One year ago, Amber Wilson’s dad dropped her off in downtown Edmonton to meet up with friends. That was the last time he, or anyone else, ever saw her.
“Our family does not have any peace,” Wilson’s mother Marty Juknevic said.
“We just want to find Amber and know what happened to her.”
According to EPS, she was dropped off near 102 Street and 100 Avenue at around 9:30 p.m. on Sunday, May 15, 2016. Juknevic said her daughter, who has a form of autism called Asperger’s syndrome, wasn’t one to stray.
“I know Amber too well to say that she just left,” Juknevic said. “That’s what people thought, that she just took off.
“Amber wasn’t like that. She just didn’t go anywhere. She would always stay within her little world.”
Wilson’s father Roy Neugebauer said he assumed she was going to see friends. He said his daughter was sad that evening but had talked about returning to rehab to tackle her crack cocaine addiction. He said his daughter had been prostituting to get drugs.
“She hated her addiction. She hated what she had to do for drugs,” he said.
“Amber always thought she was a bad person because of her addiction,” he sighed. “I never really got through to her that she wasn’t.”
Wilson’s parents and friends said the young woman was always trusting, sometimes to a fault. They said people would take advantage of her generosity and she could easily be led astray.
Despite her high-risk lifestyle, Wilson always kept in touch and phoned someone from the family everyday.
Since she was a teen, Wilson suffered from epileptic seizures and needed daily medication. There has been no sign of a filled prescription in the past year.
“I really miss my daughter, it hurts every day,” said Juknevic as she clutched her daughter’s picture.
“Please, somebody find our little girl for us and help bring her home.”
“Amber’s disappearance is considered to be suspicious in nature,” EPS missing persons unit Const. Shelley Pinch said.
“It’s unusual that in an urban area, there is simply no trace of her.”
While there is no clue what happened to her, the homicide section has been involved from the onset of the investigation and continues to assist.
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Police said the family will be placing flyers around the area where she went missing, in hopes a witness will come forward with information.
Amber Wilson, 31, is Caucasian, approximately 5’1″ tall, weighs 105 lbs., and has shoulder-length brown hair and green eyes. She has glasses and was last seen wearing a blue pullover sweater and grey pyjama pants.
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