“We just want to see her back home,” Cara Hartley told Dateline. “We want to see her safe and alive, but we just want — we want her back home.”
“She’s a funny, kind, sweet person,” Cara said of her aunt. “She’s always looking out for people.”
Cara and Theresa.
Cara told Dateline that Theresa has spent her entire life in St. Augustine, Florida. “It’s right on the water,” Cara said. “It’s really beautiful.”
Although they live in the same city, Cara said because of the busyness of life, she hasn’t spoken to her aunt for quite some time. “I haven’t spoken with her since October of [2022],” she said. “I didn’t find out she was missing until a reporter reached out to see if she was my aunt and I realized a police report had been made.”
According to Cara, the police report was made by a longtime friend of Theresa’s, Robert Markwell.
Robert told Dateline that he spoke with Theresa every day and was even helping her remodel her home in St. Augustine. “I’m at Theresa’s house sometimes, you know, anywhere from one time a day for several hours to a couple of times a day,” he said.
Robert said that he and his girlfriend were at Theresa’s house earlier in the day. “We went to Theresa’s house and continued working” on the house, he recalled. “Theresa and [my girlfriend] spent some time at the table going over paperwork.”
Robert told Dateline that in recent months, Theresa had been suffering from some memory loss problems, so they had been helping her out. “She wasn’t paying her electric bill, her water bill, so [my girlfriend] and I took over,” Robert said.
The next day, on Saturday, March 11, Robert said he went back over to Theresa’s house, but she was nowhere to be found. “She was supposed to cook a birthday cake for my girlfriend’s surprise party,” he told Dateline. A surprise party scheduled for Sunday, March 12.
“[Her]roommate told me she left with [a friend],” Robert told Dateline. He added that Theresa’s roommate told him that Theresa and the friend said they were going to stop by Robert’s house later that day, but Robert said they never showed up.
He said he also tried calling Theresa, but the calls went straight to voicemail. “I didn’t worry about it because I figured they were together and they were having fun,” he said. Robert told Dateline that he later realized that Theresa had left her phone at home
The 66-year-old was with her friend in the Ocala National Forest, when their car broke down. When the friend returned with help, Theresa was nowhere to be found.
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