Maura Murray, a 21 year old nursing student, disappeared on February 9th, 2004. It has been over 15 years and she has never been heard from and there are no recent sightings or leads. Family and friends are devistated over this sudden and complete disappearance of someone they held so closely. If you have any information at all please contact crime stoppers or other authorities. This case deserves recognition and justice.
Here is the link to the podcast episode if you would rather listen: Maura Murray Case
Maura was born on May 4, 1982 and disappeared on February 9, 2004 at the age of 21. She has been missing for over 15 years with no new information and no suspects in her disappearance. Some believe she may still be out there and alive today. If so, she would be about 36 years old now and was described to be 5’7″, 120lbs., with natural dark brown hair.
Before her disappearance Maura had a little streak of trouble. Three months before that fateful night Maura confessed to using a stolen credit card to order food which simultaniously counts as identity fraud. However, since it was her first offence the court ruled that with three months good behavior it would be discarded. Along with this little trouble she also crashed her fathers car while seemingly under the influence the night before she disappeared. That came out without consequences as well since the car insurance would cover all of the damage.
On February 5th at 10:30p.m., four days before she disappeared, she was at her campus security job and had a seemingly traumatic phone call with her sister Kathleen. After this, around 1 a.m., Maura supervisor came in to find her completley zoned out and unresponsive. When he asked what was wrong she simply said, “My Sister.” For years Kathleen would not outright state what the call was about or why her sister was acting odd after. However, a few years ago she came clean, saying that the call was about her getting released from alcoholic rehab that night. On the way home from rehab her fiance stopped at a liquor store and this was traumatic for her so she relayed that to her sister. Was Maura so distraught over a possible relapse in her sisters alcoholism?
Timeline
In this case the timeline is thourough but it does throw some comfusing pieces into the mix. I have outlined it here so that you can see what I mean.
-The day Maura disappeared, February 9, 2004, she started off by Mapquesting directions to Burlington, Vermont right after the clock struck midnight. Then there is a large gap in time where it is safe to assume she was sleeping and packing, we will discuss that more later.
-1pm she emailed her boyfriend,
I got your messages, but honestly, I didn’t feel like talking to much of anyone, I promist to call today though.
After this email she called a condo that her family use to vacation at in Bartlett, NH and asked about renting from them; the condos did not rent to her.
-1:13p.m. she called a fellow student for reasons unknown
-1:24p.m. emailed work that she would be out of town for a week due to a death in the family (this death in the family did not exsist.) This is a very morbid excuse to be using just to get a week away, why did she use it?
-2:05p.m. she called a recorded line about hotels in Stowe, Vermont. As you can see she is jumping all over the place with locations. I have to wonder if this was to throw a possible investigation off in the future or if she truley did not know where she was going.
-2:18p.m. she left a voicemail for her boyfriend promising they would talk later
-3:30p.m. she drove off campus. Classes were cancled that Monday due to a snow storm.
-3:40p.m. she withdrew $280 from an ATM that shows she was alone at this time. She then goes into a liquor store (still alone) and purchases $40 worth of liquor.
-It is unknown what time but at somepoint that day she did pick up the accident forms her father needed from the Massachusets DMV
-4p.m.-5p.m. she left Amherst via Interstate 91 north
-4:37p.m. she called to check her voicemail and this was the last recorded use of her cell phone
-7:27p.m. a woman calls 911 with a report of an accident outside of her house and states that she can see a man smoking inside the car
-Another neighbor stated that she saw someone walking around the car (unsure of exact time)
-One more neighbor, on his way home from work stopped by the accident and Maura was outside unharmed but cold. He stated he would call the police and she begged him not to. Could this be because she was drunk? Or maybe just because she had just crashed a car the day before?
-7:37p.m. a neighbor says they saw a police car head to head with Maura’s car. Later it was stated that if there was a police car there either Cecil Smith or Jeff Williams was driving it. However, when the neighbor went over to check it out they saw no one in or around either car.
-7: 46p.m. offical police arrival on the scene, Maura is no where to be found
-8-8:30p.m. reported sighting of a young person in a dark coat and jeans walking east on route 112 about 4 or 5 miles from the car crash. Was it Maura walking off into the night?
Other Info
The timeline gives us a lot of information on what happened that night but there are more details to go into this. First of all Maura’s car had toiletries, clothes, college textbooks, and birth control packed. Because of the birth control and textbooks it seemed like she was planning on living and going back to school, not ending her life that night. However, many have said that she could’ve not completley decided on suicide yet and that is why she brought these things, then utimatley decided on suicide. Along with this campus police later found her dorm room completley packed up with a printed out email to her boyfriend about relationship trouble. To me that seems like a valuable clue. Packing everything up means she was most likely moving, planning on moving, or not planning on living and wanted to reduce the hastle for others. The printed out email seems like a sign that should be looked at more closely. It was definitley left there for someone to sign. Why else would she print out an email? It obviously was send to her boyfriend and really they are the only two people who needed to know about it. So why was it left mysteriously for others to find?
The woman who first called police about the accident reported she saw a man smoking inside the car. Later she stated that she never said that and rather that she saw a red glowing light inside the car, maybe from a cell phone. There is a reccord of her stating she saw a man so if she truley did, who was this man? Did he play a part in Maura’s disappearance? That could be the key piece of evidence police are looking for in this case.
There was a report that stated Maura was cheating on her boyfriend with the university track coach. He stated that Maura had talked about running away to Mexico and starting a new life. One theory is that she really meant it and this was her get away. However, whether she made it to her new life or not is unknown.
When police got on the scene of the crash the car was inoperable and locked. There were also red stains inside and out that seemed to come from red wine. Inside the car they found a damaged red wine box and an exmpty beer can, also discovering that some of the alcohol that was bought was missing. This gives more backing the the theory that she ran away from the scene due to drunk driving. Missing from her car was her phone and bank cards, none of these things have ever been used or found.
In the years following her disappearance her father refused to be interviewed. This seems very odd, if my daughter was missing I would want to do anything to help find her, just as most parents would. When he was interviewed 2.5 years later he brought lawyers and was found to be lying about events leading up to her disappearance. In tht case we have to ask what he had to hide.
Theories
In late 2004 a man approached Maura’s father and gave him an old rusted knife that he said was used to kill Maura. His explination was that his brother did it since his brother had a criminal history and acted weird after the disappearance. Days after this happened the mans brother scrapped his car thus drawing more suspicion to him. In 2006 his house was searched and cadaver dogs went wild indicating human remains in a closet of the brothers house. I believe that this should be looked into even more due to the odd circumstantial evidence in this case.
In 2012 a youtuber called ‘Mr112dirtbag’ stated making odd videos that some believed held clues to Maura’s disappearance. Sometime before this youtube channel came out Maura’s father said that whoever took his daughter had to be a dirtbag and that is where the youtube name supposedly came from. This channel uploaded a video of himself hysterically laughing and then winking as the words ‘Happy Anniversary’ shown across the screen; this was posted on the anniversary of Maura’s disappearance. A reddit user identified this man as Alden Olsen but I am unsure if police really took this youtube channel seriously. However, the reddit user who identified him was later threatened by him and somewhat extorted online. Therefore, we know this man is unkind in some ways for sure. This should be investigated more as well.
There are other theories mostly revolving around Maura getting picked up and murdered or walking away and commiting suicide, or simply walking away and succumbing to the elements. There had never been evidence of any of these and no body or belongings have ever been found.
Tips and knowledge on this case is always appreciated so if you know anything at all please come forward and help to bring justice to Maura and her family.
Remember, this is just an outline of the basic pieces of the case. To hear things in more detail please visit our Maura Murray Podcast Episode linked here. There are also many reddit threads and articles that have other, unconfirmed information. If this case intrests you I suggest you research it due to there being so many different pieces.
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