The Disappearance of Erica Alonso

On Valentine's Day 2015, two of the five Alonso sisters, Patty and Erica, are making plans to stay the night together, watching cheesy movies and hanging out on the couch at their family's house in Laguna Hills, California. The sisters lived at home with their mother, step-father, and two other sisters. The whole family was very close and spent a lot of time together, but at the last minute, things changed because in a not so surprising sister move, Erica who is 27 and the middle sibling of the group decided to bail on her plans with Patty and instead go out with her ex-boyfriend Larry.

Even though their relationship had a history of a lot of ups and downs, Larry and Erica met up for lunch earlier that afternoon and apparently things had gone well enough between them that they decided to go out with each other that night. A few hours after Erica told her sister that plans are changing, Patty checked her Snapchat and saw videos of Erica and Larry out in a night club in town, Patty figured “that's that,” Erica was out for the night and wouldn’t be making back to the couch to “hang.”

Patty and the rest of Erica's family didn’t worry about her the next day, which is Sunday. Everyone just thought that she was recovering from the last night based on her videos with Larry. They could tell from the video she posted online Saturday night that she and Larry spent Valentine's Day at a place called the Sutro Lounge. The club isn't there anymore but back in 2015 it was a nightclub in every sense of the word; there was a DJ, lights, a packed dance floor, alcohol flowing freely, basically the IT place to be.

At this point Erica's family didn’t know if Larry was the only person with her. But then Monday rolled around and her family got a call that was worrisome from the Victoria’s Secret store where Erica had recently started working. They told the Alonsos that Erica was a no-call no-show that day. Once her family heard this they immediately contacted the Orange County Sheriff's Department, who told the family that they were going to begin to track down her movements.

The first place they started was with Larry, according to the statement he gave police, he and Erica were having a great time at Sutro. They had drinks, they were out on the dance floor, and at some point at night they met up with another couple, a man and a woman. The two couples hit it off and at 1:30 in the morning the group decided to leave Sutro and go to Larry’s house about 15 minutes away in Bervine. Larry told police that he had taken an Uber to the club, so this other couple, who’s names he says he couldn't remember, drove all four of them back to Larry’s place in a red Toyota. When they got to his place, they had some more drinks and they listened to music and just hung out. According to Larry’s statement, at about 3:45 in the morning he and Erica got into an argument and the couple that they had been hanging out with left. About 15 minutes later, Larry said Erica got into her car, a white 2014 Honda Civic, and she drove away. Larry said “that’s it, that’s the last time I saw her.”

Erica’s family were starting to feel frantic at this point. They appealed to the public for help and offered a $5,000 reward for information, just trying to get more attention in hopes someone would come forward if they had seen Erica or knew something. A few more days went by with no word, no sign of Erica, no activity on her social media accounts or cell phone. Investigators were able to get some footage from the club, they tried to find the mystery couple that Larry and Erica were hanging with to see if they could shed a little more light on what had happened that night. According to Erica’s family and a few friends, she was seen at Sutro and they said she was behaving like her young, loving self, but it was only the mystery couple that saw her when she left with Larry.

On Friday February 20th at 1:30am a call came in to the Orange County Sheriff's Department, almost a week after Erica went missing, and on the other end is the mystery couple… Apparently the couple saw themselves on the news and decided to come forward. They corroborated most of what Larry said. They told investigators that when they left, Erica was still at the house with Larry.