Pediatrician Cherryl Pearson disappears after 5 second payphone call.

Dr. Cherryl Pearson was entertaining friends at her home following a Memphis Grizzlies game she had attended by herself. She was diabetic and friends said she complained of feeling light headed, but seemed fine overall. The friends left her home at about 1:00am that night. NAMUS

As a doctor, she was on call this night, January 5, 2002. At 1:58am she received a 5 second call from a payphone near her home. No one saw her leave her house. Cherryl's sister was expecting her to babysit later that day and brought her children over to her house at 7am only to get no response when knocking on the door. She had left her insulin and other diabetes supplies along with her cellphone and pager which she would have taken if she was planning to be gone for any period of time because she was on call that night. Her car was missing too.

Two days later, on January 7th, 2002 Cherryl's car was located at an apartment complex two miles from her home. It was very clean, wiped of fingerprints and her medical bag, keys and 140 dollars in an envelope were in the trunk.

Police suspected Cherryl's brother-in-law, the one married to the sister she was supposed to babysit for that day, because the sister was the beneficiary of a $150,000 life insurance policy on Cherryl. The brother-in-law did have some criminal history but also had an alibi and there was no evidence tying him to her disappearance.

Dr. Cherryl Pearson was 5'6" or 5'7", 160lbs and 37 years old when she disappeared. She would be 57 years old today.

Here is a picture of Cherryl:

What can be said in five seconds (+-) that would make someone either open the door or leave the door without life supporting medication?

For me this is a strong hint that the kidnapper or killer was known to her.

For me this is a strong hint that the kidnapper or killer was known to her.

a reply to: ThatDamnDuckAgain

Most certainly i would say. She received a call from a payphone. So she would have to have known before hand that someone was going to call her on said payphone.

originally posted by: ThatDamnDuckAgain
What can be said in five seconds (+-) that would make someone either open the door or leave the door without life supporting medication?

My first guess would have been that an answering machine received that call.

Other than that, it seems like it would have to be someone very close to her (sibling, child, parent, best friend) who was in urgent need of immediate medical care, but even then it would still be hard to say enough in 5 seconds.

a reply to: Chalcedony

Why did you post this? Did you know her, or maybe she's a relative, or maybe you had been following the case from the beginning?

I'm not trying to get personal details from you, but it seems like an odd thing to randomly post, which made me curious.

I'm also wondering where the '5 second' part came from? I didn't see that on the Namus website.

a reply to: BrokenCircles

I didn't know her. I just look into some cases of missing women. Try to get some of these older cases back into the sunlight. The info about the 5 second phone call is from an article I read about her disappearance I thought I had bookmarked but now I can't find. The Charley project page about her says it too.

Phone records show Pearson received a five-second phone call at her residence at 1:58 a.m. The call was placed by an unknown individual at a nearby phone booth. No one saw her leave her home. She has never been heard from again.

charleyproject.org...

Usually I have to go through several sources to get information and check it's accuracy because especially with these missing women who are black, there is either very little information available or there is different info on different sites.

a reply to: Chalcedony

Thinking about the 5 second call.... It takes about that long to answer the phone even when there's nobody on the other end of the line.

ringalingaling.... 'hello... ... ... helloooo.... ... ...' click
that would be about 5 seconds.


Maybe the person called from the pay phone. They knew she was home and awake and likely alone. After the call, they walked to her house and waited in the dark. They saw her turning the lights off. They could tell when she went to bed. Then they still waited about an hour before sneaking into the house, and then somehow quickly & quietly incapacitated her, and then whatever happened next....



eta: They could have even already been in the house earlier while she was at the game. They could have unlocked a window, so that they could get in later without making a sound.


Actually, this might be a more logical reason for the 5 second call. Maybe they had drugged her, and they were calling to see if the drugs had kicked in yet, but since she answered, then she was obviously still conscious. Then maybe they called back an hour later. She didn't answer then so they knew she was out cold. I could be mistaken, but I think there wouldn't be any record of a call that isn't answered. (or even numerous unanswered calls)

a reply to: Chalcedony

I also would suspect the brother in law because It seems like it’s someone she knew if there wasn’t a struggle.
The 5 second call was to assure she was home and he could have easily told her that her sister needed help. She would have went with him without grabbing her things if he made it seem urgent.

At least this one wasn’t a child, your missing children threads hit me hard, no matter how long ago they are, someone harming anyone is bad but harming a child is messed up on all levels.

Never go to the second location. You have a higher chance of survival by fighting before being taken to a second location.

Nothing good EVER happens at the second location.

I suspect the five second call was to see if she was at home

there is a thread in Reddit called unresolved mysteries www.reddit.com... includes disappearances unsolved murders etc you could
post her story there if you would like more people to see her story

originally posted by: Chalcedony
a reply to: BrokenCircles

I didn't know her. I just look into some cases of missing women. Try to get some of these older cases back into the sunlight. The info about the 5 second phone call is from an article I read about her disappearance I thought I had bookmarked but now I can't find. The Charley project page about her says it too.

Phone records show Pearson received a five-second phone call at her residence at 1:58 a.m. The call was placed by an unknown individual at a nearby phone booth. No one saw her leave her home. She has never been heard from again.

charleyproject.org...

Usually I have to go through several sources to get information and check it's accuracy because especially with these missing women who are black, there is either very little information available or there is different info on different sites.

originally posted by: TheLieWeLive

I also would suspect the brother in law because It seems like it’s someone she knew if there wasn’t a struggle.
The 5 second call was to assure she was home and he could have easily told her that her sister needed help. She would have went with him without grabbing her things if he made it seem urgent.

It wasn't the brother-in-law. He had an alibi. Unless the Detectives on the case were paid off or completely incompetent, then they surely looked at him & his alibi very closely to confirm it was legit.

Pearson's sister was listed as the beneficiary for her $150,000 life insurance policy. Her sister's husband has a criminal record and was out on bail awaiting trial for bank robbery when Pearson disappeared. Authorities considered him a possible suspect and interviewed him, but he had an alibi and there was no evidence to tie him to his sister-in-law's disappearance. He was later convicted of the bank robbery and imprisoned.

charleyproject.org...

One might suspect that the brother-in-law just got someone else to do it, but it seems like it would require some rather odd circumstances in order for that to be true. Because that would mean that he had planned it all out good enough to make sure the Police would completely rule out the possibility of him having any involvement, but also that he didn't think through his plan enough to realize that her body would need to be found in order for her to declared dead. Since no body was found, she wasn't declared dead until 7 years later, which couldn't have been part of his plan because he would have undoubtedly wanted the money before going to prison. He couldn't have even been sure if his wife would still be waiting for him once he got out of prison.

Pearson was declared legally dead in 2009

charleyproject.org...

Or maybe he just got really unlucky, and whoever killed her never told him where she was buried before they themselves got killed. They would have probably been wanting some of that money too. Or they lied to him about where the body was, and then he killed them.

All of that seems highly unlikely though because the cops undoubtedly looked closely at not only him, but also at his acquaintances.