Boston Globe

April 16, 2004

N.H. Police Consult Psychic on Missing Woman

By Peter DeMarco

New Hampshire State Police interviewed a California psychic yesterday who says she had visions of a man abducting Maura Murray, the Hanson native who disappeared in February after a minor car crash on a rural New Hampshire road.

Lieutenant John Scarinza, the lead investigator, said he spoke with psychic profiler Carla Baron and plans to talk to her again, but he did not share details of their conversation.

Baron, a nationally known psychic, told Fred Murray that she believes his daughter was abducted and killed. Baron said the visions indicated that Murray was buried near another woman abducted by the same man.

Scarinza said authorities would consider Baron's psychic visions as they would any other tip.

"Mr. Murray has asked us if we could listen to what this woman has to say. We're not close-minded to talking to anyone," he said.

Baron was profiled last night on ABC's "Primetime Thursday." She has aided numerous police departments in missing persons and homicide cases.

More than a dozen psychics have called New Hampshire State Police offering assistance with the Murray case, Scarinza said. But Murray's father has only asked police to speak with Baron.

Meanwhile, the police chief in Haverhill, N.H., where Maura Murray was last seen, has warned her family members that they could be arrested if they trespass on property surrounding the accident site, according to the Associated Press. Police Chief Jeff Williams said in an April 2 letter to Murray's father that his department has received a written request from area residents complaining about repeated trespassing and parking problems, the AP reported.

Murray's family believes that the 21-year-old woman, a nursing student at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, was abducted by someone who offered her a ride just minutes before police responded to a 911 call about her car accident. Authorities have found no evidence of foul play and say they have been unable to determine where she was headed at the time of the accident. Investigators plan to conduct further aerial searches of the wooded area in Woodsville, N.H., where Murray crashed into a snowbank on Feb. 9, Scarinza said.

State Police and New Hampshire Fish and Game officials, along with a team of dogs, are preparing for another "line search" of the area in hopes of finding any of Murray's belongings, such as a backpack, that were apparently missing from her car, he said.

While similar searches have already been made, Scarinza said, "We don't want to leave anything to chance."