Name: John Leroy Crofts
Case Classification: Endangered Missing
Missing Since: February 1, 1998
Location Last Seen: Huntsville, Ontario, Canada
Date of Birth: May 8, 1927
Age: 70 years old
Race: White
Gender: Male
Height: 193 cm (6'3")
Weight: 77 kg (169 lbs)
Hair Color: Graying, black
Eye Color: Brown
Nickname/Alias: Unknown
Distinguishing Marks/Features: Mustache. Thin build. Walked leaning forward on his toes. "Mother" tattooed on left forearm. Medical: Suffers from mental illness
Dentals: Unknown
Fingerprints: Unknown
DNA: Unknown
Clothing: Unknown
Jewelry: Unknown
Additional Personal Items: Unknown
John Crofts last resided on Yearly Road, Huntsville.
He was last seen in the Huntsville area between February and March 1998.
John Crofts had been a drifter -- living in men's shelters and rooming houses in Toronto's downtown. Over the course of Croft's troubled life, his family had tried to care for him but mental illness had made that difficult.
His sister last saw him in March, 1997 when he boarded a bus to Toronto from her hometown of Peterborough, Ontario. She didn't learn about his disappearance until Ontario Provincial Police called her in 2001.
Four senior citizens went missing in the Muskoka area north of Toronto between 1998 and 1999.
John Crofts; John Semple ; 69 year-old Ralph Grant and Joan Lawrence . All had something in common. They were alone in the world -- cut off from family and friends because of mental illness and old age. No one has ever come forward with key information about what happened to them.
But all four of the seniors did share one other thing in common, a connection to a family, the Laans, who owned and administered Christian seniors' residences near Huntsville. The three men lived at one of these residences before they disappeared. Joan Lawrence lived in a garden shed on the family property.
In 2003 and 2004, the Laan siblings were convicted for embezzling money from seniors who had resided at their retirement homes. The Laans had been depositing old age security and pension checks from their elderly clients into their own accounts -- stealing from people who had died of natural causes and from the three men who had disappeared. They had never reported them missing. The Laans were given conditional sentences.
Foul play is suspected.
Agency Name: Ontario Provincial Police
Agency Contact Person: Missing Persons and Unidentified Bodies/Remains Unit - 1-877-934-6363 - Toll Free in North America - 705-330-4144 - Local or outside of North America - Crime Stoppers - 1-800-222-TIPS (8477)
Agency Phone Number: N/A
Agency E-Mail: opp.isb.resolve@jus.gov.on.ca
Agency Case Number: 20060127
Ontario Provincial Police - Missing Persons and Unidentified Bodies/Remains Unit
CTV
Added: 5-5-2007; Last Updated: 11-13-2021 - By: Htmlcnvtr
Questions or comments? Please contact appropriate member of the Area Team
** Listed information is from the time of disappearance.
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