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Category: Front Page News Front Page News
Published: 20 January 2022 20 January 2022

By Roger Lanse

On Jan. 16, 2022, at approximately 12:22 a.m. the Grant County Regional Dispatch Authority informed the Silver City Police Department that a caller deployed to Kuwait for the last seven months, advised that his wife and three kids were missing. According to an SCPD incident report, the caller advised that his wife had set out on a road trip on Jan. 8, 2022, from Tucson to Boca Raton, Florida, to visit his mother and some of her family members but had stopped texting and calling him four days earlier (Jan.12). She was driving a silver 2010 Dodge Caravan with an Arizona license plate and pulling a white camping trailer. Caller also stated she should have their 5-year-old black Labrador with them.

The caller stated he saw transactions at the 'Cliff Gila National Monument' on Jan. 17, and at Little Toad Creek on Jan. 15. He said he contacted his wife's aunt in Massachusetts who said his wife had contacted her about Jan. 12, from Silver City. An SCPD officer attempted to contact the aunt but without success.

Caller stated on Jan. 13, his wife sent a text to his mom stating, "We are staying on BLM which has dispersed camping. You can stay up to 14 days here, but we are staying just for today and possibly heading to Lordburg (sic), NM. I want to go to Chiricahua National Park but it's an hour going back south the way we came. It's possible that it's colder there due to the altitude of the location. I can't decide whether to go and then head up . . .idk."

Dispatch tried to ping the phone but they could not because the phone was turned off.

In a brief email from the New Mexico State Police Department, the Beat learned that on Sunday, Jan. 16, at about 10:39 a.m. a NMSP officer located caller's wife along with her three kids safe on Highway 15 near the Cliff Dwellings. This reporter requested the more detailed report from the Department of Public Safety Records Department but has not received it yet.

It's good to have a story that ends well.