NJ family devastated over daughter's mysterious disappearance

Toni Yates Image
Monday, February 22, 2021
Daughter's mysterious disappearance leaves NJ family devastated
Toni Yates reports on missing 20-year-old Nyrah Barner Curry from Paterson.

PATERSON, New Jersey (WABC) -- A family of a missing 20-year-old woman is devastated that it's taken so long to ask the public for help since she mysteriously disappeared.

Now her family says they can barely sleep or think straight and they are determined to get her home.

Nyrah Barner Curry told her family she was heading to Brooklyn from Paterson for a party on Feb. 11. They have not seen her since.

The only clue they have is that her cellphone was found in Manhattan.

Her brother, Elijahwan Curry, said he knows the last text messages he received from her were actually from her.

"It was Nyrah, like she was like 'OK I'm coming back, I need to see Lani,'" Curry said. "Lani is my niece."

He said he thinks as time passed, someone else started responding.

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Passengers on the flight and witnesses on the ground recounted their reactions when the incident happened.

He said he wrote to her saying, "Who is this? Nyrah? You OK?" and he told her their grandmother was in the hospital - which was a lie to see if she would call.

But he says the response he got was simply, "Yeah this me and is grams OK."

"It was a different feeling I had," Curry said. "Usually Nyrah would keep me updated with everything...but from Sunday it wasn't nothing."

Fliers have been posted everywhere with her worried brother's phone number on them.

Her father even met with a local chapter of Black Lives Matter on Zoom to help reach as many outlets as possible and to help spread the word.

"Whoever has her, just let her go...that's it that's all we're asking -- just let her go," her mother Claurine Curry said.

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