Family Continues To Look For Cori Baker

While everyone else has been dealing with ice, trees and power outages, one man has spent every day searching for his missing 13-year-old daughter.  Cori Baker disappeared last month and her family and police believe she's dead, but they haven't found her body.  News On 6 crime reporter Lori Fullbright reports private donations have created a $5,000 reward fund to go to the person who leads them to her.

This is Daniel Baker's new reality.  He sits alone, day after day, surrounded by maps hoping to get one step closer to finding his daughter's body.  He says it's hard, knowing she's dead, knowing she's out there, not knowing the answers, all of it.

"Not knowing, as a parent, when do you stop looking?  When do you stop asking the media for help?  When do you stop asking for contributions?  When do you do that?  As a parent, there is not time," said Daniel Baker.

A poster has been put together showing the actual pants and T-shirt Cori wore on the day she left school with her sister's boyfriend, never to be seen again.  It shows similar shoes and a sketch of her hoodie.  When Cori went missing, her father never dreamed this is where the search would lead.

"I never could've imagined it would be this way. We sat there a month ago and I thought it'd be over in a couple of days, good or bad.  Here we are more than a month later," said Daniel Baker.

Prosecutors charged Marquis Bullock with first degree murder in Cori's disappearance.  Police in Tulsa know he picked her up from school, but not much concrete beyond that.  Cori's father had hoped all the electrical crews working along high wires, might spot her, but so far nothing.

"I think it would be the ultimate beginning to the grieving process. We know, as a family, we are strong and will make it through, but without the body, it's so hard to start the process," said Daniel Baker.

Search teams are still looking for Cori's body.  Anyone who wants to help can do so by going to the west side of the Mabee Center near 81st and Lewis.  Searchers are working between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. each day.  They will close Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Anyone with information about the case can call Crimestoppers at 596-COPS.  Again, there is a $5,000 reward.