Kriti Mehrotra
If there’s one thing absolutely nobody can deny, it’s that the 2014 unsolved disappearance of toddler siblings Sarah and Jacob Hoggle is arguably one of the most chilling cases of recent years. That’s because, as carefully explored in the ‘Unrestorable’ podcast, the former was merely three at the time while the latter two, and their mother Catherine have since been suspected of killing them. Yet for now, if you simply wish to learn more about the one individual to have fought to attain them justice every step of the way — their father, Troy Turner — we’ve got the details for you.
Who is Troy Turner?
It was reportedly back in the late 2000s when Troy came across Catherine for the first time at a bar they were both employed at, just for them to soon get to know one another before getting involved. They then welcomed three beautiful children into their world, making this duo common-law partners in every sense of the term — they were two boys and a girl. However, the truth is the children didn’t have their father’s last name; they primarily went by Hoggle to honor their mother’s side of the family, only for all of it to be snatched away from them in the blink of an eye in 2014.
Troy still remembers the fact he’d spent September 7, 2014, with all three of his toddlers enjoying his eldest’s very first soccer game at the age of 5, just for them to subsequently have some snow cones too. It was a near idyllic day in his eyes, so even though he had to leave mere hours later so that he could go to his night shift job, he wasn’t too hung up over it since he knew Catherine would be around. After all, he knew that his partner’s plan was to spend the evening with her kids and parents – he had no idea she’d take their 2-year-old son Jacob to get some pizza at one point and then return alone three hours later.
Catherine actually told her parents she’d dropped Jacob off at a playmate’s house for the night, yet it later came to light he’d never even been near his friend’s house on that fateful night. As for what she told Troy; well, she didn’t have to tell him anything that night since he was so tired once he returned home at around midnight that he went to bed almost immediately. He usually did check on his kids before doing so, according to Crime Watch Daily, but he’d gotten a little selfish that night and decided to forgo this step in exchange for a bit more sleep, unaware it would be a terrible mistake.
We actually say this because, by the time Troy was awoken by their eldest the following morning, Catherine had managed to take Sarah somewhere too before disappearing for a few hours herself. He’d literally just dialed 911 upon dropping the former at his school bus stop when she showed up, claiming she’d left their two kids at a daycare center because she wanted him to sleep in. This was honestly strange because the couple had never once used such a facility before, so the second she began avoiding his questions when he approached the topic of going to pick them up later on, he knew something was wrong.
Troy hence contacted the police, only for Catherine to subsequently run away — she was found with an altered appearance a few days later, but there were no traces of either Jacob or Sarah around. She was then taken into custody, where she indicated she’d left their kids “alive and safe” with someone else before refusing to elaborate on the same despite 15 hours of questioning. It thus comes as no surprise she was soon charged with misdemeanor counts of child neglect, abduction, plus hindering law enforcement, only for two charges of murder to be added to this rap sheet in 2017.
By this point, the authorities had positively theorized that Catherine had slain both Jacob and Sarah, but no evidence or traces of their remains have ever been uncovered, plus she refuses to speak up. The truth is she has been detained in a maximum-security psychiatric hospital since her arrest due to her history of mental health issues (paranoid schizophrenia) and has repeatedly been deemed unfit to stand trial. Yet, as per reports, Troy wholeheartedly believes she’s exaggerating her conditions at every step so as to avoid standing trial for her alleged actions and facing its consequences.
Troy Turned Hasn’t Lost All Hope Even Today
“I’ve heard people refer to [the disappearance of Jacob and Sarah] as a mystery,” Troy said in court back in 2020 in an effort to convince the judge not to throw out the charges against his ex despite her ailments. “There is no mystery. Catherine planned, carried out a plan, and killed my children. Right now, the person who murdered them, I’m looking at her.” Around this same time, he’d even made it clear that his eldest is now “scared to death that his mother is going to come find him one day… [He, as the sole surviving sibling,] still has nightmares about her showing up with bodies of his dead brother and sister. He can’t defend himself if she’s out there.”
Therefore, of course, when all charges against Catherine were dismissed in 2022 and she was ordered to remain civilly committed at the psychiatric institution, Troy didn’t hold back his feelings. He said, “This system is broken. Whenever someone can murder two children and then be treated as a regular patient, be given more rights than the kids, or the survivors around them who they’ve affected, there’s something really wrong.”
Nevertheless, both Troy and his now-wife Stephanie continue to hold out hope that Jacob and Sarah will one day get some much-deserved justice. For this, these Maryland natives are staying outspoken, are calling for state law changes to increase the period before felony changes must be dropped from 5 years to 10, and are active on social media under “Justice for Sarah and Jacob” pages while also holding yearly vigils for them. There is admittedly no way Troy can move on before he gets at least some form of closure, so he’s keeping the hope alive and we hope he gets some answers soon.
“People say things like ‘time heals all wounds,’ but it’s not true,” Troy once said.“This gets worse with time, every day they’re not here is another reminder of what they would be doing, what they should be doing, what was taken from us, what was taken from them. As a father, it’s the most heartbreaking thing to live with on a day-to-day basis. Every day — [with] your heart breaking more, and more, and more — and never healing.”
Read More: Fernando Silva Murder: Where Are Richard Baribault and Troy Gunderway Now?
