Brianna Maitland was born in 1986 in Burlington, Vermont (USA). Her parents were Bruce and Kellie, and she also had an older brother. The family, who were also called Bri's girlfriend, lived on a farm near the Canadian border. At the age of 17 (October 2003), the teenager decided to move out of her family home and live with her friends. Parents claimed that it was not due to any family conflicts or aggression at home. Brianna wanted to be more independent. She also wanted to spend more time with friends who lived more than 20 km away and attended another high school. The teenager lived for a short time in the house of several different friends. Eventually, due to the constant changes of address, she decided to drop out of school in February 2004. She also moved in with her childhood friend Jillian Stout.
Three weeks before she went missing, she was attacked at a party by former friend Keallie Lacross. It is not entirely clear what was the reason for the girl's behavior. Brianna's father suspected Keallie was jealous of a boy at a party who was paying his attention not to her, but to Bri. One of the teenagers' friends later recalled that despite Maitland's proficiency in martial arts (she had trained ju-jitsu in the past), she did not use physical force against the perpetrator of the attack. Lacross hit the girl several times in the face while she was sitting in the car. Brianna had a broken nose and a concussion. For this reason, she submitted a notification to the police, which was withdrawn 3 weeks after her disappearance. Police investigated Lacross's connection to the mysterious disappearance, but found no connection.
On Friday, March 19, Brianna wrote her GED exam to start her studies. After completing the test, the teen met her mother for lunch to celebrate the occasion. The girl's father was not present because he was away on business in New York. Kellie later recalled that her daughter was in a good mood and made plans for further education. After lunch, the women went shopping. As they stood in line at one of the stores, Brianna noticed something outside that caught her attention. She told her mother that she would be right back and left the store. Kellie met the girl in the parking lot. The teenager was shaky and nervous. But she did not say what had happened, and her mother did not want to question her. Brianna said she had to go back to get ready to work at the Black Lantern Inn in Montgomery. So her mother took her home. It was around 3:30 PM - 4:00 PM. Kellie did not know then that she was seeing her daughter for the last time.
Brianna left a card shortly after with her roommate that she would be home after work, then got into her mother's car and drove to work. After she finished around 11:20 pm, she decided to go back to the apartment just like she wrote to Stout. She told her friends at work that she needed to rest before the day ahead of her second job. Co-workers then agreed that she got into the car and drove away. She was alone in the car.
The next day, in the early hours of the morning, a representative of the state police appeared at the site of the old, abandoned house. It was discovered that the back of the car the teenager was driving had hit one side of the building. Checks from the employer, change, a bottle of water, and an unlit cigarette were found on the spot. The policeman thought the car had been abandoned by a drunk driver and had it towed to a nearby garage. However, the driver did not come to pick it up.
It took several days for Brianna to be reported missing. The girl's mother found out about the accident only after five days. The roommate saw a note on Friday that the 17-year-old had left her before she left for work and then went away for the weekend. When Stout returned on Monday, she thought her friend was staying with someone else. She became concerned when Brianna did not show up at home or contact her on Tuesday. She called her friend's mother. Kellie talked to various friends and colleagues. Unfortunately, no one has seen Maitland since Friday night. So the girl's mother reported her missing. The policeman showed her a photo of the old Oldsmobile, which was immediately identified. Kellie later recalled that she had a strange, disturbing feeling when she saw a photo of the car after the accident. She thought someone other than her daughter had left the car in a hurry and escaped.
After her disappearance, several witnesses have come forward claiming to have spotted Brianna Maitland's car the night she was last seen. One of them saw a car near an abandoned house between 23:30 and 0:30 the next day. The man said it was likely the lights were on, but he couldn't see anyone nearby. A second witness was passing that way after midnight on Saturday, March 20. He mentioned that he had noticed the turn signal light. Around 4:00 AM, the missing ex-boyfriend was walking past her old house after a party night in Canada. He thought he knew the car, but there was no one inside or near it. In the morning, several motorcyclists also stopped at the scene of the accident. They thought it looked really peculiar, so they decided to take pictures. Next to the car, they noticed the change, a bottle of water, and a necklace or bracelet.
The police who investigated were initially skeptical that Brianna might have been a victim of a crime. The detectives assumed that the girl probably escaped voluntarily. The area around the scene of the accident was searched by police and tracking dogs, but no significant evidence was found. The Maitland car has been checked by police technicians. When it was returned to the family, Bruce noticed that it contained glasses, lenses, an ATM card, and migraine medications.
After some time, however, the police decided that the teenager had probably been a victim of a crime and that the accident had been faked. Brianna's parents also claimed that their daughter must have been abducted by several people as she would probably have dealt with a single attacker thanks to her ju-jitsu knowledge.
One hypothesis is that the 17-year-old's disappearance was linked to the mysterious disappearance of Maura Murray just a month earlier. There are surprisingly many similarities between the two. First of all - the aforementioned time and place. Murray was last seen in Haverhill, New Hampshire, approximately 100 kilometers away. Second, they were both attractive young women (Maura was 21). Third, they both disappeared shortly after the car accident. Fourth, Maura was looking for a hotel in Vermont just before she went missing. It is interesting that she checked specifically in Burlington, Brianna's hometown (although this may be a complete coincidence). In any event, the investigators found no evidence to link the two cases.
Police received an anonymous report within a week of Briana Maitland's disappearance. The informant claimed that the girl was being held in nearby Berkshire (Vermont), 16 km from Montgomery. The house in question turned out to be rented by Ramon L. Ryans and Nathaniel Charles Jackson. The men were known drug dealers in New York City. Police searched their home on April 15, less than a month after they went missing. Drugs were found inside, but there was no sign of Brianna. Investigators, on the other hand, found out from the girl's friends that she knew the traffickers and had experimented with heavy drugs such as crack herself.
Interestingly, the Ryans and Jackson thread returned in an anonymous letter received by the police. The author alleged that Maitland was killed by Ryans as a result of a drug-related money dispute. The teenager's body was reportedly cut into pieces and dumped on a pig farm. The police failed to confirm this statement. Brianna's parents received anonymous calls several times. Interviewees claimed that the 17-year-old was tied to a tree in the forest and then thrown into a lake.
In 2006, at the Caesars World casino in Atlantic City, NJ, a camera captured a woman similar to the missing one. However, her identity could not be established.
In 2012, the investigators checked whether the perpetrator was Israel Keyes - a serial rapist and murderer. Ultimately, this theory could not be confirmed. Keyes committed suicide in December of the same year.
In March 2016, the police collected and tested DNA samples from inside a Maitland car. However, she did not provide information on what could be established. However, in July of the same year, the house in which the missing person's car was hit, burned down in a fire. To this day, Brianna's fate remains unknown.
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