2 days ago
A Chattanooga mom of four vanished without a trace more than a year ago. Her family is determined not to let her case go cold.
Tara Daniels has known her cousin, Valerie Elder Smiley, since the day she was born. 'She was just, like, my first child, and I've loved her from day one,' Tara said. 'She's a joy to be around.'
But Tara hasn't seen her cousin since the 41-year-old disappeared from Chattanooga on Friday, June 28, 2024. 'It seems as if she's just vanished off the face of the earth,' Tara said.
Tara told Dateline that the days leading up to Valerie's disappearance were typical. 'She was acting normal, you know, the whole week,' she said. But, she added that the family had been concerned for Valerie's health. 'She was having blood pressure problems, and then it went to memory loss problems, and then we found out it was from some medication that she had been taking.'
According to Tara, the family, including Valerie's husband and four sons, were doing their best to make sure Valerie was doing all right. 'We were monitoring that,' Tara said. She thinks Valerie got confused and lost on the day she disappeared.
Apparently, Valerie and her husband, Patrick, spoke on the phone that day and he asked her where she was. 'She said, 'Well, I'm on my way home,'' Tara said. 'And so he was at the house waiting for her to return, but she never returned. So he went on to the ballgame because the kids– her twins play ball, so they went on to the ball game.' Valerie was also supposed to go to the game, but she never made it. 'Normally, she would ride with them to the game,' Tara said.
Eventually, they were able to track Valerie's phone from June 28th. 'The way that the phone showed us on the pings, you know, she was going in circles,' Tara said. 'She was trying to get back to her street, and she never made it back.'
In June, for the first anniversary of Valerie's disappearance, Valerie's family came together on WRCB, the local NBC affiliate, to spread the word that Valerie was still missing. Patrick Smiley confirmed that he spoke to his wife on the phone the day she disappeared, and she told him she was on her way home. He also said he called the authorities to report Valerie missing after the ballgame. 'By the time I made it home, it was around 10:30 or 11 o'clock at night,' he told WRCB. 'We reported it to the police and waited for them to come out so we could do a missing person report.'
The family immediately jumped into action. 'We started going out searching and looking all over the area, trying to find out: Where could she be?' Tara told Dateline. 'We were out until the wee hours of the morning trying to find her.'
The Chattanooga Police Department posted about Valerie's case on July 1, 2024. The post stated that they were requesting assistance in locating Valerie Elder Smiley, who 'was last seen on June 28, 2024, leaving her home in Chattanooga.' The post noted that 'she was driving a red 2004 Ford Expedition with a Tennessee license plate of 079 BFQD.'
Two weeks later, Chattanooga PD posted additional details that 'her phone was last pinged in Fayetteville, Georgia, on June 29th and Union City, Georgia, on June 30th.' There was no other information available. Dateline called the Chattanooga PD and left a voicemail requesting an interview. We also submitted a request on their website contact form, but have not yet heard back.
When asked if Valerie had any connection to where her phones pinged in Georgia — which is more than two hours away from Chattanooga — Tara told Dateline the family had no knowledge of any reason Valerie would have been there. 'We don't know anybody in that area,' she said.
Tara told Dateline the Chattanooga community really came through for the family. 'We had posters, we had pamphlets,' she said. 'The community came together.'
They organized search parties, too. 'In different areas, all the way down to Georgia,' she said. 'Two search teams went to Georgia just to saturate that area.' They also searched in the neighboring counties and towards Nashville. 'We had people all around the state of Tennessee.'
Valerie's car has also not been found. 'It has never surfaced, and it had a unique identifier on it,' Tara said. The red car had a sticker that said TSU MOM on it.
Tara says Valerie's accounts have all been inactive. 'None of her money has been touched. None of her credit cards have been touched,' she said. Valerie's social media accounts have also been left untouched.
More than a year later, Valerie's family is still in shock that she is missing. 'We really don't know what to think because there has not been any kind of lead,' Tara said. 'We're hopeful, believe me. We're hopeful that she is still alive; that's our prayer.'
At this point, Tara feels like they need to spread the word farther about Valerie's disappearance. 'Because she could be somewhere totally different than what we think,' she said.
'We're just a close-knit family,' Tara said. 'We often have family functions, and it hasn't been the same, you know, with her being gone.' This year, Valerie's second-oldest son graduated from high school. 'It was tough because she was not there to witness it.'
'We're just trying to get some, you know, get some closure to: Where is she?' Tara said. She told Dateline it is important that Valerie's case doesn't go cold. 'It's that important to us as a family that we keep it alive and that we not let it go, you know, cold — and not be another statistic.'
She asks that anyone with information come forward. According to the Chattanooga Police Department, Valerie is 5'5' tall and weighs about 210 lbs. She has black hair and brown eyes, and a tattoo of her name on her right calf. She would be 42 years old today.
If you have any information on Valerie's disappearance, please call the Chattanooga Police Department at 423-698-2525.
