Life hadn’t been easy for poor Jade Colvin, 14, but despite her difficult upbringing, she was trying to make the best of things. But then the unimaginable happened
Jade Colvin, whose disappearance shocked America
In 2015, when Jade Colvin was 13, she and her siblings had been taken into foster care due to her mum’s substance abuse and mental health problems. Jade wasn’t in touch with her father and authorities agreed there was no other choice.
For nine months Jade had moved around the system from facilities and foster homes. Jade didn’t like living with strangers, and she missed her mum LaDawn, in Iowa. Jade would run away and hide with her mum or with other family members. She would change her appearance and dye her hair to stay hidden, but it wasn’t hard to find the sociable teen who loved staying in touch with her friends. Jade was never able to stay completely off the radar and each time, Jade was found and brought back into the system.
On 10 June 2016, Jade ran away from a shelter for troubled youth and this time, the authorities couldn’t trace her. She was reported as a runaway. For a while Jade had been hiding with friends and family. The idea was once she turned 18, she could legally make her own decisions. But the authorities were unaware that in March 2017, Jade vanished just after her 15th birthday and even her family didn’t know where she was.
Jade’s loved ones were putting out requests on social media for Jade to get in touch and shared how much they missed her. Some hoped that she was laying low until she was 18 and free of the legal system. They had been harbouring a runaway, so no one reported her missing out of fear they’d get into trouble.
In 2019, LaDawn died and Jade didn’t turn up for the funeral which was a shock to family members. She hadn’t messaged anyone in nearly two years. In 2020, US Marshals launched Operation Homecoming which was an initiative to find missing children across several states. They began investigating Jade’s case and looked further into her last known movements.
Jade had been active on social media until March 30, 2017. Then there had been nothing from the teenager. They pieced together statements and digital evidence and discovered that Jade’s mum had sent her to stay at a farm in Decorah, Iowa that belonged to James Bachmurski. LaDawn had met him online and they’d briefly dated.
The farm was three hours from LaDawn’s home in Mallard, Iowa and set on 400 acres of land and woodland. They’d decided it was a perfect place for Jade to lay low. The team could see that Jade had spoken to her mum about it on social media and that the move to the farm was temporary while LaDawn tried to get back on her feet and they could be reunited.
Jade had moved there on March 23, 2017, but after a week, she stopped communicating with the family. LaDawn had gone to the farm and Bachmurski said that Jade had run away again. He’d not contacted the police either because he worried about getting into trouble. The Operation Homecoming team appealed for information. Bachmurski had sold the farm in 2018 and had moved to Georgia. The house had been gutted and renovated.
Investigators spoke to Bachmurski’s son, Bryan, who had been a teen when Jade had arrived at the farm, and the pair had got on well straight away. He recalled her being dropped off by her mum and on March 27, he went for pizza with Jade and his dad. Bryan had pictures of them smiling together at the restaurant that had been taken by Backmurski. Jade looked happy.
Bryan said his last contact with Jade was on March 30 when he was doing a night shift at Walmart. Jade was using Bachmurski’s phone to message him as she struggled with reception on the farm. They exchanged a few messages and talked about calling when Bryan was on a break but then just after midnight Jade stops replying. Bryan asked, “Are you OK?” and got the reply, “Yes.” Bryan said that his dad had told him that Jade had run away.
Operation Homecoming went to Georgia to question Bachmurski. He said that Jade had been doing laundry and he’d gone out to run errands. When he returned, she had gone. It was a very remote property to leave on foot, but Bachmurski said there had been tyre marks on the driveway and suggested someone had picked her up.
The team were suspicious and got local police involved. They spoke to Bachmurski’s former neighbour who said that he had a barn that Bachmurski had left belongings in when he moved away in 2018. Inside they found a box containing one of his old phones. Now 2022, it was a huge breakthrough in the case.
On the phone were pictures of Jade. There was one of her with her mum on the day she’d dropped her at the farm, and another with Bryan from the day they’d gone for pizza. There was one of Jade holding a rifle on the farm and another of her making a bonfire. It proved she was there.
Police also found deleted messages. Some were from Jade’s family reaching out to Bachmurski, asking where she was. There were also the messages that confirmed Bryan’s story about how he had messaged Jade while on his night shift – the pair were chatting like friends until Jade fell silent. They determined that the message Bryan received that had said “yes” was sent by Bachmurski.
There were also two other photos on the phone of his kitchen and bedroom at the farm, taken just days after Jade’s last message to Bryan. It showed the rooms spotless – unusually so. The farm was usually messy and untidy. Another taken two months later of the same bedroom showed that the bed had been replaced and the room was back to being untidy.
They went to question Bachmurski again and told him they were confident Jade was dead. “You know what?” he said during his interview. “I already, a long time ago, figured I’d go to the grave before I tell the truth.” In August 2024, Bachmurski was charged with second degree murder. Jade’s family had to come to terms with the fact that she had died long ago. Tragically, they had no body to bury.
At the trial in 2025, the prosecution told the jury that despite a young girl going missing from his home, Bachmurski hadn’t reported Jade missing. They said it pointed to his guilt. They revealed that in the lead up to Jade coming to the farm, Bachmurski had been messaging the teenager for a month without her mum knowing. He’d even helped pay for her to get to his house. They believed Bachmurski was attracted to Jade and the photos he’d taken of her were telling.
The defence said there was no proof Jade was even dead and pointed out she had a history of running away. But the prosecution said there was no reason for Jade to be in hiding – she would be over 20 years old by now. Jade also always used her mobile, and social media. It would have been impossible to vanish completely at her age.
The jury deliberated and found Bachmurski guilty of second-degree murder. Afterwards it was revealed that Bachmurski had a criminal history – a charge for harassment and in 2013, he’d spent almost a year in prison for assault against his own children.
In October 2025, Bachmurski was sentenced to 50 years in prison and told to serve 35 years before being eligible for parole. At 67 years old, that is likely a life sentence. Jade’s sister, Shalie, called Bachmurski a worthless predator. “You saw a young woman, a trusting girl, and decided to take advantage of her kindness,” she said. “And when you couldn’t control her, you murdered her… I hope prison shows you no mercy in the way that you showed none to Jade.”
