Around 1:30 a.m., Sept. 29, 1996, Melanie Marie Ethier left a friend's house to walk the kilometre to her New Liskeard home. She hasn't been seen since.
It's been 14 years since the 15-year-old girl went missing, and the Ontario Provincial Police Unsolved Homicide Investigation Team want to know what happened to the girl. A billboard with Ethier, smiling in a school photo, still stands on Hwy. 11 with a message.
"You know what happened to me...so why don't you help?"
New Liskeard is north-east of Greater Sudbury, north of North Bay.
The province has been offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for Ethier's disappearance, but the reward has never been claimed.
All investigation done by the former New Liskeard Police Service and the Ontario Provincial Police have found no trace of the girl. There is no evidence she left the area on a voluntary basis, and everything police have discovered has led them to believe foul play is involved.
Ethier's disappearance was also featured on Court TV Canada on its program Crime Files: Cold Case Edition.
Information about the reward, the Melanie Ethier investigation, and other missing persons, can be found at www.OPP.ca, or at www.missing-u.ca. A Facebook group, Let's work together to find Melanie Ethier, exists at www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=136947720554.
Anyone with information about the disappearance of Melanie Marie Ethier is asked to contact the OPP Temiskaming Detachment at 1-888-310-1122, or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477 (TIPS).
