LEESBURG, Fla. — Twenty years after 2-year-old Trenton Duckett disappeared from Leesburg, his family and supporters will gather Thursday night to once again light candles and hold onto hope that he will someday come home.
The annual candlelight vigil is scheduled for 7 p.m. Thursday at Leesburg Town Square. Trenton’s father, Joshua Duckett, and grandmother, Carla Fort, have continued the tradition each year since his disappearance.
Two decades have passed since Joshua last saw his son. Trenton was 2 years old then. If he is alive today, he is 22.
On Thursday, the 20th anniversary of Trenton’s disappearance, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children released a new age-progressed image showing what Trenton may look like today at 22 years old.
Inside Lake sat down with Joshua Wednesday and asked who he sees in his mind when he pictures Trenton now, the 2-year-old boy he last held in his arms or the 22-year-old young man he would be today.
“It’s hard to picture him older. So we always still picture him as the 2-year-old the last time we saw him. But we obviously know he’s grown up, so we have to kind of have to imagine him as to what he would be. But it’s hard to see 22-year-old versus the 2-year-old we last saw.”
When Trenton first disappeared, Joshua said he and his family would see children around Trenton’s age in public and give them a second look. Twenty years later, that has become much more difficult because they simply don’t know what Trenton looks like today.
Joshua said he appreciates the age-progressed images created by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, but recognizes they are renderings of what his son could look like and not necessarily an accurate representation of the adult Trenton may have become.
Trenton was reported missing Aug. 27, 2006, by his mother, Melinda Duckett, who told Leesburg police she had put the toddler to bed that evening and later discovered he was gone. A screen on his bedroom window had been cut.
The disappearance quickly became one of Lake County’s most widely known cases and drew national attention as investigators attempted to reconstruct Melinda’s movements and determine what happened to her son.
Investigators soon questioned Melinda’s account of the apparent abduction. Evidence and witness accounts conflicted with information she provided to police, and investigators found several items connected to Trenton discarded in a dumpster at her apartment complex.
Less than two weeks after reporting Trenton missing, Melinda died by suicide.
Despite searches, tips and countless theories over the past two decades, Trenton has never been found.
Joshua and his family have continued to operate on the belief that Trenton is alive.
“Absolutely. One hundred percent. I’ve always stuck by it since day one that you prepare yourself for the worst and hope for the best,” Joshua told Inside Lake.
He knows not everyone shares that belief.
“The only thing that could change my outlook on that is if law enforcement showed me definitive proof.”
For Joshua, that definitive proof would be his son’s body.
“They don’t have evidence that says anything. They don’t have evidence either way that he’s dead or alive,” Joshua said of the Leesburg Police Department.
The uncertainty is one reason Thursday night’s vigil remains important to the family.
Joshua said he continues holding the vigil each year to keep Trenton’s name in the public eye, encourage information to continue coming in, see the support his family still has after two decades and, ultimately, get answers.
Asked what he would say to people who may have forgotten about Trenton, or who may not even know his story because so much time has passed; Joshua said seemingly insignificant information could still matter.
“Just always be aware of surroundings, keep your eye out, pay attention. There are answers out there to a lot of these (unsolved) cases and people have those answers, but they don’t think it’s relevant, so they don’t say anything.”
Twenty years later, Joshua also had a message for his son.
“We’re never going to give up searching and we’re always going to fight.”
Anyone with information about Trenton’s disappearance is asked to contact the Leesburg Police Department at 352-787-2121.
