{"id":25594,"date":"2026-04-15T12:01:02","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T20:01:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/?p=25594"},"modified":"2026-04-28T12:09:47","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T20:09:47","slug":"missing-woman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/missing-woman\/","title":{"rendered":"Missing woman"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
A photo of Maria Kilmer. | Photo from @pigeon.news on Instagram<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

April 15, 2026 | <\/span>Abbi Duhart | News Editor<\/span><\/p>\n

March 28 at approximately 9 p.m., 28-year-old Maria Linda Jade Kilmer went missing. She was last seen on Highway 22 near milepost 15, where her car ran out of gas and she had to pull over to the side of the road.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the passenger in her car, she was traveling from Lyons to Salem, and when she ran out of gas, she left her car to board a motorcycle with an unidentified driver to get help.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kilmer left behind all of her belongings in her car, including her keys, purse, license and phone. Carmen Bitzer, her mother, mentioned that Kilmer leaving behind her phone and purse was extremely out of character. Additionally, Kilmer left behind her glasses and medications, even though multiple family members explained that she wouldn\u2019t be able to see without her glasses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Her stepmother, Amber Brecht, said that she was on her way to help Kilmer after receiving a text from her saying she was stuck. Kilmer additionally dropped a pin so Brecht could find her location, but once Brecht got there, Kilmer was gone.<\/span><\/p>\n

Brecht additionally said that after Kilmer\u2019s disappearance, she received several text messages from unknown numbers claiming to be Kilmer.<\/span><\/p>\n

Many of Kilmer\u2019s family members emphasized that it doesn\u2019t make sense she would leave her car knowing family was on the way to help her. Kilmer\u2019s sister mentioned, \u201cMy sister is not the kind of person to just leave somebody on the side of the road, and I don\u2019t think she would have just gotten into a stranger\u2019s car.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

By Sunday, Kilmer\u2019s sister urged that she knew something must have been very wrong for Kilmer not to return, explaining that they live in the same apartment complex in Independence and would check in with each other daily, always telling each other where they were going.<\/span><\/p>\n

Both Kilmer\u2019s mother and sister declined to mention the name of the passenger who was in the car with Kilmer because police instructed them to avoid disclosing this information.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kilmer is a woman of indigenous heritage, and her mother works within a group that helps to raise awareness for missing and murdered indigenous women. In regard to this, her mother said that she never thought she would have to use this to help find her own daughter.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cShe always calls,\u201d said Bitzer. \u201cShe knows my number by heart, so not having her phone is not going to deter her from calling her mom.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The morning of April 3, Oregon police released information about the case, saying that Kilmer was found and was unharmed. Ultimately, she was located after reaching out to a family member, confirming her identity. Investigators are still looking into why Kilmer went missing, but, as of now, there is no evidence of any crime. Police have refrained from releasing any other information regarding this case.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contact the author at howlnews@wou.edu<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

April 15, 2026 | Abbi Duhart | News Editor March 28 at approximately 9 p.m., 28-year-old Maria Linda Jade Kilmer went missing. She was last seen on Highway 22 near milepost 15, where her car ran out of gas and she had to pull over to the side of the road. According to the passenger […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1645,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"Missing woman","_seopress_titles_desc":"Maria Kilmer missing on Highway 22 after running out of gas","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9552,6191,8601,5808,6431,9185,8248,1170,10280,10281,4793,310,4762,7603,7582,10283,9232,10282,7081,5371,9047,6836,3195,410,684,39],"class_list":["post-25594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-car","tag-case","tag-crime","tag-criminal","tag-drive","tag-evidence","tag-gas","tag-heritage","tag-highway","tag-highway-22","tag-identity","tag-independence","tag-indigenous","tag-investigate","tag-investigation","tag-lyons","tag-mile","tag-milepost","tag-missing","tag-murder","tag-murdered","tag-oregon-2","tag-police","tag-salem","tag-western","tag-wou"],"modified_by":"saragerrick","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1645"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25594"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25603,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25594\/revisions\/25603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}