The sister of a young Queensland mum who vanished without a trace two months ago has vowed she will ‘bring her home’ as their devastated family awaits the results of a forensic investigation into human remains.
Investigators searching for Tayla Spies discovered the human remains on Friday, 1km from where police located the 29-year-old’s 2017 Toyota Hilux the day before.
Officers ‘suspect’ they may be the remains of Ms Spies but cannot confirm until a forensic examination has been completed.
Rebecca Spies shared a TikTok video on Saturday addressing the gruesome discovery and shared a powerful message to her missing sister.
‘I’m not done fighting for you sissy, your story is far from over!’ she said.
‘I really have tried my hardest to find her and bring her home where she belongs, and I’m not done yet.’
Ms Spies was last seen driving her Hilux through Surat on Queensland’s Western Downs, about 80 kilometres south of her home in Roma, on February 2.
Two months later, investigators found her abandoned vehicle near Noorindoo, a town 460km west of Brisbane, about 3pm on Thursday.
The Hilux was discovered at a Yuleba-Surat Road private property about five minutes’ drive from where the young mum was last seen.
Detective Chief Inspector Garry Watts told a press conference on Friday that a landowner contacted police after coming across the vehicle on their land.
‘He does not believe it was been there over two weeks, however, we are making inquiries just to ascertain the veracity of that,’ he said.
‘The vehicle was locked and an amount of property that we believe belongs to Taylor was located in the vehicle.
‘It was not in a good condition, put it that way.’
Det Insp Watts said investigators found the pink shirt Ms Spies is seen wearing in CCTV footage on the day she went missing.
He said investigators are yet to find a connection between Ms Spies and the property.
Police had been searching a 9,000 square kilometre area of bushland around the towns of Surat, Yuleba, Meandarra and Glenmorgan before they found Ms Spies’ ute.
Investigators have also accessed her social media accounts and were monitoring her bank accounts.
Officers have set up a search and recovery base at the landholder’s address and, along with the SES, they are conducting a grid search to locate any items of interest.
Det Insp Watts admitted the case was proving to be one of the more difficult missing persons investigations due to the vast area police are looking at.
‘Now that we’ve got a location of the motor vehicle, we can hone our resources into that area and conduct a full and thorough foot search,’ he said.
The location of the vehicle is a backroad deviation from the more direct route to Ms Spies’ hometown of Roma on the Carnarvon Hwy.
Ms Spies – pronounced ‘Speez’ – had spent the night at the Windsor Hotel in Dalby before she disappeared.
The next day the mother-of-three drove west and stopped at a service station in Surat, where she was captured on CCTV.
She was later observed north of Surat, driving on the Carnarvon Highway – this was the last time she was seen.
A friend of the Spies family had offered a $5,000 reward for information that could lead to her discovery.