WHERE ARE BRIANNA MAITLAND & MAURA MURRAY?

FOUR YEARS AND COUNTING...


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Where Are Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray?
Two Vanishings Spur Fears of Serial Killer on the Loose
By H.P. Albarelli Jr.

On a freezing cold March 19, 2004 night at 11:20 p.m., 17-year old Brianna Maitland clocked out of her job at the historic Black Lantern Inn in Montgomery Center, Vermont. Brianna had to get up early the next morning for her second job as a waitress in nearby St. Albans. Business at the Black Lantern had been bustling that night, and earlier that day Brianna had spent several hours shopping with her mother Kellie. She was tired, she told fellow workers, and could not stay for an after-closing dinner. Less than two hours later her car was spotted a mile from the inn backed into the clapboard siding of an abandoned, roadside farmhouse. The vehicle, with its headlights still on, was empty except for two un-cashed paychecks and personal items on the front seat. Brianna Maitland had vanished.

Five weeks earlier, and 90 miles south of Montgomery Center, on a cold, snowy February 9 evening at about 7:20 p.m., Maura Murray, a 21-year old University of Massachusetts student, collided her car into a snow bank on a sharp curve on Route 112 near Haverhill, New Hampshire. Within a few minutes, a school bus driven by Butch Atwood stopped alongside Maura's vehicle. Atwood, who told reporters he is a former police officer, asked Maura if she was okay and if she wanted him to alert local police. Maura, according to Atwood, said that she was fine and that she had already used her cell phone to call AAA for assistance. Still concerned, Atwood continued up the road to his house, only about 100 yards away, and, once inside, telephoned police to report the accident. About 10 minutes later, a Haverhill police officer, and then a New Hampshire State Police trooper, arrived on the scene. Maura Murray's car was empty and she had vanished.

The still unsolved disappearances of Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray have caused widespread feelings of insecurity among women throughout New Hampshire and Vermont, and have renewed fears that a serial killer may be on the loose. The vanishings have served to shatter the long-standing reputations of the two states as geographically safe and tranquil havens from the ills of urban America. Both disappearances have also created deep concerns about law enforcement response procedures, as well as friction between the families of both missing women and the New Hampshire and Vermont State Police departments.

Throughout the 1900s, Vermont and New Hampshire were at the top of the nation's list of states that were near-free from violent crimes and murder. Indeed, in the 1950s and early 1960s, Vermont experienced murder rates that were in the low single digits, sometimes escaping annual counts without any recorded killings. All that began to slowly but steadily change in the late 1960s and early 1970s. By the late-1970s and 1980s, murders doubled and tripled in the two states. In the 1990s, and after, violent crime and murders rose astronomically, and much of it was directed at young women.

During the years 1970 to 2004 nearly 30 women vanished in the tiny states of Vermont and New Hampshire. Of that number, 10 were eventually found, most having been brutally murdered. In total, 19 women remain unaccounted for between the two states. By most authoritative counts, there are over 60 unsolved homicides in Vermont and New Hampshire that occurred between the years 1970 and 2004.

Over the past several decades law enforcement authorities in both states have repeatedly claimed that the murdered and missing are the victims of a wide variety of causes including runaways, domestic violence, and crimes of passion and sexual predators. Law enforcement officials argue that there is no evidence a serial killer is on the loose, but many people take exception with this. These people point to the series of young women murdered in the two states during the 1970s and 1980s by a person the media dubbed the "Valley Killer." The Valley Killer, who has never been apprehended or identified, is responsible for attacking at least 7 women, and for murdering at least 6 women. Included in the Valley Killer�s death count are several young women, who physically resemble Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray.

With the recent disappearances of Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray, police continue to insist there are �no reasons to believe that a serial killer is on the loose.� Police maintain there is no reason to believe any of the unsolved cases are connected in any way. But many people remain skeptical of that claim. Says Brianna Maitland�s father, Bruce, "Just because there isn't any evidence is not a reason to close the door on that theory, or any other. If you look at the vital statistics on all of these missing women you'd see right away that most are startlingly similar. If none are related, then that means there are a good 100, or so, individual murderers out there roaming about free to do anything they want."

By all accounts, Brianna Alexandra Maitland was an extraordinary young woman. Beautiful beyond her years, creative, caring, and fiercely independent, she was the envy of many of the girls who knew her. Brianna was as good as any man at shooting skeet, riding a snow mobile or all-terrain-vehicle, and she could track a deer for miles through the woods. �She had a special charisma,� said Shauna LaCross, who was close to Brianna. �She looked good wearing anything, things nobody else could wear. She had great style and smarts to match, and she was the best friend anyone could ask for.� Numerous other friends and acquaintances of Brianna interviewed for this article had similar things to say about her. Said Hillary Hardy, a young businesswoman in Richford, Vermont who is six years older than Brianna, �All the girls around Brianna looked up to her and envied her. Everyone wanted to be like her. She had real style and a unique quality about her.� Said one of Brianna�s high school teachers, �She loved learning. It was refreshing to have her in class. She had a real thirst for knowledge.� At the time of her disappearance, Brianna was making plans to attend college part-time while working.

Brianna�s mother, Kellie Maitland, said that her daughter was a voracious reader, consuming every title by Homer, Anne Rice, Nicolas Sparks, Maya Angelou, Cormac McCarthy, and Margaret Atwood. �Besides books she loved the outdoors, music and dancing, and she was highly skilled in the martial art of Jiu-Jitsu, having taken several years of training� Kellie said. �She didn�t grow up with a television in the house, so she loved works of the imagination that held meaningful lessons about life.� Brianna�s aunt, Tammy Cox of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, who vigilantly maintains a website devoted to finding Brianna, said, �Brianna would always amaze me by quoting long sections from books she had read and then equate them to something pertinent happening in her life. She was very introspective about things.� Brianna, despite her uniqueness, never flaunted anything. Close friend LaBelle said, �She was a really generous person who would do anything to help a friend or stranger. She would always stand up for anyone who was picked on and she really cared about people who had very little or were downtrodden, even though her own parents had to work so hard to make ends meet.� Bruce Maitland said, �She was oblivious to all her talents and good qualities. She never showed any kind of conceit. She loved life and embraced every minute of it, good or bad, and was always there to help anyone that asked.�

Like countless teenagers in northern Vermont, Brianna found it difficult to avoid the countless drug dealers who have poured into the state from the nearby urban areas of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Connecticut to peddle crack cocaine and heroin. A large number of Vermont�s rural towns are seriously under-policed, many with no law enforcement of their own. In some Vermont towns it is not uncommon to hear citizen complaints about brazen dealers peddling their illicit wares in town squares, parks, and high school parking lots. In the last ten years there have been numerous reports of rampant heroin and cocaine addiction in several Vermont border towns fed by sophisticated underground pipelines maintained by the Hells Angels and Outlaw motorcycle clubs in nearby Montreal, Canada, only about 90 miles away. Reports about steady supplies of powerful, hydroponic marijuana supplied to Vermont and New Hampshire by dealers from northern New York Indian reservations are also commonplace.

Law enforcement officials in Vermont say that rural isolation and lack of out-of-school activities for teens is a strong contributing factor in the attraction to drugs. Said Vermont State Police investigator Lt. Brian H. Miller, an officer who sincerely cares about the youth of Vermont, �I think for some kids drugs serve as an escape mechanism from the drudgery and isolation of winter and living in a small town. When there is little to nothing to do a lot kids will take turns in the wrong directions.� One 15-year old high school student in Richford, Vermont vividly underscored Lt. Miller's comments by remarking, "Up here you have to go over 30 miles to see a movie, or drive 50 miles to see to a live band or dance to music. A lot of us don't have cars, or are too young to be able to legally drive. We don�t even have a skating rink in this town�. Drugs may be bad, but they make things a lot easier to take.�

Socio-economic factors also play a large role. Said Lt. Miller, �The area has a lot of generational poverty, and sections are economically depressed due to factory and business closings and the wealthier adjoining counties pushing less advantaged people out to live in this [Franklin County] area� People in Vermont are fiercely independent and due to this there can be a lack of community spirit, especially as people become more spread out and don�t know their neighbors. People are less likely to get involved in any meaningful way. There are also people who are truly working too hard to make ends meet and don�t have time to do much else�. [The] lack of spiritual roots is also a major factor, particularly among the youth.�

Reports about Brianna�s involvement with drugs are a source of debate. Early on in her disappearance on May 5, 2004, Vermont State Police Lt. Thomas Nelson publicly stated,
�We have looked at [the possibility that Brianna Maitland�s and Maura Murray�s disappearances are related] and talked with the New Hampshire State Police about both cases. We have not found anything that connects the cases in any way.� At the same time, Vermont State Police Capt. Bruce Lang, chief criminal investigator of the Criminal Investigation Bureau, said, �There is no serial killer on the loose in the area.� Asked how he could make that assumption, Lang says, �We are looking for good solid leads. We are not looking for frivolous or pointless information that will lead us on more wild goose chases in either one of these cases.�

On June 14, 2004 Vermont and New Hampshire law enforcement authorities held an unprecedented joint press conference to address rampant reports that a serial killer was operating between the two states and stalking young women. At the conference Vermont Lt. Nelson told reporters, �[Brianna] made unhealthy lifestyle choices in her life prior to her disappearance.� He added, without offering any evidence, �Brianna was involved in the drug communities in [Franklin County]. She allowed that world to become part of her world.� Capt. Lang also added that Brianna �owed someone money for drugs at the time of her disappearance.�

Many of Brianna�s friends, and her parents, take exception with Lt. Nelson�s and Capt. Lang�s statements. Said LaBelle, �Brianna didn�t do anything that nearly everybody her age in Franklin County didn�t do. You can�t go anywhere up here without running in to drugs. Parties, parking lots, dances, the bathrooms in the high schools.� Jillian Stout, a close friend of Brianna�s since elementary school and with whom Brianna was staying at the time of her disappearance, said, �Drugs are everywhere you look. It�s hard to get away from them. You can�t just hide in your house or room all the time.� Bruce Maitland said, �Nelson�s statement in my view was an exercise in character assassination. It was a calculated effort to paint my daughter out as a bad person that got what she deserved. It was an effort to draw the heat away from the police. It made me sick to hear it. No teenager deserves to be portrayed that way by a public servant, especially when they are missing and nobody knows the facts or their fate.�

Franklin County�s largest newspaper, the St. Albans Messenger, was quick to repeat Lt. Nelson�s and Capt. Lang�s comments without pursuit of any facts behind the allegations. Bruce and Kellie Maitland immediately objected to the characterization of their daughter, and, after nearly 12 months, the newspaper printed a retraction of the story. Explained the Messenger�s editor, who apologized in writing to the Maitlands, Capt. Lang eventually sent an e-mail to the newspaper that read: �I never said anything about confirming that Bri Maitland owed anyone drug money. I said we had been told that she may have owed someone drug money. That is a big difference.�

At the same press conference, Maura Murray�s father, Fred, was surprised to hear New Hampshire State Police Lt. John Scarinza state, �It was [Maura Murray�s] intention to leave. What�s also clear is she did not want to tell any of her family what her intentions were. And she did not tell any of her friends.� Lt. Scarinza further said that his department believed Maura was headed for an �unknown destination,� and after her accident �she may have accepted a ride to get there.�

�It does not matter why she left or if she told anybody about it,� said Fred Murray. �She had an accident and this presented her with a completely different set of circumstances, any other plans went out the window. I believe that my daughter would be home safe and sound right now if the police had not ignored the case until it was way too late. They would have known where she was heading if they had bothered to check the last phone call she made three hours before she left Amherst. I told the police where she was going two days after the accident but they didn�t check that either. The police failed to follow their own procedures and are now striving to prevent this from coming to light. Maura probably did get a ride with one or more of the area�s multitudinous sex offenders who law enforcement can�t catch because they waited too long to get started.�

Like Brianna Maitland, Maura Murray was a very attractive young woman filled with talent and promise. Maura, before enrolling in the nursing program at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, was a cadet for two years at the prestigious United States Military Academy at West Point in New York. In 2000, Maura graduated fourth in her high school class, and scored 1425 out of 1600 on her SAT tests. Promptly accepted at West Point, she spent nearly 2 years there majoring in Chemical Engineering before transferring to Massachusetts to study nursing. Maura possessed tremendous athletic abilities, excelling in running, basketball, softball, and soccer. She was also an avid hiker and camper. At the University of Massachusetts she was on the Dean�s List each semester. Like Brianna, Maura loved life and was naturally drawn to people. Maura, according to her family, was looking forward to her formal engagement to her boyfriend who was serving at the time of her disappearance as a United States Army officer in Okalahoma. She had already arranged for a summer job in an Oklahoma hospital to be close to her fianc�. A friend of Maura�s said, �Maura is person who gets along with everyone. She is outgoing and smart. She always makes you feel better if you are down, and always finds a way to make you laugh at any situation, no matter how bad it may seem.�

On the day she disappeared, Maura had suddenly departed the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. For unknown reasons, she told her college professors on February 7 she had to go home for a week to attend to a �family emergency.� There was no emergency, but family friends say that Maura was stressed by a full-load of classes and holding down two part-time jobs and may have only wanted to take a much-needed break. Also, earlier on the evening of February 5, Maura received a phone call that greatly upset her. The call remains a mystery.

On February 9, before she left the University, Maura performed a computer Mapquest search of the Berkshires and of Burlington, Vermont. She then withdrew $280 from an ATM and stopped to make purchases at an Amherst liquor store, where she spent about $35. Hours later Maura ran her car into a snow bank on a sharp and icy curve on New Hampshire�s Route 112, about a mile east of Swiftwater. The collision caused her air bags to deploy and a small spider web crack in her vehicle�s windshield. About 10 minutes after reportedly telling bus driver Butch Atwood that she needed no assistance, and two people had telephoned the police to report her accident, she vanished without a trace. Gone with Maura were her cell phone and credit and bank cards, which have not been used since.

The first Haverhill police officer on the scene of Maura�s accident, Sgt. Cecil Smith, said there were �no footprints� or any other markings in the snow or ground to show where Maura had gone. Ground and air searches were conducted for Maura beginning 2 days later. Family friends, her fianc�, and Her father, Fred Murray spent days covering the Haverhill area. According to Maura�s family, specially trained dogs used in the search followed her scent from her car to the beginning of bus driver Atwood�s driveway, about 100 yards away, before losing it.

Two months after Maura vanished, police announced that a witness had come forward with information that he had seen Maura 4-to-5 miles east of her accident scene. Coincidentally, that witness was a construction worker who happened to live very near bus driver Atwood. New Hampshire State Police investigators were initially excited about this lead, but nothing has been said of it in nearly 2 years. Maura�s case has been featured on Greta Van Sustern show, CNN, and the Montel Show, which also featured the Maitland case. Despite this coverage, and more, reportedly no useful leads came in to law enforcement investigators.

Today, outside of Haverhill, New Hampshire on Route 112 one can still see the numerous placards bearing Maura�s picture and the bold word �MISSING� that Fred Murray tacked up on every available spot. On some of the nearby trees and telephone poles people have left kind notes and flowers commemorating Maura. Reads one note, �God and perseverance will bring Maura back to us.�

Like the Maitland�s, Fred Murray has been aggressive in pursuing his daughter�s disappearance and in pushing the police to act more thoroughly in their investigation.
As in the Maitland case, this has on occasion led to friction between Maura�s family and law enforcement. Fred Murray became particularly upset when, for unexplained reasons, the Haverhill and New Hampshire State Police would not provide John Walsh of America�s Most Wanted television show a copy of their report on Maura�s case so that Walsh could feature Maura�s disappearance on his show. Since this incident, Fred has become increasingly frustrated with the lack of information shared with him.

Adding to Fred Murray�s frustration and desire for hard facts have been the flood of contradictory press reports and televised media features about Maura�s case. Especially confusing are reports concerning the moments immediately following the accident on Rt. 112, and exactly who saw exactly what. Fred Murray said that police have refused to tell him the identities of all the witnesses at the scene of the accident. Initial press reports had bus driver Atwood stopping his bus beside Maura�s car, then subsequent reports had him spotting her car from his home 100 yards away and rushing down on foot �to see if he could help.� Indeed, Atwood told one reporter, �She spun on the curve. She had no lights on, and it was a dark car�. I put my flashlight in the window. She was behind the airbag.� Other reports have Atwood as the only witness on the scene while others state quite clearly that there were multiple witnesses, yet none are identified by name. Other reports had Atwood telling reporters that he invited Maura to wait at his house, but she declined. A Caledonian Record article dated Feb. 27, 2004 reads: �Atwood said Murray didn�t appear intoxicated, despite police having said a witness indicated she had appeared to be impaired due to alcohol.� Another article speaks of a witness who happened onto the scene in a vehicle and spoke with Maura, but does not identify the witness. Fred Murray was also upset by a string of police statements that painted Maura as �suicidal� and �endangered and possibly suicidal.� Fred said that is simply not true, and that such reports originated in police reports to the media released 2 days after his daughter�s disappearance.

In late December 2005, Fred sued New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch, state Attorney General Kelley Ayotte, and New Hampshire State Police for the release of information tied to the investigation of Maura�s disappearance. Among the items Fred especially wanted were an inventory of items taken from his daughter�s car; a copy of Maura�s computer hard drive (Maura�s computer was taken from her university room by police); and a surveillance tape from the liquor store where Maura stopped on her way out of Amherst. New Hampshire law enforcement officials responded to the lawsuit by saying, �We have shared whatever information we feel we can share without jeopardizing the investigation.� A New Hampshire judge dismissed the lawsuit about a month later, and Fred filed an appeal, still pending, with the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

Five weeks after Maura�s accident and disappearance, on March 19, 2004, Brianna Maitland�s empty 1985 Oldsmobile 88 was found backed into the gray, weathered clapboards of an abandoned farmhouse in Montgomery, Vermont. The house, which sits on a gentle curve in Route 118, is locally known as the �old Dutchburn place.� In 1986, two elderly brothers, Myron and Harry Dutchburn, occupied the house. One night someone broke in to the house to rob it. Both brothers were brutally beaten close to death. Taken to the hospital, and then eventually to a nursing home, the two never returned to the property. Today, a sheet of plywood covers the hole punched into the side of the Dutchburn house by Brianna�s car. Affixed to the plywood are several handwritten messages. Reads one: �We miss you and love you Bri.� Says another, �Brianna, you were the best friend anyone could ask for.� The Dutchburn house rests on a small bluff overlooking an open field that borders the winding Trout River. Inevitably, winds whip across the field and blow the messages away, but more always appear.

Never before reported is that on March 20, less than 12 hours after her disappearance, Brianna�s abandoned car was spotted by a passing State Police officer on regular patrol in the area. The officer stopped to examine the vehicle, which had punched a hole in the farmhouse�s siding causing a heavy piece of plywood covering a window to fall on to the vehicle�s rear trunk. He opened its doors, saw two Black Lantern Inn paychecks made out to Brianna on the front seat, and reportedly picked several items up off the ground nearby and tossed them into the back seat. He noted the vehicle�s plate number in his notepad, took a photo of the scene, and then continued on his way reportedly thinking someone, perhaps a drunk driver, had abandoned the vehicle.

Three days later, Jillian Stout, a friend of Brianna�s since fourth grade, called Bruce and Kellie Maitland. At the time of her disappearance, Brianna had been staying with Jillian at her home in Sheldon, Vermont. Jillian asked if Brianna had come home, and the Maitlands quickly realized their daughter was unaccounted for. The Maitland�s immediately called the Vermont State Police to report Brianna missing. The police said they would put out post-haste an all-points-bulletin on Brianna�s car. When the Maitlands went to the local State Police barracks in St. Albans the next morning to fill out the necessary missing person forms, and to provide police a photo of their daughter, the patrol officer who had discovered Brianna�s car at the Dutchburn house days earlier happened to be there. He quickly recalled the abandoned vehicle at the Dutchburn house and opened his notepad and extracted a photo of Brianna�s car. He asked the Maitlands if the vehicle pictured was Brianna�s. Up until this time, the Maitlands knew nothing about their daughter�s car being discovered abandoned. Kellie Maitland looked at the photo and felt herself becoming sick. Bruce Maitland asked why they hadn�t been notified earlier about the car�s discovery. The officer explained that he was just returning from a long weekend off and that was why he has not contacted the Maitlands. �I didn�t understand why someone else with the police couldn�t have called us,� Bruce said. �The car was registered in my wife�s name. They could have easily called us long before we came in to report Bri missing.�

The Vermont State Police can't explain why the Maitlands had not been notified sooner of the vehicle�s discovery. Lt. Nelson later explained it was perhaps because the vehicle was on private property, and that it did not look like it had been involved in an accident. Nelson said people often leave their cars in such a way because �they had too much to drink." Nelson, who was also there at the time the Maitlands came in, told the couple that young people sometimes �go to Boston or some other place with friends and don�t tell their parents for days.� Bruce Maitland would later say, �I felt that Lt. Nelson�s two theories contradicted one another. If Bri had left her car because she was drunk how could she get to Boston? It�s a simple question, but it leaves a big hole in his reasoning that allows space for all kinds of theories that cannot not be investigated by them and treated in a professional manner. Because of this anything else they might say or do falls down like a house of cards.�

The Maitland�s told Nelson they doubted Brianna had done that. �She has two jobs,� Bruce said, �and besides, why would she leave her car behind?� They begged Nelson to launch a full-scale search for their daughter. Nelson replied, according to the Maitlands, that he would check things out and follow up with them. He told Bruce Maitland the patrol officer would meet him in a few hours at the Montgomery garage where Brianna�s car has been towed two days earlier at the request of the overseer of the Dutchburn property.

Bruce, accompanied by his son Waylon, drove to the garage, and the patrol officer arrived about an hour later. Bruce asked the officer if he had looked in the car�s trunk. The officer said he had, but when no keys for the vehicle could be found, the officer, according to the Maitlands, said he had not examined the trunk�s interior. Bruce and Waylon borrowed a crow bar from a mechanic in the garage and pried the truck open. Nothing was found inside except for a few personal items belonging to Brianna. �God help me,� said Bruce Maitland, �you can�t imagine how scared I was opening that lid.�

In the days following Brianna�s disappearance, Bruce and Kellie Maitland became increasingly frustrated about �the lack of aggressiveness� in the state police investigation. They knew, as do most Americans who watch television, that investigators in such cases initially zero in on family members, and thinking perhaps this was slowing the investigation down, they offered to take lie detector tests so that the police could focus on other theories. In their discussions with police, they constantly sensed that investigators suspected that Brianna might have run away. The Maitland�s kept pointing out that their daughter would not have gone off leaving two un-cashed paychecks, eye contacts, migraine medicine, and several new clothing outfits purchased along with Kellie the day of her disappearance. Bruce also argued that Brianna would not have gone anywhere leaving her car abandoned, a vehicle that had belonged to her deceased grandfather. �She loved that car,� Bruce said. �In many ways, it represented her freedom and sense of independence, and if you knew Bri you�d know that was her essence.� Still investigators moved too slowly in the Maitland�s estimation and they feared that Brianna�s trail was growing colder with each passing day. Bruce kept insisting on knowing why only uniformed officers and one inexperienced detective were assigned part-time to the case and not better skilled detectives. He became particularly upset when he learned that it took nearly nine days for the police to interview anyone at the Black lantern Inn. (The Vermont State Police say that the officer who first discovered Brianna�s abandoned car, with the paychecks on the front seat, did go to the Black Lantern that same day, but found it not yet open for business. The officer �was then drawn away from returning by other duties.�)

As Bruce pushed for action, some law enforcement officers grew irritated with his constant phone calls. According to a source who asked not to be identified for this story, one officer told others that �for every call he got from the Maitlands he would work all the less on the case.� As expected, law enforcement officials deny this, and say they were doing all that they could on the case. But there are reasons to think this was not entirely the truth. No fingerprints are on file for Brianna Maitland. For unexplained reasons, none were isolated from her vehicle that was impounded for months. Police waited months to request DNA samples from Bruce and Kellie Maitland. �Worst of all,� Kellie said, �they told us that people we were told had snatched or killed Brianna were in prison at the time of her disappearance, and now it seems that was not the case at all.� Eventually, the Maitlands developed a good rapport with the police, but not until lead investigators were changed and Lt. Brian Miller took the case over. Said Lt. Miller, �There were misunderstandings at the start of the case. There was some occasional miscommunication, and tempers in these situations can grow heated. Understandably, there was a lot of stress among everyone involved.�

Perhaps the most telling evidence of law enforcement mistakes made in the Maitland case, came recently from a January 12, 2006 Associated Press article concerning another woman reported missing in Vermont. Tina Fontaine disappeared in Vermont�s Northeast Kingdom town of Albany. Initial reports about Fontaine�s disappearance sent shock waves across Vermont and rumors were rampant that her disappearance was closely related to the Maitland case. Reads the AP article: �A 29-year old woman�s disappearance has prompted Vermont State Police to take a new and more intensive approach, assigning [eight] detectives to the search from the beginning�. The search marks a change from when Brianna Maitland disappeared two years ago� The state police have been criticized for being slow to involve detectives in Maitland�s disappearance.� (Fontaine was found murdered days later, and her boyfriend, who confessed to killing her, was arrested.)

One of the very first things the Maitlands and Vermont law enforcement officials gave strong consideration to in Brianna�s disappearance was an incident that took place 20 days earlier. On February 27, Brianna attended a party with a few of her friends. Also attending were many additional teens that Brianna didn�t know well. At the gathering, for reasons nobody still fully understands, a girl named Keallie Lacross attacked Brianna giving her two black eyes, facial cuts, and a concussion. Despite the ferocity of the attack, Brianna did not defend herself by using her Jiu-Jitsu skills. Crying and bleeding, Brianna ran from the party and began to walk to the home of nearby friends, where she called her father who quickly drove to pick her up. The next day, after going to the hospital for treatment, Brianna filed a formal complaint against her attacker with the police. The complaint, which was still pending at the time of her disappearance, was soon after dropped by the Franklin County District Attorney�s office, over the vehement objections of Brianna�s parents.

About the time the complaint was dropped, Vermont State Police, accompanied by U.S. Border Patrol and U.S. Fish and Wildlife agents, raided a rented house in Berkshire, Vermont, only about 10 miles away from Montgomery. The police were acting on a confidential tip that Brianna Maitland was being held against her will in the house, and that two notorious young men, Ryans and Jackson, may have played a role in Brianna�s disappearance. A search of the house revealed no signs of Brianna, but did turn up amounts of marijuana, cocaine, handguns, and drug paraphernalia. Police arrested the occupants of the house, Ramon L. Ryans, 28, of Queens, New York, Nathaniel Charles Jackson, of New York and North Carolina, Timothy Powell of Berkshire, and Stephanie A. Machia, 17, also of Berkshire. All of those arrested admitted to knowing Brianna, but maintained they did not know where she was or what had happened to her. After being arraigned and released pending trial without bond set, Jackson left the state of Vermont and Ryans left Franklin County and went to Burlington, Vermont, some 30 miles away, where he moved in to an apartment occupied by a 25-year old single mother named Ligia Rae Collins.

On July 4, 2004 around midnight, Ligia Collins, Gia to her friends, disappeared from her Burlington apartment. Ramon Ryans, according to several press reports at the time, was still living with Collins, and was the person who first reported her missing. Burlington police immediately launched an investigation into Collins� disappearance. On July 12, they attempted to apprehend a 52-year old man named Moses Robar who, while being pursued in his vehicle by officers, pulled over and shot himself in the head. Two days later, Robar died in the hospital and Ligia Collins was found murdered in the Green Mountain National Forest in Lincoln Gap, Vermont. About a week later, Burlington police arrested two additional people for Collins�s murder. In the confusion surrounding the investigation, and in subsequent media stories, Ramon Ryans� name was lost. Law enforcement officials said that he quietly slipped out of Vermont and returned to New York City. Within days of his leaving he was placed on Vermont�s 10 Most Wanted list.

Months later, on May 23, 2005, Ryans was arrested in New York City. Reportedly, his �drug lord� had turned him in, in return for $5,000. Ryans was brought back to Vermont to stand trial in St. Albans on the Berkshire bust. At about this same time, the Maitlands, who, assisted by Kellie Maitland�s sister, Tammy Cox, had set up a web site to garner leads to their daughter�s disappearance, received several tips about a man called �the Joker.� According to tips, the Joker, who police have identified as Jorge E. Soto, 26, of Springfield, Massachusetts was an associate of Ryans, whose street name was �Streets�, and Nathaniel Jackson, who went by the street handle �Low.� Soto, who sometimes lived in Richford, Vermont, 13 miles from Montgomery, reportedly had been bragging that he had killed Brianna. People in Richford said that Soto was notorious in their town for having killed a puppy at a party with his bare hands because its barking got on his nerves, and for bragging that he was �untouchable� to local law enforcement. When police questioned Soto about his boastings concerning Brianna he told them his claims were only bravado made up to make him �appear big and mean� in the eyes of those to whom he dealt drugs and to those who owed him money. After police had questioned him, Soto reportedly continued to tell people that he killed Brianna, and even told one group of teens he had buried her body in a St. Albans cornfield behind a house he occasionally occupied.

In early June 2005, a smug looking Ramon Ryans appeared in Vermont district court in St. Albans and pleaded guilty as charged to possession of cocaine and marijuana in the Berkshire bust. The judge in the case sentenced Ryans to 45 days to 1 1/2 years, with all time suspended but 45 days. The 45 were then completely erased by granting earned credit for time served. A St. Albans Messenger article on the case reads: �[Ryans] entered the courthouse wearing shackles and walked out the front door a man on probation�. The state amended the cocaine charges from a felony to a misdemeanor because Ryans spoke with Vermont State police Lt. Tom Nelson about [Brianna] Maitland�. Ryans also submitted to a polygraph test regarding Maitland�s disappearance [according to assistant state�s attorney Diane Wheeler].� Wheeler would not elaborate on the results at the time, but later told this writer �the results were inconclusive.� The media, police and Wheeler said nothing at the time about Ligia Collins� death.

Last month, Assistant District Attorney Wheeler told this writer that Ryans did offer state police investigators �information in the Maitland case that drew them away from false leads and put them on the right track with things.� She declined to elaborate on what that meant. Bruce Maitland said, �That�s fine, that�s good. If he put them on the right track where are they going? It�s been months and nothing seems to be happening. Police are telling me that they are no closer to solving the case then they were months ago.�

The Maitlands, who by the time of Ryans� sentencing had received numerous tips and information concerning the involvement of Ryans, Jackson, and Soto in their daughter�s disappearance, were shocked by the light punishment. �This guy made a mockery and a joke out of the police and the court system. From what I know, he gave the police nothing. He destroyed countless young lives in Vermont and by sending him back out on to the streets he�ll keep right on doing it,� said Bruce Maitland. The Maitlands were not the only ones angered at the sentence. Vermont State Representative Norman McAllister, by trade a full-time farmer who is widely known for his no-nonsense style, expressed his own outrage at the sentence, and raised questions about the approach to the case by the state police. On Ryans� sentence, McAllister said, �This kind of sentence sends all the wrong messages to all the wrong people. Vermont needs to get serious about crime and its rapidly spreading drug problem. We have heroin and cocaine everywhere in this state, and we have dealers pouring into our rural areas to sell drugs because of a lack of law enforcement and the laxity of the courts here. Every young person in the state is at risk. It�s an epidemic. It has to stop.� McAllister, who had known the Maitlands from the time that Brianna could barely walk, said, �My feeling is [the state police] kind of dropped the ball. Brianna�s parents feel like they�ve been left in the dark and short-changed by the system. I don�t feel that the state police are trained properly to handle missing persons cases. They seem hesitant to bring in the FBI and other professionals.�

Echoing Rep. McAllister�s sentiments was an editorial aired on local NBC affiliate WPTZ Channel 5 urging the Vermont and New Hampshire state police to stop wasting time �and to pick up the phone� and to call in the FBI.� Continued the editorial: �Police insist there is no connection between the disappearances because they can�t find a connection between the girls. Well, what if the connection is the killer?� To date, neither Vermont nor New Hampshire has called upon the FBI for any assistance, other than minor laboratory assistance.

In the last three months of 2005, and in early 2006, several significant events took place around the Maitland case, all of which police are still investigating. On October 31, 2005, Bruce and Kellie were jolted by news that a friend and former neighbor, Tom Patras, had been found murdered in his Montgomery, Vermont home, just a few miles away from where Brianna had disappeared. Patras, 47, was discovered dead along with Valerie Papillo, 36, a friend who had come to his home to have dinner. Patras had been shot in the head and Papillo had been severely beaten before being shot in the face. For about 48 hours rumors concerning the murders flew about Franklin County, and the state, that the killings were related to Brianna Maitland�s disappearance, but then the Vermont State Police quickly arrested a couple from Connecticut. James Richitelli, 51, and Elizabeth Gagne, 29, both reported to be heroin addicts, had traveled to Montgomery on October 30 to look for two men Richitelli had worked with years earlier at nearby Jay Peak Resort. The couple, according to police, were attempting to purchase drugs, and when they went to Patras� house and he told them he had none, he was murdered. Papillo arrived on the scene only moments later to have dinner with Patras and was murdered when she stumbled on to the crime scene. �I was shocked,� said Bruce Maitland. �It knocked me off my feet. Tom was a good neighbor. Brianna liked him a lot. She liked that he was so talented and smart. He was a good man.�

A week later, Bruce and Kellie received a confidential tip concerning a 32-year old Burlington man named Gerald T. Montgomery. The tipster told the Maitlands that Montgomery had been an associate of Ramon Ryans and Nathaniel Jackson. Bruce and Kellie were already well aware of Montgomery through the newspapers. Earlier, on March 8, 2005, Montgomery had raped, beaten and strangled to death a 31-year old University of Vermont graduate, Laura Winterbottom. The rape-murder, which had taken place in a vehicle on a Burlington street, caused many in Burlington to rally against sexual violence in that city. After his arrest, it was learned that Montgomery, who worked in a Burlington elementary school, was a convicted sex-offender in New York.

Then last December, the Maitlands received another confidential communication concerning a young St. Albans man who Brianna knew, and who reportedly had been closely associated with Ryans, Jackson, and Soto. The message revealed that the young man had �committed suicide� and left behind a handwritten note containing details about Brianna�s disappearance. Kellie and Bruce were particularly upset to soon learn in their pursuit of this information that the young man in question had died on October 8, the same day as Brianna�s birthday.

In mid-February of this year, Vermont State Police called the Maitlands to inform them that they had obtained a videotape of a woman who �resembled Brianna.� A surveillance camera in Caesars Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey had taken the tape. Police requested it from the casino after a Vermont man who had been gambling there reported he had seen �a woman there who looked like Brianna.� The quality of the tape is poor, the picture grainy and taken from a distance. The woman in question looks older than Brianna�s photos and does not have a nose ring, as Brianna wore. She is with a man who appears to be in his early 40s, perhaps older. Bruce and Kellie can�t positively identify the woman as Brianna and doubt very much that it is their daughter. �But we can�t discount anything. We would really like to know who it is so that we can move on with the investigation,� Bruce said. Jillian Stout, Brianna�s oldest and closest friend said, �Brianna would never go anywhere for two years and not call me or someone else close to her. She just isn�t like that. She was a good friend and she cared a lot about her friends. They were everything to her.�

At the June 2004 joint press conference, Fred Murray and Bruce Maitland met for the second time. After the reporters and cameras had departed, Murray and Maitland urged law enforcement officials to aggressively pursue the possibilities that their daughters had been the victims of a serial killer, or had been abducted for purposes of white slavery and forced prostitution. Bruce Maitland said some law enforcement officers have scoffed at the white slavery theory, but a quick examination of recent criminal activities in Vermont reveal that in 1999 and 2000 several young women in Burlington, Vermont were forced into prostitution in New York. Jose �Ritchie� Rodriguez, 25, a convicted felon who lived between Vermont and New York, was eventually arrested and charged with operating a prostitution ring and statutory rape. He was also a suspect in the death of a 16-year old girl, Christal Jean Jones, who at the time was a ward of Vermont�s Social and Rehabilitation Services agency. Jones was found dead in a New York apartment building that police there said was a notorious place of prostitution. New York law enforcement officials say that the city has an unknown but suspected high number of such places that offer the services of young girls ranging in age from 13 to 25 years old. A Burlington Free Press article related to the case detailed that men like Rodriguez come to Vermont to specifically target young women to be forced into prostitution situations. Such men sell heroin cheaply to the girls so that they become addicted, and then manipulate them into selling themselves for more heroin. Read the article: �The men are exotic, and the girls like that. Some local girls are especially attracted to men with black or brown skin, observers say.�

This month, and last month, marks the two-year anniversaries of the disappearances of Brianna Maitland and Maura Murray. Police seem no closer to solving either case than they did at the very beginning. A former FBI profiler, who declined to be identified for this article, and who was asked to review the facts contained in this article, said, �Based on the materials I�ve seen I would not rule out anything, including a serial killer in one or both cases, especially the Murray case. With all the media and Hollywood focus on these type killers they have become all the smarter and devious�. I also wouldn�t rule out that either state could see a reoccurrence of these events sometime soon.�

Dr. Maurice Godwin, a nationally recognized expert on serial killers, said last week, �In my expert opinion I believe that a local individual who has killed at least two times previously is responsible for Maura Murray's abduction and murder. Maura locked her car as if she anticipated on returning to the car once she found help. Her attack and murder was for a sexual assault and the murder was to do away with her as a witness. Yes, I believe a stranger serial killer is responsible for Maura Murray's disappearance.� Dr. Godwin said the facts so far presented in the Maitland case seemed to point to abduction or foul play committed by someone that Brianna most likely knew. Vermont State Police Lt. Brian Miller said, �We have taken no theories off the table. We give every lead and tip our most serious attention. This is a tough case, no doubt, but we will solve it.� A New Hampshire State Police spokesperson, who declined to discuss any details of the Maura Murray case, said, �We are doing everything possible to solve [Maura Murray�s] case.�

Fred Murray, who still routinely drives from his home in South Shore, Massachusetts to New Hampshire to search for his daughter, said, �Nobody knows how much I miss Maura. Nobody can imagine the hurt at not knowing where she is. It�s a hurt I wish upon no one. I will find my daughter.�

Last week, Bruce Maitland said, �You can�t imagine how much we miss and love Brianna. You can�t imagine how dark and empty our days and nights can be with not knowing where she is or what happened to her. No matter how long, or how much it takes, we will find her. We owe her that and so much more.� Said Kellie Maitland, �Inside I am always screaming in pain at not knowing where Brianna is.�


H.P. Albarelli Jr. is an investigative journalist who divides his time between Vermont, Florida, and London. He is the author of a novel, THE HEAP, published last year. He has written extensively on the Frank Olson case, the 9-11 anthrax attacks, and the CIA�s Cold War experiments. Albarelli is especially thankful to Bruce, Kellie, and Waylon Maitland; Fred Murray; Amber Lauren Smith; Tammy Ryea; Tammy Cox; Helena Murray; Danielle Hogan; Vermont State Police Lt. Brian Miller; Vermont Rep. Norman McAllister; and agents of the U.S. Border Patrol and U.S. Customs Service for investigative assistance in Vermont and New Hampshire on this article.

Anyone with useful information in the case of Brianna Maitland should contact: Lt. Brian Miller, Vermont State Police at 802-524-5993. On the Maura Murray case, please contact: Lt. Russ Conte, New Hampshire State Police at 603-271-2663. E-mail info about the Brianna Maitland case can also be sent to: tips@bringbrihome.org, and about the Maura Murray case to: Info2@mauramurray.com. Readers interested in learning more about the cases can go to: www.bringbrihome.org, and www.mauramurray.com.

LATEST BRIANNA MAITLAND ARTICLE, FEB. 2007...
Latest Maitland revelation another marker along a complicated, troubling path
Written by H.P. Albarelli Jr. & Jedd Kettler
(COUNTY COURIER, VERMONT, FEB.1, 2007)

Nearly three years ago, on March 19, 2004, at about 11:30 p.m., 17-year-old Brianna Maitland disappeared on her way home from work at a Black Lantern Inn in Montgomery.

Her light-green, 1985 Oldsmobile 88, with the headlights still on, was found one mile from the inn, backed into the clapboard side of the ramshackle farmhouse commonly referred to as the "old Dutchburn house." In 1986, two elderly brothers, Myron and Harry Dutchburn, had been severely beaten by an intruder who burglarized their home. The brothers, who were hospitalized and then placed in a nursing home, never returned to the house.

Never before reported by the Vermont media is that on March 20, less than 12 hours after her disappearance, Brianna's abandoned car was first spotted by a passing State Police trooper on regular patrol along Route 118. The officer stopped to examine the vehicle, which had punched a hole in the clapboard siding of the Dutchburn house, causing a heavy piece of plywood covering a window to fall on to the vehicle's rear trunk. The trooper opened the vehicle's unlocked doors, saw two Black Lantern Inn paychecks made out to Brianna Maitland on the front seat, and reportedly picked up several items off the ground nearby the vehicle, including a broken necklace, and tossed them into the vehicle's back seat. He noted the vehicle's license plate number in his notepad, took a photo of the scene, and then continued on his way, reportedly thinking someone, perhaps a drunk driver, had abandoned the vehicle.

Three days later, 17-year old Jillian Stout, a close friend of Brianna's since 4th grade, called Bruce and Kellie Maitland, Brianna's parents, at their Franklin home. At the time of her disappearance, Brianna had been staying with Jillian at Jillian's father's home in Sheldon. Worried about Brianna, Jillian asked the Maitlands if she had returned home, and the Maitlands quickly realized their daughter was unaccounted for.

Brianna's parents immediately called the Vermont State Police to report their daughter missing.

The police said they would put out post-haste an APB [all-points-bulletin] on Brianna's car. When the Maitlands went to the local State Police barracks in St. Albans the next morning to fill out the necessary missing-person forms, and to provide police a photo of their daughter, the patrol officer who had discovered Brianna's car at the Dutchburn house days earlier happened to be there. He quickly recalled the abandoned vehicle at the Dutchburn house, opened his notepad and extracted a photo. He asked the Maitlands if the vehicle pictured was Brianna's.

Up until this time, the Maitlands knew nothing about their daughter's car being discovered abandoned. Kellie Maitland looked at the photo and felt herself becoming sick. Bruce Maitland asked why they had not been notified earlier about the car's discovery. The officer explained that he was just returning from a long weekend off and that was why he had not contacted the Maitlands. "I didn't understand why someone else with the police couldn't have called us," Bruce said. "The car was registered in my wife's name."

After a series of additional snafus that stalled the investigation's start, law enforcement officials launched intensive efforts to locate Brianna. State police officers received "a good many tips" and conducted numerous interviews, bringing in "over 160 persons for personal interviews and interrogation," according to Vermont officials. At least three individuals were given polygraph examinations that were "inconclusive" with at least one revealing "deception." The first few months of State Police efforts included the participation of the FBI, and prolonged ground and air searches were conducted. Many of these searches included hundreds of volunteer citizens.

The first good lead
One of the earliest leads that came in to the State Police, less than a month after Brianna's disappearance, concerned a confidential tip that Brianna was in the basement of a Reservoir Road farmhouse in Berkshire, against her will. Police investigators, accompanied by U.S. Border Patrol and Vermont Fish and Game agents, quickly raided the rented house, about 15 minutes away from the Black Lantern Inn.

When police entered the farmhouse on April 15, 2004 they discovered several people inside, but following a thorough search of the house and property, found no signs of Brianna. During the search, however, police did discover various amounts of marijuana, cocaine, handguns, and drug paraphernalia.

State police arrested the occupants of the house, Ramon L. Ryans, 28, of Queens, N.Y.; Nathaniel Charles Jackson of New York and North Carolina; Timothy Powell of Berkshire; and Stephanie A. Machia, reportedly 17, also of Berkshire. At the time of the arrest, both Ryans and Jackson were fairly notorious among local residents in Richford and Enosburg for "hanging around public parks and school yards" and allegedly "selling crack cocaine." Some young teens and adults in the towns knew both men by their respective street names, "Street" and "Low." In addition to "Low," Jackson was also on occasion referred to as "Nasty."

All of those arrested at the Berkshire farmhouse admitted to knowing Brianna Maitland, but maintained they did not know where she was or what had happened to her. After being arraigned and, pending trial without bond set, the four were released. Jackson reportedly returned to a Richford apartment that he shared with several other individuals, and Ryans left for Burlington, some 50 miles away, where he lived in an apartment he shared on occasion with a 25-year old single mother of two, Ligia Rae Collins.

Disappearance & murder in Burlington
About two months later, on July 4, 2004, around midnight, Ligia Collins, "Gia" to her friends, disappeared from her Burlington apartment. Ramon Ryans, according to police affidavits, was still living with Collins, and was the person who first reported her missing to police.

On July 6, a Burlington detective, Shawn P. Burke, responding to Ryans' report, visited Collins' apartment on St. Paul Street, and interviewed Ryans, who was there with Machia of Berkshire. According to Burke's affidavit, Machia told the detective she was a "babysitter" for Collins' two young children. Ryans told Det. Burke that a woman, Ellen Ducharme, owed Collins "a couple hundred dollars or something like that," and that Collins had received a telephone call from Ducharme at around midnight on July 4 and was told she "had the money (Collins was owed)." Collins, according to Ryans, told him she was going to Ducharme's apartment "to pick it up."

Ryans told Burke he woke up at about 4 a.m. and discovered Collins had not returned home and assumed that she had stayed at Ducharme's apartment. He said he never saw or heard from Collins again, and at about 2 p.m. that same day, he reported Collins missing to the police.

Det. Burke also interviewed Machia at the same time. Machia, who advised Burke she was born Aug. 1, 1984, told Burke she had babysat Collins' children overnight, July 2-3, and that on July 5 she learned from Ryans that Collins was missing. Det. Burke noted that Machia referred to Ryans as "Street," rather than by his legal name. Burke later wrote in his affidavit, "I asked Ramon what his street name was and he laughed, looked at the ground, and then pointed at me. I asked Ramon if he did not understand my question to which he laughed and said, 'I got no street name.'"

Det. Burke, later that same day, attempted to contact Ellen Ducharme at a hotel she worked at in Colchester, Handy's Extended Stay Suites. The manager at the suites told the detective that Ducharme had "resigned the previous week" after being suspected of "stealing payroll checks from a guest of the hotel." The manager told the detective that Collins had cashed the stolen checks.

After further intensive investigation, Det. Burke eventually met with Ellen Ducharme at the headquarters of the Burlington Police Department. Ducharme told Burke that she had long known Collins and that both Collins and her "boyfriend (Ryans)" often sold her crack cocaine. Ducharme told Det. Burke, according to his report, "she only knows Collins' boyfriend as 'Lyle' or 'Homie.'" Ducharme additionally told Burke that she had no idea where Collins was or what had happened to her, but did relate an earlier incident in which Collins had come to her house on July 4 at about 2 a.m. to sell her "one gram of crack cocaine."

Ducharme went on to tell the detective that while Collins was at her apartment her boyfriend [Ryans] called her on her cell phone and began screaming at Collins "to make the next delivery." Wrote the detective later in his report, "I questioned Ducharme about her relationship with Collins and the male she refers to as 'Homie' who I know to be Ryans. Ducharme only describes Ryans as a black male in his mid-twenties who is in Vermont selling crack cocaine."

Det. Burke's affidavit continues: "Ducharme advised that she has purchased crack cocaine from Collins and Ryans on countless occasions over the past two months. [She] advised that she spent hundreds of dollars on crack cocaine from both Collins and Ryans. Ducharme also advised that she has purchased crack cocaine from a white girl she only knows as Stephanie who is a friend of Collins.' Ducharme's description of Stephanie is consistent with the person I identified as Stephanie Machia."

Machia entered the Franklin County Court Diversion program after entering a plea and making a deal with the state, following the April 2004 Berkshire raid, the Franklin County State's Attorney's office revealed last year.

After interviewing Ducharme, Det. Burke met the following day with Ducharme's boyfriend, 52-year old Moses Robar. Robar, who had been jailed for domestic assault against Ducharme on July 3, 2004, and had been ordered by the court as a pre-trial condition to stay away from Ducharme, told Burke he had been with Ducharme on July 6 and 7. Both Robar and Ducharme claimed that during that time they traveled to Maine to go to a racetrack and attempt to make up with one another, a claim that further investigation proved to be untrue. Robar told the Burlington detective he knew nothing about where Collins was or what had happened to her.

The next day Burlington police executed a search warrant at Ligia Collins' and Ramon Ryans apartment on St. Paul Street. Investigators found Ryans in the apartment. They also found "a .22 caliber pistol, $600 in cash, and a scale typically used to weigh controlled substances, and a small amount of marijuana," according to a police report. Ryans told investigators that at the time, he and Collins had nothing to do with the sale of illegal drugs.

On July 12, 2004, Burlington detectives went to the Milton home of Moses Robar's father and brother. Moses was not home at the time, but police seized "some of Moses clothing, which had blood on them."

Later that day, at about 7:30 p.m., police investigators spotted Moses Robar in his vehicle in Burlington. When they attempted to stop Robar and approached his white 1992 Chevrolet truck, he raised a gun to his head and shot himself. He was rushed to the hospital, and was pronounced dead two days later; the cause of death was a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The Maitland/Collins connection
The investigation into Collins' disappearance continued for almost another week, drawing in several additional suspects and possible witnesses. On July 13, 2004, Burlington detective Arthur Cyr and FBI Special Agent Jody Corbett met with Ellen Ducharme at the Chittenden County Correctional Facility, where she was being held as a suspect in the Collins case. The County Courier has exclusively learned from confidential sources that they were there to specifically question her about possible involvement in the disappearance of Brianna Maitland. Reportedly, minutes into their questioning regarding Brianna Maitland, Ducharme broke down and confessed to the murder of Ligia Collins. Ducharme gave the two law enforcement officers a statement, which was not tape recorded, that she had known Collins for about six years and that since March 2004, the same month Maitland disappeared, she had been purchasing cocaine from Collins and Ryans. Ducharme further stated that she had tried to stop doing drugs, but that Ryans and Collins had "pushed it on her."

In a later police statement, it was reported that Ducharme told the two law enforcement officers that "her house was broken into recently and that Moses' (Robar) gun was stolen. Ducharme advised that Moses accused her of selling his gun for crack cocaine. Ducharme advised that Collins arrived at her house on 'July 4' and that she had Moses' gun. Ducharme advised that she asked Collins if Collins had broken into her house to which Collins replied, 'Don't worry about it.' Ducharme advised that Collins continued to walk into the kitchen and at this time Ducharme took (a baseball bat) and hit Collins in the back of the head." Ducharme continued her statement and told the two police officers that she hit Collins several more times with the bat and that "Collins fought back." She explained that there was "blood all over the place" and that finally she pushed Collins down her cellar stairs. Ducharme reportedly said that Robar was in her living room when all this occurred and that he "laughed" and told her that Collins "was not her friend because Collins sold her cocaine." Ducharme said she was in a "rage" and "so high" on cocaine at the time.

After killing Collins, Ducharme told investigators that she called a friend to come over to help her and Robar dispose of Collins' body. The friend, Timothy Crews, eventually came to her apartment, and he and Robar, according to Ducharme, drove Collins' body to Lincoln Gap, where they dumped it near a deer camp that both men had used in the Green Mountain National Forest. Crews lived near Ducharme, and had previously been imprisoned for murder.

The connection deepens
In the confusion surrounding the Collins investigation, Ramon Ryans' name was only mentioned once in any media accounts, early on when Ryans was cited in a brief news account as having been the person to report Collins missing. Law enforcement officials in Burlington said that after the arrest of Ellen Ducharme for Collins' murder, Ryans quietly slipped out of Vermont and returned to New York City. Within weeks of his leaving, Ryans was placed on Vermont's 10 Most Wanted list because he failed to show up for the St. Albans court hearing on the Berkshire raid.

Months later, on May 23, 2005, Ryans was arrested in New York City. Reportedly, his "drug lord" had turned him in to law enforcement authorities in return for $5,000. Ryans was brought back to Vermont by U.S. Marshals and State Police detectives to stand trial in St. Albans for his Berkshire arrest.

At about this same time, the Maitlands, who, assisted by Kellie Maitland's sister, Tammy Cox, had set up a web site to garner leads to their daughter's disappearance, received several tips about a man called "the Joker." According to tips, the Joker, whom police have identified as Jorge E. Soto, 26, of Springfield, Mass., was an associate of Ramon Ryans and Nathaniel Jackson, as well as several other known drug dealers in Richford, Enosburg, and St. Albans. Soto, who sometimes lived in Richford, reportedly had been bragging that he had killed Brianna. People in Richford said that Soto was notorious in town for having killed a puppy by strangulation at a party because its barking got on his nerves.

When police questioned Soto about his boastings concerning Brianna, he told them his claims were only bravado, made up to make him "appear big and mean" in the eyes of those to whom he dealt drugs and to those who owed him money. After police had questioned him, Soto reportedly continued to tell people that he killed Brianna, and even told one group of teens he had buried her body in a St. Albans cornfield behind a Lake Street house he occasionally occupied.

In early June 2005, Ryans appeared in Vermont district court in St. Albans and pleaded guilty as charged to possession of cocaine and marijuana in the Berkshire bust. The judge in the case sentenced Ryans to 45 days to 18 months, with all time suspended but 45 days. The 45 were then completely erased by granting earned credit for time served.

According to published reports, Ryans' felony cocaine charges were amended to misdemeanors after speaking with Vermont State Police Lt. Tom Nelson about Brianna Maitland. Ryans also took a polygraph test concerning her disappearance.

At that time, Assistant State's Attorney Diane Wheeler wouldn't elaborate on the results of that test, but later revealed to an independent reporter, "the results were inconclusive." Others have said that Ryans' test also revealed "deception." The local media, police and Wheeler said nothing at the time about Ligia Collins' death. Some Burlington law enforcement officials expressed doubt that officials in St. Albans were aware of any connections with Ryans, Collins, and their associates.

The Maitlands, who by the time of Ryans' sentencing had received numerous tips and information concerning the involvement of Ryans and Jackson in their daughter's disappearance, were shocked by Ryans' light punishment. "This guy made a mockery and a joke out of the police and the court system," said Bruce Maitland. "From what I know, he gave the police nothing. Absolutely nothing. He destroyed countless young lives in Vermont, and by sending him back out on to the streets, he'll keep right on doing it." Reports have it that once he walked out of the St. Albans courthouse, Ryans once again headed to New York.

The Maitlands were not the only ones angered at the sentence. Vermont State Rep. Norman McAllister, by trade a full-time farmer who is widely known for his no-nonsense style, expressed his own outrage at the sentence. On Ryans' sentence, McAllister said, "This kind of sentence sends all the wrong messages to all the wrong people. Vermont needs to get serious about crime and its rapidly spreading drug problem. We have heroin and cocaine everywhere in this state, and we have dealers pouring into our rural areas to sell drugs because of a lack of law enforcement and the laxity of the courts here. Every young person in the state is at risk. It's an epidemic. It simply has to stop."

This week, Vermont State Police Det. Lt. Glenn Hall declined to comment on Ryans' current status in regards to the investigation, except to say, "He was somebody that has been interviewed. His name came up along with many others."

Nearly a year ago, St. Albans Assistant District Attorney Wheeler told an independent journalist that Ryans did offer state police investigators "information in the Maitland case that drew them away from false leads and put them on the right track with things." She declined to elaborate on what that meant. Bruce Maitland, at the time, said, "That's fine, that's good. If he put them on the right track, where are they going? It's been months and nothing seems to be happening. Police are telling me that they are no closer to solving the case than they were months ago."

Defending the investigation
Hall and Wheeler, speaking this week, defended the police investigation, saying investigators have been diligent in following the many leads they have received in the case, and that information from many different departments has been shared with St. Albans police soon after being received.

Hall also said he believes other police departments and investigative units throughout the state have been and will continue to be forthcoming with any information relevant to the Maitland investigation. In particular, Hall said, they have been in contact with the Burlington Police Department a number of times, inlcuding when Gorton's claims were recorded by police there.

"We're in contact with them," Hall said. "This is a small state. They're well aware of this case. I'm very confident that if they get any information they pass it along to us."

Wheeler said that while information coordination between departments around the state can run into snags, the Maitland investigation has not hit such obstacles.

"Not in the Maitland case at all," she said.

The high-profile nature of the case has ensured that officers from around the state are aware of it and, from roadside stops to anonymous tips, she believes the information has been forwarded quickly to investigators assigned to the case.

Wheeler added that investigators in the Maitland case have included a number of agencies in the investigation, including a Federal Bureau of Investigations officer who attends formal meetings on the case.

"They've engaged so many agencies," she said. As in other high profile cases, small details are examined and collected, and they do make an effort to see the tips they've received with "fresh eyes," she said.

Many have expressed frustration with progress in the investigation, though. And fear that such pieces of information have not been vigorously investigated have led Bruce and Kellie Maitland to take steps of their own

A P.I. is hired
Months ago, Brianna's parents, Bruce and Kellie Maitland, reluctantly decided to hire a private investigator to pursue a number of leads concerning Brianna's disappearance because they felt "law enforcement was not aggressively" following up on some of the leads they had received.

State Police officials vigorously deny this and say in their defense that the Maitlands don't understand that "not everything can be shared or discussed" with family members "in such a sensitive investigation."

Said Bruce Maitland: "We really didn't have the money to hire anyone, and if Greg hadn't called us out of the blue, I'm not sure how we would have found anybody."

"Greg" is Greg Overacker, a 39-year old private detective who works for Eastern Private Detectives in Mohawk, N.Y. Overacker has also worked as a bounty hunter, process server, and private security agent to celebrities, and bail bondsman all over the United States. While working in Northern New York on a case on Father's Day in early 2006 he saw a "Missing" poster for Brianna. Overacker "became haunted by her face."

"I eventually called the Maitlands," Overacker said, "because I felt that I just had to do something." Overacker agreed to dig into the case in return for telephone and mileage expenses only. Last summer he made a trip to Vermont and spent nearly a week interviewing people in Richford, Montgomery, Enosburg, St. Albans and Burlington. "Two days into my meetings with various people," Overacker said, "I knew and understood how deep and convoluted this case was going to be. It seemed that lots of people were involved in aspects of the case and that there was somewhat of a conspiracy of silence about certain events."

One of those events that kept repeatedly coming out in his interviews concerned a late-night party in Richford the night Brianna disappeared.

Overacker said, "The party report which kept coming up had Brianna in attendance and had something horrible happening to her at the party. Some people claimed she was killed at the party, others said she over-dosed, others said she was deliberately over-dosed."

Several reports that Overacker heard had Brianna's body disposed of "on a farm somewhere in Franklin County." Said Overacker: "The reports for the most part were very gruesome. When I was able to sit down with (an independent journalist) and compare notes, I knew there had to be a strong element of truth to the reports. I spent a few days with (him) in Richford, and we met with more people all over the county and then I was really convinced, but still things were cloudy in some ways."

Things remained somewhat cloudy until Overacker called a couple in Enosburg last month to confirm a few basic facts about Brianna. The couple, who requested anonymity, told Overacker about a possible statement that had been given to Burlington police "months ago" concerning Brianna's alleged murder.

A horrific turn
Last week the Maitland case took a horrific and brutal turn after Overacker and an independent journalist finally located a copy of the statement. New and shocking information contained in that document, and others, is now drawing a reinvigorated and intensive focus to the case. That information, obtained exclusively by the County Courier, has also greatly heightened concerns about the rampant rise in illicit drugs sales and violence in Franklin County, as well as statewide.

The bulk of the new information is contained in a notarized affidavit from March 2006, signed by a uniformed Burlington police officer, consisting of an accusation by Debbie Gorton that Maitland had been killed and her body disposed of shortly after her disappearance.

Wheeler this week declined to comment on the document or Gorton's accusations or its effect on the case. She also declined to comment on any changes in the Maitland investigation, except to say, "Just like many cases, this case is dynamic ... so certainly there have been changes in the last six months. But every case has those dynamics."

The affidavit was produced shortly after the officer assisted the Colchester Police in March 2006 "with an investigation that (led) them" to a home occupied by Debbie Gorton and her three children. The investigation, according to the affidavit, led to one of Gorton's sons being arrested. While police were in the process of arresting her son, reads the affidavit, Gorton "became outraged and began shouting at the officers that she would not testify against her sister, Ellen Ducharme, in the upcoming Ligia Collins murder trial, if police took her son."

The affidavit continues: "In a fit of rage, [Gorton] also shouted some things about Brianna Maitland, the subject of a high profile missing persons case in Vermont. After the police left the residence, I asked to speak to Debbie in private, and she agreed ... I digitally recorded our conversation."

Gorton then told the officer "that as a parent, she would want Brianna's body found, but insisted that no one would find it. [She] said she received all of her information about Brianna from her sister, Ellen Ducharme, who is currently incarcerated. Ellen allegedly told Debbie that Moses Robar�Timothy Crews, and Ramon Ryans killed Brianna. She said they took Brianna's body to a farm and cut her up into pieces. They transported her body in a truck to the farm�. Debbie said this happened about one week after Brianna went missing. She said that Brianna's body was in Ellen's basement at one point, according to Ellen�. Ellen told Debbie that Ramon was the person who killed Brianna. Debbie then commented that she never told Detective Burke about Brianna because Ellen told her about Brianna after Detective Burke interviewed her. Debbie further commented that this was the first time she had spoken to a police officer about what she knew of Brianna. She was not sure if Ellen disclosed this information to police."

The two-page affidavit concludes: "Ellen knew Ramon through Ligia Collins because Ramon supplied Ligia with drugs and was also her boyfriend. Debbie said that Ellen told her the information about Brianna after Detective Burke questioned Debbie about the deaths of [name withheld] and Ligia Collins�. Debbie said Ellen was present when Brianna was killed and witnessed her killing�. Debbie speculated�that was why Moses Robar killed himself� Debbie swore to the truthfulness of her statement �"

Det. Lt. Hall this week said this statement, like so many other tips, remains unsubstantiated, despite efforts to corroborate its claims.

"It would be easy to look at this and say it could be something. And that's our job to figure that out ... When we get information, we've got to look at it, we've got to decipher the truthfulness of this. We haven't been able to substantiate any of this ... It's one piece of many that have come in and will continue to come in."

H.P. Albarelli is an independent, investigative journalist who has performed investigative work for the federal government and whose articles have been published in books, magazines, and newspapers across the country, and on the Internet. Albarelli lives in Richford and is at work on a non-fiction book entitled "Green Mountain Gothic."