I'm in Holland right now where we're celebrating my daughter's 14th birthday. My daughter chose to go an live with her mothers side of the family and continue her education in Holland two years ago. But, before that, Amanda Dowler (Milly) was one of her school friends. Milly had been to our house a few times and I had picked up my daughter from hers.
It is incomprehesible to my daughter and her friends thet Milly would have run away. She simply was not that kind of girl at all. But it is equally incomprehensible that no one saw something happen to her during her walk from Walton on Thames Station, down Station Road, across the traffic lights at The Halfway, then along Rydens Road to the road where she lived. These are straight, boring, open roads and the walk from Walton station to Amanda's home would not have been the type of walk a person would enjoy. So a lift from someone she thought she knew might have been welcome. On the other hand, she might have been walking on the pavement on the side which faces oncoming traffic beside a long row of parked cars outside the Birds Eye offices. Someone in one of those cars, or a van, could have grabbed her and headed off back up the road past the station.
So if anyone was driving down Station Road, or Rydens Road on the afternoon of the Thursday before last and can remember seeing anything, however insignificant it may have seemed at the time, please get in touch with the police.
HJ
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Times were between 3.45 to 4.00pm on 21.3.02. Millie is 5'0" tall has light brown shoulder length hair, when last seen was wearing a school uniform Dk. Blue blazer, white blouse and grey skirt.
HJ is it worth adding her photo to your Homepage ?
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I really do hope that there is a happy ending to this.
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As parents I think we can just about imagine the agony, torment and fear in the mind of the parents.
It brings everthing else we talk and argue about into its proper perspective of unimportance in relation to this reality.
We must all pray for a happy ending to this awful event.
alvin
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HJ,
The police are now saying she may have "run away with someone she knew"
Of course, this not the same as getting into a car with someone she knew so I wonder why they are saying these things. Did they find something at her home to give them this idea?
Let us hope sincerely that she is found safe and well and soon.
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This is every parents nightmare.
Having lost ours one evening for the best part of a couple of hours, just the memory still brings tears even years later. That had a happy ending to an episode with an extremely silly and innocent cause.
You feel so utterly utterly helpless and wretched, and realise that with road transport as it is today just missing for 20 minutes means looking for a needle in a haystack would be relatively easy in comparison.
I know people criticise kids having mobiles, but the search and the communication difficulty means our family is now equipped 100%.
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I couldn't think of anything worse.
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I have lived in Walton for ove 17 years and know the area quite well. Three of my neighbours have their children at Heathside School and they all know Milly.
Station Road and Rydens Road are used by Goods traffic heading to the Hersham/Molesey industrial estates - much of this traffic is in order to avoid the low railway bridge by MJA on Hersham Road and the one next to Hersham Station.
I frequently see the drivers/passengers of these type of vehicles whistling at and verbally harasssing young schoolgirls on their way to & from school. I do not usually like to generalise or stereotype: but for whatver reason, these type of people are mostly in a "white van". I saw white-van-man & passenger harassing my neighbour's daughter (who also co-incidentally is the daughter of a Maths teacher at another local school!) just yesterday on Hersham Road -within 10 feet of posters appealing for news of Milly. I have always found this kind of behaviour unacceptable and reprehensible; however, at least they have limited their unwelcome attention to verbal means.
Although the Police (and HJ) seem to think that it is probable that Milly must have got in to a vehicle willingly, I think it would be quite easy for an cunning abductor to spot an opportune moment on Rydens Road to bundle a pedestrian in to the back of their van/truck in a split second without anyone noticing. This could be demonstrated/tested by the police by doing a "reconstruction" where they do not publicise the event and see if anyone notices. Although I can understand why the Police must look in the locality first (they have used the helicopter for about a week, and on Saturday had a twin engined RAF spotter plane taking photographs); I sadly believe that Milly must have been taken against her will and is probably miles away from Walton. I fear that this is another tragic case like that of Sarah Payne, another Walton/Hersham local girl, - who was taken by an opportune criminal. I only hope I am wrong and Milly is found quickly.
Maybe HJ can try to organise a joint TV appeal by Walton/Weybridge/Esher celebreties (Michael Aspel, Chris Tarrant, Cliff Richard, Mick Hucknall, Geoff Hurst, Jenson Button, Kate Winslett and others) - appealing to the kidnapper to phone crimestoppers to say where Millie is, even if the news is that she is no longer "safe and well".
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As an afterthought, I wonder whether the Police have asked all the businesses on Molesey Road - where most of the commercial traffic is headed - for information about their visitors between 3pm and 4.30pm on that day, and to ask all those visitors about their routes, and if anyone of them saw Milly on Rydens Road or Station Road.
To see a map of the location
click here
You can see more deatils by using the zoom button, or clicking on a partiular spot.
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