Mieczysława Pawlica lived in the village of Romanówka in the Świętokrzyskie Province. This small town is located near Sandomierz and has about 350 inhabitants. Mrs. Mieczysława lived under one roof with her husband, son, his wife and small child, and her own or her husband's father (this is not specified in the sources). Mr. and Mrs. Pawlica ran a farm with her husband. In the past, the woman worked in the commune office in nearby Dwikozy. When she gave birth to the aforementioned son Jacek and a daughter, she decided to devote herself to raising children and running the household.
Mrs. Mieczysława had serious problems with her spine, which required several surgeries. However, they did not bring any spectacular improvement. The woman moved with crutches, and sometimes the pain was so severe that she spent most of the day in bed. Despite her health problems, she tried to help with the household as much as she could.
August 17, 2015 seemed like an ordinary day. Mieczysława, then 60, went shopping with her husband. In the evening, the family ate dinner together, and at the end of the day (around 11 p.m.) the woman went out to the balcony of her room on the first floor to smoke a cigarette. Her daughter-in-law saw her then. Soon everyone went to sleep.
The next day, Mrs. Mieczysława's husband and son got up early to feed the farm animals. The first strange thing that was noticed that morning was that the door was not locked, although the family members always remembered to do so. Finally, 7:00 came. At this time, the main character of the story usually got out of bed. However, the door to her room was still closed. The woman's husband decided to check if everything was okay. It was then that he made a disturbing discovery.
In his wife's room were the glasses and crutches she used every day. The man also noticed a purse containing all the documents and money, as well as medicines and other personal items of the woman. Mrs. Pawlica, however, was not in the room. This seemed particularly strange, because she almost always moved on crutches.
Mieczysława's husband then went to check the other rooms and then returned to his wife's bedroom. Then he pulled back the carefully folded blanket, which gave the impression that no one had slept in the bed that night. What he found really scared him. There was a large blood stain on the mattress. Seriously concerned household members began to search every nook and cranny of the property.
Another sinister discovery was made near an old well that had not been used for years. It was boarded up, but the missing woman's relatives noticed that two of the boards had been broken off. A bloody shirt belonging to Mrs. Mieczysława was also found near the well. In the gazebo, relatives discovered two knives with visible traces of blood on them.
The missing person's family called the police. In the light of all this evidence, investigators treated the case of Mrs. Mieczysława's disappearance very seriously. One of the first steps was to check the inside of the well. It was not an easy task because it was almost 60 meters deep. For this reason, it was handled by a suitably qualified team. However, neither the missing woman's body nor any belongings belonging to her were found inside.
An area of approximately 800 hectares was also searched (for comparison, the area of the entire commune is 550 hectares). Specialized equipment was used, i.e. drones and a helicopter with a thermal imaging camera. In addition to investigators, volunteers took part in the search. There were also specially trained tracking dogs. They lost their trail near the border of the family property.
It was later determined based on DNA tests that the blood on the knife belonged to the missing woman. However, no other evidence was found, and most importantly, Mrs. Mieczysława was not found alive or dead. It is also worth adding that 9 years earlier in Romanówka, a woman of the same age as the heroine of this article went missing. This case was also unsolved. However, the police do not connect them.
So what happened to the 60-year-old? Several theories were considered during the investigation. One of them assumed that the woman had been kidnapped or killed by unknown perpetrators. This scenario has several loopholes. First, there were no signs of a break-in. Potential perpetrators would have had to have been let in by Mrs. Mieczysława or entered through an unlocked door.
Above all, relatives claimed that they did not hear any noises that night. If someone tried to kidnap or kill a 60-year-old woman, the household members should have heard some struggles or screams. Why would anyone want to harm a woman who seemed to have no enemies? What was the perpetrator's motive? This theory doesn't really convince me.
The second hypothesis was suicide. This was explained, among others, by: that a razor blade was found in the missing person's bedroom. Mrs. Mieczysława was also supposed to read about suicide (I don't know what exactly she read and whether it was the main or maybe a side thread of a book or article). Why would a woman take her own life? Theoretically, the cause could have been her illness. Physical pain was present in her daily life and dealing with it was certainly not easy.
However, if Mieczysława Pawlica actually committed suicide, where is her body? If she left her room on her own, why did she do it without crutches? This hypothesis seems even less likely to me than the previous one.
The third scenario assumed voluntary escape from the current life. There was an idea that during one of her numerous stays in sanatoriums, Mrs. Mieczysława met a man with whom she started an affair. One of the neighbours heard the sound of an engine starting late in the evening on the day of the disappearance. According to this hypothesis, it was the lover who took the missing woman with him.
This is quite an interesting scenario, but the blood found in the woman's bed doesn't fit here. If Mrs. Mieczysława wanted to start a new life away from her family, she would have taken the bullets, glasses, and documents with her. For these reasons, I reject this theory.
The last hypothesis seems to be the involvement of people from the closest circle. Investigators questioned family and neighbors and subjected them to a polygraph test. All of them passed the lie detector test and were cleared of suspicion.
Why can we assume that this theory seems the most likely? First of all, because all other logical explanations seem to make no sense (unless you have another idea - feel free to write in the comments). In addition, a polygraph can be fooled, so passing the test does not de facto exclude anyone. At the same time, I do not want to make accusations, because we have no evidence that would confirm anyone's guilt. This is simply one of those cases where almost every scenario seems improbable.
There is also a number of circumstantial evidence that would indicate that this hypothesis is also wrong. Mrs. Mieczysława's family was apparently very close-knit, and we have no information about any conflicts between its members. Finally, one should ask oneself what the motive would be for the perpetrator to be among relatives or neighbours/acquaintances? What would he gain from the woman's death/disappearance?
Finally, I will add a few more interesting facts. The marks on the mattress apparently looked as if someone had tried to wash away the blood. According to one of the scenarios, the woman's body was to be thrown into the well, but the perpetrator decided (rightly) that she would be searched. So he disposed of the body in a different way.
In general, the plot of the well and the bloody shirt found nearby is very interesting, but it also seems to make no sense. The same applies to knives, on which traces of blood were discovered. If someone killed Mrs. Mieczysława, why did they abandon them near the crime scene? This is an extremely mysterious case and I would love to find out the truth about the events on the night of Mrs. Mieczysława's disappearance.
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