oviedo
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2008
- Messages
- 17,620
- Reaction score
- 167,697
Missing Richmond woman struggled with mental health, substance abuse
A search for details of the life of Anneliese Heinig, the missing mother of two from Richmond, reveal a woman who is loved by family and friends but who also has struggled and had a history of conflict involving law enforcement.
BY JESSICA LOWELLKENNEBEC JOURNAL
Share
RICHMOND — As the search for Anneliese Heinig enters its second week in Falmouth, her family no longer believes she will be found alive.
“We’ve come to terms with the fact that we have to face the reality that Anneliese is gone,” her father, Christopher Heinig, said in an interview.
Police in Sagadahoc County were already familiar with the 37-year-old mother of two when her teenage daughter reported her missing Nov. 28.
A review of public documents shows Heinig has had suicidal thoughts and has undergone court-ordered counseling for post traumatic stress and substance abuse treatment following protection from abuse order requested by the father of her younger child. That came six months after Heinig was taken by Richmond police to Mid Coast Hospital in Brunswick in December 2017 for evaluation after she threatened to throw herself off a bridge.
In an interview Sunday, Christopher Heinig acknowledged his daughter’s past problems, and said she had not only completed counseling but remained active with one of her therapy groups.
But there is no obvious explanation for why she posted two cryptic messages on Facebook in the days before she disappeared.
On Nov. 22, she posted: “I just want peace. I pray for Peace and my family. I love my children and I want the world to know.”
And hours before she was last seen Nov. 26, she updated her profile photo with a photo of her two children that was several years old.
Despite missing person flyers posted from Richmond to Portland and shared widely online, few tips have been called into Richmond police and none has provided new information.
The multiagency search launched a week ago where Heinig was last seen has also turned up no new information.
Over the weekend, a statement from Falmouth police said the search would continue for the foreseeable future, but would be scaled back absent new information.
“We’ve been going through pictures of Anneliese,” Christopher Heinig said. “Not that I’ve been trying to be a tough guy, the unemotional kind of practical guy, but I’ve tried to be strong and keep my wife supported and my daughter, Grace. But every once in a while, I’ll see a picture of her and break down and cry.”
Heinig’s 16-year-old daughter contacted the Richmond Police Department on Thanksgiving Day to report her mother had failed to show up at a family dinner.
That was two days after a Maine state trooper had the vehicle Heinig had been driving towed from the shoulder of Interstate 295 in Falmouth — nearly 40 miles from her home in Richmond — where it had sat for about seven hours.
Sgt. James Donnell, who was working that day, pinged Heinig’s cellphone and tracked its location to a tow yard in South Portland.
Inside the black Mercury Mariner SUV, registered to her parents, were Heinig’s cellphone, wallet and keys. In the back were birthday items for her daughter, whose birthday had just passed.
Following that came the tip about the last probable sighting of Heinig, walking south along the side of I-295 away from her vehicle at a time of day when traffic on that stretch of highway starts to pick up for the day.
At 6 a.m., the equivalent of 929 vehicles per hour passed that spot, as measured by the Maine Department of Transportation. By 7 a.m., the volume of traffic had increased to 1,637 automobiles per hour — just shy of the peak morning traffic at 11 a.m. that day.
Despite the number of vehicles passing that spot, no one else has offered any information about seeing Anneliese Heinig that morning.
The Heinigs retrieved the vehicle from South Portland, and have said the low gas indicator was on. Anneliese Heinig did not call AAA or her sister, Grace, for help.
If she left any kind of note, that has not been disclosed.
LIFE STRUGGLES
Responses from lifelong friends and others posted in the days after news spread of Heinig’s disappearance included messages of love and offers of prayers for her safety. They beg her to return to the people who love her or to reach out and let someone know she is safe. They urge her to let family and friends help her.
A number of Heinig’s friends shared stories about her during a candlelight vigil organized to offer support for the Heinigs at the end of the first week of searching.
RELATED
Dozens attend vigil in Brunswick for Anneliese Heinig
A public records request by the Kennebec Journal confirmed Anneliese Heinig’s life has been turbulent at times. The Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Office and the Richmond Police Department have been called repeatedly to her home on Main Street to intervene in family conflicts or to help find her daughter when she would not come home.
In 2019 alone, Richmond police officers have been to the home 23 times, most recently on Oct. 26.
Police have also been called to a home on Alexander Reed Road when she had lived there with Ryan Theriault, the father of her 5-year-old son.
Theriault, like many of Heinig’s friends, has not responded to a message seeking comment.
Falmouth police Lt. Frank Soule talks with Anneliese Heinig’s family on the bridge on Route 9 over the Presumpscot River in Falmouth, in the area being searched Wednesday. Anneliese’s sister, Grace, is at left, and her father, Chris, is at center. Portland Press Herald photo by Shawn Patrick Ouellette
Two years ago this month, Richmond police Officer Chris Giles responded to Alexander Reed Road for a reported family fight and possible assault. While no charges were brought, Giles brought Heinig to Mid Coast Hospital for evaluation after she said she was ready to do herself in and threatened to throw herself off a bridge.
“On the way to the hospital, Annalese(sic) again made reference to jumping off a bridge,” the officer wrote in a report. “I asked her which bridge and she said it didn’t matter, any bridge. She also said, ‘When I leave the hospital I will be much closer to jumping.'”
In the middle of 2018, Theriault sought and received a protection from abuse order against Heinig after a violent outburst.
As part of that process, she was ordered to complete a psychiatric program at Mid Coast Hospital and seek counseling for post-traumatic stress disorder and substance abuse. The court also discussed the conditions under which Heinig, accompanied by the children’s grandparents, could see her children.
Eventually, the order was dismissed.
On Sunday, Christopher Heinig said his daughter and Theriault realized they loved each other but could not live together.
“She just recently started working for SaviLinx at Brunswick Landing,” Christopher Heinig said. “That’s the first really good job that she’s had in a number of years. She enjoyed the work. She enjoyed the people she was working with, and they enjoyed her.”
Having that job, one that would make her financially secure, was a wonderful feeling, he said.
PRAYING FOR ANNELIESE
On Friday, 10 days after she was last seen, family and friends numbering about 200, gathered around the gazebo of the Brunswick Mall to offer support to her family and pray for Anneliese Heinig’s return.
Friends, family and community members gather at a candlelight vigil Friday evening at the Brunswick mall for Anneliese Heinig, a 37-year-old mother of two who has not been seen since Nov. 26. Portland Press Herald photo by Brianna Soukup
For nearly an hour, under gently falling snow, stories from Heinig’s lifelong friends drew laughter and tears. Holding onto candles as a sign of hope, friends conjured a picture of Heinig as a bright and friendly child, an athlete, a dancer and a fierce and loyal friend.
Heinig’s family was there, too, holding candles and hope.
Snipped
Missing Richmond woman struggled with mental health, substance abuse
A search for details of the life of Anneliese Heinig, the missing mother of two from Richmond, reveal a woman who is loved by family and friends but who also has struggled and had a history of conflict involving law enforcement.
BY JESSICA LOWELLKENNEBEC JOURNAL
Share
RICHMOND — As the search for Anneliese Heinig enters its second week in Falmouth, her family no longer believes she will be found alive.
“We’ve come to terms with the fact that we have to face the reality that Anneliese is gone,” her father, Christopher Heinig, said in an interview.
Police in Sagadahoc County were already familiar with the 37-year-old mother of two when her teenage daughter reported her missing Nov. 28.
A review of public documents shows Heinig has had suicidal thoughts and has undergone court-ordered counseling for post traumatic stress and substance abuse treatment following protection from abuse order requested by the father of her younger child. That came six months after Heinig was taken by Richmond police to Mid Coast Hospital in Brunswick in December 2017 for evaluation after she threatened to throw herself off a bridge.
In an interview Sunday, Christopher Heinig acknowledged his daughter’s past problems, and said she had not only completed counseling but remained active with one of her therapy groups.
But there is no obvious explanation for why she posted two cryptic messages on Facebook in the days before she disappeared.
On Nov. 22, she posted: “I just want peace. I pray for Peace and my family. I love my children and I want the world to know.”
And hours before she was last seen Nov. 26, she updated her profile photo with a photo of her two children that was several years old.
Despite missing person flyers posted from Richmond to Portland and shared widely online, few tips have been called into Richmond police and none has provided new information.
The multiagency search launched a week ago where Heinig was last seen has also turned up no new information.
Over the weekend, a statement from Falmouth police said the search would continue for the foreseeable future, but would be scaled back absent new information.
“We’ve been going through pictures of Anneliese,” Christopher Heinig said. “Not that I’ve been trying to be a tough guy, the unemotional kind of practical guy, but I’ve tried to be strong and keep my wife supported and my daughter, Grace. But every once in a while, I’ll see a picture of her and break down and cry.”
Heinig’s 16-year-old daughter contacted the Richmond Police Department on Thanksgiving Day to report her mother had failed to show up at a family dinner.
That was two days after a Maine state trooper had the vehicle Heinig had been driving towed from the shoulder of Interstate 295 in Falmouth — nearly 40 miles from her home in Richmond — where it had sat for about seven hours.
Sgt. James Donnell, who was working that day, pinged Heinig’s cellphone and tracked its location to a tow yard in South Portland.
Inside the black Mercury Mariner SUV, registered to her parents, were Heinig’s cellphone, wallet and keys. In the back were birthday items for her daughter, whose birthday had just passed.
Following that came the tip about the last probable sighting of Heinig, walking south along the side of I-295 away from her vehicle at a time of day when traffic on that stretch of highway starts to pick up for the day.
At 6 a.m., the equivalent of 929 vehicles per hour passed that spot, as measured by the Maine Department of Transportation. By 7 a.m., the volume of traffic had increased to 1,637 automobiles per hour — just shy of the peak morning traffic at 11 a.m. that day.
Despite the number of vehicles passing that spot, no one else has offered any information about seeing Anneliese Heinig that morning.
The Heinigs retrieved the vehicle from South Portland, and have said the low gas indicator was on. Anneliese Heinig did not call AAA or her sister, Grace, for help.
If she left any kind of note, that has not been disclosed.
LIFE STRUGGLES
Responses from lifelong friends and others posted in the days after news spread of Heinig’s disappearance included messages of love and offers of prayers for her safety. They beg her to return to the people who love her or to reach out and let someone know she is safe. They urge her to let family and friends help her.
A number of Heinig’s friends shared stories about her during a candlelight vigil organized to offer support for the Heinigs at the end of the first week of searching.
RELATED
Dozens attend vigil in Brunswick for Anneliese Heinig
A public records request by the Kennebec Journal confirmed Anneliese Heinig’s life has been turbulent at times. The Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Office and the Richmond Police Department have been called repeatedly to her home on Main Street to intervene in family conflicts or to help find her daughter when she would not come home.
In 2019 alone, Richmond police officers have been to the home 23 times, most recently on Oct. 26.
Police have also been called to a home on Alexander Reed Road when she had lived there with Ryan Theriault, the father of her 5-year-old son.
Theriault, like many of Heinig’s friends, has not responded to a message seeking comment.
Falmouth police Lt. Frank Soule talks with Anneliese Heinig’s family on the bridge on Route 9 over the Presumpscot River in Falmouth, in the area being searched Wednesday. Anneliese’s sister, Grace, is at left, and her father, Chris, is at center. Portland Press Herald photo by Shawn Patrick Ouellette
Two years ago this month, Richmond police Officer Chris Giles responded to Alexander Reed Road for a reported family fight and possible assault. While no charges were brought, Giles brought Heinig to Mid Coast Hospital for evaluation after she said she was ready to do herself in and threatened to throw herself off a bridge.
“On the way to the hospital, Annalese(sic) again made reference to jumping off a bridge,” the officer wrote in a report. “I asked her which bridge and she said it didn’t matter, any bridge. She also said, ‘When I leave the hospital I will be much closer to jumping.'”
In the middle of 2018, Theriault sought and received a protection from abuse order against Heinig after a violent outburst.
As part of that process, she was ordered to complete a psychiatric program at Mid Coast Hospital and seek counseling for post-traumatic stress disorder and substance abuse. The court also discussed the conditions under which Heinig, accompanied by the children’s grandparents, could see her children.
Eventually, the order was dismissed.
On Sunday, Christopher Heinig said his daughter and Theriault realized they loved each other but could not live together.
“She just recently started working for SaviLinx at Brunswick Landing,” Christopher Heinig said. “That’s the first really good job that she’s had in a number of years. She enjoyed the work. She enjoyed the people she was working with, and they enjoyed her.”
Having that job, one that would make her financially secure, was a wonderful feeling, he said.
PRAYING FOR ANNELIESE
On Friday, 10 days after she was last seen, family and friends numbering about 200, gathered around the gazebo of the Brunswick Mall to offer support to her family and pray for Anneliese Heinig’s return.
Friends, family and community members gather at a candlelight vigil Friday evening at the Brunswick mall for Anneliese Heinig, a 37-year-old mother of two who has not been seen since Nov. 26. Portland Press Herald photo by Brianna Soukup
For nearly an hour, under gently falling snow, stories from Heinig’s lifelong friends drew laughter and tears. Holding onto candles as a sign of hope, friends conjured a picture of Heinig as a bright and friendly child, an athlete, a dancer and a fierce and loyal friend.
Heinig’s family was there, too, holding candles and hope.
Snipped
Missing Richmond woman struggled with mental health, substance abuse
