AZ AZ - Maria De Los Angeles Martinez, 17, Phoenix, 13 Oct 1990

Nocgirl

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This did not get very much coverage but details are a little creepy. She advertised for a babysitting job at a local radio station and a man came and picked her up and she has not been seen again. Does anyone know anything else? I cannot believe she did not tell her parents where she was going or who she had been corresponding with. Her name was Maria De Los Angeles Martinez.

http://www.missingkids.com/missingk...NCMC&seqNum=1&caseLang=en_US&searchLang=en_US
 
This reminds me of another case. A girl put up an advertisement to babysit, went to meet a man who called her with a job, and was never seen again. I can't remember the girl's name or even the state where she disappeared. I'm sure they're not related, but the babysitting angle reminded me.

I graduated in '87, and I babysat all through the 80s. Back then, I would get calls from people I didn't know all the time who had heard of me from their friends. I would go to their homes, or they would pick me up if they lived out of my neighborhood. All I would say to my parents is a quick "I'm going to babysit" as I left the house. Nothing ever happened, but it strikes me how much times have changed.
 
This reminds me of another case. A girl put up an advertisement to babysit, went to meet a man who called her with a job, and was never seen again. I can't remember the girl's name or even the state where she disappeared. I'm sure they're not related, but the babysitting angle reminded me.

I graduated in '87, and I babysat all through the 80s. Back then, I would get calls from people I didn't know all the time who had heard of me from their friends. I would go to their homes, or they would pick me up if they lived out of my neighborhood. All I would say to my parents is a quick "I'm going to babysit" as I left the house. Nothing ever happened, but it strikes me how much times have changed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------ we walked to our babysitting jobs
they were mostly neighborhood jobs and the people usually had more than two children so we worked as a team.

I guess if more teens worked as a team babysitting it may help somehow?
 
I agree, I babysat alot in the 80's as a teen and normally did it for neighbors and people my family knew. I don't think I ever posted ads in public. This is just an innocent thing that turned tragic.

If a total stranger called me from an ad I placed, I would not be comfortable just taking off with him. I think I would have had my parents talk to them first and screen them out and made sure we had a phone number and address, and verify there were even kids.

Times have changes so much. There is absolutely no way I would allow my child to run off an babysit for someone I did not know.
 
Or, why would you allow a babysitter - without knowing background - to stay with your kids?
 
<snipped> This reminds me of another case. A girl put up an advertisement to babysit, went to meet a man who called her with a job, and was never seen again. I can't remember the girl's name or even the state where she disappeared. I'm sure they're not related, but the babysitting angle reminded me.

Are you thinking of Margaret Fox? Her disappearance has many similarities...Margaret place an ad looking for a babysitting job, got off a bus at the location she was given and was never seen again.


http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17787&highlight=fox
 
Bump.

This month marks 20 years that Maria has been missing. Come home soon sweetie.
 
Meghan from the Charley Project just mentioned this case in her blog. What a sad case. Poor Maria's parents must be devastated. I wonder if they are still in Phoenix? Her name makes it very difficult to find info on as well. Also if her parents were illegals or did not speak english this makes the case even harder.

I wish a reporter in the Phx area would bring back some of these cases. So many get swept under the rug.

Somebody knows the the man who took this poor girl.
 
I can't imagine doing this, advertising for a job on the radio like that and then going off with a stranger. My guess is the person who did this-they had killed before. Such a creepy story. Someone should contact the phoenix sun paper and even the radio station and do a follow up
 
Bump.

There's really no more info on the web about this case than what the Doe Network tells us. However, look at all the different variations of her name on her Namus page:

https://www.findthemissing.org/cases/3906

I really think that this poor girl was just trying to innocently advertise her babysitting services on the radio in the hopes of earning some money and a very dangerous person answered the ad.
 
Glad more people are noticing this case. I wonder-did her parents and family speak English well at all? Was Maria the first born in the country? The language barrier and maybe distrust of the police on her family's part could have hampered any investigation.
 
Glad more people are noticing this case. I wonder-did her parents and family speak English well at all? Was Maria the first born in the country? The language barrier and maybe distrust of the police on her family's part could have hampered any investigation.

I thought of that also. Another thing I wondered is if Maria spoke English that well herself. Maybe she and her family were new to the country. Could it have been a Spanish language station that she made the advertisement from? If so, it would stand to reason that the man who picked her up was also more fluent in Spanish than English. As such, if his family knew anything about what happened, they may also have been reluctant to go to the authorities about what they knew.

I wonder if one of us should get in touch with the detective listed on her Namus page to request more info. That's what I had to do with the case of Johnnie Herrera from 1971, and the Oxnard, CA detective was quite helpful.

https://www.findthemissing.org/cases/3906
 
I think the detective should be contacted and also there needs to be some digging to find out if that was a spanish language station
 
I just sent the following e-mail to Det. Jared D'Addabbo, who is in charge of Maria's case:

Hello. I am member of an internet forum called Websleuths, which is a huge network of volunteers who try to crack various missing persons and murder cases, some very old. Recently, I found a thread on there about the 1990 disappearance of Maria de Los Angeles Martinez, who vanished after being picked up at her house by a man who answered her radio ad for her babysitting services. She called her parents a short while later to ask for a ride home, but the line disconnected before she could give an address and she's never been seen or heard from again. There appears to be very little information other than this. So, if you don't mind, I have some questions I'd like to ask about this case:


* Were Maria and her family citizens, or recent immigrants to the U.S.?


* Was Maria and/or her family fluent in English? Was the radio station from which she did her advertisement a Spanish-language station? If she wasn't fluent in English, would she have at least known enough to get by if absolutely necessary?


* Maria vanished on October 13, 1990, but her Namus page indicates that she wasn't reported missing until October 20. Did her family give a reason for waiting a week before reporting their minor daughter missing?



* Were there ever any suspects in the case?


* Did Maria's family see her enter this man's car? Did they remember what either the car or the man looked like?


* Maria's Namus page gives several variations of her name under the AKA heading. Why are there so many variations?


I'd be appreciative of any information you may be able to give me.


Thank you,
Bobby Border
 
Just received this e-mail from the detective in charge of Maria's case:

Maria was an illegal immigrant. She was a Spanish speaker and the radio station from which she did her advertisement was a Spanish language station. It is unknown why Maria's family waited to report her as a missing juvenile. There are suspects in this case. Maria's relative claimed to have seen her leave in a vehicle. In Mexico, people identify themselves by using the paternal surname and the maternal surname. That is why there are different variation of Maria's names in NamUs.
 

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