the years. She’d told some people that Michael had moved to Georgia, while others were told he was in New York and California. She’d also told her new partner’s mum that Michael was a pilot who travelled a lot. She even told her supervisor at work that he was in jail because he hadn’t paid child support.
Michael had vanished
Then in February 2018, one of his friends decided to go to the cops and try to find out why Michael had vanished from his life.
Officers found no trace of Michael after November 2015. He hadn’t used any bank cards or got another job. His driving license and passport had both expired. Officers went to his former house and spoke to Shaver, who said that she hadn’t seen her husband since 2015 either.
Investigators went inside the house and initially, Shaver appeared to be helpful but when they walked around the property outside and requested to bring police cadaver-seeking dogs to the property, she stopped co-operating and requested they return with a warrant.
This raised suspicions straight away with the police officers. Shaver was quickly named a person of interest in Michael’s disappearance. Two weeks later, the property was searched. Police dogs were brought in and alerted officers that there were indeed human remains in the back garden, near the newly-concreted fire pit area.
Digging equipment arrived at the scene and articles of clothing and what appeared to be a human arm bone were found underneath a concrete slab in the backyard. As they dug further, skeletal remains were found buried 3ft from the surface wrapped in a fitted sheet and a tarpaulin.
The human remains were subsequently identified as Michael and in September 2020, Shaver was arrested and charged with second degree murder. It seemed that Michael had died as the result of a single bullet to the back of the head, fired by a handgun. Shaver had a pink handgun in her bedside table that was the same calibre.
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Cops believed that Michael had been killed sometime between November 7 and November 10, 2015. And they suspected it was in fact Shaver who had been sending the messages, pretending to be him, from his phone. The Facebook account messages that he’d supposedly sent, could be traced back to an IP address at the home.
Shaver was released on bail as the investigations continued. By May 2023, Michael’s family were still waiting for answers as the investigation continued, delayed by the pandemic, but Shaver switched her story again.
Her legal team said that someone else had confessed to killing Michael – their own daughter. They said the girl, now a teen but aged seven at the time of the killing, claimed that she’d shot her father to protect her mum from alleged abuse during an argument.
Affair with married man
However, the daughter and Shaver had also claimed that the mum had an affair with a married man, who had been there too and had shot Michael a second time. An autopsy disputed that story, as he’d only been shot once, and cast doubt on the validity of any of the claims. Shaver’s lover would also testify that he’d never even met Michael.
In September 2024, Shaver’s trial began. She took the stand in court and claimed that her husband had been abusive during their marriage. She denied shooting him but admitted that she had tried to cover up for her daughter, who was the one who had pulled the trigger. Their daughter, now 15, testified in court saying that she’d pulled the trigger after finding her dad kicking her mum. The teen said her parents argued but during cross-examination, she struggled to explain details.
Witnesses were called and they said that the Shavers’ relationship wasn’t in a good place back in 2015 when Michael vanished. They’d separated several times and both had even dated other people. The prosecution said that Shaver had in fact killed her husband with a gunshot to the back of his head and then had buried him in the back garden, under the fire pit. They said she had pretended to be him by sending messages and was now making her daughter take the blame.
The jury took just a few hours to find Shaver guilty of second-degree murder. In November 2024, Shaver, 41, was sentenced to life in prison and showed no emotion while Michael’s family members cried with relief.
Michael hadn’t walked away from his life like Shaver had claimed. She’d shot him dead in cold-blood, buried him and had pretended to be him to deceive his loved ones – before allowing her daughter to take the blame.
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