Cold Case Files: Kanawha County mother of three, Melanie Metheny, now missing 16 years
KANAWHA COUNTY, W.Va. (WCHS) — Melanie Metheny's disappearance is nowhere closer to being solved today than it was 16 years ago.
Her story is one of the most recognized and talked about cold cases in Kanawha County, but even with all of the attention it's received since she first went missing, her family and investigators are still left with more questions than answers.
Metheny, 21, was last seen about 8 a.m. July 19, 2006, dropping two of her three children off at Country Kids Daycare in Belle. Her van was found four days later on Charleston's West Side but offered no clues on what had happened to her.
Metheny would be 37-years-old now. Her aunt, Catherine Moles, said dealing with the pain that has come since her disappearance is a day-by-day process with which she still struggles.
"Hope for the best. Expect the worst, and just try to keep the hope going," Moles said during a recent interview with Eyewitness News at Coonskin Park.{ }
In 2016, a Ginkgo Biloba was planted near the park's pond in honor of Melanie. The tree is said to be a symbol of strength and perseverance.
The tree continues to grow as the years pass, but the pain for some who come to visit is still as fresh as it was 16 years ago.{ }
"My sister called me in the evening and said that they can't find Melanie," Moles recalled. She said she never dreamed she would still be missing today.
Metheny was a dedicated mother, her family and friends have said.{ }
Her children, Ryan, Nathan and Hannah, were her life and she was determined to give her children the life she knew they deserved. They were 4, 2, and 1 at the time their mother went missing.
Shortly before her disappearance, she had decided she was going to be a nurse. The morning she was last seen, she had planned to go to Garnet Career Center to pick up transcripts to take to West Virginia State University.{ }
"She was supposed to be picking up school transcripts and she didn't make it. No one saw her at Garnet," Moles said.{ }
Kanawha County Sheriff's Office detective Sgt. Ana Pile said nothing had been reported in the days leading up to Metheny's disappearance that was suspicious or out of the ordinary. Pile said daycare workers who last saw her also said nothing seemed to stand out about her demeanor that morning.{ }
"It's verified that Melanie herself dropped her children off. Daycare workers reported that she seemed just normal as usual, nothing concerning to them," Pile said. "But what had tipped the family off, later in the day, was the fact that she had failed to pick her kids up at daycare."
Soon after the daycare couldn't reach her, Metheny's father, James, was the first to report her missing to police. Metheny's 1998 Chevrolet Ventura van was also missing. Her picture, the van's information and license plate were splashed across local news outlets, in hope someone had information that could help find her.{ }
“She’s been missing for over 48 hours and anyone that has any type of information that saw her Wednesday evening, please call the number," her father pleaded in a previous interview with Eyewitness News.{ }
Her family and rescue crews with K-9 units searched the woods and areas near Campbells Creek where she lived part time with her boyfriend at the time, Jared Davis. Pile said Davis was not considered a suspect in Metheny's disappearance.{ }
A break in the case came on day four of the search for her when her van was found on Charleston's West Side near Wyoming Street and Beuhring Avenue.
"The vehicle was processed for evidence. There were certain personal items that should have been potentially in the vehicle or with Melanie that were not discovered. Nothing further was gained from locating the vehicle," Pile said. "There was nothing out of the ordinary and didn't appear there had been a struggle."
Moles said the discovery of the van, in an area she said Metheny had no known connection to, greatly bothers her.{ }
"I've questioned it. It was parked on an intersection at a corner on the West Side. Her van had been plastered all over the news for several days but no one had reported that van," she said. She said she wonders how long the van had actually been sitting there and why it wasn't reported for so long.{ }
According to previous news reports, neighbors said it had been there since at least 2 p.m. July 19.{ }
The van's discovery only added to the frustration and questions investigators had, too.
"You have to wonder, did she go missing from that vehicle? Did someone else deposit the vehicle there and it wasn't Melanie? It poses all kinds of new questions," Pile said.{ }
Phone records indicated that Metheny had made a call from her cell phone to an auto-repair shop around 9:00 a.m. to confirm she had an appointment in the coming days to bring her van in for service. She also called her voicemail box about 9:30 a.m.
Pile said tips poured in from the community. One of the tips came from someone who claimed to have seen Metheny fighting with someone in a red sport-utility vehicle on the West Side on the afternoon of her disappearance.{ }{ }
"That witness had reported, around the time that Melanie had gone missing, he observed a red SUV. There were two individuals in the SUV and they were arguing and he thought he heard the female yell something about babies," Pile said. Pile said investigators were never able to confirm if it was actually Melanie in the SUV, and they weren't able to locate the vehicle.{ }
Pile said the investigation into Metheny's disappearance has lead to more than 200 interviews.{ }
"Those interviews could range anywhere from recording a phone call that we received from someone out of state who just wanted to say, 'Hey, I think I saw a female that looked like Melanie Metheny in California,' for instance," she explained. "All the way to the very lengthy interviews that were done in the beginning of the investigation."
Pile said they still receive calls about the case.
"We still get people calling in now that will say, 'You know, I remember around that time, observing a male and a female in an argument. I think the female resembled Melanie, It's been on my mind ever since and I wanted you to know.' Unfortunately, with the time that has passed, tips like that are very difficult to follow up on," Pile said. "In the immediate time that the investigation began to take place, there were tips received. People have said said they saw a female that looked like her, walking in the vicinity of the van even or in the blocks surrounding that. Some of those we were able to verify were absolutely not her. Some of them are just difficult to verify."
Pile said there have been extensive searches, mostly in Kanawha County, of mines, mine shafts and other areas tipsters have pointed them to, but there has never been a confirmed suspect identified publicly in the case.{ }
"To say that there has been a named suspect, no. Have there been many names and some of the same names brought up over the years? Yes," she said.
The pain of her niece's disappearance led Moles to start working with families of missing people from around the state. She keeps a list of them all.{ }{ }
"No matter what they do, what their status is in society. They are people. Their family are human beings that have feelings and everyone deserves to be found," she said.{ }
There are countless victims in cases like Metheny's - shattered lives of family members left as collateral damage. Families only trying to find peace.{ }
Moles said she searched for a long time for a word to describe how she feels, along with the way the families of missing people feel.{ }
The word she found, saudade, is Portuguese. A close translation in English would be desiderium, which is defined as an ardent desire or longing, especially a feeling of loss or grief for something lost.
Moles printed out a definition of{ }saudade to help explain. “A longing for something or some event that one is fond of, which is gone, but might return in a distant future. It is like nostalgia but with the hope that what is being longed for might return, even if that return if unlikely or so distant in the future to be almost of no consequence to the present," she read. "Although it related to feeling of melancholy and fond memories of things, people and days gone by, it can be a rush of sadness coupled with the paradoxical joy derived from acceptance of fate and the hope of recovering or replacing what is lost by something that will either fill the emptiness or provide consolation."
Metheny's family started Melanie's Hope, a charitable organization dedicated to raising awareness about missing people. It also supports animal rescue, something that was important to her.{ }
Bill Daniel, Metheny's mother's husband, knows the peace they are searching for will come when they find the truth.{ }
“Don’t give up hope if you’re in our situation. Look for the light. If you know something, say something, tell somebody. I don’t care who you are, just need the information, that’s all," Daniel said.{ }
He said he wouldn't hesitate to write a check to someone who came forward with information that could solve the case, if that is what it took. A reward was offered at the time of her disappearance.
"We just keep hoping and waiting and searching and praying that she comes back," he said.
And with each agonizing anniversary, Moles said, she will wait. Knowing one day, that truth will come.{ }
"A lot of people give up. We don't," she said. "One day we will find her."
Pile said investigators would "love to bring closure to Melanie's family. We would love to, more than anything, say that we found her alive and well. And if we can't do that, we want to to tell them that we have found her and bring closure to them that way and hopefully we are able to charge a suspect."
Anyone with information about the case is urged to contact the Kanawha County Sheriff's Office at 304-357-0169.
Watch below for compilation of stories from the Eyewitness News archives. (WCHS)
