Inside jungle search for Tahnee Shanks, QLD mum missing in Mexico
Tragic end feared for Queensland mum and her estranged partner missing in Mexico as authorities searched through jungle with cadaver dogs to hunt for ‘clandestine graves’ after a tip-off.
Whitsunday
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A jungle search for the “clandestine graves” of a Queensland mum and her estranged partner behind a subdivision in a popular tourist city in Mexico involved armed officers with machine guns and cadaver dogs.
Tahnee Shanks and her estranged partner Jorge Luis Aguirre Astudillo vanished near Cancun almost a year ago and her family is still “running around in circles” trying to get answers from Mexican authorities.
Mexican newspaper Por Esto! has reported how security forces and dogs searched several hectares of jungle area near an artificial lagoon and housing unit in the south of the popular tourist city after receiving potential “new evidence” about the couple’s whereabouts.
The paper said authorities believed the pair could be buried in clandestine graves to “leave no trace”.
Experts from the State Attorney-General’s Office, Investigative Police, Quintana Roo Police, Ministerial, National Guard and the Secretary of National Defense (Sedena) did a sweep behind the Kusamil subdivision on January 14.
Por Esto! ran a headline Abominable about the number of homicides in Cancun in 2022, with photos and mention of the Shanks search on the front page of the Quintana Roo edition on January 15.
A story with several photos ran on page 3.
Tahnee, 32, was captured on a toll camera image in what was believed to be a white Toyota Tundra on the morning of May 2 with Mr Aguirre Astudillo and their daughter Adelynn, 2.
“Their truck remained parked for more than 10 hours at a home, where they were possibly killed,” the Por Esto! article reads, quoting sources participating in the search.
“It is presumed they were taken there alive and ultimately, on board another unit, they were transferred to that jungle area.
“Sources close to the investigations mentioned both were victims of a criminal group and possibly there may be more bodies in the area.
“Apparently they were deprived of life and buried in a clandestine grave but, having the background as a place where other bodies have been found attributed to a cartel, it is believed that there could be more victims.”
The search ultimately proved futile. Their bodies were not found.
Tahnee’s mother Leanne Shanks described the news as a “dress rehearsal” for her deepest fears.
“There’s just a hole in my heart,” Ms Shanks said through tears as she went on to recount a phone call saying both of them had been found dead.
“I had a dress rehearsal of finding out (they were definitely dead).
“It ended up being false.
“To be told they’ve found them, that made it a finality whereas I guess you still carry that bit of hope, you know.
“Sometimes I wonder what’s worse.”
Ms Shanks — who lives in Brisbane now but raised her family in the Mackay and Whitsunday region — is now pushing for access to potentially crucial video footage that could help rule out Mexican cartel involvement in her daughter’s disappearance.
There is an eight-hour window between the toll camera photo and when Adelynn was dumped alone at night outside the Chapel of the San Archangel in a dangerous part of Cancun.
Ms Shanks — who did a mercy dash to Cancun to rescue her granddaughter in the days after she was abandoned — says she has learned of the existence of CCTV vision, taken outside the church that night, which could help the family understand what happened.
She says she has been trying for months to get access to the footage, which she has been told allegedly depicts a relative of Mr Aguirre Astudillo dropping her off.
“If Jorge is still alive and (a relative) is seen dropping Addy off, well then I’m thinking domestic violence,” she said.
“Whereas before, if it was a cartel thing, it looked like both were maybe killed.”
Mexican police initially confirmed possible cartel links in the couple’s disappearance, fearing the former Whitsundays woman was caught up in “retaliation” from crime groups her estranged partner was allegedly involved in.
In the same month Ms Shanks went missing, Quintana Roo general attorney Óscar Montes de Oca Rosales said investigators were looking at two lines of inquiry.
The first was that Ms Shanks had suffered domestic violence and Mr Aguirre Astudillo was now in hiding or on the run.
Mr de Oca Rosales has since told media two judicial complaints had been lodged against him in Mexico’s legal system from two different women.
Tahnee had told friends in texts Mr Aguirre Astudillo had not been physically violent toward her but she feared the verbal and coercive abuse would escalate.
The second was that Jorge was “a criminal with links to Mexico’s notorious cartel and the couple’s disappearance is payback for Jorge’s dirty dealing”.
“It could be just retaliation for the criminal groups that he was involved with,” Mr de Oca Rosales told media.
“According to the law, we consider them as alive and that’s the way we look for them until something is shown to be different.”
How CCTV near Cancun church could help Tahnee Shanks’s family find answers
Ms Shanks said this week little had changed in their pursuit of answers, let alone justice, if Tahnee had been wronged.
“We are just running around in circles bashing our heads against the wall (trying to get information),” Ms Shanks said.
“But I am expecting a phone call from the consulate trying to organise (a viewing of the video) because I’ve just got permission where I can see the CCTV of, supposedly, where Addy’s dropped off.
“We paid to track his phone down for that day. He was ringing his mother in America, he was ringing his girlfriend nine times, so he had activity all afternoon and into the night, apparently.
“The police have got all this information, too but I don’t know what they’ve done with it or what they’re doing about it.
“There’s a new police department put in place over there and apparently things are happening but I need interpreters and it’s just not easy to get that.
“I wondered if our federal police could look at the case, at least look at it and see what they come up with, but again you can’t interfere with them over there.
“So we’re pretty well still nowhere.”
Ms Shanks said she was told someone from missing persons identified Jorge and a relative in videos outside the church.
She said she went to stay in Merida with Tahnee when her granddaughter Adelynn was born in 2019 and may be able to identify the relative in the video.
“I think I’ll even recognise their walk, I’ll know if it’s them,” she said.
“Apparently in the police reports there are reports of two other vehicles near Jorge’s vehicle.
“Jorge’s vehicle isn’t seen for hours until it’s burnt out but these other two vehicles are seen running around all over the place.
“So they’ve interviewed the people driving one of them but I have no idea what they got out of that.
“I’m willing to go back over (to Mexico) but the consulate can’t really look after me which makes it hard because I don’t even know where to start or if they (the police) will speak to me.
“Is it criminal or is it domestic? We really still are none the wiser.”
Mexican media report shock twist in car investigation
There has been a “surprising twist” in the police investigation into the cars allegedly involved in the couple’s disappearance, Mexican news outlets have reported.
Periodico Quintana Roo reported the Cancun prosecutor’s office had discovered a vehicle in which the couple were “allegedly abducted” was being driven by a person who bought it several weeks after they disappeared.
That person who bought the car after they disappeared is not accused of any wrongdoing and reports suggest he innocently bought the car.
The newspaper says the State Attorney-General’s Office was tracking a white 2017 Ford Lobo and the person driving it had documentation proving a transaction with another person.
This allegedly included a handwritten receipt accepting the sum of 250,000 pesos as the first payment for the truck, with the remaining 80,000 pesos pending for the release of the invoice.
Earlier information suggested the pick-up truck the family was travelling in had been found burnt out in Puerto Morelos with licence plates missing and a serial number ground down.
Periodico Quintana Roo says the burnt-out truck is connected to a different kidnapping.
The newspaper says the state’s Attorney General office also seized the mobile phone of the man found with the Ford Lobo and uncovered all conversations via WhatsApp with the other party, before and after the sale of the vehicle.
“The following is information from the prosecutor’s investigation: A group of hit men intercepted this couple on their trip to Merida and forced them to board a vehicle, a white 2017 Ford Lobo truck, in which they were taken to a still unknown place where they were presumably murdered and hidden,” the newspaper writes.
“This Ford Lobo, fully identified even by its serial numbers, was allegedly ‘delivered’ to (another person), who acted as a ‘fence’ by selling it, believing it was not part of this investigation.
“He assured the buyer it belonged to an ‘engineer’ whom he was doing the favour of selling it.”
Why devoted mum Tahnee Shanks missed her little girl’s birthday
Three major milestones have now passed without any sign of Tahnee.
Her 33rd birthday, her daughter Adelynn’s third birthday and Christmas have all come and gone without a word to family or friends.
Tahnee’s brother Daniel and his wife Angela are caring for Adelynn at Conway Beach in the Whitsundays but Ms Shanks recently spent a few weeks up there when the couple took a break.
“She’s still a bit slow (picking up English) but she just talks all the time,” Ms Shanks said.
“She can’t get all the words out but her English is getting better, definitely.
“She sees a psychologist who does play therapy with her every week and she said she’s just an amazing child for adapting.
“She is. She’s unreal. She’s unbelievable, that child, to be able to adapt.”
Tahnee would have celebrated her 33rd birthday on October 26 with Facetime calls from her family if she was still living in Mexico but she had actually planned to be living back in Australia, with flights booked to go home mere weeks after she disappeared.
“Today is a sad day for the Shanks family,” her family said on Facebook on her birthday.
“We should be celebrating with you, enjoying your company, reminiscing old times and hugging you tight.
“It has now been five months and 24 days since Tahnee went missing in Cancun, Mexico and we need answers, we need to #bringtahneehome.
“Happy birthday Tahnee Shanks. We miss you more everyday.”
On November 14, the family celebrated Adelynn’s third birthday.
“Tahnee’s daughter the beautiful little princess Adelynn celebrated her 3rd birthday today,” a Facebook post read.
“It has been over six months since her mother Tahnee Shanks disappeared without a trace. She needs her mother.”
The Shanks family is offering a A$70,000 reward (one million Mexican pesos).
They ask anyone with information to email them on bringtahneehome@gmail.com or phone +61 475 775 859.
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