Marokopa, on New Zealand’s North Island, is a place where the land feels like family. For Tom Phillips, that connection ran deep. Raised on the family farm, Tom grew up in the rugged terrain, hunting, camping, and learning to navigate the wilds. It was a way of life he continued with his own children—Jayda, Maverick, and Ember—who spent more time exploring the hills than sitting in classrooms, being homeschooled by their father.
Tom and the children’s mother, Catherine, had separated, but there was still an unspoken rhythm to their co-parenting. The family farm was a sanctuary for Tom and the kids, who relished the freedom and connection with nature. Yet beneath the surface, there was turmoil. Tom seemed to be struggling—there were disputes, frustrations, a restlessness that grew more palpable over time.
On September 11, 2021, that tension culminated in a disappearance. Tom and the children vanished, leaving behind his Toyota Hilux at Kiritehere Beach, keys neatly tucked under the floor mat, waves lapping at the tires. Everything about the scene was uncanny, almost like a deliberate performance meant to mislead. It sparked fears that they had been swept out to sea. Search teams combed through the area for days, employing helicopters, drones, and boats. The search was exhaustive and increasingly desperate, as each passing day seemed to bring the family further from reach.
Then, on the 18th day, they returned. Tom walked back into the farmhouse, children in tow, as though emerging from a brief adventure. He said they had camped in the bush to “clear his head.” The children appeared healthy, their grandmother calling them “bouncy as ever.” But while they might have looked fine, the town couldn’t shake a sense of unease. Neighbors whispered about the impossibility of it—how could a father keep three kids in the bush, safe and comfortable, for nearly three weeks? The story didn’t quite add up. How had they survived so comfortably in the wilderness for nearly three weeks? Why had Tom parked his truck in such a precarious spot?
Less than three months later, on December 9, 2021, Tom and the kids vanished again. This time, there was no warning, no note. The authorities hesitated to launch another full-scale search, reasoning that Tom had pulled a similar stunt just months earlier. But as days turned into weeks, it became clear that this was different—Tom wasn’t coming back this time.
The Hunt
With the family’s prolonged disappearance, Tom Phillips became not just a missing person but a fugitive. By January 2022, an arrest warrant was issued when he failed to appear in court for wasting police resources. It wasn’t just his absence that concerned authorities—it was the children’s safety. The questions were now darker: were the kids being kept away intentionally, or was there something more sinister happening in the wilderness?
The search for the Phillips family focused on western Waikato, a region Tom knew intimately. Police combed through dense bushland and farmland, helicopters traced the coastline, and checkpoints were set up on rural roads. Clues occasionally surfaced—a potential campsite here, a reported sighting there—but nothing concrete ever materialized. It was as though the family had vanished into thin air. Investigators grew increasingly frustrated as false leads multiplied and the case grew cold.
Catherine’s appeals for the children’s return became more urgent. “Ember has asthma. She needs medication,” she would plead publicly, her voice strained. The strain on the community began to show too. The longer the family was gone, the more the town became divided in their opinions. Some saw Tom as a father overwhelmed, seeking refuge in nature, while others were convinced he was a manipulative man using his children to spite Catherine.
But everything changed in May 2023, when a seemingly unrelated crime sent shockwaves through the investigation. A bank in Te Kuiti was robbed. Two armed individuals carried out the heist and fled on a motorbike. Surveillance footage identified one of the suspects as matching Tom’s description, prompting a new warrant and suspicions that his disappearance was more complex than anyone had imagined. The possibility that Tom had involved one of his children in the robbery only deepened the mystery and heightened the urgency to find them.
The case remained stagnant until October 3, 2024, when a startling development brought a flicker of hope. Pig hunters, trekking through hills near Marokopa, captured a grainy video of four figures walking in single file—an adult ahead of three children, all dressed in camouflage and carrying backpacks. The grainy footage captured fleeting moments—Tom’s silhouette, the rustle of branches, the children trailing behind with deliberate caution. The sight was brief, but unmistakably Tom and his kids. The hunters immediately alerted authorities, noting that Tom appeared to be armed. Police launched a massive search effort, deploying helicopters and ground teams, yet days of intense searching yielded nothing. The family had, once again, disappeared without a trace.
The Lingering Mystery
Now, nearly three years since they first went missing, the question of where Tom Phillips and his children are has only grown more complex. The October 2024 sighting seemed to confirm that they were alive, but it also reaffirmed just how elusive they had become. Tom’s knowledge of the land gave him a distinct advantage; he knew how to navigate the dense forests and rugged terrain that surrounded Marokopa. But even a skilled woodsman can’t survive indefinitely without help—or so many believed.
Authorities have long suspected that Tom has been receiving outside assistance, yet despite public pleas, a generous reward, and promises of immunity for anyone aiding him, no one has come forward. It’s as if the family exists on the periphery of reality, slipping between the cracks whenever someone gets too close. Theories about their fate range from plausible to outlandish—some suggest they’re living in a hidden encampment in the hills, others speculate they’ve adopted new identities far from Marokopa. The darker theories hint at something more final, that perhaps the October sighting was an orchestrated deception or that the wilderness has claimed them for good.
Catherine continues to fight for answers, releasing public statements, pleading for anyone with information to come forward. The children’s older half-sisters have also rallied support, urging authorities to intensify the search. But as the months drag on, it feels like the story is settling into legend—a father and his three children lost to the bush, swallowed by the land that Tom had always considered his sanctuary.
The hills around Marokopa remain silent, save for the whisper of wind through the trees and the rhythmic crash of waves on Kiritehere Beach. It’s a place that has become a symbol of unanswered questions. Where the truck was found in 2021, the shoreline is now a quiet reminder of a mystery that continues to unfold. Until then, the hills and waves keep their secrets, and the Phillips family remains part of Marokopa’s shadowed legend, forever just beyond reach.
Deep Lore 