LOCAL NEWS
6A - Oscoda Press, Oscoda, Mi., Wednesday, July 13, 2011
by Holly Nelson
OSCODA Pamela Pam Sue Hobley, 15, and Patricia Patty Ann Spencer, 16, disappeared, apparently without a trace, almost 42 years ago on Oct. 31, 1969.
The Oscoda High School students were last seen around 2 p.m. as they walked along River Road from the high school toward the business district, according to the
Oscoda Township Police Department report.
Hobleys family is still looking for closure and answers. Her sister, Mary Hobley
Buehrle of Osseo, said she and her other two sisters believe the answers are in the Oscoda area, locked in the memory of whomever killed the girls. Pam and Patty are dead. The families know this in the deepest valleys of our souls. We do not know why. We do not know how. But someone does, she said. If there were any lingering
doubts, those vanished when her mother, Lois, was on her death bed in October 2008. As she drew her last breath, Lois said, I see Pam, Buehrle related. When the girls were reported to be missing, they were first thought to be runaways with a destination
of Flint, according to sparse newspaper reports of the day. The girls, however, were close to their families and, after a few weeks without any contact or sighting of either teen, the focus changed to foul play.
Over the decades, there has been much speculation and at least one purported eyewitness account, that from a man now dead who, after telling this reporter what
happened, was deemed non credible by the case investigator, now also dead.
Based on the police report, some leads were followed, including
one which led to the excavation of a grave in the woods. A Shetland pony was found. Other tips lie in the ile, but nothing could be found to indicate whether
pursued. Buehrle said she was saddened that her sister and Pattys lives are now deined only by the 36-page police report. Pamela Hobley and Patty Spencer were loved, they were cherished, said Buehrle. They were not angels, they were young girls struggling in a fast changing world of drugs, pressures and expectations. They were cherished
as a child, a sister, a grandchild, a friend. They are still cherished and missed.Buehrle said her grandparents and parents died never knowing what happened to Pamela. The
mystery especially plagued her mother, who worked at an Oscoda restaurant, and her grandmother, May Jones, who owned another restaurant downtown.
After two or three years without a word, the family moved to Hale. There was no longer a feeling of safety for them in Oscoda. Over the years they pursued answers, never with success. Lois Hobley even sought out a psychic. Mary said the family thought the mystery was over in 2002, when the FBI contacted Lois for a DNA sample to compare with bones found in an AuSable Township woods.
F o r t y - two years later, we still miss our big sister. We still ask, What happened
to Pam? Imagine 15,360 days of asking oneself the same horrible question, day after day, year after year and never getting an answer. Buehrle said she hopes the girls did not suffer and that the person or persons who snuffed out their young lives have experienced consequences. We do pray he has cried once in a while for what we believe he did. We pray his guilt is a blanket that has dampened every good moment in his life. We pray the tapestry of his life has always had the thread of guilt and shame woven
intricately through it, she said. He knows what happened and so do the people who were there with him. We know he covered it up. We know he has succeeded for
42 years to keep the secret buried. What was it? Someone got pregnant? Someone got mad? Someone could not cope with the reality of statutory rape? Buehrle
asks some of the questions, some spawned by rumors, that daily plague her. Please find the courage and strength to give peace and closure to the families your actions ripped
from our lives 42 years ago, Buehrle said in a public appeal to the murderer or murderers.
According to Buehrle, she and sisters Becky and Betty are determined to ind the answers and the identity of the murderers. Im not going to let it die, Buehrle stressed.
She has enlisted the help of Oscoda Township Police Chief Mark David and pleads that anyone with any information, no matter how seemingly trivial, contact him at 989-739-9112.
David said the case has never been closed and, after reviewing it, plans to follow up on several possible leads.
