Dateline NBC - What happened to Roy Whited? Preview Dateline: Missing in America Season 4

Episode Date: June 24, 2025

Hey Dateline fans, here’s a special preview of the next episode of Dateline: Missing in America Season 4. In ‘Mystery on Lovejoy Road,’ Josh Mankiewicz tells the story of the mysterious disappearance of 64-year-old Roy Whited, who was last seen in Sparta, Tennessee, in May 2024.Listen to the full episode in the ‘Dateline: Missing in America’ feed – you may remember something that could be the key to finding Roy.Listen on Apple: https://apple.co/3ZKq9YmListen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2eljLLNxVuhsHkGn9ktn7F?si=ux69W6dMQdybzs46qPWYGA

Hi, I'm Josh Mankiewicz with a preview of Dateline Missing in America. In our podcast's fourth season, we share six new unsolved mysteries. And we hope someone listening may have a clue that could help crack one of these cases. Could that someone be you? Here's Dateline Missing in America. Tucked into the rolling hills and valleys of Middle Tennessee is Sparta, a rural community where neighbors aren't strangers, and many who live here see each other every week at church. For almost a decade at the DeRosset Church of Christ, gospel music and the sermons of Pastor Roy Whited made the Sunday morning service soar.

He was a good preacher. You know, he had a way with the word. Doug Watts says Roy is the reason he started going to church again, more than 20 years after he'd quit. I told him he did it, and he said, no, God done it. I said, he did it through you, you know. And I believe that. In the first week of May 2024, something happened in Sparta that seemed almost impossible to believe.

That's when 64-year-old Roy Whited vanished. He's just gone like a puff of smoke, isn't he? Yes, sir. Just unbelievable. For White County Sheriff Steve Page, Roy's case is personal. I mean, Roy, you is personal. I mean, Roy are friends. The sheriff is as baffled as anyone else, wondering how anyone as recognizable as Roy could disappear in plain sight. I would dare to say 95% of the people in this county know you, Roy Whitehead.

Or maybe even 100%. It is a mystery that has forced Roy's closest friends and family into the fellowship of the missing. It's a group no one chooses to join. Certainly not Roy's brother, Lynn Whited. I pray, I pray, I pray that he is somewhere and we will find him because otherwise I have to think the worst.