Robert Pillsen-Rahier
In July of 1990, 15-year-old Robert Pillsen-Rahier would disappear while spending time at the Cheyenne Mesa Adolescent Treatment Facility in Colorado Springs. While investigators never found any evidence of foul-play, Robert's mother continues to believe that employees of the facility know more than they ever told police…
Robert Thomas Pillsen-Rahier was born on October 27th, 1974, and would spend the first few years of his life with his mother, Jean, in Arizona. From an early age, though, Robert would begin to express a number of emotional issues, which seems to have stemmed from a tragedy Robert experienced firsthand: the suicide of his stepfather.
When he was just a child, Robert's mom met a man named Gerald, who was a disabled Vietnam war veteran. Gerald would become Robert's stepfather, and would end up having one child with Robert's mother: a younger brother named Gerry Jr.
Robert and his stepfather would end up becoming incredibly close, but due to his own issues stemming from his combat experience - namely, his physical disabilities, which left him bound to a wheelchair and resentful - Gerald would make the decision to take his own life when Robert was just seven years old. Robert would actually end up walking into the house just moments after the fatal gunshot, witnessing the deceased body of the only father he had ever known. In the wake of this tragedy, Robert would end up blaming himself for his father's death, despite him having been one of the bright spots in Gerald's life. From this point forward, Robert would begin to express a lot of understandable-yet-troubling behavior, which manifested itself in aggressive and emotional outbursts over the next several years.
Shortly after the tragic loss of his stepfather, Robert would move with his mother and brother to Colorado Springs - with the family hoping to start anew. It was shortly after this, though, that Robert began to be bullied in his new school for being overweight; and this was later exacerbated by Robert being put into special education classes due to his ongoing behavioral issues. Robert would end up becoming resentful of his fellow classmates and himself, blaming himself for his father's death and his inability to make (or keep) any friends. It's even reported that Robert was beginning to contemplate self-harm as he entered his teenage years, and the bullying at school started to reach a head when he injured another kid in a schoolyard fight.
After this, Robert would be sent to a behavioral treatment facility named Cheyenne Mesa, which was known for dealing with adolescents who were experiencing behavioral or psychiatric issues. While Robert's issues weren't quite at that level, it was impossible to ignore that was becoming evidently problematic.
Robert's mother, Jean, hoped that him being treated at the facility would end up straightening out the youth, but that was little more than a pipe dream; with the youth's behavior deteriorating after a short stay at the facility in 1990, and him becoming even more defiant in the aftermath. Now fifteen years old, Robert was becoming more headstrong and stubborn, with his outbursts becoming more pronounced. He even ran away from home briefly, with these issues continuing to express themselves in troubling ways throughout the year.
Ultimately, state authorities would weigh in on the matter, threatening to take Robert into their custody unless he returned to a behavioral treatment facility for more long-term care. This forced Robert back into the confines of the Cheyenne Mesa facility in June of 1990, where he would end up staying for the next several weeks.
On the morning of July 6th, 1990, Robert would call his mother, Jean. The two made it a point to speak every day while the teen was away from home, and almost all of their prior conversations had been pretty normal mother-son talks. The conversation this morning, however, felt different.
During their morning conversation, Robert would hint at something being wrong. However, when asked, he would refrain from saying what exactly was wrong; telling his mother through (what sounded like) tears that their call was being monitored, and he was unable to speak plainly about what was going on. As Jean would later recall, Robert told her:
"They monitor the phones. Mom, I've got to talk to you."
As their conversation approached its end, Robert hinted at running away from the facility because the current conditions were just that bad.
Almost immediately after their phone call, Jean phoned the Cheyenne Mesa Adolescent Treatment Facility and made arrangements to visit as soon as possible. However, during this call, she was told that Robert was going to be unavailable for the rest of the day, as he had plans to go off-campus with some staff members and other students, so any plans would have to wait until after he returned.
Jean was expecting a call back from the facility - from Robert - later that day. When it finally came, it wasn't her son on the other end of the phone, but employees from Cheyenne Mesa. This is when she received the news that any parent fears: that the location of her child was currently unknown.
Employees at Cheyenne Mesa claimed that Robert Pillsen-Rahier had run away on July 6th, 1990, of his own accord. However, unfortunately, it doesn't seem like much of an investigation ever took place.
Despite authorities registering Robert as a missing person at that time, it doesn't seem like they ever investigated the case as a potential homicide or kidnapping (despite there not being any sign of life in over three decades). In fact, when I filed a FOIA request for any information regarding this case, they outright denied it after letting it sit in their system for almost an entire year. This - paired with what we know of the case - leads me to believe that police never took this investigation seriously, and don't have a lot of information about Robert as a result.
We do know that a couple of Cheyenne Mesa employees claimed to be the last known people to see Robert on or around their campus on the morning of July 6th, 1990. One employee claimed that they last saw Robert when he was laying in the middle of a field on the facility's grounds that morning, at around 8:45 AM; while another claims to have spotted him leaving the facility later that day. This employee claims that they didn't try and stop Robert - citing his size and weight at the time (180 pounds) as well as his known behavioral issues - but this same employee would later tell police when questioned:
"Maybe (Bobby) didn't make it. Maybe he is dead."
The time frame that these employees gave for Robert leaving the campus - during the morning hours of July 6th, 1990 - happens to correlate to when he was speaking to his mother Jean on the telephone.
Later, when Robert's clothing and belongings were returned to his mother, she would note that the clothing staff members had reported him wearing on the day he disappeared - a blue plaid shirt and black jeans - were mixed in with the rest. This implied that he had not been wearing them when he "ran away", and the same could be said for his shoes: along with Robert's clothing were both pairs of shoes he had taken with him. This indicated that he had been barefoot at the time of his disappearance, which was another point against him having voluntarily run away.
In the days after Robert's disappearance, his mother Jean would end up making repeated calls to Cheyenne Mesa, hoping to get to the bottom of what had happened to her son. But after just three days, employees at the facility told her to stop calling them - claiming that she was harassing them and they were going to get the police involved if she kept at it. Mind you, these were the people that had last seen her son alive and had become his legal caretakers during his government-mandated stay at their facility. But now, just three days after his disappearance, these same people were claiming that he was no longer their responsibility - since, according to them, he had run away.
All of this information would end up haunting Jean, Robert's mother, for decades. She would later claim that the weekend before his disappearance, he had come home for a visit, and had brought home some dirty laundry. While doing his laundry, she had noticed some blood in his underwear but thought nothing of it at the time. Now, after his disappearance, she began to fear that he had been sexually abused while at Cheyenne Mesa - in particular, by the staff members that supervised him on a regular basis and monitored his phone calls, and only reported him missing hours after he had last been seen alive because Jean had been expecting a call from her son.
However, because there wasn't a push by detectives to figure out where this missing and troubled teen was, any hopes of finding an answer seem to have fallen by the wayside in the months and years after Robert's disappearance.
The Cheyenne Mesa Adolescent Treatment Facility would end up closing its doors for good just a handful of years later. The facility had become financially insolvent just a few years after Robert's disappearance, and the grounds would ultimately be sold to new owners in 1997 (who attempted to revive the facility under new management, but that seems to have never come to fruition).
Police in Colorado Springs would eventually reclassify Robert's case years later - changing his status from "runaway" to "endangered missing" - but continue to state that there is no evidence of foul play in his disappearance.
It appears like Robert's mother Jean now resides in Kansas but continues to look for her missing son - who has been missing more than twice as long as he was with her and the rest of his loved ones. In 2010, Jean would tell reporters that she remembers Robert's disappearance:
"... like it was yesterday, you never get over it, you're always looking, you're always looking at people's faces..."
Jean continues to hold out hope that Robert is still alive out there, somewhere, safe and sound, but believes that those who worked at Cheyenne Mesa know much more than they ever told police. Speaking to Denver Post reporter Kirk Mitchell in 2014, she stated:
"There has been absolute silence. I don't understand the dead silence. It's not him. I know him. If he ran away he would have called. There is no way he would run away without any shoes."
Robert Pillsen-Rahier was just fifteen years old when he disappeared in July of 1990. He would now be approaching his 46th birthday just later this month (October of 2020). You can find age-progression photos of Robert online, at the Unresolved website (or on our Instagram account), to see what Robert might have looked like as an adult. However, it's worth noting that Robert had a scar on his forehead and a discoloration on his right arm, as well as a burn on the top of his right hand and scars on the last two toes of his right foot. He was wearing wire-rimmed glasses at the time of his disappearance, and might still need corrective lenses or contacts.
If any of this sounds familiar, please contact the Colorado Springs Police Department at 719-444-7000. Once again, that's 719-444-7000.
There will hopefully be an update in this case in the near future, but until such a time, the story of Robert Pillsen-Rahier will remain unresolved.
Episode Information
Episode Information
Researched, written, hosted, and produced by Micheal Whelan
Published on October 18th, 2020
Producers: Roberta Janson, Ben Krokum, Gabriella Bromley, Peggy Belarde, Quil Carter, Laura Hannan, Damion Moore, Brittany Norris, Amy Hampton, Steven Wilson, Scott Meesey, Marie Vanglund, Scott Patzold, Astrid Kneier, Travis Scsepko, Aimee McGregor, Sydney Scotton, Sara Moscaritolo, Sue Kirk, Thomas Ahearn, Bryan Hall, Seth Morgan, Marion Welsh, Jo Wong, Patrick Laakso, Alyssa Lawton, Meadow Landry, Tatum Bautista, Teunia Elzinga, Michele Watson, Ryan Green, Stephanie Joyner, Dawn Kellar, and Elissa Hampton-Dutro
Music Credits
Original music created by Micheal Whelan through Amper Music
Other music created and composed by Ailsa Traves
Sources and other reading
Colorado Bureau of Investigation - Robert Thomas Pillsen-Rahier
The Charley Project - Robert Thomas Pillsen-Rahier
NamUs - Robert Thomas Pillsen-Rahier
RCCCMC - Robert Thomas Pillsen-Rahier
Colorado Springs Business Journal - “Cheyenne Mesa complex sold”
The Gazette - “The missing: a mom’s pain, a cop’s burden”
KKTV - “20 Years Later: Springs Mother Still Searching For Missing Son”
The Denver Post (Cold Cases) - “Colorado Springs boy disappears from youth treatment home”
KKTV - “More than 27 years later, a mother hopes for answers about missing son”
Reddit - “What happened to Robert Pillsen-Rahier?”
Websleuths - “CO - Robert Pillsen-Rahier, 15, Colorado Springs, 6 July 1990”