Missing in New Hampshire since October 9th, Abigail Hernandez turned 15 over the Columbus Day holiday weekend...
Investigators say the North Conway, New Hampshire teenager finished school on that afternoon and walked her normal route homeward, but then mysteriously disappeared from her residence shortly thereafter.
A tri-state multi-agency task force equipped with K-9s and helicopters has been searching woods, lakes, rivers and highways for five straight days now, without luck. They even set up roadblocks and were seen handing out fliers to tourists who flock by the thousands to scenic New Hampshire this time of year to take in the spectacular fall foliage.
Police say over 200 tips have also been investigated, some of which came from as far away as Texas, and still there is nothing solid to go on. They believe the last anyone may have heard from Abigail Hernandez was via cellphone approximately four hours after her strange disappearance.
That call was said to have been transmitted a couple miles from the girl's house near the resort town of Cranmore Mountain.
In all, nearly 5000 acres have been scoured in a desperate search which has turned up the skeletal remains of a missing person from 2006, but which has produced little else of substance in the Hernandez case.
Abigail Hernandez is described as a light-skinned female, about five-foot four-inches tall and weighing 118 pounds. The bright, athletic 15-year-old has long dark hair with dark eyes and is of Hispanic descent. She was last seen wearing black stretch pants, tall brown boots and a light colored sweater with a yellow pattern and flecks.
Local law enforcement agencies and the FBI ask that anyone who sees the missing child or who may know of her current whereabouts phone them at (603) 356-5717 or 1-800-CALL-FBI.
A Facebook page has also been launched to aid in the hunt for this endangered individual.
UPDATE: 10/16/2013: Officials have retracted earlier statements concerning a call placed on the missing teen's cellphone in the area of the Cranmore Mountain ski resort the day she disappeared. That location is less than two miles from the Hernandez residence and accessible by foot, but investigators now say "No such call was ever made."
In 2011 the badly beaten body of Krista Dittmeyer was retrieved from a pond on Cranmore Mountain. Three male friends were accused of the young mother's murder and pleaded guilty before trial.
However, over 80 percent of criminal cases are actually plea-bargained in the United States, whether or not the accused are in fact innocent. As well, a number of other young females have vanished from this remote New Hampshire region in the years before the brutal killing of Dittmeyer, and since.
UPDATE: 12/8/13: FBI confirms that missing teen recently sighted "online" also sent her mother a letter just two weeks after vanishing -- read full coverage of these late breaking developments HERE.
UPDATE: 10/16/2013: Officials have retracted earlier statements concerning a call placed on the missing teen's cellphone in the area of the Cranmore Mountain ski resort the day she disappeared. That location is less than two miles from the Hernandez residence and accessible by foot, but investigators now say "No such call was ever made."
In 2011 the badly beaten body of Krista Dittmeyer was retrieved from a pond on Cranmore Mountain. Three male friends were accused of the young mother's murder and pleaded guilty before trial.
However, over 80 percent of criminal cases are actually plea-bargained in the United States, whether or not the accused are in fact innocent. As well, a number of other young females have vanished from this remote New Hampshire region in the years before the brutal killing of Dittmeyer, and since.
UPDATE: 12/8/13: FBI confirms that missing teen recently sighted "online" also sent her mother a letter just two weeks after vanishing -- read full coverage of these late breaking developments HERE.
UPDATE: Law enforcement sources now say that Abigail Hernandez had "befriended an older boy on Facebook and had a high school boyfriend" as well. The FBI's Rapid Child Abduction Deployment Unit is in charge of the search efforts.
ReplyDeleteAlso missing from this region under similarly suspicious circumstances: Heidi Wilbur, Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray. Found in this same region: The skull of a 20 to 30-year-old Asian female.
(Hernandez missing-person case is active/unsolved -- feel free to post your own verified updates and/or remarks in this comment section.)
E.R.
ER, what is your take on this missing hiker found Oct 12, 2013:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.adirondackalmanack.com/2013/10/missing-hiker-hanged.html
Well, it has been known to happen from time to time. However, I could find no references in earlier coverage of Haworth's disappearance suggesting that he was depressed or suicidal. Only that he was an experienced hiker. (Does someone who intends to kill himself purchase groceries first?)
DeleteOf course murder does happen in the woods too -- upstate New York's dense and massive Adirondack mountain chain would be an ideal place for staging either a homicide or suicide.
E.R.
somebody NEEDS TO look AT THE crazy MOTHER...SHE'S NUTS.
ReplyDeleteThat is cruel..
DeleteWhere is the father in all of this?
ReplyDeletei am just suggesting, what about sarah brown, she helps finds missing children,or john edwards, or maybe a quije board. maybe this can help. i wish you all good luck,
ReplyDeleteAnd celina Cass from that area.
ReplyDelete