In 2006, the non-profit organization Let's Bring Them Home, was contacted by members of Maura Murray's family and immediately put up a $75,000 reward for information that would bring closure to the case. The offer made headlines but the reward was quietly rescinded later and a member of the organization contacted me this week to explain why.
She says Fred Murray's behavior and Helena Dwyer-Murray's secrecy raised red flags.
Fred was difficult. Often hostile. Very controlling. I didI asked her what she thought Helena was holding back. Here's her reply.
everything he told me to do and that was the extent of the
relationship. He would only talk to me when he felt like and IF he
felt like and then he abruptly cut off all communication once the law
suit was filed to obtain police records. I was fine with that -- I
found him to be difficult and at the time I was helping dozens of
other families like his.
Helena was nice enough but she held back information. It was strange.
I never felt like I was getting the full story. They were all
secretive. It frustrated me because I did a lot of interviews for
them back then about the reward and Maura's case.
I backed out of the case slowly.... and have never spoken to anyone
again about it until I emailed you.
She wouldn't answer direct questions unless it was on the phone . She
wasn't going to do it in writing. And even then she hedged a lot. At
the time, I was trying to understand Maura's mental state of mind.
We were, after all, offering a very large reward for information in
the case.
I ended up pulling the reward about 3 months later. I wasn't trying
to be ugly to the family but there were too many demands put upon our
organization by the Murray family.
A screen shot of one of Fred's emails to the organization is above.
Another thing she found weird were the hang-up calls the tip line sometimes received. Each hang-up was logged and the phone number traced.It went to a phone listed under Julie Murray's name.