Dancer Heather Bird has been missing since August 28th. That’s 26 days, so why has it taken so long to bring her case before the public? Heather’s mother, Susan Bird, didn’t report her missing until September 14th, since she’d demonstrated a pattern of being gone for periods of time in the past (usually just staying with friends). Heather Bird worked on and off at Cheaters Gentleman’s Club as a topless dancer. Cheaters is located in Osmond Beach, Florida at 1545 N. U.S. Highway 1.
News footage from WESH 2, with news reporter Clair Metz right on location at Cheaters, which is painted pink and has palm trees and an eye-pleasing landscape, which gives you the impression that random passers-by, such as cross-country truck drivers, may drop in at Cheaters, to take the edge off monotonous, sleep-inducing, marathon driving. Well, in any case, as Clair Metz was reporting, lots of cars and trucks zoomed by on U.S. 1.
I forgot to mention that the night of August 28th, Heather was seen leaving with some unknown man, who is said to have patronized the club. Heather may have known him from somewhere else or maybe not; this is the question, and a very important one. One wonders whether Heather would have left with a perfect stranger? We hope not!
Another important fact I ought to mention (as reported in the Daytona Beach News), is that a family friend, Albert Surrat, had dropped her off earlier that night, and said she was ‘jittery’ and ‘possibly on something’ (I take it he means drugs). At the same time, and this presents a problem of sorts, we hear Heather Bird had no history of drug abuse or depression, at least up to this point in her life, unless Albert was misreading her for some reason.
We’re seeing some inconsistencies here when analyzing the scant available data on those events surrounding August 28th, the day Heather, who used a stage name of Kat, leaves (the bikini bar roadside gentleman’s club) with an anonymous man, and vanishes into the night. Another problem is that Cheaters didn’t have any surveillance cameras, neither in the outside parking area, nor inside the club itself.
It’s a safe bet; management didn’t want to spy too closely on their patrons, who were probably hoping their little secretive visit would remain unnoticed. I would guess this to be the wish of any man who might pay a visit to an adult club of some kind, or for that matter, many of the girls might prefer to keep things low key, just as a matter of professional courtesy. As such, this may explain also why a strong level of ‘scattering bodies’ exists once the police and news crews arrive on the scene!
You get it, ‘I didn’t see anything, I didn’t hear anything, I don’t know nothin’!’ Think SpeakEasies during Prohibition, that with the flip of a switch could turn a decadent, brawling tavern into a mom and pop operation of a benign soda shop. But Heather’s mom, Susan, has a hunch that Heather has been keeping company with a motorcycle gang. It’s not yet clear whether Susan has anything as hard proof in this regard. With this plausible theory in mind, that shadow she left with would be one of these bad bikers (her mother is referring to).
Moreover, if this motorcycle gang got her hooked on drugs somehow, this would give more credence to Albert Surrat’s account of Heather’s erratic behavior the day in question, August 28th. But why would these biker types want to do Heather any harm? Naturally, we want to know whether Heather is still alive, but we’re hearing her cell phone hasn’t had any activity whatsoever since that day. For me, I favor the alternative theory; it was a stranger that took Heather away, not a biker she already knew. Don’t know why exactly?
