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| Ross, Bernard "Bunny" Jr May 12 1977; Ashland-Portage Maine | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 11 2010, 11:13 AM (1,336 Views) | |
| monkalup | Jan 11 2010, 11:13 AM Post #1 |
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The Old Heifer! An oxymoron, of course.
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Bernard ‘Bunny’ Ross Jr. Missing since: 1977 from Ashland-Portage area Age: 19 Height and weight: 6’1” 160 Hair: Dirty blond Eyes: Blue Race: White Other: Despondent at time of disappearance. Contact: State police A Fort Kent resident, Ross initially was considered a suspect in a Presque Isle truck theft. Though the vehicle was found and the charges dropped, Ross was not found and was reported missing by his family. Ross last was seen on May 12 in a wooded area off Reality Road near the Ashland-Portage town line. Numerous attempts to find him have turned up no clues. http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/109433.html |
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Lauran "If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. | |
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| monkalup | Jan 11 2010, 11:14 AM Post #2 |
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The Old Heifer! An oxymoron, of course.
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http://z13.invisionfree.com/PorchlightUSA/...showtopic=16774 |
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Lauran "If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. | |
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| nutsdeb | Jan 11 2010, 06:32 PM Post #3 |
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I know it's a long shot but could this missing man be the doe from Delafield Wisconsin found in September 1977. Eyes darken on death and the doe has hazel eyes listed. http://www.theyaremissed.org/ncma/gallery/...php?U200700068S Deb |
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| nutsdeb | Jan 11 2010, 06:34 PM Post #4 |
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If we had a photo of Bernard ‘Bunny’ Ross Jr. we could compare... or would someone from US (I'm your Aussie contact) like to submit just in case? Deb |
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| tatertot | May 1 2010, 05:11 PM Post #5 |
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http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-20469823.html MISSING IN MAINE Have you seen these people? For many, the search for truth about lost loved one is an ongoing struggle, even decades later Article from: Bangor Daily News Bangor, ME Article date: June 27, 2009 More results for: never reported missing On the evening of April 24, five members of Charles Springer's family gathered at a southern Maine restaurant to mark his 70th birthday. Like many such celebrations, family members shared a meal that ended with a cupcake topped with a birthday candle. Absent, however, was the guest of honor. Charles Milton Springer, a truck driver from Belmont who liked to be called "Chuck," walked out of his home on May 2, 2008, with only the clothes on his back. He has not been seen since. Springer is among an estimated 100 people in Maine who have been reported missing during the past three decades and have never been found. The missing person reports include the names of individuals as young as 3 and as old as 70, some in good health and others with medical or mental health problems. The files date back to 1971, about the time that federal and state authorities began indexing such cases. Many of the missing are believed to be dead, the victims of foul play or the elements. Some are teenage runaways and adults whom authorities believe have fled to escape problems, while others seem to have simply vanished into thin air, leaving no trace behind. Sometimes, new leads blow the dust off old cases. That was the case this week, when state police and Sanford police converged on a Lebanon residence and recovered from a well human remains believed to be those of Frances Moulton, who disappeared at the age of 27 in the summer of 2006. The remains were taken to the Office of the State Medical Examiner for examination, but an identification is not expected until next week. Though Springer has been missing for more than a year, family members he left behind still think of him daily. "Oh, it's not good at all. I get through the day, you know," Ellie Springer, the missing man's mother, said this week in a telephone interview from her daughter's home in Lebanon, where she recently moved because of health problems. "I try not to think about it too much. When I think about it too much, I get a hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach and I feel like I just want to cry," she said. "I don't want to make myself sick. I'm 89 years old." Haunting cases Lt. J. Darrell Ouellette, commander of the state police barracks in Houlton, has seen the effect that a missing loved one can have on families. Until three years ago, Ouellette headed the state's Missing Children Clearinghouse. His experience with missing adults is a product of his regular duties with the state police, who investigate all missing persons cases in which foul play is suspected except those in Bangor and Portland, where the city police departments handle their own. The FBI gets involved in missing children cases and those in which the missing person is believed to have crossed, or been taken across, state lines. Though Ouellette has investigated dozens of missing person cases over the decades, there are some that continue to haunt him. One such case involves the 1977 disappearance of a 19-year-old Fort Kent man. The son of a Fort Kent schoolteacher now living in Portland, Bernard "Bunny" Ross Jr. initially was the subject of a warrant in a truck theft case. The truck was found and the charges dropped, but Ross remained missing. Despite a thorough search, Ross was never found. Though 32 years have passed, Ross' parents maintain regular contact with Ouellette to see if there have been any new developments. "We've done some work trying to locate him," Ouellette said. He periodically checks for activity with Ross' Social Security number, but so far has found nothing. "Once in a while [Ross' father] will see a vanity plate that has the word bunny, and he'll ask me to run the plate and find out who it is, and I'll run the plate and I'd find out that it belongs to a female or somebody else," he said. "So there's always that glimmer of hope that he's alive, that he just ran away or he had some sort of accident where he doesn't know where he belongs or whatever. But he's accepted the fact that his son may be dead," Ouellette said. The numbers Getting a handle on the actual number of missing people in Maine is no simple matter. The missing person page on the Department of Public Safety's Web site, which has only 16 listings, is still under construction. Two more missing people police believe were murdered are listed on the site's unsolved homicides page. The site does not include cases being investigated by county and municipal police departments. As of June 1, 92 people who disappeared in Maine were listed in the FBI's National Crime Information Center's database, the national repository for criminal justice information, according to Todd Matthews, a regional systems administrator for the missing people Web site www.NamUs.gov. Police believe the actual total is higher because of inconsistent reporting over the years.Although police are legally bound to register children with the NCIC within three hours of receiving a report that they're missing, there is more interpretation involved before listing adults. People 21 and older can be entered into the NCIC database, but only if they have a physical or mental disability, may be in physical danger, are missing after a catastrophe, went missing under circumstances suggesting their disappearance may be involuntary, or who otherwise are believed to be in danger, according to the U.S. Department of Justice's guidelines. "Law enforcement has a lot of discretion with adults," Ouellette said. "Police departments have to make a call on that, whether a person is in danger." They might not submit a report of a missing adult in good physical and mental condition and not considered at risk. Public Safety Department spokesman Steve McCausland agrees. "It's usually not a crime, obviously, for someone to go missing as an adult. Sometimes adults for their own reason want to go missing," he said, adding, "Your most famous missing person probably in the Bangor area is [Roderick] Hotham. He's not on that list but he certainly is missing." Arguably one of Bangor's highest-profile missing people, Hotham made headlines when he vanished in September 1992 from the Stucco Lodge in Veazie. At the time of his disappearance, the certified public accountant was accused of defrauding five federally insured financial institutions of about $4 million through false representation and promises. The vast majority of missing person cases are solved quickly, according to Ouellette and Penobscot County Sheriff Glenn Ross. Ouellette said of the 160 runaway teenagers reported missing every month in Maine, "99.9 percent" return home within 24 hours or let their parents know where they are and that they don't plan to come home. "Luckily, most of them are teenagers who have pretty good parents. They just want to get away for a while," he said, adding that most return when it gets cold and they've run out of food and money. Ross said 300 to 400 missing person and "attempt to locate" reports are filed with the county's deputies and municipal police departments in a typical year and that all but a handful are resolved quickly, often in less than 24 hours. These cases involve people who weren't home when expected or who didn't show up for a scheduled event, he notes. People who commit suicide and whose bodies are found quickly come off the list. "With the ones that are truly missing, there's usually a lot of interaction between the family and the police that keeps it on the radar screen," he said. Among the most troubling cases are those involving missing kids. The profiles of three people who were reported missing as children in the 1970s and 1980s appear on the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children's Web site, located at missingkids.com, National Center spokeswoman Nancy McBride said. They are 3-year-old Douglas Charles Chapman, who vanished in 1971 while playing outside in Alfred; Cathy Moulton, 16, of Portland, who also went missing in 1971; and Kimberly Moreau, who was 17 when she disappeared from Jay in 1986. Not among the National Center's listings, however, is a fourth missing child from Maine, Kurt Ronald Newton, who has not been seen since 1975, when he wandered away from his family's campsite at Chain of Ponds Public Reserve Land near Coburn Gore on the Quebec border. The state police serve as the National Center's designated statewide missing children's clearinghouse, Ouellette said. "They keep very good track of missing children," he said of the center. The National Center "actually has a better database than we do, simply because they enter everything in there and they periodically check to see if the children have been recovered," Ouellette said. The center's Web site includes profiles with photos, including age-progressed photos showing what missing children would look like at their chronological ages, he said. "When you only have three [missing children], it's three too many, but it's not a lot compared to more populated states, where it's really a much bigger problem," Ouellette said. "We have a one-person missing children unit," said Ouellette, who staffed it for five years. For the last three years, it has been staffed by Lt. Brian McDonough, commander of the criminal investigation division based in Gray. "We don't have the resources. We don't have the staffing [like in more populated states]. Connecticut and New York both have full- time investigators assigned to their [NCMEC missing children] clearinghouses," Ouellette said. Given their other duties, he and McDonough could devote only about 5 percent of a typical workweek to it, he estimated. Cold cases Ouellette said cold-case investigations on missing people sometimes remain stagnant for long periods. Though state police maintain ongoing investigations when it comes to missing children and adults they believe have met with foul play, current staffing levels do not allow police to devote much time to those involving adults missing under circumstances lacking a criminal element. "We do not have a special bureau or person who oversees that," McCausland said. "These cases remain open all the time, but they don't get a lot of publicity or a lot of attention because the lead detectives are working other cases," Ouellette said. Sometimes, however, cold-case investigations pick up again because of new leads, the discovery of human remains or some other break, such as in the case of Moulton. McCausland said Moulton last contacted her family in July 2006 and was reported missing that September. She lived in Lebanon at the time of her disappearance, but often stayed with friends and family in Sanford. Police aren't saying what new leads or evidence led them this week to the human remains they found at the bottom of a well in Lebanon. But police, who suspected foul play in her disappearance, believe the remains are those of Moulton. McCausland said Thursday that a positive identification of the remains and cause of death would not be available for several days. New technologies The advent of new technologies is helping to offset the shortage of police staffing. On the Internet, there are a growing number of sites devoted to finding missing people and solving cold cases. Some sites allow the public to report - and help solve - missing people cases. Also relatively new are the AMBER Alert and Code Adam systems. The AMBER Alert, which Ouellette noted has yet to be used in Maine, is an early warning system issued by law enforcement to notify broadcasters and state transportation officials when children are abducted. The AMBER Alerts interrupt regular programming and are broadcast on radio and television and highway signs and the Internet. They also can be issued on lottery tickets, wireless devices such as mobile phones, and over the Internet. Code Adam, which Ouellette says has been used in Maine, requires no police authorization. When a child goes missing in a public building, such as a store, an announcement is made over the public address system. The building is locked down and employees immediately canvas the store to look for the child and monitor all exits to ensure the child does not leave the building. If the child isn't found within 10 minutes or is seen with someone other than a parent or guardian, police are notified. Social networking sites and cell phones also can provide clues about the circumstances leading up to a disappearance, adds retired Massachusetts Police Chief Thomas Shamshak, who now runs a private investigation company based in Boston and Providence, R.I. The families of two missing Mainers, Jeremy Theodore Alex and Miguel Oliveras, hired Shamshak to help with their searches. Shamshak says the more exposure a missing person case gets, the better the chances are of solving it. "Otherwise, they go cold." Springer's case Chuck Springer, whose career as a long-distance truck driver spanned more than three decades, is a perplexing case. After leaving his Halls Corner Road home, family and friends speculate that he may have been headed toward the town hall in an attempt to have his driver's license reinstated. Chuck's sister, Joanne Grigoreas, who last year left her job and home in Massachusetts to be with her mother in Maine and since has been joined by her husband, said that during the weeks and months after Chuck's disappearance, the family theorized about his whereabouts. They speculated that he might have walked to Route 3 and gotten a ride, possibly with another trucker, and that he might even have gotten a job. But extensive ground and air searches, as well as his family's efforts to contact homeless shelters, hospitals and his trucker friends throughout the country, have failed to turn up any trace of Springer, a single man whose loves include music and classic cars. Ellie Springer said she remains heartsick that she and her oldest son had argued the day before he vanished. Chuck was angry and frustrated about having lost his driver's license because he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, while his then 88-year-old mother still had hers. Later that day, she avoided him over fear of another confrontation. "He knew he had a memory problem, but he didn't really acknowledge that it was getting to be what it was," she said. Grigoreas said at this point the family seeks closure. "That's an important part of it, really. We've pretty much come to the realization that there's a 90 percent chance he's no longer alive, but not knowing really is the very worst part," Grigoreas said. "We just want to get it finalized." That doesn't mean the family is just sitting waiting for news. "Some days we get up and we're full of ambition," Grigoreas said. "We'll do something to try to find him, contact Internet sites or send out mailings or something, and other days we tend to lose hope sometimes. You know, what good is it doing?" dgagnon@bangordailynews.net 990-8189 WHAT YOU SHOULD DO .... IF AN ADULT GOES MISSING: Double check with other family members, work, school, and friends that the person has not shown up as planned. Ensure the person is missing, not on vacation or on some other logical, planned absence. Determine if any of the missing person's personal belongings are missing. Check for a letter or note left by the missing person. Contact the local law enforcement agency to file a missing person report. Provide law enforcement with the needed personal information, namely the missing person's full name, age, date of birth, sex, race, hair and eye color, date last seen, last known location, known vehicle information, and recent photo. Ask if the agency would like DNA, fingerprints, dental or medical records of the missing person. Obtain the case number and request a copy of the missing person report from the investigating agency. Obtain the NIC number for the NCIC entry into Missing Persons File. Request the name direct telephone number of the detective or investigator assigned to the case. Notify the National Clearinghouse for Missing Adults at 800-690- FIND (800-690-3463). Create and circulate posters of the missing person except in locations prohibited by city codes. Do not list your personal contact information on a missing person poster. Check with local hospitals, jails and medical examiners. Notify the investigator of any tips or leads on your missing person. Notify the state and national clearinghouses when the missing person is located. Contact the local news media to help broadcast information about your missing person. Source: National Center for Missing Adults .... IF A CHILD GOES MISSING: If your child is missing from home, search the house checking closets, piles of laundry, in and under beds, inside large appliances and inside vehicles, including trunks - wherever a child may crawl or hide. If you still cannot find your child, immediately call your local law enforcement agency. If your child disappears in a store, notify the store manager or security office. Then immediately call your local law-enforcement agency. Many stores have a Code Adam plan of action - if a child is missing in the store, employees immediately mobilize to look for the missing child. When you call law enforcement, provide your child's name, date of birth, height, weight, and any other unique identifiers such as eyeglasses and braces. Tell them when you noticed that your child was missing and what clothing he or she was wearing. Ask that your child's name and identifying information be entered immediately into the National Crime Information Center Missing Person File. After you have reported your child missing to law enforcement, call the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children at 800- THE-LOST (800-843-5678). Source: National Center for Missing & Exploited Children ONLINE RESOURCES The following are some of the growing number of missing people resources currently available on the Internet: Maine Department of Public Safety missing persons page: www.maine.gov/dps/msp/criminalinvestigation/missingpersons.shtml National Center for Missing & Exploited Children: www.missingkids.com National Center for Missing Adults: www.theyaremissed.org North American Missing Persons Network: www.nampn.org FBI kidnapping and missing person investigations page: www.fbi.gov/wanted/kidnap/kidmiss.htm The Doe Network: www.doenetwork.org National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs): www.NamUS.gov Missing Children International: www.missingchildreninternational.org . Project Jason: www.projectjason.org Charley Project: www.charleyproject.org CUE Center for Missing Persons: www.ncmissingpersons.org ChildSeek Network: childseeknetwork.com Child Quest International: www.childquest.org Polly Klaas Foundation: www.pollyklaas.org PorchlightUSA for the Missing and Unidentified: http:// porchlightusamissing.1colony.com Missing persons cold case compilation for Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont: www.themissingandremembered.org |
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| tatertot | Sep 17 2010, 10:14 AM Post #6 |
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http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/r/ross_bernard.html![]()
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| monkalup | Feb 5 2012, 09:42 AM Post #7 |
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The Old Heifer! An oxymoron, of course.
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http://www.pressherald.com/news/memories-o...2012-02-05.html Memories of missing children The parents of Maine's vanished children say the passage of time – even decades – does little to ease their anguish or to address a need for closure. By BEN MCCANNA Morning Sentinel Claire Moulton is one of a handful of parents in Maine waiting for a missing child to come home. click image to enlarge Richard Moreau of Jay, whose daughter Kimberly vanished in 1986, still hangs fresh posters of her in Jay, clinging to hope that closure is possible someday. Michael G. Seamans/Morning Sentinel 20120201_Missing click image to enlarge Portland residents Claire and Lyman Moulton, holding a photo of their oldest daughter, Cathy Marie Moulton, at the age of 16, wonder “whether we’ll ever know what happened to her before we die,” Claire Moulton said. Cathy was last seen walking along Forest Avenue in Portland in the fall of 1971. Her parents are now in their 80s. Gordon Chibroski/Staff Photographer She has been waiting for more than 40 years. Moulton's daughter Cathy Marie Moulton was 16 years old when she was last seen on Sept. 24, 1971. Today, she would be 56. Every day, Moulton's mother is preoccupied with thoughts of her daughter. "You never forget," she said. "I mean, every day I pray that somehow, somewhere, we'll find her." There are six unsolved missing-children cases in Maine, according to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, a nonprofit group, and Maine State Police. Four of the children disappeared in the 1970s, one disappeared in the mid-1980s and Ayla Reynolds of Waterville disappeared seven weeks ago when she was 20 months old. Police have said they do not believe Ayla Reynolds was abducted, and that her father, Justin DiPietro, and others in the home the night she disappeared have not told investigators all they know about her disappearance. Divers again searched Messalonskee Stream on Friday, but police said they found no clues. A $30,000 reward has been offered for information in the case. Parents of three of the other missing children describe an unending ordeal that haunts their thoughts every day. Without closure, it's difficult to live a normal life, they said. "It's a nightmare," said Moulton. "We've been living with this for a long time now." Cathy is the oldest of the Moultons' three daughters. She was last seen walking along Forest Avenue in Portland, according to the Charley Project (www.charleyproject.org), an online database for missing-person cases. In the early days after her daughter's disappearance, Moulton developed a ritual. "Our house had a sun parlor on the front, and every day I used to go out in the parlor and look up and down the street expecting her to show up," Moulton recalled. "I just couldn't believe she wouldn't be coming home." The ritual persisted for decades, she said. "I kept doing it right up until a year ago when we moved. But I had not-as-high hopes in recent years," she said. Moulton and her husband still live in Portland. They are in their 80s. "At this point, we're concerned whether we'll ever know what happened to her before we die," she said. 'THE WORST THING IS NOT KNOWING' Devorah Goldburg, public relations senior manager at the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, said the parents of missing children struggle with the uncertainty. "It is very difficult," she said. "Parents tell us repeatedly that the worst thing is not knowing." Goldburg said the center never gives up hope of finding missing children. "No case is closed until we either find the child or learn with certainty what happened to the child," she said. "We work very hard to keep hope alive, and to remind communities that the child is still missing." Carol Ross said her hope wavers. In 1977, her son, Bernard Ross Jr., was 18 when he drove off in his aunt's pickup truck in Presque Isle. Ross was reportedly despondent when he left. The truck was later found, but Ross is still missing. Today, he would be 53. "I go from thinking he's out there somewhere -- maybe in a hospital or carrying on a new life," Carol Ross, 74, said. "Other times, I think he must be gone, because he would have called us." Ross and her husband, Bernard Ross Sr., 76, live in Portland. Recently, the Rosses got a glimpse of what their son might look like today after the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children developed an age-progressed image. The center combined the parents' and siblings' facial features with their son's high school senior portrait to show what a middle-aged version of Bernard Ross Jr. might look like. "It's still kind of strange to look at it," the father said. He added that news of missing children such as Ayla Reynolds stirs up old feelings. "It brings up some pain, some grief and hope for that child," he said. TWO YOUNG BOYS LOST In addition to Ayla Reynolds, there are two unsolved missing-children cases in Maine that involve small children. The two young boys vanished in the 1970s in separate incidents. On Sept. 1, 1975, Kurt Ronald Newton of Manchester vanished from Natanis Point Campground in Chain of Ponds in western Maine near the Quebec border. He was 4 at the time. Today, he would be 40. Kurt was last seen riding a Big Wheel tricycle near his parents' campsite, according to the Charley Project. Department of Public Safety spokesman Steve McCausland said efforts to find Kurt were historic in scope. "One of the largest searches of the decade was mounted up there to try to find him," he said. "All they found was his tricycle." After the search concluded, Kurt's parents mailed missing-child posters with Kurt's photo to every school district in the United States. His parents, Ronald and Jill Newton, declined to be interviewed. Douglas Charles Chapman was last seen playing in a sand pile outside his parents' home in Alfred on June 2, 1971. He was 3 at the time. Today, he would be 43. A search dog followed Douglas' scent from the home, "through a field, past an apple orchard onto a farm, and down the driveway to the main road," according to the Charley Project. The ensuing six-day search was one of the largest ever for a missing person in York County, according to a 1993 story by The Associated Press. It included about 3,000 volunteers, aircraft from the Navy and National Guard, and scuba divers. Officials even pumped local wells dry to look for the boy, the story reported. In 1993, the boy's father, Gary Chapman, successfuly pleaded with police to expand the investigation. He said police had been convinced Douglas had wandered off, died and would eventually be found, but Chapman wanted investigators to consider abduction. The boy's parents are divorced. His mother, Carole Allen, moved to New York, and his father to Waterboro. Neither could be reached for comment. Someone has answers, Allen said in 1993. "It doesn't make sense that a child should disappear and nobody saw anything," she said. In 2001, Chapman told the Hartford Courant that his son's disappearance was difficult for the community to accept. "People want to believe that these things don't happen and kids just don't disappear," he said. "Well, kids disappear way too often." McCausland said police still get tips on both missing boys. "We, from time to time, have received inquiries from people who either think they themselves could be Douglas or Kurt, or thought they recognized one of them," he said. "None of those leads have panned out." A FATHER'S LINGERING GRIEF Richard Moreau's daughter vanished nearly 26 years ago. Every day, he wonders what happened to her. Kimberly Ann Moreau was last seen in May 1986 in Jay when she climbed into a white Pontiac Trans Am driven by a man she had met earlier that day, according to the Charley Project. She was 17 at the time. Today, she would be 43. The driver of the car is considered a person of interest in the case, but he was never charged. Richard Moreau, 69, said he and his wife knew right away that something was wrong when their daughter wasn't home by dinnertime. The next morning, the Moreaus reported their daughter missing, but police didn't get involved for another 48 hours, he said. When they did, police said the girl had probably run away. Moreau and his wife didn't agree, so they performed their own investigation with the help of two family members. The Moreaus talked to people in the area, took statements and compiled a folder of evidence that they eventually turned over to detectives. "We could not rely on anyone else to get it done," he said. Four months later, state police took over the investigation, Moreau said. "They realized this was something more than just a child that ran away, and they listed her as exploited and endangered, which, as far as I know, is how she remains listed today," he said. Those initial years were difficult, Moreau said. Soon after Kimberly disappeared, Moreau and his wife concluded that their daughter was dead. Within a year, Kimberly's grandfather died from what Moreau described as heartbreak. A year later, Kimberly's mother died of cancer. "I had three years of what I classify as total hell," Moreau said. "Pardon my language, but that's the best way I know how to put it." A few years later, in 1991, Moreau took matters into his own hands again after he was encouraged by private investigators to spread awareness of his daughter's disappearance. Moreau began taping missing-child posters onto utility poles throughout the area, he said. Also, as a supervisor in the shipping department of International Paper Co., Moreau would insert missing posters into shipments. Those posters have been sent to cities in Asia, Europe and South America. "She's basically been around the world," he said of his daughter's image. Moreau estimates he has distributed more than 50,000 posters, and that number continues to climb. As recently as last month, Moreau was hanging new posters in Jay, he said. Whenever posters deteriorate because of bad weather, Moreau replaces them with fresh copies. Moreau said he hopes his daughter's remains will be found so she can be buried in the local cemetery next to her mother, grandmother and grandfather. He said he wants the opportunity to visit his daughter's grave and talk to her. He's imagined countless times what it would be like to have that kind of closure. "It would be like taking 10 tons off my shoulders," he said. "I'd be able to go to bed at night, lay down and get a full night's sleep without ever waking up. "I would be able to say, 'Darling, I know you're home, and I love you.'" Morning Sentinel Staff Writer Ben McCanna can be contacted at 861-9239 or at: bmccanna@centralmaine.com |
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Lauran "If you have a chance to accomplish something that will make things better for people coming behind you, and you don't do that, you are wasting your time on this earth." The late, great Roberto Clemente. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. | |
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| Ell | May 21 2016, 06:23 AM Post #8 |
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Heart of Gold
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A mysterious letter that was recently sent to a couple whose son disappeared in 1977 from Fort Kent has rekindled police interest in the 39-year-old case – and dredged up old emotions for his loved ones. Bernard “Bunny” Ross Jr. was 18 years old when he vanished May 12, 1977, after leaving the family’s home one morning in a state of distress, his parents said. He was suspected of stealing a vehicle, which was later found abandoned on a dirt road in Ashland. No one has heard from him since, and his parents, Carol, 78, and Bernard Ross Sr., 80, had to learn to live without knowing his fate. But any peace they might have found was disrupted when they received an unsigned letter a couple of months ago at their home on Munjoy Hill in Portland, police said. The author indicated that he or she knew about their son’s disappearance, referenced a previous story in the Kennebec Journal about missing persons that mentioned the Ross case, and then suggested that another story about Ross should appear in the Kennebec Journal. The Augusta-area newspaper is owned by MaineToday Media, which also publishes the Portland Press Herald. A police spokesman said he was not aware of any connection the Kennebec Journal might have to Ross’ disappearance. Maine State Police Lt. Troy Gardner of the major crimes unit in Houlton contacted the newspapers, hoping that a story might coax the letter’s author to contact police. Maine State Police Lt. Troy Gardner leaves the Portland home of the family of Bernard Ross, an 18-year-old who went missing in 1977. The family recently received an anonymous letter claiming knowledge of their son's fate. Maine State Police Lt. Troy Gardner leaves the Portland home of the family of Bernard Ross, an 18-year-old who went missing in 1977. The family recently received an anonymous letter claiming knowledge of their son’s fate. Derek Davis/Staff Photographer “I’ve never had anything like this happen in my career,” Gardner said. “Basically, all we’re doing is extending an olive branch, saying we want to make contact with this person. Of course, there’s no way of knowing whether the letter’s truthful or the information is accurate, but we are asking for whoever wrote the letter to please contact us.” Gardner declined to release the letter, describe what it said or explain what made police take the unusual step of contacting the newspapers to arrange for an interview with the missing man’s family. Gardner acknowledged that the letter could be an elaborate hoax, but added that even if it wasn’t, police wouldn’t release it to the public. “If there was details in the letter that we felt were important to the investigation, we wouldn’t release them,” he said. “That’s common sense. It protects the integrity of the investigative process.” Gardner arranged for an interview with Carol and Bernard Ross Sr. on Friday. The couple said they are reluctant to put themselves into the spotlight, but were willing to endure the pain of talking with reporters because they want to do what’s right for their son. The couple, who have been married for 60 years, said their other children are grown and have children of their own, but they still wonder what happened to their oldest son. Perhaps the most painful memories were the calls they received from police departments around the country trying to identify a body, putting them in the macabre position of hoping the deceased person was their son. “We’ve had several calls,” Carol Ross said. “You’d get your hopes up, but of course it would turn out to be someone else.” |
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Ell Only after the last tree has been cut down; Only after the last fish has been caught; Only after the last river has been poisoned; Only then will you realize that money cannot be eaten. | |
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9:27 AM Jul 11