Alison Goodwin Thresher was 45 when she vanished from her Bethesda apartment in late May 2000. On the evening of May 23 she had dinner with her parents, returned to her Sumner Highlands Apartments unit on Sangamore Road, spoke with an acquaintance by phone around 10:00 p.m., and sent an email to her employer just after midnight on May 24. She never reported for a new job as a copyeditor at The Washington Post’s website and was reported missing on May 25. Alison left behind two children, Hannah, then 12, and Sam, then 10.

The day after she disappeared her copper-colored 1997 Volvo station wagon was found abandoned near Ridge Drive and Broad Street by the C&O Canal, about a mile or more from her apartment; Alison was not with the vehicle and her wallet and keys were not found inside it. Investigators later treated the case as a presumed homicide, saying evidence suggested she may have been killed inside her apartment and that someone attempted to destroy evidence there.

Detectives later searched more than 300 acres near the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center after receiving information that Alison might have been buried there, but no remains were found. The circumstances of what happened after her last confirmed contacts remain unresolved.