In light of the recent allegations about Bill Rausch, I've taken another close look at all the evidence and records I've gathered over the years. A couple weeks ago, we noticed that a page was missing from the phone records that the Rauschs handed over to the Murrays. Specifically, Page 9, which would have been the page where Maura's roaming calls would have been catalogued - if she made roaming calls in New Hampshire before or after her disappearance.
Reader (and friend) "Becky" had a good idea. She said another way to tell if Maura had made any roaming calls would be to look at the final page of the phone bill, which would include a grand total of all roaming minutes. All you needed to do then would be to subtract the minutes Bill used and if there was more left over, you'd know Maura had roaming charges, too.
So I went back to the reports. And that page is missing, too.
The records supplied to the Murray family - and to John Smith and Lance & Tim - are missing Page 9 and also the last page, Page 25, the page that would have tallied and summarized all charges.
Others have suggested these pages were misplaced or left out by mistake. Art Roderick claimed the police surely would have thought to subpoena the original records in 2004.
But early articles suggest the police didn't believe Maura's disappearance was even a crime worthy of subpoenas. In fact, the police stopped searching for Maura by Thursday, three days after she vanished, and didn't go looking again for some time.
And none of us so-called sleuths (not I or Lance or Tim or Art or Maggie or John) noticed that these pages were missing or what that might mean until October of this year.
We can't assume the police got the original records or thought to do so. Not when we know so much was missed early on. My hunch is that the records they have were given to them by the Rausch family.
As we can see by Bill Rausch's roaming charges, if Maura did make calls in the White Mountains the day of her disappearance - or in the days after - those calls would be found in these missing pages. Is it a coincidence those exact pages are missing? If so, that's some real bad luck.
Reader (and friend) "Becky" had a good idea. She said another way to tell if Maura had made any roaming calls would be to look at the final page of the phone bill, which would include a grand total of all roaming minutes. All you needed to do then would be to subtract the minutes Bill used and if there was more left over, you'd know Maura had roaming charges, too.
So I went back to the reports. And that page is missing, too.
The records supplied to the Murray family - and to John Smith and Lance & Tim - are missing Page 9 and also the last page, Page 25, the page that would have tallied and summarized all charges.
Others have suggested these pages were misplaced or left out by mistake. Art Roderick claimed the police surely would have thought to subpoena the original records in 2004.
But early articles suggest the police didn't believe Maura's disappearance was even a crime worthy of subpoenas. In fact, the police stopped searching for Maura by Thursday, three days after she vanished, and didn't go looking again for some time.
And none of us so-called sleuths (not I or Lance or Tim or Art or Maggie or John) noticed that these pages were missing or what that might mean until October of this year.
We can't assume the police got the original records or thought to do so. Not when we know so much was missed early on. My hunch is that the records they have were given to them by the Rausch family.
As we can see by Bill Rausch's roaming charges, if Maura did make calls in the White Mountains the day of her disappearance - or in the days after - those calls would be found in these missing pages. Is it a coincidence those exact pages are missing? If so, that's some real bad luck.