A Black trans woman disappeared in the Bahamas last year; her loved ones in Chicago still have no answers
Colette Slowe used to describe herself as a happy-go-lucky person.
Now she's "miserable," waiting every day for news of her daughter, Taylor Casey, a Black trans woman who disappeared while on a yoga retreat in the Bahamas last June.
With no updates in six months, Slowe now fears her daughter was killed in a hate crime.
"I don't believe she just passed. You know, passing is something you do in your sleep," Slowe told the Chicago Sun-Times. "I believe it was danger, some wrongdoing."
Casey was last seen at Sivananda Ashram Yoga Retreat in Paradise Island, Nassau. While there aren't reports of foul play, identity shouldn't be ignored in the case, her "chosen family" member Jacqueline Boyd said.
Colette Slowe speaks during a news conference outside City Hall on Taylor Casey’s 42nd birthday last July 11, where friends and family of Casey gathered to urge state and city officials and the FBI to help find Casey. Casey was reported missing during a yoga retreat in the Bahamas on June 19, 2024.
Pat Nabong/Sun-Times
"In the absence of actual facts, I think context matters," Boyd said.
Casey was the only Black or transgender person at the yoga retreat, and Slowe said Casey felt isolated before she went missing. The day before she disappeared, Slowe recalled her describing her experience as "hard."
"I didn't take it like it was the yoga that was hard," Slowe said. "It was something else, dealing with those people, that was hard."
Casey loved house music and dancing and was deeply involved in queer activism. She advocated for homeless LGBTQ+ youth and planned most of her family reunions and holidays. But most of all, Casey accepted and loved everyone, Boyd said.
"After she went missing, so many people from communities, so many of the young people that she had helped, everybody said, 'I could be myself with Taylor,'" Boyd said. "She just created this space of who you were was wonderful, and you should be exactly who you are."
Over the last year, her family and friends have been left with questions about Casey's disappearance. But police officials haven't had any answers, Slowe and Boyd said.
"It's like you have all of this mystery and no answers, literally no answers," Boyd said. "There's no direction."
Slowe called the Royal Bahamas Police Force "nonchalant" and "non-caring" about Casey's case.
The Royal Bahamas Police Force, the FBI and the U.S. Embassy in the Bahamas didn't respond to requests for comment and a status update on the case.
Casey's phone was found in the Atlantic Ocean a few weeks after her disappearance. Slowe said police promised to return it to her in November, but she still doesn't have it.
Slowe and another friend of Casey's visited the Bahamas shortly after her disappearance, and Casey's family and friends have continued to search for her from Chicago.
Casey's family launched a website to call attention to her disappearance, and have raised more than $50,000 in donations to help continue the search. They have already paid for lawyers and private investigators to take up the case, Boyd said.
"This is very unique, it's not cut and dry," Boyd said. "And ample resources are so appreciated."