Family seeks help finding daughter

Local radio stations have teamed up with Esserman Nissan in Miami to spread the word about a missing 22-year-old woman.

BY ROBBYN MITCHELL
rmitchell@MiamiHerald.com



Sylvia Henry prepared small mountains of curry chicken and roti to encourage someone to come forward with information about her missing daughter, Stepha.

Henry, along with her husband and younger daughter, spent Monday at Esserman Nissan in Miami talking to the media and residents, taking donations and serving food to radio listeners who were drawn by the family's pleas.

''The best thing is that this will increase the reward for information,'' she said. ``That will really help because somebody out there knows something.''

So far the family and community organizations have raised $11,000.

Stepha Henry, a 22-year-old Brooklyn resident and a graduate of New York's John Jay College of Criminal Justice, disappeared on May 29 after being seen at Peppers Cafe in Sunrise about 1 a.m.

During her annual Memorial Day visit to her aunt's home in Miami Gardens, she told her mother she was getting a ride from a friend's brother-in-law.

The 5-foot-2, 110-pound woman with auburn hair was picked up in a dark four-door Acura Integra that night.

That was the last time her family saw her.

Sylvia Henry left her Brooklyn home to try to find her daughter in early June and has been in South Florida since then trying to find ways to reach out to the community to aid in her search.

She did a radio interview on Cox Radio's WHQT-FM 105.1 and caught the attention of Chris Assmar, general manager of Esserman Nissan and a longtime advertiser with the radio station.

''After I heard the interview, I went and Googled Stepha and was disturbed about how little media coverage she had been given,'' Assmar said.

So he contacted the station and set up a fundraiser for reward money at the dealership, which also donated $5,000 to the Stepha Henry Fund. Esserman also vowed to donate $200 to the fund from every vehicle sold during the event.

But the main objective of the event was media coverage, to keep Stepha's name on the mind of the public.

''When Natalee Holloway went missing in Aruba, I felt like I knew her because her family was on TV every night talking about her it seemed,'' said Jerry Rushin, vice president and general manger of WEDR-FM and WHQT-FM, which co-sponsored the event. Both stations broadcast live at the dealership from 1 to 8 p.m.

''We're just trying to get that kind of exposure for Stepha,'' Rushin said. ``I've seen it a 1,000 times. Once you put the call out on the radio, the community will respond.''

''It's good to see so many different types of media in one place,'' said Steve Henry, Stepha's father. ``It should help us bring her home.''

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