Mystery Surrounds Radio Host's Disappearance

                                                                                                  
(courtesy KIRO-TV website)
UPDATED: 7:34 pm PDT June 14, 2007

SEATTLE -- Former KIRO radio late-night talk-show host Mike Webb has been missing for two months, according to his family and friends.

“It’s disturbing; we’re all very concerned about him. I’m worried about him. It’s not like him to disappear for this long and to just take off like that,” Webb’s friend and former producer, Jeremy Grater, said.

Webb’s rented Queen Anne house is posted with notice to pay rent or quit the premises, and it appears Webb hasn’t been there in months, leaving all his possessions and clothing behind, KIRO 7 Eyewitness News reporter Karen O’Leary said.

“The timing is really weird; I mean, if this were about taking off, if this was about hiding somewhere, this would have happened a long time ago,” Grater said.

Webb was convicted of insurance fraud and lost his job at KIRO radio a few years ago and was serving time doing community service until his disappearance.

Internet blogger Mike Hood, a one-time nemesis of Webb, said he is worried about Webb.

“It’s a real tragedy right from the top. I mean, he was a man pretty much at the top of his game, in the middle of his life, who in a very short period of time went all the way down to the bottom and we don’t know how far down he really is right now,” Hood said.

According to the Seattle police missing persons report, Webb had been hanging out with a “shady character,” and text messages were received from Webb’s phone for days after his disappearance.

“One day you think the worst, and the next day you think maybe it’s just a big misunderstanding and will have the best possible outcome,” Grater said.

http://www.kirotv.com/news/13507382/detail.html

Many of you already know this story has a partial conclusion.  On June 28th (while radio people were gathered at the foot of Queen Anne Hill to celebrate the Soundies), police were about 30 blocks away beginning research on a body discovered in a crawl space at Mike's house.  It had decomp'd enough that it was completely unidentifiable.

Friday June 29th the Med Examiner concluded it was indeed Mike Webb; and that he had died from multiple stab wounds (and possibly blunt force trauma).  The case has now moved into investigation of a suspicious death, officially ruled a homicide.

Suspicion is initially on the people who were living at the house in the later weeks.  Obviously the story will likely unfold very quickly and very publicly and we will all hear and learn more.