Brian Flowers of Honda Marysville: Patti Adkins Case and Reward

Brian Flowers was Patti Adkins’ secret boyfriend and a coworker at the Honda of America Manufacturing plant in Marysville, Ohio, and he has been the Union County Sheriff’s Office’s primary suspect in her June 29, 2001 disappearance for more than two decades. He has never been charged, arrested, or indicted, and he denies any involvement.¹

Who Flowers Was to Patti Adkins

Flowers worked on a different assembly line from Adkins at the same Marysville plant. He was married. Adkins, a 29-year-old mother of a seven-year-old daughter, was involved with him in a relationship the two kept hidden from coworkers, and investigators say she would frequently walk over to his line during shifts to talk with him.²

In the months before Adkins vanished, she withdrew roughly $90,000 and handed it to Flowers. A banker confirmed the withdrawals and that the money was going to him. According to Union County Sheriff’s Office Lieutenant Jeff Stiers, Flowers told Adkins he needed the cash to buy out his share of a side business so his wife could not claim it in a divorce he said was coming.² Investigators have questioned whether Adkins may have angered Flowers by later asking for the money back.³

The Last Time Adkins Was Seen

The Honda plant scheduled a “shutdown week” around the Fourth of July, and the 2001 break began after the shift that ended in the early hours of June 29. Adkins had told friends she was going to spend the week on a trip to Canada with Flowers. To keep the relationship quiet and to avoid leaving her car in the plant lot all week, she arranged for a coworker to drop her at work that day.²

According to her close friends, the plan was for Adkins to hide under a tarp in the bed of Flowers’ pickup truck once she clocked out, so nobody would see the two of them leave together. She was last seen leaving the plant at the end of the second shift in her white Honda uniform.⁴ Nobody has reported seeing her since.

Adkins’ daughter had been left with Adkins’ sister, Marcia Pitts, on the understanding that Adkins would come back to pick her up after the vacation. When Adkins didn’t return on July 8, 2001, Pitts called Flowers. He told her he didn’t know who Adkins was, denied any relationship, and denied any plans to travel together. Pitts then reported her sister missing, and the Union County Sheriff’s Office took over the investigation on July 10, 2001.²

Why Investigators Focused on Flowers

Flowers gave law enforcement permission to search his property and his truck. Investigators recovered items Adkins had given him, including a birthday card, a phone, and a T-shirt, along with a letter Adkins had written to him about their relationship and her wish to be with him. Those items directly contradicted his statement to Pitts that he didn’t know Adkins.²

Given the friends’ account of the tarp plan, investigators paid close attention to the bed of Flowers’ pickup. No DNA belonging to Adkins was found there.² There is no public evidence that the trip to Canada ever happened. Since the day she disappeared, there has been no activity on any of Adkins’ financial or personal records, and she has had no contact with her family. The Sheriff’s Office has long suspected foul play.⁴

Flowers has been publicly identified as the primary suspect, but authorities have acknowledged that “little evidence has been connected to him.”⁵

Where the Case Stands

Patti Adkins was legally declared dead in 2011, about ten years after she vanished.⁶ No one has been charged in connection with her disappearance.

In May 2025, a Change.org petition urged Union County Prosecutor David Phillips to bring the case to a grand jury for potential indictment; it drew more than 2,000 signatures. Phillips said publicly that a grand jury was “not an appropriate step at this point, given the status of the evidence,” while adding that his office remained hopeful it could eventually determine what happened.⁷

In June 2025, the Union County Prosecutor’s Office assigned a full-time investigator, working from within the Sheriff’s Office, to conduct a comprehensive review of the case file. Phillips described the aim as finding errors or gaps in the existing file and trying to fill them. Union County Sheriff Mike Justice said internal discussions about adding the investigator had begun months earlier and that the department had continued to work every lead, though he characterizes the matter as a missing person investigation rather than committing to a foul play determination.⁸

Reward and How to Submit Tips

A group called Concerned Citizens for Patti has offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to Adkins’ location and recovery.⁹ Central Ohio Crime Stoppers is also offering a cash reward and continues to feature the case in Columbus-area broadcasts and in The Columbus Dispatch. All Crime Stoppers tips are anonymous.¹⁰

Union County Sheriff’s Office: (937) 645-4110
Crime Tip Hotline: (937) 642-7653
Central Ohio Crime Stoppers: 614-461-TIPS (8477)
Online: www.stopcrime.org
Mobile: P3 Tips app

1
NewsNation. Boyfriend of Woman Missing for 23 Years Remains Primary Suspect, Deputies Say
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NBC News. Ohio Mother Patricia Adkins Remains Missing Years After Her Disappearance
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Clermont Sun. The Strange Disappearance of Patricia Patti Adkins
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Union County Sheriff’s Office. Patti Adkins Unsolved Case
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NBC4 Columbus. Boyfriend of Woman Missing for 23 Years Remains Primary Suspect, Deputies Say
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NewsNation. Missing Ohio Woman Patricia Adkins
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ABC News 4. Search for Patti Adkins Intensifies 24 Years After Disappearance
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13WHAM. Search for Patti Adkins Intensifies 24 Years After Disappearance
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The Columbus Dispatch. Reward Offered for Info Leading to Recovery of Woman Missing 20 Years
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Central Ohio Crime Stoppers. Central Ohio Crime Stoppers Case Feature