When police arrived at a remote section of Highway 200 near the tiny town of Circle, Montana, on the evening of April 20, 1989, they encountered a familiar sight. Two cars had collided and one person had suffered minor injuries. One of the drivers had fled the scene on foot.

The abandoned car was traced to thirty-seven-year-old Patricia Meehan of Bozeman, three-hundred-eighty miles southwest of Circle. Police determined she had caused the accident by failing to return to the right lane after passing another car.

Patricia was declared a fugitive for leaving the scene of an accident. Because she had fled on foot, police assumed she would be located shortly. They may have been wrong on their ruling and they have been proven wrong on their assumption.

Thirty-five years later, police are still searching for Patricia Meehan, although there is no warrant for her arrest. Instead, she is listed as an endangered missing person who may be suffering from amnesia and psychological trauma.

Patricia Meehan

At approximately 8:15 p.m. on April 20, 1989, Peggy Bueller was driving west along State Highway 200 near Circle. Her mother and father were also in the car. Carol Heitz, an off-duty police dispatcher, was driving behind her.

Carol could see Peggy’s car and then another car approaching from the east in the wrong lane. Peggy swerved to avoid the car. Carol tried to do the same, but the errant car hit hers head on. Dazed but not seriously injured, she staggered out of her vehicle and sat down to gather herself.

The driver of the car that had hit Carol came beside her. The woman stared at her for what she thought was approximately thirty seconds but never said anything before walking away. The Buellers then arrived on the scene. Peggy’s mother and father assisted Carol while Peggy summoned help; she also saw the woman who had caused the accident. This time, she was standing across the road in a field staring at the accident scene. Again, she did not say a word.

Peggy said the woman was acting like a curious bystander rather than someone who had been involved in the accident. After a couple of minutes of staring, she walked farther into the field, away from the accident. Peggy saw her climb a fence and disappear into the night.

Area Of The Accident

Motor vehicle records showed the car was registered to Patricia Meehan of Bozeman. Carol and Peggy identified her as the woman they had seen. Police began searching for her on the premise that she had recklessly caused an accident and unlawfully fled the scene.

Search dogs tracked Patricia through the field in which she was last seen. Approximately 3/4 of a mile from the accident site, they found size six tennis shoe tracks, consistent with her shoe size. Eventually, the tracks ended and the search was suspended until daylight.

The search continued for five more days, but no further shoe tracks were found. Police believe Patricia either hitched a ride out of the area or stowed away in a hay truck that was parked half-a-mile from the accident site.

Patricia Vanishes

Patricia Meehan had lived in Montana for three years. She was unmarried and worked as a rancher and also worked several odd jobs.

The site of the accident near Circle in northeast Montana was nearly four-hundred miles from Patricia’s home in Bozeman in southwest part of the state. She had lived in Montana for only three years, and she is not known to have been acquainted with anyone in the northeast part of the state. None of her friends or family knew why she would be in the area.

In late 1988, friends and family noticed Patricia had become depressed and withdrawn. She began seeing a psychologist, Dr. Don LePlante, and had an appointment to see him on April 21, the day after the accident.

On April 19, the day before the accident, Patricia called her parents in her native Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, saying she was stressed and hinted at wanting to return home. The following day, several hours before the accident, Patricia’s landlord said she seemed unusually hyper.

Feeling Blue

Dr. LePlante does not believe a rational Patricia would have fled the accident scene. He instead believes she may have suffered a traumatic head injury when the cars collided, causing her to become disoriented.  Fearing she had killed or seriously injured another person, Patricia may have blocked out the accident.

The combination of these factors, Dr. LePlante believes, may have caused amnesia to the point where Patricia does not know who she is.

Dr. Don LePlante

Counseling Psychologist

By June 1989, two months after the accident, over twenty-five sightings of Patricia Meehan were reported across the northern United States. Five of the sightings were confirmed by police in Minnesota, South Dakota, Washington, and her home state of Montana.

Reports of Patricia’s increasingly strange behavior seemed to support Dr. LePlante’s theories that she was suffering from a rare and dangerous form of amnesia.

Was Patricia Suffering From Amnesia?

On May 4, three weeks after the accident, a police officer in Luverne, Minnesota, six-hundred-seventy miles from the accident scene, believes he saw Patricia at a Hardee’s restaurant. The woman had been drinking water alone in a booth for over five hours until the restaurant’s closing time. She then walked to a nearby twenty-four-hour diner where the officer questioned her. The woman told him she was from Colorado but refused to give her name. The officer sensed the woman was troubled, but he had no grounds to detain her.

The following day, two other sightings of Patricia were reported in neighboring South Dakota, one at a truck stop in Sioux Falls, thirty miles west of Luverne, Minnesota, shortly before noon. In the women’s restroom, a truck driver saw a woman she believed was Patricia staring into the mirror. The trucker asked the woman her name; she replied “I don’t know.”

The other sighting was between 10:00-11:00 that evening at a diner two-hundred miles west in Murdo, where she was with a man who appeared to be in his thirties. They were seen arguing and departed the restaurant separately.

Two weeks later, on May 19, a woman entered a Bozeman, Montana, restaurant only a few miles from Patricia’s home, asking to be seated quickly because she had to go shopping. Waitress Barb Ruff said the woman talked to herself and seemed disoriented and spacey as she hastily ate her breakfast. When Barb saw the missing person poster of Patricia a few weeks later, she, along with several coworkers, were certain Patricia was the disheveled woman in the restaurant.

Shortly thereafter, a woman resembling Patricia was seen at a horse auction in Billings, one-hundred-forty miles east of Bozeman.

Over two weeks later, on May 30, a truck driver believes he saw Patricia hitchhiking on Interstate 90 in rural Washington, near North Bend, seven-hundred ninety miles west of Billings, Montana. The woman refused the driver’s offer to give her a ride; she had earlier told another passing female motorist that her car had broken down and that she was going to phone for assistance.

The following week, Patricia may have been seen at a truck stop along Interstate 5 in Tacoma, Washington, forty miles southwest of North Bend. Several people reported her asking for directions to Aberdeen, eighty miles southwest of Tacoma.

Several Alleged Sightings Of Patricia

Other reported sightings of Patricia Meehan were received by law enforcement throughout the Pacific Northwest, mostly at truck stops between Montana and Seattle. Her sister lived in Seattle and her former boyfriend, Kurt Fletcher, lived in Spokane, Washington, but Patricia did not make contact with either.

A transient arrested for littering in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, on August 30, 1990, was initially thought to be Patricia. Fingerprints of the woman calling herself “Morning Star” and claiming to be a messenger of God, however, did not match those of the missing Montanan.

In the years after her disappearance, Patricia Meehan is believed to have continued hitching rides with truckers. In the thirty-five years since she walked into the dark Montana field, over 5,000 sightings of her, stretching across America, have been reported. In many of the instances, the woman believed to be her was seen crying. I could not determine how many of these sightings have been recent.

Additional Sightings

Patricia Meehan is listed as an endangered missing person because of her psychological state and possible neurological damage resulting from the automobile accident. The evidence suggests she suffered a brain injury and that her condition was deteriorating when she was later seen.

Doctors fear if Patricia were not treated soon after the accident, the damage could be irreparable. If she were suffering from amnesia and her memories returned, the shock could have threatened her sanity.

Patricia faces no risk of prosecution for the automobile accident she caused on April 20, 1989. No evidence or suggestion of foul play has been found in relation to her disappearance.

In Need Of Treatment

Patricia Bernadette Meehan has been missing since April 20, 1989. She was five-feet-three inches tall and weighed between one-hundred and one-hundred-fifteen pounds. She had a fair, freckled complexion and appeared much younger than her age of thirty-seven. When last seen, she was wearing blue jeans, a brown coat, and tennis shoes. She was also carrying a leather purse.

Patricia is described as extremely shy and she spoke almost with a whisper but with a noticeable mild eastern accent. She would today be seventy-two-years-old, though she could still appear younger than her age. I have not found any age-progressed images of her.

If you have any information on the whereabouts of Patricia Meehan, please contact the McCone County, Montana, Sheriff’s Office at 406-485-3405.

Still Searching For Patricia

SOURCES:

• Billings Gazette
• Charley Project
• Doe Network
• Great Falls Tribune
• Kalispell (Montana) Daily
• Seattle Times
• Unsolved Mysteries