FORT WORTH, Texas — Of all the places they could be on a sweltering Labor Day morning, a group of about 10 people chose to join a search, scouring the overgrown woods and weeds in east Fort Worth looking for Typhenie Johnson.
"We've covered approximately 71 square miles of searching in the last three years," said Art Sahlstein, who's led the searches for Johnson since 2016. "Oh no, we will not stop until we find her."
Johnson's former boyfriend, a man named Christopher Revill, was convicted in August of kidnapping her after she vanished in October of 2016. Her body has never been found.
His aggravated kidnapping conviction resulted in a life prison sentence.
"No, I didn't know Typhenie at all," said Jana Gibson, who drove from Little Elm Monday to help in the search.
For nearly three years, people like Gibson, who only know Johnson through news coverage, have helped search for her.
"I am very invested," Gibson said, adding that her own niece disappeared and was found murdered years ago. She says this is her way to give back.
They are also searching for Taalibah Islam, another of Revill's former girlfriends, who's been missing since 2006. Revill was reportedly the last to have seen her, also. Her case was the focus of the sentencing portion of Revill's trial.
"We've had a lot of the jury members go ahead and express interest in coming out and searching," Sahlstein said.
Also joining the search Monday was Tony Maldonado. He's a mechanic who helped Johnson two days before her disappearance and was texting her about her car trouble the day she disappeared. The defense tried to create doubt in the case by focusing on Maldonado.
"I've never been involved in something like that before," he said. "It was pretty surreal, to say the least."
This group of searchers, most of whom never met Johnson, now feel connected to her and connected to each other. It's something that's not lost on Johnson's mother, Deborah.
"There needs to be more people that are like these guys," she said.
Deborah Johnson lives in South Dakota, but she is still in Texas, searching.
"She's my child," she said. "That in itself should sum it up. You do what you have to do for your child."
It's a search that will push on until the day they bring Typhenie Johnson home.