Here’s a preview of what you’ll be able to read about in Driven by Darkness, my upcoming true-crime book that’s now with my editor.
On March 12, 2022, teenager Naomi Irion and her 1992 Mercury Sable disappeared from the parking lot of a Walmart in Fernley, Nevada.
After Naomi’s brother Casey Valley went to the Walmart and reviewed security video, he convinced the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office that his younger half-sister had been kidnapped.
Detectives Erik Kusmerz and Tyrell Joyner, aided by the FBI, began piecing together footage and images that told the terrifying tale.
The chain of events began at 4:22 a.m. on March 12th, when a pickup truck, seen above with glowing taillights, parked at a “homeless encampment” near the Walmart in Fernley. This may have been a deliberate tactic to mislead law enforcement into thinking that the perpetrator was an unhoused person .
The illustration above shows where the suspect pickup truck was parked. Minutes later, eighteen-year-old Naomi parked her Mercury Sable in the Walmart parking lot.
The Walmart parking lot was adjacent to the homeless encampment. Security video uncovered by Casey Valley showed the unknown perpetrator stalking through the Walmart parking lot.
Above is a view of the Walmart parking lot, looking in the direction of where Naomi parked her car on Saturday morning, March 12, 2022.
The perpetrator spotted Naomi sitting in her car. Naomi, who had traveled the world, was texting friends overseas while waiting to catch a shuttle bus to the Tesla/Panasonic battery factory where she worked.
The perpetrator crept through the parking lot, pushed his way into the driver’s side of Naomi’s car, and at 5:25 a.m., drove off with her.
In an apparent effort to misdirect law enforcement, the perpetrator initially headed towards Wadsworth, Nevada. At a location near Hill Ranch Road, he disabled Naomi’s cell phone.
Above is the area near Hill Ranch Road where Naomi’s phone sent its final pings on the morning of March 12th. The FBI and local authorities later scoured the area but found no sign of Naomi, her phone, or the perpetrator.
At about 3:30 p.m. on March 12th, some ten hours after abducting Naomi, the then-unknown perpetrator parked her car near the Lowe’s Home Improvement Store in Fernley. Then he walked back to the homeless encampment, near Greater Nevada Credit Union, where he’d left his pickup truck early in the day.
Minutes later, a surveillance camera captured footage of the perpetrator’s truck leaving the homeless encampment. But for some reason, the perpetrator didn’t flee the scene.
Instead of fleeing the scene, the perpetrator drove from the homeless encampment to a dirt lot in between Lowe’s and a Sherwin-Williams paint factory.
The perpetrator parked his pickup truck in the dirt lot. Then he walked to where he’d parked Naomi’s car minutes earlier, near Lowe’s, and moved her car to the dirt lot where he’d parked his truck.
In the image above, Naomi’s car can be seen as the perpetrator moved it into the dirt lot next to his pickup truck.
The perpetrator left Naomi’s car in the dirt lot by the Sherwin-Williams factory, got back into his pickup truck, and drove away.
As seen above, when the perpetrator’s pickup truck passed in front of the Sherwin-Williams factory, surveillance cameras got a good look at it.
With help from Chevrolet salesman Danny Estep, Detective Joyner was able to identify the truck as a High Country 3500 model with telltale chrome trim features and marker lights on the roof.
Katie Stangle, an analyst with the Nevada Threat Analysis Center, helped Joyner and his team identify Chevrolet High Country trucks in northwestern Nevada with similar color paint and with similar features. This was a key step in eventually identifying the perpetrator and bringing him to justice.
There’s much more to this strange and tragic case. My upcoming true-crime book, Driven by Darkness, chronicles the lightness of Naomi’s life and the darkness of the predator who crossed her path.
