Officials said Maze was kidnapped from a rest stop near Wolf Creek, Montana as she was driving from Helena to Great Falls on Tuesday.
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When contacted, FBI Public Affairs Specialist Sandra Barker said “The FBI Salt Lake City Field Office, along with the Lewis & Clark County Sheriff’s Office in Montana, continue to the investigate the death of Rita Maze, whose body was found in her vehicle in Spokane, Washington on September 7th”.
By the time authorities found her auto two hours later and more than 500km away from where she was originally taken, Rita Maze was dead. She called her husband about 10:30 p.m. Tuesday, authorities told KXLY.
Rochelle Maze, 23, says her mother told her she was afraid her abductor had access to the.9-mm Ruger pistol that she kept in the auto, though authorities did not comment on what weapon was used to kill her.
Rochelle Maze said her mother told her that she was overpowered by a “massive guy” who was about 6 feet, 5 inches tall and wearing a black hoodie.
The call set off a frantic search by her family and law enforcement that ended when Rita Maze’s body was found Wednesday in the trunk of her auto, abandoned near Spokane International Airport in Washington state.
In her final moments, desperate to survive, the elementary-school cook called her family in Great Falls, Montana, and tried to relay as much information as she could about what happened, relatives said. Bob Maze told the police that he had last spoken to his wife at around 11:30 that morning and hadn’t heard from her since.
Authorities have not said how Maze was killed, although they are expected to release more information Thursday. “I told her that I loved her”, Rochelle told the newspaper.
Sheriff Leo C. Dutton of Lewis and Clark County held a news conference where he described some further details. Also, sometime in the late evening, a Helena police officer, searching for Maze, calls her cellphone number and she answers.
About two hours after her initial call, however, police found her body in her vehicle, a black Pontiac Grand Prix, in a parking lot outside of Spokane Washington International Airport.
“We know where the body was located; we know where she started out”, he told the newspaper.
Maze’s daughter, Rochelle Maze, spoke with local media about the final conversation she had with her mother.
Because interstate travel was involved in the abduction and murder, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is working with Montana and Washington investigators to solve the case.
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“She was talking to my Dad and had told him help me, help me, she was in the trunk of her auto, she thinks she was hit with something or by someone, she didn’t really see”, Rochelle said. Taking us on park days and always being a kid with us.
