Post by hi224 on Dec 5, 2018 8:03:39 GMT
At 7:35pm, on February 9th, 2004, New Hampshire State Police are called to scene of a single car accident on Rt. 112. It was the intersection of Wild Ammonoosuc Road and Bradley Hill Road where a U-Mass Amherst student named Maura Murray vanished after she apparently lost control of her vehicle after a sharp bend. When authorities arrived not ten minutes later, Maura was gone. There has been no credible sighting of her since.
A nursing student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Murray left campus earlier that afternoon after packing her car and emailing her professors that she was taking a week off for a family emergency. No family emergency existed. Due to her preparations and no evidence of foul play, police investigators had suggested that she may have wanted to disappear and had treated her case as a missing person investigation, but some of her family and friends believe she was abducted.
Events Leading Up To Disappearance
In November 2003, three months before her disappearance, Maura was arrested for using a stolen credit card. The charge was continued in December to be dismissed after three months' good behavior.
On Thursday, February 5, 2004, around 10:30 pm, Maura spoke on the phone with her older sister Kathleen while on break from her campus job. They discussed Kathleen's relationship problems with her fiance. Hours later, still on her shift, Maura broke down into tears. Her supervisor escorted her back to her dorm room around 1:20 am. Maura apparently did not share with anyone the reason for her breakdown.
On Saturday, February 7, Maura's father Fred Murray arrived in Amherst. That afternoon they shopped for a used car and later went to dinner with a friend of Maura's. Maura dropped her father off at his motel room and, borrowing his Toyota Corolla, returned to the campus to attend a dorm party with her friend. At 2:30 am she left the party and drove the Corolla with the intention of returning it to her father. At 3:30 am, en route to his motel, she struck a guardrail on Route 9 in Hadley. The police questioned her but didn't file charges or administer a sobriety test. She was driven back to her father's motel and stayed in his room the rest of the night. At 4:49 am she called her boyfriend in Oklahoma to discuss the accident.
Sunday morning, Fred Murray determined the auto damage was covered by his insurance. He rented a car, dropped Maura off at the university, and departed for Connecticut. At 11:30 pm that evening, Fred phoned Maura reminding her to obtain the forms pertaining to the accident on Monday from the Registry of Motor Vehicles. They agreed to talk again Monday night to discuss the forms and together fill out the insurance claim over the phone.
Around midnight, Monday, February 9, shortly after speaking with her father, Maura used her personal computer to search MapQuest for directions to The Berkshires and Burlington, Vermont.
Around 1:00 pm she also made a phone call to inquire about renting a condominium in the same Bartlett, New Hampshire, condo association her family had vacationed at in the past. Telephone records indicate the call lasted three minutes. The owner did not rent the condo to Maura. Then Maura called a fellow nursing student for reasons unknown. At 1:24 pm Maura emailed a work supervisor at the nursing school faculty that she would be out of town for a week due to a death in her family and that she would contact them when she returned. There was no family emergency at the time.
At 2:05 pm she called a number which provides prerecorded information about booking hotels in Stowe, Vermont. She listened to this information for approximately five minutes. At 2:18 pm she telephoned her boyfriend and left a voice message promising him they would talk later. This call ended after one minute.
In her car she packed clothing, toiletries, and college textbooks. When her room was searched later, campus police discovered most of her belongings packed in boxes and the art removed from the walls. It is disputed whether she packed them that day or if they were merely still packed from her recent return from winter break. Around 3:30 pm, she drove off the campus in her black Saturn sedan.
At 3:40 pm Maura withdrew $280 from an ATM. Closed-circuit footage indicates she was alone. This withdrawal nearly emptied her bank account although she was due to receive paychecks in the coming days. At a nearby liquor store she purchased about $40 worth of alcoholic beverages, including Baileys Irish Cream, Kahlúa, vodka, and a box of Franzia wine. Footage also shows she was alone when she made that purchase. At some point in the day she obtained Registry of Motor Vehicle accident report forms, as they were later found in her car.
Maura then left Amherst, presumably via Interstate 91 north. She called to check her voice mail at 4:37 pm, the last recorded use of her cell phone. To date there is no indication she had informed anyone of her destination or evidence she had chosen one.
Disappearance
Some time after 7:00 pm, a Woodsville, New Hampshire, resident heard a loud thump outside of her house. Through her window she could see a car up against the snowbank along Route 112, also known as Wild Ammonoosuc Road. The car pointed west on the eastbound side of the road. She telephoned the Grafton County Sheriff's Department at 7:27 pm to report the accident. At about the same time another neighbor saw the car as well as someone walking around the vehicle. She witnessed a third neighbor pull up alongside the vehicle.
That neighbor, a school bus driver returning home, noticed the young woman was not bleeding but cold and shivering. He offered to telephone for help. She asked him not to call the police (one police report says "pleaded") and assured him she'd already called AAA. (AAA has no record of any such call.) Knowing there was no cell phone reception in the area, the bus driver continued home and phoned the police. His call was received by the Sheriff's Department at 7:43 pm. He was unable to see Maura's car while he made the phone call but did notice several cars pass on the road before the police arrived.
At 7:46 pm, a Haverhill police officer arrived at the scene. No one was inside or around the car. The car's windshield was cracked on the driver's side and both airbags had deployed. The car was locked. Inside and outside the car he discovered red stains that looked to be red wine. The officer found a damaged box of Franzia wine on the rear seat. In addition, he found an AAA card issued to Maura Murray, blank crash report forms, gloves, compact discs, makeup, two sets of MapQuest driving directions (one to Burlington, Vermont, another to Stowe, Vermont), Maura's favorite stuffed animal, and Not Without Peril, a book about mountain climbing in the White Mountains. Missing were Maura's debit card, credit cards, and cell phone, none of which have been located or used since her disappearance.
At 8:00 to 8:30 pm, a contractor returning home from Franconia saw a young person moving quickly on foot eastbound on Route 112 about 4 to 5 miles (6 to 8 km) east of where Maura's vehicle was discovered. He noted that the young person was wearing jeans, a dark coat, and a light-colored hood. He didn't report it to police immediately due to his own confusion of dates, only discovering three months later (when reviewing his work records) that he'd spotted the young person the same night Maura disappeared. Just before 8:00 pm, EMS and a fire truck arrived to clear the scene. By 8:49 pm, the car had been towed to a local garage. At about 9:30 pm, the responding officer left. A rag believed to have been part of Maura's emergency roadside kit was discovered stuffed into the Saturn's muffler pipe. Authorities would only refer to Maura as missing the next day, almost twenty-four hours after she was last seen.
A nursing student at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Murray left campus earlier that afternoon after packing her car and emailing her professors that she was taking a week off for a family emergency. No family emergency existed. Due to her preparations and no evidence of foul play, police investigators had suggested that she may have wanted to disappear and had treated her case as a missing person investigation, but some of her family and friends believe she was abducted.
Events Leading Up To Disappearance
In November 2003, three months before her disappearance, Maura was arrested for using a stolen credit card. The charge was continued in December to be dismissed after three months' good behavior.
On Thursday, February 5, 2004, around 10:30 pm, Maura spoke on the phone with her older sister Kathleen while on break from her campus job. They discussed Kathleen's relationship problems with her fiance. Hours later, still on her shift, Maura broke down into tears. Her supervisor escorted her back to her dorm room around 1:20 am. Maura apparently did not share with anyone the reason for her breakdown.
On Saturday, February 7, Maura's father Fred Murray arrived in Amherst. That afternoon they shopped for a used car and later went to dinner with a friend of Maura's. Maura dropped her father off at his motel room and, borrowing his Toyota Corolla, returned to the campus to attend a dorm party with her friend. At 2:30 am she left the party and drove the Corolla with the intention of returning it to her father. At 3:30 am, en route to his motel, she struck a guardrail on Route 9 in Hadley. The police questioned her but didn't file charges or administer a sobriety test. She was driven back to her father's motel and stayed in his room the rest of the night. At 4:49 am she called her boyfriend in Oklahoma to discuss the accident.
Sunday morning, Fred Murray determined the auto damage was covered by his insurance. He rented a car, dropped Maura off at the university, and departed for Connecticut. At 11:30 pm that evening, Fred phoned Maura reminding her to obtain the forms pertaining to the accident on Monday from the Registry of Motor Vehicles. They agreed to talk again Monday night to discuss the forms and together fill out the insurance claim over the phone.
Around midnight, Monday, February 9, shortly after speaking with her father, Maura used her personal computer to search MapQuest for directions to The Berkshires and Burlington, Vermont.
Around 1:00 pm she also made a phone call to inquire about renting a condominium in the same Bartlett, New Hampshire, condo association her family had vacationed at in the past. Telephone records indicate the call lasted three minutes. The owner did not rent the condo to Maura. Then Maura called a fellow nursing student for reasons unknown. At 1:24 pm Maura emailed a work supervisor at the nursing school faculty that she would be out of town for a week due to a death in her family and that she would contact them when she returned. There was no family emergency at the time.
At 2:05 pm she called a number which provides prerecorded information about booking hotels in Stowe, Vermont. She listened to this information for approximately five minutes. At 2:18 pm she telephoned her boyfriend and left a voice message promising him they would talk later. This call ended after one minute.
In her car she packed clothing, toiletries, and college textbooks. When her room was searched later, campus police discovered most of her belongings packed in boxes and the art removed from the walls. It is disputed whether she packed them that day or if they were merely still packed from her recent return from winter break. Around 3:30 pm, she drove off the campus in her black Saturn sedan.
At 3:40 pm Maura withdrew $280 from an ATM. Closed-circuit footage indicates she was alone. This withdrawal nearly emptied her bank account although she was due to receive paychecks in the coming days. At a nearby liquor store she purchased about $40 worth of alcoholic beverages, including Baileys Irish Cream, Kahlúa, vodka, and a box of Franzia wine. Footage also shows she was alone when she made that purchase. At some point in the day she obtained Registry of Motor Vehicle accident report forms, as they were later found in her car.
Maura then left Amherst, presumably via Interstate 91 north. She called to check her voice mail at 4:37 pm, the last recorded use of her cell phone. To date there is no indication she had informed anyone of her destination or evidence she had chosen one.
Disappearance
Some time after 7:00 pm, a Woodsville, New Hampshire, resident heard a loud thump outside of her house. Through her window she could see a car up against the snowbank along Route 112, also known as Wild Ammonoosuc Road. The car pointed west on the eastbound side of the road. She telephoned the Grafton County Sheriff's Department at 7:27 pm to report the accident. At about the same time another neighbor saw the car as well as someone walking around the vehicle. She witnessed a third neighbor pull up alongside the vehicle.
That neighbor, a school bus driver returning home, noticed the young woman was not bleeding but cold and shivering. He offered to telephone for help. She asked him not to call the police (one police report says "pleaded") and assured him she'd already called AAA. (AAA has no record of any such call.) Knowing there was no cell phone reception in the area, the bus driver continued home and phoned the police. His call was received by the Sheriff's Department at 7:43 pm. He was unable to see Maura's car while he made the phone call but did notice several cars pass on the road before the police arrived.
At 7:46 pm, a Haverhill police officer arrived at the scene. No one was inside or around the car. The car's windshield was cracked on the driver's side and both airbags had deployed. The car was locked. Inside and outside the car he discovered red stains that looked to be red wine. The officer found a damaged box of Franzia wine on the rear seat. In addition, he found an AAA card issued to Maura Murray, blank crash report forms, gloves, compact discs, makeup, two sets of MapQuest driving directions (one to Burlington, Vermont, another to Stowe, Vermont), Maura's favorite stuffed animal, and Not Without Peril, a book about mountain climbing in the White Mountains. Missing were Maura's debit card, credit cards, and cell phone, none of which have been located or used since her disappearance.
At 8:00 to 8:30 pm, a contractor returning home from Franconia saw a young person moving quickly on foot eastbound on Route 112 about 4 to 5 miles (6 to 8 km) east of where Maura's vehicle was discovered. He noted that the young person was wearing jeans, a dark coat, and a light-colored hood. He didn't report it to police immediately due to his own confusion of dates, only discovering three months later (when reviewing his work records) that he'd spotted the young person the same night Maura disappeared. Just before 8:00 pm, EMS and a fire truck arrived to clear the scene. By 8:49 pm, the car had been towed to a local garage. At about 9:30 pm, the responding officer left. A rag believed to have been part of Maura's emergency roadside kit was discovered stuffed into the Saturn's muffler pipe. Authorities would only refer to Maura as missing the next day, almost twenty-four hours after she was last seen.
