There he was murdered.
Miles north of Interstate 10, past acres of untouched desert, he was shot in the back of the head. The murderer’s bullet tore through the victim’s brain, exiting through his mouth.
A likely scenario for the human skull found in Buckeye, according to the father of missing geologist Daniel Robinson. The Buckeye Police Department, however, claimed it was misinformation.
"Buckeye police recovered those remains. There was no apparent gunshot hole in those remains," said BPD spokesperson Carissa Planalp.
David Robinson, Daniel's father, claims the former missing person could have been dumped there by the police for the vultures and coyotes to pick apart. The desert is unforgiving, like a serial killer, he said.
Not too far away, about 3 miles south of where the skull was found, 24-year-old Daniel Robinson went missing. His Jeep tipped over near a remote ravine, but to this day, no trace of Daniel’s body has been found, according to the BPD missing person report.
Jeff McGrath, a private investigator who represented the family pro bono, told InBuckeye the rancher who found Daniel's vehicle said he probably would have noticed a body because his cattle would have swarmed it out of curiosity. David heard similar claims, proposing that former Buckeye police leadership may have staged it there. He told InBuckeye the rancher had said the Jeep had not been there two days earlier.
Buckeye police deny this claim and tell a different story, begrudgingly questioning the narrative of a Black man who lost his son forever. Painful inaccuracies from the Robinson family, omissions from the police and federal indifference despite the discovery of multiple bodies cast the case of Daniel Robinson in shades of grey.
Unlike the desert sky in Buckeye on a summer night, Daniel's tragedy may never be black and white.
Human remains found by a psychic
Following national media attention, tips poured in for the police and Daniel's search team.
One tip claimed he was spotted in Flagstaff; another claimed he was a victim of a white supremacist, an Air Force member who was working to keep Daniel away from a romantic relationship with a white woman who frequented Waddell's Longhorn, according to the Buckeye police missing person report. Another man walked through the front door of the police station to tell investigators he thought his gay, drug-addicted father may have kidnapped Daniel because he looked like his type.
Despite the ludicrousness of some tips, McGrath approached each theory with an open mind, he said.
One tip came from a self-styled private investigator from California named Mindy Rodgers. She badgered McGrath, asking to be brought onboard the case. Later, she'd visit McGrath in Arizona. In his interactions with Rodgers, he learned her tools were spiritual, not forensic.
"The interesting thing is that when we found the rest of the human remains, it was after a psychic came into my office from San Francisco," McGrath said, referring to Rodgers.
She told him she had visions of Daniel. Later, she drew a crude area on a map where she thought Daniel’s body was. According to McGrath, the exact coordinates were the size of a football field.
"And so, we blew up a map of exactly those coordinates. It was a small area, and my partner and I said, ‘Okay, here's the start.’ And I got in there, and I'm not kidding you, less than 30 seconds, I'm staring at a huge femur," McGrath said.
Rodgers told InBuckeye she's been a psychic medium for more than a decade. Her life took a turn after a near-death experience, which developed her psychic abilities, according to Rodgers. Her initial case centered around Twentynine Palms, Calif., a desert region also known for missing people. Since then, she's worked on two dozen cases, each one culminating in a unique way.
She believed Daniel was speaking to her from beyond.
"I feel like Daniel's not only trying to help us find him," Rodgers said, alluding to the remains, "I think he's leading us to find others that need to be found and closure that needs to happen for other families.
“So, I do think he's on the other side, trying to bring awareness to the area and have some closure for other families."
David Robinson confirmed the account with InBuckeye, claiming it was shocking in more ways than one.
"The remains were found in the area where the psychics wanted to check," David said. "That was huge and scary because the human remains were new, meaning fresh. Not to be so graphic, but the marrow was still on the bones, which were pinkish in color."
David last searched for his missing son April 12 on the doorstep of a new-build community coming to Buckeye, according to posts on X, formerly Twitter. The community is hardly more than a mile away from where Daniel's Jeep was found. David told InBuckeye that Buckeye's previous police chief, Larry Hall, told him a story about drug trade routes in the isolated area of the city.
"He kind of gave a situation that the cartels probably did something to my son," he said. "That the cartels land a plane at night on Sun Valley Parkway and drop drugs off and fly back into Mexico."
Investigators created a composite sketch of the skull found, according to David. He claimed the skull, found north of his son's Jeep, was that of a family member of someone who spoke to him. In their conversation, he said the decedent's sister told him her brother was missing after police allegedly dropped him off in the West Valley.
"They never heard of him again. He just disappeared. But she was concerned about that. I gave them a copy of that picture, and they said, 'Yes, that's the brother,'" David said. "Of course, the family had to look at that picture itself. That person has been identified."
A Buckeye Police Department missing person report indicates more human bones and personal identification were eventually found with the femur after police searches. Identification suggested he was a missing man, last seen in Litchfield Park, named Jeremy Isaac Lawrence.
Dental records confirmed the skull was of Lawrence as well, apparently found miles apart, according to the Buckeye missing person report GPS locations. Police discovered Lawrence's truck destroyed by fire in 2019, before his remains were found.
"It should be noted that there are several other missing persons cases where the persons' vehicles have been found in this open desert area,” wrote the detective.
Steve Britto went missing in 2010. His vehicle was later discovered along Sun Valley Parkway near milepost 110 — just 2 miles south of where Lawrence’s remains were found. Britto himself was never located. Similarly, in 2007, an unidentified man was found shot to death in a desert wash off the same stretch of Sun Valley Parkway, also near milepost 110.
The Maricopa County Examiner's Office is declining to release details of the remains found by Robinson searchers until investigations are finalized.
The third missing person
Daniel Robinson was last seen leaving a job site off Sun Valley Parkway, where a coworker identified in police documents as Kenneth reported Daniel acting strangely and driving into the desert. Daniel’s family reported him missing after losing contact.
A month later, his Jeep turned up flipped inside of a ravine, with his clothes, cell phone and wallet left behind.
David told InBuckeye he was highly critical of BPD, accusing it of selective reporting, falsifying information and mishandling evidence. For instance, he claims police have downplayed the number of human remains his teams have found to manipulate public perception.
David claims the teams found the remains of as many as seven people to date. He was unable to share evidence with InBuckeye. In a legal response to a Freedom of Information Act request, Buckeye police released all pertinent findings and reports from the remains found by David's searchers.
The department's former chief was previously suspended for falsifying crime stats. For that reason, David thinks police may be capable of staging Daniel's Jeep and lying about the number of dead bodies found.
McGrath, the private investigator, examined the vehicle after it was recovered and noted discrepancies in the mileage on two logging devices, suggesting possible movement after a car crash. Police claim these discrepancies are not uncommon, however, McGrath also discovered 46 ignition starts after an airbag deployment.
That’s something McGrath claims someone wouldn't do in a tipped vehicle with airbags deployed.
"Although an unanswered anomaly, the ignition cycles do not appear to be a factor in the collision," wrote investigators in the missing person report. Police spokesperson Planalp later claimed investigators may have unintentionally triggered extra ignition cycles during data retrievals. McGrath conceded some claims made by police are possibilities, according to the missing person report.
The report also paints Daniel as heartbroken in the days leading up to his disappearance, suggesting an emotional crisis before his probable demise, something David claims is untrue.
Through his side job at Instacart, a grocery delivering service, Daniel came across a woman identified as Katelyn, who allegedly drunkenly invited him in after he delivered alcohol to her and her friends. David claims Daniel spent the night there.
Katelyn seemingly dismisses romantic claims, according to the report.
"Katelyn said she believed Daniel was harmless though, as he had only one arm and was short in height," police wrote in the report.
David suggested to InBuckeye that a romantic encounter occurred, pushing another counter-narrative.
"I'm like, damn. You're too smart to be spending the night in that way, how you know she doesn't have a husband, boyfriend or something, and you spend a night in some woman's bed," he said. "I was pissed, because he was too smart for that."
David disputes police claims about Daniel’s interactions with Katelyn, asserting phone records and timestamps don’t align with the police narrative. He also questions the omission of a second woman Daniel mentioned spending time with, suspecting she may be underage or that her story was intentionally excluded.
Katelyn would suggest in the police report that Daniel would come to her house unannounced, despite letting him know he could stop by anytime to pick up his "canopy," which he allegedly left there. It’s unclear exactly what the item was.
She later insisted Daniel stop visiting after observing him multiple times via a home camera. Investigators suspect he started acting strangely after his friendship with Katelyn ended. Police interviews with friends and his sister report some abnormal behavior around and after meeting with Katelyn, according to the police report.
"I’ll either see you again or never see you again," Daniel said, in his final text to Katelyn.
Theories
Daniel's sister confided in McGrath that their father discussed involuntarily committing Daniel to psychiatric care, the investigator claims.
About two weeks before his disappearance, people started noticing more abnormal behavior, according to McGrath. In one incident, Daniel's sister found the front door wide open with his wallet and car keys sitting on her coffee table for hours, which immediately raised concern since he left without his vehicle, according to the PI.
He eventually returned around 11 p.m. that night. Investigators later found video footage of him getting off a bus. He had apparently used the bus to travel to various locations, for unknown reasons, and then got back on another bus that took him to his sister's place.
Daniel's sister told police he came over and "would just sit there for about 30 minutes and wouldn’t say anything.” She tried talking to him, but he “just sat there and [did] not respond,” then left abruptly.
Daniel's coworker told The Independent he had a distant look in his eyes, and he first thought he exhibited drug-use behavior the day he went missing. McGrath came to a similar conclusion after noting Daniel had allegedly stripped his clothes off after exiting his vehicle, indicative of PCP overheating, he said.
This led to David Robinson and McGrath parting ways after a disagreement over a media interview involving the PCP theory, which David found impossible to believe.
McGrath said David may be incentivized to keep the foul-play narrative going, claiming David stayed at swanky hotels initially when searching for Daniel in Arizona. He also claims David paid for weekly round-trip flights for his girlfriend.
David has received more than 10,200 donations totaling over $404,000 in a GoFundMe account dedicated to his son, according to InBuckeye research.
David ran last year for Congress as a Democrat in South Carolina and plans to run again, he said. He frequently solicits political donations through his near-daily updates and livestreams on Facebook. Records show he has raised approximately $13,000 in political contributions, yet none came from Arizona residents — despite his strong media ties to the state.
"When he contacted me, he was a desperate father," McGrath said of missing Daniel Robinson's father, "which is why I said I can't find it in my heart to take money. But I think he lost focus. It's unfortunate."
There are several other missing persons cases where the persons' vehicles have been found in this open desert area.
