13-year-old Hailey Dunn was growing up in the tiny town of Colorado City, Texas, a place with fewer than 4,000 residents where like everybody pretty much knew everybody else. It was one of those close-knit communities where neighbors watched out for each other and families had deep roots in town. Hailey’s dad, Clint, always described her as a tomboy who still loved sparkly, pretty things.
Her mom, Billie Jean Dunn, said the thing she remembered most was Hailey’s laugh, loud, contagious, impossible to forget. She was energetic, funny, and had this huge personality that naturally pulled people toward her. Friends said Hailey never held back what she thought. She loved joking around, had a sharp sense of humor, and wasn’t afraid to speak her mind.
She cheered, played the saxophone, and was seriously competitive when it came to sports. By the eighth grade, she was already involved in volleyball, basketball, and softball, and she genuinely loved school, her teachers, and her friends. After her parents split up when she was around 10 years old, Hailey and her older brother, David, moved in with their mother and her boyfriend, Shawn Adkins, on Chestnut Street.
Even after the divorce, though, Hailey stayed incredibly close to her dad. Clint lived just across the street, and she’d stop by almost every single day, sometimes before school, just to say hi, sometimes for dinner, sometimes for no reason at all other than wanting to spend time with him. Christmas Day in 2010 seemed completely normal.
Hailey’s grandmother, Connie, later said Hailey had been in an amazing mood that day. She was excited about her presents, especially her brand new iPod, and spent most of Christmas and the following day hanging out with her dad. Nothing about those days gave anyone any reason to worry. The night after Christmas, Hailey’s 16-year-old brother, David, went to stay at a friend’s house.
Hayley stayed home playing video games late into the night. Then, the next morning, December 27th, Shawn left for work around 5:30 in the morning. About an hour later, Billie Jean headed out for her own 12-hour shift. Before leaving, she checked on Hayley and said she was still fast asleep in bed. Everything looked perfectly normal.
Billie figured Hayley would spend the day at home alone until she eventually wandered over to Clint’s house like she usually did. She even left her cell phone behind so the kids could use it if they needed anything. Meanwhile, Shawn claimed he arrived at work in Snyder around 6:00 in the morning, got into a huge argument with his boss almost immediately, quit on the spot, then drove to his mother’s house in Big Spring before returning to Colorado City later that afternoon.
But, something felt off almost immediately. Clint was used to seeing his daughter every day, and on December 27th, she never came by. No knock at the door, no quick visit, nothing. Hours passed, and he still hadn’t heard from her. Around 2:00 in the afternoon, a text message was sent from the cell phone left at the house to one of Hayley’s friends.
It simply read, “Wide, what you doing?” The friend never replied. Later that evening, Shawn picked Billie up from work. When they got home, Billie realized Hayley wasn’t there. She asked Shawn if he’d seen her, and he casually told her Hayley had walked to her father’s house before supposedly deciding to spend the night with her friend Mary Beth.
There was just one problem with that story. Clint said Hayley had never shown up. Guys, real quick before we continue, I’m honestly curious where everybody’s watching from. Tell me what city you’re in and what time it is for you right now. Thanks for hanging out with me, and uh definitely leave it down in the comments. All right, let’s keep going.
The next morning came and went, and Hayley still hadn’t come home. Billy finally called Marybeth’s parents, hoping maybe there had been some misunderstanding. But, they confirmed they hadn’t seen Haley at all. She definitely had not spent the night there. Inside Haley’s room, nothing appeared disturbed. All the things she normally would have taken for an overnight stay were still exactly where she left them.
Billy started going door-to-door around the neighborhood asking if anyone had seen her daughter, but nobody had any answers. At first, she wondered if maybe Haley had gone to the store and someone passing through town had abducted her. Other times, she thought maybe Haley had simply gotten upset and run off for a while.
A missing person’s report was finally filed during the afternoon of December 28th. Investigators initially classified Haley as a runaway, which later brought heavy criticism once the seriousness of the situation became clear. Before long, the case was officially treated as a missing child investigation. The entire community rallied around the family almost immediately.
Volunteers searched everywhere they could think of, and the media quickly picked up the story. Clint was absolutely devastated. He spent nearly every waking moment searching for his daughter, digging through dumpsters, walking alleys, checking streets, searching any place he thought she could possibly be.
People started noticing something else, too. Clint seemed completely consumed by the search, while Billy and Shawn appeared far less involved. As search efforts expanded into isolated fields and wooded areas, reporters mentioned that Billy often avoided participating in those searches. Billy later explained that she simply couldn’t handle looking through forests and open land because, to her, it felt like they were searching for her daughter’s body.
Even Clint admitted those searches were emotionally brutal, but Shawn kept his distance almost entirely. He wasn’t handing out flyers, wasn’t joining organized searches, and didn’t appear heavily involved in the investigation at all. Police questioned dozens of people, including registered sex offenders living nearby, but investigators quickly ruled them out.
On Wednesday, December 29th, both Clint’s and Billie’s homes were searched. Then, just 1 day later, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children joined the case. Search dogs eventually picked up Hailey’s scent near a local motel, leading investigators there. But, employees didn’t remember seeing her.
Surveillance footage showed nothing, and after searching all 24 rooms, police found no evidence she had ever been there. Then came New Year’s Eve. Only 4 days after Hailey vanished, Billie and Shawn hosted a New Year’s party at their home. A lot of people found the timing deeply disturbing. Billie claimed she barely even realized it was New Year’s and said friends and relatives had simply come over to support her.
Clint, however, saw things very differently. He later said he stood outside on his porch with binoculars searching for his daughter while watching Billie and Shawn celebrating late into the night. “I don’t understand how you can celebrate New Year’s when your daughter is missing,” he said. “That should be the last thing on your mind.
” As the New Year began, the mood across Colorado City felt heavy and tense. There were still no answers, no confirmed sightings, no trace of Hailey Dunn anywhere, and the exhausting [music] searches just kept going. Well, Lena and Victor, we’re going into day nine in the search for Hailey Dunn, and there’s still no sign of her.
When I visited with the Dunn family this morning, I saw Texas Rangers scouring through Hailey’s room. If we take a look over here, this is the window to her bedroom. Now, Texas Rangers, I’m told, have not found anything and no sign of foul play or any sign of her packing her bags and running away from home at this time.
More than a week later, and still no sign of Hailey, her mother says it’s frustrating, but she remains hopeful. And I have to do nothing but hope that she left by herself and that she’s going to come back to me because if I don’t cling onto that hope, I don’t have anything. Now, local authorities tell me they’re following several tips at this time.
Several agencies have stepped in and the reward once again is $25,000 for tips that lead to Hailey Dunn. On January 4th, 2011, both the Texas Rangers and the FBI officially joined the investigation. More than 100 billboards featuring Hailey’s photo were placed across Texas and beyond in hopes someone might recognize her.
The case exploded into national headlines after Nancy Grace covered Hailey’s disappearance and interviewed Billie Jean Dunn on television. Suddenly, millions of people across the country knew Hailey’s name. Hailey’s case was on national television and Nancy Grace seemed to be a little hard on you. What was that like hearing her question Billy like that? Uh I heard about it.
>> [clears throat] >> I wasn’t there when Billy was getting interviewed by her. I was talking to the Texas Rangers, but I heard about it and it’s frustrating, you know, what she said about me and but it really doesn’t bother me cuz, you know, my main focus is this Hailey. We just want her to come home safe.
Does it hurt to think people would point fingers at you, a person who cares about her? Yeah, it hurts. It does. Describe to me the relationship between you and Hailey. Uh it was it’s really really good relationship and you know, I love her with all my heart and I believe she loves me with all her heart. We get along just fine.
See, is there anything else um you want people to know about you and your relationship with the family at all? Cuz it seems like a lot of people are buzzing on the internet about it. Yeah, as far as me, Hailey, and Billy and David, you know, we all get along just fine. And I would never do nothing to that little girl.
I love her with all my heart. And I just wish for her safe return. The very next day, January 5th, Billie asked Shawn to leave the house. Apparently, that wasn’t unusual for them. Friends said they fought constantly, separated, then got back together again a few days later. As investigators dug deeper though, a more troubling picture of Hailey’s home life started to emerge.
Reporters later explained that while things may have looked ordinary from the outside, life behind closed doors was much more chaotic and difficult for Hailey and her brother David. One reporter put it this way, “We learned there was a lot of alcohol and partying going on at their home from the mother’s side, and it gives the impression that their home life was more difficult than they were trying to make it seem.
” It turned out Billie Jean Dunn and Shawn Adkins had already been on law enforcement’s radar long before Hailey disappeared. Roughly 10 months earlier, police had responded to domestic disturbance calls involving the couple. Both Shawn and Billie had called police on each other at different times, and officers described the pair as aggressive and constantly arguing.
I really need to file a report on somebody. What exactly happened? I broke up with this guy a couple of days ago, and then he’s telling me that he’s going to kill me, and that it’s going to be remembered for a long time. I got a situation on my hands. I have a ex-girlfriend. She’s taking a whole bunch of society pills that I take.
Well, I guess she got them from me, and she said she like took a bunch of her pain pills, [music] too. And she’s saying that she wants to die. So, she’s calling my mom to report on me, you know, to her friends and stuff like that. So, she’s upset about it, and she’s just, you know, not being herself right now.
Threatening to kill her. Damn it. Yeah, it’s Billie Dunn. Oh, god. This has been going on all day. All right, I’m going up there. Not long afterward, like they often did, Billie and Shawn reconciled, and Shawn moved back into the house. >> He used to tell me about the man. What kind of things? She didn’t She didn’t like him.
She didn’t trust him. She was afraid of him. I don’t want to be here right now. I’m going to be here with you cuz [music] I don’t feel right with my stepdad. Hailey had reportedly told her grandmother Connie that she sometimes saw Shawn’s shadow outside her bedroom door late at night.
She was terrified he might come into her room while she was sleeping. Detectives later asked both Billy and Shawn to take polygraph tests. The first attempt had to be stopped because both of them were allegedly under the influence of drugs at the time. Billy insisted she had only taken prescription medication for anxiety. Shawn walked out of the examination at least twice.
During a third attempt, he only completed the first phase before quitting again. He complained investigators were turning the case into a witch hunt and trying to pressure him into confessing to something he didn’t do. But during questioning, he said something investigators couldn’t ignore. When detectives asked where he believed Hailey might be, Shawn answered, “In Surry County.
” Then they asked who police should consider suspects. His response was short and chilling, “Both of us.” According to the polygraph examiner, those answers registered as truthful. Shawn refused to explain further and left before completing the second phase of testing. Results from Billy’s second polygraph and Shawn’s initial examination reportedly showed signs of deception on several important questions.
Um I want to thank everyone for coming this afternoon and giving me an opportunity to make a statement. First, I want to speak directly to Hailey in case she’s listening. Um wherever you are, Hailey, I’m looking for you. Hundreds of people are looking for you. We all want you home safe. Um I just [music] want to see and touch your beautiful face.
Um I really love you. I desperately need you home. And um There’s not a minute goes by I’m not praying for you or crying wishing you were in my living room. Um [music] I can’t handle not knowing where you are or if you’re safe. You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever laid my eyes on and I’m very proud that God chose me to be your mother.
Next, I want to say if someone out there has Hailey, please let her go. Just turn her loose. Drop her off at a church, a school, police station, anywhere that she can get to a phone and call police or call her family. I’ve been flat out called a liar by some people. Others speculate on my possible involvement in Hailey’s disappearance or wonder if I’m covering up for somebody.
Some people accuse me of withholding information and not cooperating with law enforcement. These things are not true, but I now feel that I have to defend myself from ridiculous accusations, slander, or defamation of character. For months afterward, searches and memorial gatherings continued around Colorado City, although freezing winter conditions often forced volunteers to pause operations.
Eventually, police held a press conference announcing they were now investigating the case under the assumption that Hailey may have been held against her will or could already be dead. Investigators reviewed phone records, bank activity, and Shawn Adkins’ employment history. That’s when major inconsistencies started appearing in Shawn’s timeline.
His boss later revealed Shawn had not been fired at all. According to him, Shawn arrived at work around 6:00 in the morning on December 27th, bought a drink, turned in his uniform, voluntarily quit, and left by 6:10. Shawn later admitted he lied about being fired because he didn’t want Billie Jean getting angry with him.
He told detectives that after leaving work, he drove straight to his mother’s house in Big Spring to use her computer and apply for unemployment benefits. But cell phone records completely contradicted that version of events. Between 6:35 and 6:56 that morning, his phone was still connecting to towers in Colorado City, nearly 50 miles away from Big Spring.
Records did confirm Shawn was eventually in Big Spring, but only between 9:38 in the morning and 2:40 in the afternoon. Additional cell phone data also placed him in the Scurry County area that same day. Shawn claimed he returned to Colorado City around 3:00 and last saw Hailey at approximately 3:15 before she supposedly walked to her father’s house.
But tower data showed he was still in Big Spring at 2:40, leaving barely 20 minutes to drive roughly 40 miles. Meanwhile, Hailey’s brother David later described something unsettling from that afternoon. When he returned home around 4:00, the doors were locked. After failing to get inside, he climbed through a window.
Once inside, he saw Shawn standing in the hallway looking completely startled. David compared it to a deer frozen in headlights. Hailey’s uncle later recalled another disturbing conversation with Shawn after the disappearance. He told Shawn he couldn’t imagine anyone hurting a child. Shawn responded coldly, “It’s like killing a deer.
” Bank records also revealed that after Shawn picked Billie up from work around 6:00 in the evening, the couple stopped at two ATMs where Billie withdrew a total of $140. Initially, Billie claimed the money was for groceries and gas. Investigators later determined it had actually been spent on drugs. Concerned about possible drug use inside the home while children were living there, detectives conducted a deeper search of the property.
During that search, they discovered hundreds of printed internet articles about serial killers, sexual sadism, and family murders. Billy dismissed it by saying they were simply interested in true crime stories. By 2011, investigators officially identified Shawn as a person of interest in Hailey’s case, though he denied any involvement.
Around the same time, Child Protective Services removed David from the home. Then, on February 24th, investigators made another shocking discovery. More than 100,000 images of child pornography were found on a flash drive inside Billy’s house and on a computer located at Shawn’s mother’s home. Police also seized a laptop that had previously been stored at the station.
Clint later claimed Shawn’s stepfather actually went to the police department demanding Shawn’s laptop back, and somehow investigators returned it. Despite the disturbing evidence, no arrests were made immediately. Authorities explained that because multiple people lived in both homes, they needed to determine exactly who was responsible for the material.
On March 17th, 2011, law enforcement officers arrived at Billy and Shawn’s home intending to speak with Shawn. Billy told officers he wasn’t there. But after entering the house with a warrant, they discovered him hiding inside. Billy was arrested for providing false information to police. A few months later, in June 2011, Billie Jean Dunn received probation after pleading guilty to lying about Shawn’s whereabouts.
Her sentence included 90 days in jail, suspended, along with 1 year of probation. She later moved with Shawn more than 250 miles away to Travis County while serving probation. By 2012, the couple had finally split up for good. Billy later admitted she had begun suspecting Shawn’s involvement in Hailey’s disappearance, especially after learning that both local investigators and the FBI considered him a person of interest.
As the years passed, the searches slowly lost momentum. Every memorial gathering seemed to bring new tips, but each lead eventually faded into another dead end. Then, after another year without answers, everything changed. On March 16th, 2013, a hiker discovered human remains roughly 20 miles from Colorado City near JB Thomas Lake in Scurry County.
2013, local authorities were notified of human remains located near Lake JB Thomas in Southwest Scurry County. The remains were sent to the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification for DNA analysis. On April 26, 2013, the Scurry County District Attorney’s office received written confirmation that the remains have been positively identified as as those of Hailey Dunn.
Authorities never officially announced the cause of death, but Clint later said investigators believed Hailey likely died from blunt force trauma. A reward of $15,000 was offered for information leading directly to the arrest of whoever killed Hailey Dunn. Sadly, the family had to wait another four painful years before Hailey was finally laid to rest in January of 2017.
Texas mother desperate to find her daughter’s killer is speaking out. It was 6 years ago when 13-year-old Hailey Dunn went missing after leaving her father’s home in Colorado City, that’s west of Abilene. Her remains were found 3 years later, but her killer remains at large. Her mother, who is from Austin, says she has hope justice will be served.
I still want to believe every time tell me that there’s going to be an arrest soon, I [music] I keep that faith. In 2018, Clint Dunn publicly stated that he believed either Shawn or Billie Jean Dunn attacked his daughter while the other helped cover it up. They were both involved, he said. There’s no question about it.
Clint never stopped pushing investigators for answers. He constantly stayed in contact with police and begged for an arrest. But despite years of investigation, detectives still lacked enough evidence to move forward. I’m just I’ve been staying out of the way of law enforcement all this time. I thought I was doing the best thing by and not coming down on law enforcement.
And I’ve just It’s been too many years of no action. Nothing has been done. So, I’m tired of waiting. Um I had my the investigator over the case right now at Howard County. He told me one time, he said he doesn’t care if it takes 20 years to do this. And I do care if it takes 20 years. I don’t want the person that hurt my kid to doesn’t need to walk the street for 20 years.
You think that person is still out there somewhere? Yeah. I think he’s here in this town. Big Spring, Texas. You think he’s in Big Spring? I know he was 2 months ago. You have somebody in mind? Shawn Atkins. So, you think it’s Shawn Atkins, the only named suspect? >> Yep. And I think that Billie Jean knows something.
She said too many lies. She’s [snorts] avoided too much. And she knows more than what she said. Then, years later, Clint’s social media posts caught the attention of an anonymous person who claimed they had found several of Hailey’s belongings sometime in late spring or early summer of 2011. At the time, that person had been a middle school student and knew absolutely nothing about Hailey or the disappearance, so they never reported the discovery.
But in 2019, after seeing one of Clint’s online posts, they suddenly remembered what they had found and contacted him. Exactly what the items were and where they had been discovered has never been publicly revealed. Clint only stated that the belongings were located in an area investigators had searched multiple times during the early stages of the case.
Private investigator Erica Morris had been working alongside Clint ever since Hailey vanished. Erica later claimed she had uncovered evidence and communicated with officials, but after Hailey’s remains were found, authorities allegedly stopped responding to calls and stopped updating them about progress in the investigation.
Then, in October 2019, Erica began receiving messages from women across West Texas who said they were being harassed online by a man calling himself Casey. Erica knew Casey was Shawn Adkins’ middle name, so she asked the women to send her photos and videos he had shared. According to her, it confirmed the person contacting them was Shawn.
On October 28th, 2019, Erica accompanied one of the women to a police station to file a report. But the officer reportedly refused to take it seriously and accused the woman of making the story up. That pushed Erica to publish an open letter warning authorities that if Shawn wasn’t arrested soon, more victims would appear.
Another 2 years passed before the case finally took a dramatic turn. In May 2021, Erica received a response from the Mitchell County District Attorney’s Office inviting both her and Clint to a meeting. Erica later said, “During that meeting, they assured us that Hailey’s killer would be arrested sometime in June.
” And finally, more than 10 years after Hailey Dunn disappeared and 7 years after her remains were discovered, an arrest was made. Reaction from Colorado City tonight is emotional and also getting straight to the point. Shawn Adkins is sitting in the Mitchell County Jail tonight charged for the murder of 13-year-old Hailey Dunn. She first went missing over 10 years ago.
You know, this community, they have spent more than a searching. Searching for a young girl, searching for answers, searching really for justice. We are a step closer to that tonight. The arrest of Shawn Adkins is what the community of Colorado City has been waiting on for a long time. District Attorney Ricky Thompson consulted with the Texas Rangers Cold Case Program regarding Hailey’s investigation.
The Texas Rangers obtained a search warrant to collect Shawn’s DNA. Then, on June 13th, 2021, Shawn Casey Adkins was officially arrested and charged with the murder of Hailey Dunn. Billy Dunn later said, “I can’t say I’m shocked that it was Shawn. Of course, I would have hoped it wasn’t him, especially since I stayed with him after Hailey went missing.
But I’m not surprised. And I thank God that this person has been apprehended and will answer for what he’s done here on Earth. As of July 2021, Shawn Adkins remained jailed on a $2 million bond and had not entered a guilty plea. The KCBD Investigates team, the Mitchell County District Attorney’s office, has released a single page from Shawn Adkins’ arrest warrant.
He is the man police hold responsible for killing Hailey Dunn in Colorado City. Big Spring police arrested him last month, but we don’t know why. When KCBD requested the arrest warrant, we were sent to Mitchell County and the DA there refused, citing Texas law claiming it blocked us from access to this public record since it involves the alleged abuse and death of a child.
So now, while we’re waiting on the Attorney General to rule on this decision, in the meantime, it has been 10 days since our request for the entire arrest warrant and affidavit. We have only this part of the warrant so far, ordering any law enforcement agent to arrest Shawn Adkins for the charge of murder out of Colorado City. But that does not shed any light on what led Mitchell County to that conclusion.
So, our Investigates team will keep pursuing your right to know about what police say led to the death of Haley. After Shawn’s arrest, private investigator Erica Morse described Clint Dunn as the driving force behind the case. She said he became an example for every parent fighting for justice for their child.
Disclaimer : This content may be created by AI for entertainment purposes. Any resemblance to real persons, events, or places is coincidental.
