She Vanished After Last Being Seen Barefoot And Disoriented Outside A Hotel
Emma Fillipoff grew up in Lanark, Ontario, but at the age of 25, she decided to fulfill her dream of moving out west by relocating to Victoria, British Columbia, in the fall of 2011.
She didn’t have employment or a place to stay figured out. Rather, she went on to live a transient lifestyle, bouncing between jobs and residences. Sometimes, she even slept alone in the woods.
Emma was known as a free-spirited, adventurous, and independent person who enjoyed photography and writing. By the summer of 2012, she also purchased a van with the goal of living in it and traveling the island.
However, there were reportedly warning signs that her mental health was suffering. According to friends, she displayed obsessive compulsions, like using objects to arrange patterns, and was supposedly stressed out since she felt like she was being harassed.
Her alleged harasser was someone Emma reportedly had a bad experience with in Campbell River, British Columbia, where she studied culinary arts from 2008 to 2009.
Then, on November 28, 2012, Emma mysteriously disappeared after last being seen barefoot and disoriented outside a Vancouver hotel.
Before Emma’s Disappearance
Leading up to that day, Emma was staying at a woman’s shelter, and beginning around midnight on November 23, she made multiple phone calls to her mother, Shelley Fillipoff. She kept expressing her desire to come home, and Shelley assured her daughter that she’d make the proper arrangements to get her.
Yet Emma called back and changed her mind multiple times. Hours later, on November 24, she told Shelley not to come anymore and claimed she’d sort things out herself.
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But later that same night, Emma contacted her mother again and admitted she did want to come home. She also stated she was feeling overwhelmed and wanted Shelley to visit Victoria, British Columbia, to help her pack her things.
The next day, Shelley received another call from her daughter. That time, Emma called off the plan again, and Shelley agreed not to visit.
Come November 27, though, Emma called her mother in tears and asked for assistance getting home. Shelley quickly made plans to fly out the following day.
Emma disappeared on the evening of November 28, and that morning, she spoke with her mother for the last time. She told Shelley not to come, and Shelley assured Emma that she wouldn’t.
However, Shelley was growing concerned for her daughter and decided to fly out anyway. She tragically didn’t make it there before Emma vanished.
Emma Goes Missing
After talking to Shelley at 4:30 a.m. on November 28, she was captured on surveillance footage at 8:23 a.m. purchasing a $200 prepaid credit card at a 7-Eleven located on the corner of Douglas and Humboldt Streets. She was carrying various bags and kept peering out of the window.
Around noon, Emma might’ve gone to the library, and by the early afternoon, she began acting strangely. She ran into a friend, telling them she wasn’t feeling well and couldn’t talk. Other witnesses also reported seeing Emma, who was exhibiting odd behavior by walking back and forth in the street, appearing lost and confused.
At 5:54 p.m., Emma then went back to the same 7-Eleven to purchase a prepaid cell phone. Surveillance footage showed her lingering by the store’s doors afterward, peering outside again. The cell phone she bought was never activated.
Afterward, she went to the Sandy Merriman shelter and reportedly learned her mother was traveling to see her. Emma stormed out the front door, and at 6:10 p.m., she was picked up by a taxi driver near the shelter.
She first asked for a ride to the airport before changing her mind. She claimed she couldn’t afford to pay the $60 fare despite having between $2,000 and $3,000 in her bank account. Emma wound up asking the taxi driver to drop her off at the same location where she was picked up.
Upon exiting the vehicle, one of her friends, Denis Quay, saw her standing barefoot on a corner. Emma reportedly appeared paranoid and disoriented. Denis asked if someone was following her or if she was looking for someone, but she just kept peering around.
Eventually, Denis went to a nearby restaurant at 7:00 p.m. to contact the police. Authorities found Emma barefoot and holding her shoes outside the Empress Hotel on Government Street. The officers spoke to her for approximately 45 minutes, and Emma wouldn’t talk much. Instead, she’d provide one-word answers or nod her head.
Emma refused to put her shoes back on as well and said she was planning to meet a friend. Eventually, authorities determined Emma wasn’t a threat to herself or others at 8:00 p.m., and she walked away.
That marked the last time Emma was ever seen or heard from again.
The Search For Emma
Shelley arrived at the women’s shelter at 11:00 p.m. that evening, and when she learned her daughter wasn’t there, she reported Emma missing.
It was discovered that nearly all of Emma’s belongings had been left behind in her van, including her laptop, passport, camera, journals, and library books. In conversations with shelter staff, Shelley reportedly learned Emma had been displaying symptoms of depression, and her behavior had become paranoid and erratic.
A team of Emma’s family members, friends, and volunteers searched Victoria as well as Vancouver Island communities. The search area ultimately grew to include the British Columbia mainland and other locations throughout Canada and the United States.
Despite these efforts, Emma’s whereabouts remain unknown, and what exactly happened to her remains a mystery.
There was a possible break in the case in 2018 when a man named William came forward and claimed to have given Emma a ride the morning after she was reported missing.
William told authorities that, at 5:15 a.m. on November 29, 2012, he’d dropped her off at a Vancouver Island intersection located approximately 70 miles away from the hotel. As for why he didn’t come forward sooner, William stated he was afraid of being implicated in Emma’s disappearance.
The tip led the police to execute a three-day search. With the help of cadaver dogs, they scoured View Royal, the Gorge Waterway, and the Galloping Goose trail. Unfortunately, no clues were found.
In 2021, on the nine-year anniversary of Emma’s disappearance, Victoria Police released new photos that Emma took of herself. Their goal was to spark renewed interest in her case.
“There has been an extensive investigation into Emma’s disappearance ever since, but to date, investigators have been unsuccessful in determining what may have happened to her,” Victoria Police said in a statement.
“We’re asking for your help to solve this file.”
Around the same time, Emma’s mother, Shelley, expressed how it was “staggering” that her daughter still hadn’t been located.
“I remember thinking that a month was unbelievable and then thinking that six months wasn’t possible,” she recalled.
Nonetheless, Emma has now been missing for over 12 years. A Facebook page entitled “Help Find Emma Fillipoff” continues to raise awareness about her case. Most recently, in April 2023, a new composite image of Emma was released as part of a preview for a docuseries on Emma’s case, “Barefoot in the Night: The Search for Emma Fillipoff.”
Emma was five foot five, with waist-length light brown hair and brown eyes. Anyone with information regarding her disappearance is urged to contact the Victoria Police Department at (250) 995-7654.
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