Christine Lynn Slinger was born on December 1, 1989, in the eastern Ohio area. Christine was always close to her family and friends growing up.
As a young adult, Christine would go on to have two children, a girl and then a boy. The girl’s father would ultimately get custody of her, but it seemed that custody did transfer back to Christina shortly before she vanished.
Her son has a different father, and little is known about him.
On August 20, 2017, Christina was visiting her mom’s house in Massillon Township, Ohio. Around 7:30 p.m., her daughter’s father- Steven Stafford- picked her up and was planning to take her back to his home in New Philadelphia, Ohio where their daughter was currently at.
Christina kissed her mom goodbye, and they both said their ‘I love you’s”. Christine walked out the door smiling at her mom, just before the front door closed, Christina said, ‘I’ll be back!’.
But Christina didn’t come back. In fact, Christina was never seen or heard from again.
Since we don’t know too much about her life growing up, let’s go back and start with her disappearance.
Where is Christine Slinger?
In 2017, Christine had two children, a girl, and a boy. Each child had a different father, and the father of her daughter had actually had custody of the girl. This man, Steven Stafford, lived in New Philadelphia, Ohio. It seemed that in recent months, Christine had either had her daughter a lot more, or had legally regained custody, but in any event, Steven was very worried about his daughter. Christine had been dating a man, a man with a history, and a man who was a registered sex offender.
On August 20, 2017, Christine was with her mother at her mother’s house in Massillon, Ohio. Around 7:30 p.m., Steven showed up to take Christine back to his house in New Philadelphia, Ohio, where their daughter was.
It’s not exactly clear what was supposed to happen there. Was she going to visit? Was she going to pick up her daughter and bring her back home?
Christine’s mother, Betty, said that when Christine left, they exchanged ‘I love you’s, and then Christina had said she’d be back.
But Christina didn’t come back.
Betty started looking for her daughter, calling around and asking people right away. Kudos to this mother for acting fast. Even though her daughter is an adult, a mother is still a mother.
Betty did reach Steven and asked him where Christine was. He told her that on the drive to his house, they had an argument. Christine demanded to be let out of the car at Sandy Valley Mobile Home park. He wasn’t sure if she was just angry and wanted out of the car, or if she knew someone there, but he did indeed pull over and let her out of the car.
Steven said that was the last time he saw or spoke to her.
With Christine missing less than 24 hours, Betty still knew something was very wrong. On August 21, Betty reported her daughter missing to the local authorities.
We are often critical of law enforcement in missing person cases, but not always. There is a drastic difference across the U.S. in how missing person cases are handled, and sometimes the criticism from the public is warranted and justified, but it’s also worth noting that some departments handle these cases well, jumping into action quickly and taking the report seriously. By everything I can tell, it seems everyone here acted swiftly.
Law enforcement, along with family and friends, began looking for Christine. Investigators spoke with Steven, the last known person to see Christine, and he told them he had let her out at the mobile home park. Authorities asked if he would come in for a polygraph test, to which he agreed. They scheduled the test for the very next day, August 22. So you can see things were definitely moving quickly.
On August 22, however, Steven didn’t show up for his polygraph test.
And to everyone’s shock and horror, Steven was found at his home in New Philadelphia, deceased, with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Steven did leave a note behind, which simply said,
“Tell my daughter I love her”.
I think the obvious thought here is that he did something to Christine and couldn’t live with it. But what? And, where is she?
Also, I want to point out, that there has always been zero evidence that points to Steven as doing something to Christine, so authorities haven’t ruled out other possibilities as well.
Detectives are able to ping Steven’s cell phone and pinpoint his whereabouts the night of August 20th. If something had happened to Christine, it was likely that night since she never returned to her mother’s home.
His cell phone pings are in the general areas of Massillon and New Philadelphia. It doesn’t look like he ever left the area, at least he didn’t go far.
Volunteers came in to help search and search parties were sent out.
The Midwest Chapter of Texas Eqqusearch also came up to help search. They brought ATVs to search the many wooded areas, and they used search dogs.
Residents of the mobile home park also came out to search. Most of them stated they didn’t know Christine, but if it was a member of their family they’d want help searching for them.
No clues would be found during these searches, however.
Massillon and New Philadelphia are about a 40-minute drive from each other, 25 miles. If Steven did something to Christine, she would have to be in the surrounding areas.
Sandy Valley Estates Mobile Park is in Magnolia, Ohio. Not directly on the route from Massilon to New Philadelphia. While New Philadelphia is a straight shot south of Massilon, Magnolia Ohio is off to the East, although still not too far.
What were they doing over there? For instance, if Steven was taking her to New Philadelphia when they got in a fight and she demanded to be let out of the car, wouldn’t there likely be someone on the route?
If Steven and Christine left Massilon towards Magnolia, that is a 17-mile drive.
From Magnolia back to New Philadelphia, it’s a 13-mile drive.
Lots of wooded areas in between, and what does concern me is the few lakes that we have. The only one directly in between Magnolia and New Philadelphia is Zoar Lake. Zoar is also known for its large Dam, which actually brings in visitors to check it out.
Off the route, but not too far, is Atwood Lake. Atwood Lake has 28 miles of shoreline.
Tappan Lake is another 20 miles to the south but is also a very large lake.
There were several localized searches conducted through fields, farms, and woods- but I haven’t found anything to indicate any water searches were done.
Family of course still hopes that Christine may be out there since there is zero evidence that anything happened to her, but of course, they also fear the worst. It’s been five years.
While Steven’s suicide definitely makes him look guilty of something, what about the other people in Christine’s life? Her boyfriend, who has a criminal record and is a registered sex offender? Is someone else living in that mobile home park? Could she have been kidnapped?
With Steven’s death, unfortunately, answers are going to be difficult to find.
What do you think happened to Christine Slinger?
Christine Slinger is described as a caucasian woman, with brown hair and brown eyes, standing about 5’3 and weighing around 120 pounds when she was last seen in August of 2017. She was wearing a light blue tank top, blue denim capri pants or jeans, pink and black flip-flops or white sneakers, rings, and acrylic fingernails.
She was 27 years old when she was last seen, and would today be 32 years old.
Christine’s family has searched for so long and yearned for answers.
Anyone with any information on the whereabouts of Christine Slinger is asked to call the Stark County Sheriff’s Office at 330–430–3800.
