38 Year Old Patricia Schafer & Two Children Jessica, 3, and John, 13 Missing in East Hanover, NJ Since 01/08/09 (Update: Found Safe)
Authorities are searching in Morris County, NJ for missing 38 year old Patricia Schafer and her children, 3 year old Jessica and 13 year old John. The three were last seen leaving their East Hanover, NJ home at 7:30 am Thursday morning, January 8, 2009 by husband and dad, Douglas Schafer. Patricia Schafer is believed to be driving a silver 2003 Saturn Wagon, with New Jersey license plates PFZ-77A
38 year old Patricia Schafer
Patricia Schafer, 38, and her children, Jessica, 3, and John, 13, were last seen at the family’s home Thursday morning at 7:30 a.m. by her husband, Douglas Schafer, the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement.
Jessica, 3, and John, 13, Schafer
A search is under way by authorities in several locations throughout the state.
The 5-foot-tall mother is thin, weighing about 85 pounds, investigators in the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office said.
She is believed to be driving a silver 2003 Saturn Wagon, with New Jersey license plates PFZ-77A.
If anyone has any information regarding the whereabouts of the missing mom and children, please call East Hanover police at (973) 887-0432 or the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office at (973) 285-6200.
To further discuss the case and provide your opinins, go to Scared Monkeys.net: Missing Persons forum.
UPDATE I: Husband Passes Lie Detector Test, Pleads For Their Return
An hour later, Douglas Schafer, 42, left with a police escort without talking to reporters, a far cry from Friday morning, when he was telling CBS 2 HD about the wife he confronted moments before she disappeared.
“I said I knew you were taking money from me. I walked up in the bedroom and I came back down and within five, 10 minutes she was gone,” Douglas Schafer said. “With the children.”
“I called some family members and they said they hadn’t spoken to her in months because she had stolen some checks from them,” Schafer said.
Those who live nearby were stunned, while some were skeptical.
“I can’t see why she’d run away,” neighbor Tom Cavezza said, adding he didn’t really think it was possible that she ran away. “No, ah, it’s possible. I don’t know. I don’t know.”
Schafer said his wife left her cell phone here at the home, and took money before she left.
UPDATE II: Missing N.J. mother, 2 children found in Towson, MD
A New Jersey mother and her children were found unharmed in Maryland just days after they disappeared from home.
Morris County Prosecutor Robert Bianchi said Patricia Schafer, her 13-year-old son and three-year-old daughter were leaving Towson Town Center yesterday when Baltimore County police stopped them.
Schafer will be charged with interfering with the custody of the children and will remain jailed in Maryland pending an extradition hearing. It was not immediately clear if she had retained an attorney.
UPDATE III: East Hanover mother who disappeared with kids facing theft charge; Psychiatric evaluation required; $250K bail to be reviewed today
An East Hanover mother who whisked her two children off to Maryland without telling her husband is facing charges of stealing from a relative and may have falsely claimed to be receiving chemotherapy for esophageal cancer, according to court records released Thursday.
Goldblatt Terrace resident Patricia Schafer, 37, is charged with interfering with custody by allegedly depriving her husband Douglas Schafer, who is the father of their children, of parenting time with their 3-year-old daughter and 13-year-old son, and of keeping secret the whereabouts of their children.
The charge applies even to married couples such as the Schafers if one parent deliberately keeps the children from the other for a prolonged period of time.