Missing Michaela
Michaela Joy Garecht
Kidnapped November 19, 1988
Forever in our hearts
P.O. Box 55844
Hayward, CA 94540
ph: (510) 995-7085
missingm
The Investigation
The search for Michaela is NOT a "cold case"
November 8, 2009
In just a couple of weeks, we will pass the 21st anniversary of Michaela's kidnapping. Usually cases that have gone unsolved this long are called "cold cases." I guess that term means a lot of things. It means that the trail of evidence has grown cold, that new information isn't at hand, and generally that the case isn't being actively worked by the investigating agency.
In Michaela's case none of those things are true. Because of possible connections between the cases, Michaela has been catapulted into international attention in the aftermath of the recovery of Jaycee Lee Dugard, who was found alive eighteen years after her kidnapping. We didn't wake up the day after Jaycee was found, however, and say, "Hey, let's start looking for Michaela again." We were actively searching for her well before that day. The Hayward Police Department was working on the case and pursuing leads. I was running this website and a couple of social networking sites, writing about Michaela, and just generally trying to get the word out, to keep her alive in the hearts of the public, and to keep reaching out in the hope that she would see that we are still looking for her.
As of this date, the investigation into a possible connection to the Garridos continues. There are several other promising leads which are also being pursued. Investigators have an astrounding amount of information on this case. In fact, that has always been a part of the challenge on this case. Investigators are still looking for that piece of information that will narrow it down, pinpoint the destination. Most of all, we are looking for information which will help us to find Michaela.
The following entries have been written at various points since the inception of this website. I am leaving them up just to provide background and perspective.
Sharon Murch
Michaela's mom
Where is Michaela?
For many years, I thought it was impossible that Michaela could still be alive. I know that part of the reason for this is that there is really nothing more difficult that imagining your child suffering, with nothing you can do about it. As time went by, it became far easier to think of her in a place where there is no sorrow, there are no tears, where I knew we would meet again. But the truth is that I also thought it was impossible for a child as intelligent as Michaela to have not found a way to contact us in the many years in which she has been gone.
Then a couple of years ago, I received a tip about a young woman in another state, who had partial amnesia regarding the early years of her life, but who had recently discovered that her name was supposed to be pronounced "Ma-kay-la." I really thought this was it. I really believed that Michaela was alive, and that she was going to come home.
That lead did not turn out to be my daughter, but it did open my eyes to the fact that it IS possible that she is still alive. It is possible that she could be suffering from partial or total amnesia, whether induced by injury or trauma. Someone else also pointed out that many kids who run away end up feeling so ashamed of the way they have been living that they are afraid to go home. They are afraid that they will no longer be loved because of who they have become, and what they have done. However difficult it is for me to imagine that Michaela could ever doubt my love for her, I had to admit that this could well be true for a child who has grown up in an environment of abuse and degradation at the hands of her abductor.
The scenario most likely to be associated with the possibility that Michaela is still alive is if she is in another country. As an adult, I had to find the instructions every time I wanted to call my aunt in England. For a child, being in a strange country, not even able to speak the language, it would be impossible to figure out how to use a phone to call home or get help. By the time she might be able to figure it out, she would have been there long enough to have been thoroughly brainwashed. Even intelligent adults can be subject to brainwashing by their captors over a period of time. I have been given to fantasies, as the U.S. military goes into various countries in the middle east, that a young woman will approach a soldier, looking out at him through big, blue eyes, and will ask, "Can you help me find my way home?"
It is the possibility that Michaela may still be alive that drives my desire to solve this case. I have come to realize that there are many things I could learn about my daughter's fate that I would really rather not know. As it is right now, I can let the worst thoughts pass through my mind. I can think, no, that couldn't possibly have happened to my daughter. But if I knew, if I had pictures painted in my head of exactly what happened to Michaela, they would haunt me, they would torture me. And yet I would know with a certainty that Michaela is safe now, she is at peace. I would know that she has not spent her entire life in an environment of abuse and degradation.
Those are words, I know, words that get tossed around, and we know what they mean, but do we really feel them? Michaela was my little girl, and I devoted my life to making her feel loved, secure. How could somebody come along and in an instant take that away from her? As much as the questions of what happened to her, where she is, who is responsible, these are the deeper questions that have driven me off the deep edge over the years: HOW could this have happened to my daughter? WHY did God allow this evil person to kidnap her?
Comments: Jaycee Connection?
Jaycee Dugard was found alive, 18 years after she was kidnapped. There are a number of things that could connect Jaycee's and Michaela's cases. The kidnappings (and the recovery) occurred in the same general area. The girls were the same age, and looked very similar to one another. The mode of abduction is similar (being dragged into a car), and the car is similar. When I heard Jaycee was found, I will admit that I hoped that Michaela had been with her the whole time. Yet we've heard of no other girls at the kidnapper's home besides Jaycee and her daughters. Or have we? The following is taken from my blog (www.thewonderingheart.blogspot.com), regarding possible connections between Jaycee and Michaela. If the information I am working with is true, there are many questions yet to be answered.
We have all heard about the neighbor who called authorities several years ago about what was going on in Garrido's back yard. In this interview with the woman who called, she said there were several girls and young women in his back yard. Not just three, but several. They came and went, she said, but there was a core group that consisted of FIVE GIRLS.Two were very young, maybe four she said, and one was around 11, one around 15, and one about 25.
So that core group consisted of at least two girls in addition to Jaycee and her two daughters. This was a few years ago, so Jaycee's daughters would have been younger. I don't know whether they would have passed for four year olds, but probably wouldn't have appeared to be fifteen year olds. At that time, the girls would have been 7 and 11, and might the 7-year old have looked like a younger child? As for the 15-year old, Jaycee's mother has commented that Jaycee "looks very young." She said she doesn't look much different from the way she did the day she was kidnapped. She could easily have been the fifteen year old. So who would have been the 25-year old?
Could it have been Michaela? One of the key things the neighbor mentioned is that the girls "all looked the same," and everyone has commented on the striking similarities between Jaycee and Michaela.
I read a newspaper article this morning that spoke of "false hopes." I do note that the director of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children came back with, "There's no such thing as false hope."
There are so many questions that have yet to be answered. Who are the other girls who were kept in the back yard? If some came and went, where did they come from and go to? It is a fact that the car in Garrido's back yard matches the car that was used to kidnap Michaela.
I will admit that over the years I have hung onto every little shred of hope that has come along. Here, now, I have a shred that just might lead to Michaela coming home alive. But it isn't an empty, desperate hope. Okay, it is desperate. I do quite desperately hope. But it's not empty. It's not without reason or basis. There are reasons for it. I believe in my investigators (who didn't need this to light a fire under them because they were already boiling), and I just hope and pray that they will find cooperation as they try to get to the bottom of this.
Garrido actually appears to want to tell his story. Whatever manic or psychotic epiphany he has experienced over the last few months has made him want to bring everything into the light. I hope he holds nothing back.
Meanwhile, I'm just going to hang onto my hopes for all they're worth, and maybe a bit more.
And once again, let me say, Michaela, if you are out there, come home! And if you are a person who knows where she is, please tell us!
You can reach me immediately by sending me an e-mail at sharon.murch@gmail.com. I get them on my phone and my phone is always with me. You can leave a voicemail message also, at 510-995-7085. This phone is rarely answered, but its voicemails go to my cell phone also, so I get them quickly and I will call you back.
Thanks.
Sharon Murch
Michaela's mom
The Kidnapper
On November 18, 1988, Michaela's kidnapper was described as a man in his 20's, with long, dirty-blonde hair. His most outstanding characteristic was severe acne, like boils. He was driving an older, tannish-gold, full-size sedan, boxy in shape, with body damage. The eyewitness noted his eyes. "He had fox eyes," she said. "He looked right at me, but he didn't even see me." Remember, it is twenty years later. He would not have the same appearance today.I know of a number of people who have been investigated as potential suspects on Michaela's kidnapping over the years. There has been a great deal of speculation about some of these in the media, in books, and on websites.The information I know has not convinced me of the likely guilt of any of these suspects.The case is yet to be solved.If you have any information, please call Inspector Robert Lampkin at theHayward Police Department (510) 293-7079Robert.Lampkin@hayward-ca.govor Special Agent Marty Parker at the San Francisco FBI(510) 251-4169maparker@leo.gov The case is currently being actively investigated, under the direction of Inspector Robert Lampkin at the Hayward Police Department, and Special Agent Marty Parker at the San Francisco FBI office.They are investigating new leads, which still come in fairly regularly. Michaela's case is far from forgotten in the San Francisco Bay Area, and is still covered in local and national media, bringing in new information each time.The investigators also go through the older leads in the files, re-checking them. In the early days after Michaela's kidnapping, so many leads came in that investigators were not always able to investigate each lead as thoroughly as possible because there were so many other leads they had to get to.Somewhere in the thousands of leads that the investigators received after Michaela's kidnapping lies the truth. Eventually, they will dig it out. Eventually, this case will be solved.
P.O. Box 55844
Hayward, CA 94540
ph: (510) 995-7085
missingm
