WA WA - Donna Van Zandt, 33, Quinault, April 2014

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Some additional information from all kind of sources.

Donna Petukhova VanZandt/ Van Zandt Still not known how she got the Van Zandt name.

DOB August 1981, in 2020 39 yrs (lather per Namus)

From Familysearch
Married August 2003 with J.K.L., Divorced J.K.L. June 23, 2005

Married R.D.S, June 7, 2012 King County, Washington, Divorced R.D.S. December 11, 2013
<modsnip: quoted post removed>

According to the Tacoma Daily of January 8, 2014 the case was ruled as a dismissal. Tacoma Daily Index, January 08, 2014

Missing since April 28, 2014 from Neilton, Grays Harbor County, Washington, (what was her connection to Neilton?) car found August 2014 in the Olympic National Forest near Neilton, WA.

Her mother died on November 18, 2012. Of course she could have mourned about her mother when she went missing, but I don’t see an immediate relation with her mother’s dead date nor her father’s.

A lot of reports say that her car was found with camping and hiking gear. If the police report is suggesting that her car was stuffed with all her possessions (sounds to me much more then camping and hiking gear) round the incident with "Steve" (S.G.D) living in Port Townsend?, where did all her other stuff go. Could she have stashed it at an acquaintance, was her stuff still at Steve's, did she rented a storage place?


According to the Tacoma Daily of January 8, 2014 the case was ruled as a dismissal. Tacoma Daily Index, January 08, 2014
<modsnip: quoted post removed>

In the Namus file there is a tattoo on her ankle mentioned, not specified. Looking at her Flickr pictures, I think it’s a pictures of poppies. According to this pictures she has also a tattoo with the word “Vladimir” above her left? breast (not sure which site, pictures are often turned, above your heart seems appropriate) I think Donna's loved ones should ask LE to add this to the Namus file.

Donna Van Zandt’s albums | Flickr

upload_2020-10-18_17-44-32.png

upload_2020-10-18_17-44-50.png

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upload_2020-10-18_17-45-27.png

Elena (Donna’s mother) was born Yelena Bronislavovna Akhmilovskaya on March 11, 1957 in Leningrad, USSR, married a couple of times.

<modsnip: sleuthing family>
 
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Not a local, but I spend plenty of time in that area for work and recreating.
My guess would be there is no actual connection to Neilton itself. Neilton just happens to be the closest community with a name to where her car was found, so that is why they mentioned it. It is a very, very small place.
If you are about 5 miles up Quinault Ridge Rd (where the car was found), Neilton would actually be about a 25 minute drive from there (according to Google). Though probably less if you are familiar with driving on logging roads.
 
<modsnip: no source links>

Namus states: Date of Last Contact: April 28, 2014. Is this an approx. date or did she actually had contact with somebody?

You never know until she is found, but for now I think she decided to end it all and she is out there in the woods somewhere.
 
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Bit of hope said:
<modsnip: no source links>

Namus states: Date of Last Contact: April 28, 2014. Is this an approx. date or did she actually had contact with somebody?

You never know until she is found, but for now I think she decided to end it all and she is out there in the woods somewhere.
Click to expand...
Grays Harbor listed that date on the "Missing" notice they posted:
https://www.facebook.com/missingnorthwest/photos/a.290118679451/10157509093484452
Seattle Times reported a general April timeframe:
www.seattletimes.com

Missing Seattle woman’s car found in Grays Harbor County

The car registered to a Seattle woman who has been missing since April was found last week in a remote area in Grays Harbor County. The vehicle registered to Donna Van Zandt, 33, of Seattle, was...
www.seattletimes.com www.seattletimes.com
My old post was removed and I've requested to be a "verified insider," so I will wait to add any other information.
 
@August 1 has now been verified as a friend of Donna Van Zandt. As a Verified member they are allowed to post information about their knowledge of this case and any inside information they may be able to share without having to provide links to what they state as fact about the case.

As always, please treat our VI with respect at all times, and do not bicker with them or challenge them about what they have to contribute. If there is something you disagree with you may respectfully question them and then move on without badgering them for information or arguing with them.

Welcome to August 1. Thank You to you and all others for being here to discuss Donna's case.
 
I worked with Donna at a nonprofit in Seattle for a few years in the early 2000s. I met my wife at the same job and Donna was at our wedding. We were not the closest of friends, but we would go see movies or have dinner on occasion. We stayed in touch when I went to law school and ended up in Minneapolis. Donna visited us once or twice and we all stayed in touch with letters, emails, and occasional Facebook posts. When my daughter was a few months old, Donna sent some cute handmade stuffed animals. We were not in regular contact, but would talk a few times a year.

Donna's early life was fascinating and complicated. What I know is from her, and I am not going to share details in case I have them wrong. But there are two things worth mentioning. One is that she was on her own at a very early age (16, I believe) and was always independent and resourceful. The other is that her teeth were false. She had them pulled and replaced them with false teeth. An earlier post mentioned her teeth and she would probably have loved hearing positive comments about them.

In 2014, I had not heard from her for a while. She reached out in the spring and she was in trouble. She mostly wanted legal advice. I no longer have the exact dates of our first conversations, but it would have been later in February or early in March. She was vague about the details, but there were some complicated relationship issues and she had been charged with possessing methamphetamine. She alleged domestic abuse and had left that person. She told me that they had mutual restraining orders. There was no more ongoing contact between the two and I'm not going to share his name as I feel very confident that her disappearance had nothing to do with him. I assume law enforcement would have looked into that possibility since the records were public.

Donna had essentially left Seattle and was moving around. She had been in Pierce County (which includes Tacoma, WA) and in different places on the Olympic Peninsula.

We spoke and emailed pretty regularly for most of April 2014. Her phone number changed several times over those weeks and her internet was not dependable.

I am not a mental health professional, but I have worked in social service positions. She was clearly in crisis. She was talking about elaborate and complicated plots to get her in trouble that I could not follow. I got her connected with a therapist friend in Seattle and she started talking to him. Things seemed to be improving by later in April. Conversations seemed more coherent and she had found a place to stay - she told me it was a domestic abuse shelter, but I don't have a name or address (and would not ask since those are usually kept private). She was getting job interviews and sent me copies of at least one of them that was for a position in Chicago. It felt like she was getting things back on track. She had an open criminal case related to possession of meth, but she seemed to be thinking about that clearly.

The job interview was on April 25, 2014 and I emailer her later that day. The interview was done via Skype or something similar - which seemed a little unusual in 2014. She told me that she had a T-Moblie hotspot she was using for that and that her connection was good. She described her location as being in a NNE corner of the house. She said that the rooms were "like low end motel rooms - no work spaces," but she set something up in the corner of the bed that was working. She responded the next morning and told me that the job did not feel like it was a good fit, but she was happy to have had the interview. We traded a few short emails that day and one of her last ones told me that she had almost cancelled, but was "trying to be more brave." I did not hear from her again after April 26.

I tried to reach her by phone and email after that, but the phone was disconnected and she did not reply to my emails. I did not know who else she might be talking to.

The therapist I connected her with let me know about the discovery of her car (as an aside, she loved that car). His last contact with her was a little earlier than mine.
 
August 1 said:
I worked with Donna at a nonprofit in Seattle for a few years in the early 2000s. I met my wife at the same job and Donna was at our wedding. We were not the closest of friends, but we would go see movies or have dinner on occasion. We stayed in touch when I went to law school and ended up in Minneapolis. Donna visited us once or twice and we all stayed in touch with letters, emails, and occasional Facebook posts. When my daughter was a few months old, Donna sent some cute handmade stuffed animals. We were not in regular contact, but would talk a few times a year.

Donna's early life was fascinating and complicated. What I know is from her, and I am not going to share details in case I have them wrong. But there are two things worth mentioning. One is that she was on her own at a very early age (16, I believe) and was always independent and resourceful. The other is that her teeth were false. She had them pulled and replaced them with false teeth. An earlier post mentioned her teeth and she would probably have loved hearing positive comments about them.

In 2014, I had not heard from her for a while. She reached out in the spring and she was in trouble. She mostly wanted legal advice. I no longer have the exact dates of our first conversations, but it would have been later in February or early in March. She was vague about the details, but there were some complicated relationship issues and she had been charged with possessing methamphetamine. She alleged domestic abuse and had left that person. She told me that they had mutual restraining orders. There was no more ongoing contact between the two and I'm not going to share his name as I feel very confident that her disappearance had nothing to do with him. I assume law enforcement would have looked into that possibility since the records were public.

Donna had essentially left Seattle and was moving around. She had been in Pierce County (which includes Tacoma, WA) and in different places on the Olympic Peninsula.

We spoke and emailed pretty regularly for most of April 2014. Her phone number changed several times over those weeks and her internet was not dependable.

I am not a mental health professional, but I have worked in social service positions. She was clearly in crisis. She was talking about elaborate and complicated plots to get her in trouble that I could not follow. I got her connected with a therapist friend in Seattle and she started talking to him. Things seemed to be improving by later in April. Conversations seemed more coherent and she had found a place to stay - she told me it was a domestic abuse shelter, but I don't have a name or address (and would not ask since those are usually kept private). She was getting job interviews and sent me copies of at least one of them that was for a position in Chicago. It felt like she was getting things back on track. She had an open criminal case related to possession of meth, but she seemed to be thinking about that clearly.

The job interview was on April 25, 2014 and I emailer her later that day. The interview was done via Skype or something similar - which seemed a little unusual in 2014. She told me that she had a T-Moblie hotspot she was using for that and that her connection was good. She described her location as being in a NNE corner of the house. She said that the rooms were "like low end motel rooms - no work spaces," but she set something up in the corner of the bed that was working. She responded the next morning and told me that the job did not feel like it was a good fit, but she was happy to have had the interview. We traded a few short emails that day and one of her last ones told me that she had almost cancelled, but was "trying to be more brave." I did not hear from her again after April 26.

I tried to reach her by phone and email after that, but the phone was disconnected and she did not reply to my emails. I did not know who else she might be talking to.

The therapist I connected her with let me know about the discovery of her car (as an aside, she loved that car). His last contact with her was a little earlier than mine.
Click to expand...
Do you think the husband may have been involved in the disappearance? That relationship seemed rather odd.
 
Bit of hope said:
Some additional information from all kind of sources.

Donna Petukhova VanZandt/ Van Zandt Still not known how she got the Van Zandt name.

DOB August 1981, in 2020 39 yrs (lather per Namus)

From Familysearch
Married August 2003 with J.K.L., Divorced J.K.L. June 23, 2005

Married R.D.S, June 7, 2012 King County, Washington, Divorced R.D.S. December 11, 2013
<modsnip: quoted post removed>

According to the Tacoma Daily of January 8, 2014 the case was ruled as a dismissal. Tacoma Daily Index, January 08, 2014

Missing since April 28, 2014 from Neilton, Grays Harbor County, Washington, (what was her connection to Neilton?) car found August 2014 in the Olympic National Forest near Neilton, WA.

Her mother died on November 18, 2012. Of course she could have mourned about her mother when she went missing, but I don’t see an immediate relation with her mother’s dead date nor her father’s.

A lot of reports say that her car was found with camping and hiking gear. If the police report is suggesting that her car was stuffed with all her possessions (sounds to me much more then camping and hiking gear) round the incident with "Steve" (S.G.D) living in Port Townsend?, where did all her other stuff go. Could she have stashed it at an acquaintance, was her stuff still at Steve's, did she rented a storage place?


According to the Tacoma Daily of January 8, 2014 the case was ruled as a dismissal. Tacoma Daily Index, January 08, 2014
<modsnip: quoted post removed>

In the Namus file there is a tattoo on her ankle mentioned, not specified. Looking at her Flickr pictures, I think it’s a pictures of poppies. According to this pictures she has also a tattoo with the word “Vladimir” above her left? breast (not sure which site, pictures are often turned, above your heart seems appropriate) I think Donna's loved ones should ask LE to add this to the Namus file.

Donna Van Zandt’s albums | Flickr

View attachment 268313

View attachment 268314

View attachment 268315


View attachment 268316

Elena (Donna’s mother) was born Yelena Bronislavovna Akhmilovskaya on March 11, 1957 in Leningrad, USSR, married a couple of times.

<modsnip: sleuthing family>
Click to expand...
Can you post the court records re the marriages divorces and whatever dismissal you're talking about?
 
Windy69 said:
Do you think the husband may have been involved in the disappearance? That relationship seemed rather odd.
Click to expand...
Donna was married and divorced. My understanding was that they had both moved on. I don't think there is any chance he was involved in any way. She had some other relationships after the divorce, at least one of which was messy. There are public documents related to that and the attached screenshot has the case numbers. I am not going to post the man's name because I have no reason to think he was still in the picture.
 

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Windy69 said:
Do you think the husband may have been involved in the disappearance? That relationship seemed rather odd.
Click to expand...
My understanding, based on what @August1 wrote, is that she already left her husband, (divorce was in Dec. 2013) was "wandering" and had an "affair" or was somehow involved with another man, in the early months of 2014. Also I think the restraining orders and court docs. are about this person (and her arrest for possession of methamphetamine), not about (one of) her husbands.

ETA
Also Verified Insider @August1 said he thinks this particular person is not related to her missing, although, to be honest, I'm not sure you can be 100% sure about that. LE probably checked it out.
 
Bit of hope said:
My understanding, based on what @August1 wrote, is that she already left her husband, (divorce was in Dec. 2013) was "wandering" and had an "affair" or was somehow involved with another man, in the early months of 2014. Also I think the restraining orders and court docs. are about this person (and her arrest for possession of methamphetamine), not about (one of) her husbands.

ETA
Also Verified Insider @August1 said he thinks this particular person is not related to her missing, although, to be honest, I'm not sure you can be 100% sure about that. LE probably checked it out.
Click to expand...

If you want my personal opinion and I don't feel I can be a verified insider because I saw Donna three times in my life and never spoke soul-to-soul, but still, I saw her... if you need me to become a verified insider, I can, but it would be of little use because sleuthing the family is not allowed.

Donna's first husband has 100% nothing to do with it. In fact, the chess community holds very positive views of him. So him, I wouldn't even sleuth or follow. I think it was a trauma for him and he was long out of her life.

The rest of the people around Donna/Dana I don't know. Thank you all very much for keeping this thread alive because - a young woman disappeared, and at first it seemed that no one cared but people who didn't know her.

Now, with @August1 being here, and our deal @Bill of hope keeping these threads that are not high-profile alive, I hope that one day we'll get there. I think that she is one of the victims of someone having lair in Olympic forest, but it is JMO.
 
August 1 said:
Donna was married and divorced. My understanding was that they had both moved on. I don't think there is any chance he was involved in any way. She had some other relationships after the divorce, at least one of which was messy. There are public documents related to that and the attached screenshot has the case numbers. I am not going to post the man's name because I have no reason to think he was still in the picture.
Click to expand...
How well did any of her friends actually know her husband at the time? You know, RDS. It appears he had spent 6 months in prison for multiple felony convictions just a few years ago. Was that a one-off or just the first time he got caught? Were there subtle signs of trouble before she disappeared or did this happen suddenly without warning?
 
Windy69 said:
How well did any of her friends actually know her husband at the time? You know, RDS. It appears he had spent 6 months in prison for multiple felony convictions just a few years ago. Was that a one-off or just the first time he got caught? Were there subtle signs of trouble before she disappeared or did this happen suddenly without warning?
Click to expand...
I met her first husband, but did not meet RDS. I spoke and emailed regularly with Donna starting in early or mid-March of 2014 (the month or so before her disappearance) and she never mentioned RDS. She did speak about other people, but I am not comfortable sharing any of that because I cannot verify anything significant.

I would say that there were major signs of trouble in her life before Donna disappeared. I posted screenshots of the restraining orders in an earlier post, there was a bench warrant for a case in Pierce county (3ZC004734), and there was also an open criminal case in Jefferson Superior Court (14-1-17-6). She told me that she had been homeless starting in early December 2013. From what she described, it sounded like she had been living out of her car and finding people to stay with for short periods of time. While I was in contact with her, she got into a domestic violence shelter. I do not know exactly when things started to fall apart, but she forwarded me emails back to early November 2013 where it appeared she was in crisis.

What breaks my heart and keeps me coming back to threads like this is that she seemed to have gotten into a much better place in life when I last communicated with her. She had stable housing, was speaking and writing clearly, was looking for work, and seemed to be able to see further ahead than just dealing with the next crisis. Donna was smart, self-reliant, and had a huge heart. She was dealing with major problems, but it felt like she had turned a real corner.
 
I have a strong feeling Donna was fighting her own demons, one of them was probably addiction. When you have the decease of addiction your life is spiraling down very quickly. You loose your job, your house, your friends, you are not able to be a productive member of society anymore, you don't care anymore that people you associate with are no good for you, you do unspeakable things to get money to provide for drugs, etc. I think she was trying to put it together. For getting clean and staying in recovery people need some steady basis. Being in a shelter could have provided that somehow and she was off the streets. Maybe, and this is pure speculation, she used again and was kicked out. Leaving her in total desperation, being back to square one. Her struggle breaks my heart too.

Has LE ever considered foul play? She being harmed and her car dumped there? Or do they think she killed herself and/or succumbed to drugs and her body is somewhere out there? Did LE ever process her car or did a thorough search in the woods?
 
Bit of hope said:
I have a strong feeling Donna was fighting her own demons, one of them was probably addiction. When you have the decease of addiction your life is spiraling down very quickly. You loose your job, your house, your friends, you are not able to be a productive member of society anymore, you don't care anymore that people you associate with are no good for you, you do unspeakable things to get money to provide for drugs, etc. I think she was trying to put it together. For getting clean and staying in recovery people need some steady basis. Being in a shelter could have provided that somehow and she was off the streets. Maybe, and this is pure speculation, she used again and was kicked out. Leaving her in total desperation, being back to square one. Her struggle breaks my heart too.

Has LE ever considered foul play? She being harmed and her car dumped there? Or do they think she killed herself and/or succumbed to drugs and her body is somewhere out there? Did LE ever process her car or did a thorough search in the woods?
Click to expand...

Donna's situation is somewhat different from many addicts who are born in addicted, dysfunctional families. Her mother was a gifted champion, known worldwide. As to her father, he might have battled some demons of his own, but still, "didn't find himself in the dump", as the saying goes. Her addiction could be the symptom, maybe it was the only answer she had found. To me, it is about some childhood tragedy. When I saw her, and it was a decade before these events, there was no evidence of drug use. This is why so many people mention Donna's survival skills, and I only see the inner rift caused by the loneliness. Could she have killed herself? We need to know the family history to answer. I think that running out of the car leaving everything inside is more typical if you are attacked. Is it possible that she was in a hurry not to change her mind? Yes, is always possible, too. "Ships that pass in the night".
 
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