By Billy Cox
Florida Today
Sept 20, 1995
Linda Curtis always thought the truth about her daughter eventually would leak through. Whether by fluke or coincidence, a mystery witness, or an overlooked detail, somebody, somewhere had to know something.
But now, a dozen years after Tami Lynn Leppert was last seen alive in Cocoa Beach, and three years after the story went coast-to-coast in TV's "Unsolved Mysteries," Curtis is running out of time. At age 54, the talent scout/modeling agent is months, perhaps weeks from dying, without enough money to cover her own funeral expenses.
So, from her bed in Florida Hospital in Orlando, where dialysis has kept her alive for the past four weeks, Curtis is making a final appeal:
"There's always the possibility that somebody will feel sorry for me. I don't want anybody to feel sorry for me," she declares in a voice just above a whisper, "but if that's what it takes to get the right person to come forward, that's OK."
"I won't be able to bring charges against anybody. I just want to know."
Curtis was rejected six weeks ago by Shands Hospital in Gainesville as a liver/kidney transplant candidate, because of her degenerative heart disease. With both organs in the final stages of collapse, Curtis plans to leave the hospital and spend her final days at home in Orlando.
As owner of Galaxy Productions on Merritt Island, Curtis' track record for turning youngsters into beauty contest and talent show winners -- complete with big money incentives -- drew reams of national attention during the 1980s, from ABC's "20/20" to Life Magazine. Her prize student was her own daughter, Tami Lynn Leppert.
Leppert -- a veteran of more than 400 pageants beginning at age 4 -- was earning bit parts in movies such as "Scarface" and "Spring Break" before her disappearance in 1983.
Leppert's behavior turned paranoid and violent that summer. She said she had witnessed something she wasn't suppossed to see. She refused to eat from her own plate and insisted that people were trying to kill her.
The popular, 18-year-old Rockledge resident last was reported walking along State Road A1A near Cocoa Beach's Glass Bank building on July 6. Cocoa Beach police pegged Leppert for a runaway, but she has never been seen or heard from since.
Curtis advanced more elaborate theories, complete with names, but nothing panned out. Local private investigator Mike Angeline, a former classmate of Leppert's, followed up dozens of leads generated by "Unsolved Mysteries" to no avail.
Leppert's disappearance initially was linked to serial killer Christopher Wilder, who abducted Satellite Beach model Terry Ferguson from Merritt Square Mall and is thought to have murdered her in 1984.
In 1988, Leppert's name appeared on a law enforcement task force list of potential victims of John Crutchley. Crutchley, the so-called "vampire rapist," is serving time for 1986 convictions of kidnapping and rape, and he remains a suspect in a number of unsolved murders. But, according to Brevard County sherriff's spokesperson Stacey Hall, "John Crutchley is not currently a suspect in the disappearance of Tami Leppert."
Curtis was virtually disabled in a car accident in 1983. Several years later, she moved to Orlando, where, for the last two years, she has been confined to a wheelchair. Longtime friend Wing Flanagan, who she calls "my adopted son," has been at her side for the entire ordeal.
"How would you reconcile this?" says Flanagan, 28, a professional photographer, "If she knew Tami was dead, she could at least know that she'd be reunited with her soon. But Linda doesn't even know that."
Unable to sit up now, Curtis says she bears no ill will toward the people she feels are responsible for her daughter's disappearance.
"You have to learn to forgive. That's the most important lesson in life," Curtis says. "You don't have to like it. But you have to forgive and then move on. What good does hate do? eople should never hate. It doesn't help them."
Looking back, Curtis says one of the first films she ever saw -- "Peter Pan" -- turned out to be not only her favorite, but her daughter's favorite as well. The cinematic treatment about the boy who never wanted to grow up apparently wove symbolic threads throughout their lives.
"I always wanted to grow up to be Wendy, so I could take care of Peteer Pan," she says, "When I found out Peter Pan wasn't real, it broke my heart."
At age 5, Leppert, enamoured of the big screen, told her mother she wanted to act. "Not that she wanted to be a movie star," Curtis remembers, "but that she wanted to be an actress. That was her goal."
Curtis made a career of surrounding herself with children, schooling them in the arts of stage and poise.
"I've worked with children of all ages, from detention centers to Sunday schools," she says. "And the rewards I've gotten from them have been miracles in themselves. I've enjoyed every minute of it. Because each child is special, each child is pure. They all have a unique talent. Sometimes, you just have to wait a little bit for it to show."
Curtis concedes that living for 12 years without knowing hwer daughter's fate has exacted a toll. In a curious twist of life and art, Curtis is now the caretaker of an image -- suspended in memory -- of the child that never grew up.
"But the Lord says He won't give you anything more than you can handle," Curtis says. "Sometimes you question that. But somehow, I've handled it. I've managed to do that. He tought me that I'm stronger than I thought."