Volunteers search for missing student
Toolbox
The Associated Press - Published: April 27, 2008
MIDDLEBURY — Nearly 150 volunteers turned out Saturday to search for a missing Middlebury College freshman, combing fields, woods and river banks in another unsuccessful search for clues to the disappearance.
On foot and in kayaks, people from Vermont and beyond participated in an event organized by Natalie Garza, 40, of Albuquerque, N.M., whose 19-year-old son Nicholas Garza vanished Feb. 5 after leaving a dormitory.
Frustrated by unsuccessful searches by the Vermont State Police, Middlebury Police and numerous search-and-rescue agencies from northern New England, Garza hired forensics investigator Gary Peterson and conducted her own search, even though police did one of their own in a separate area the same day.
"It was a desperate sort of act, actually," said Garza, who has taken up residence on the campus since five days after the disappearance.
A group of Garza's friends joined in, but most of the volunteers were not Middlebury College students.
36