| The
footage from a casino eye in the sky may have cracked a two-year old
missing persons case. Police say a missing Vermont teenager may
have surfaced in an Atlantic City casino.
Brianna Maitland, 19 years
old, may have been picked up by the Caesars Atlantic City Hotel
Casino surveillance system on January 17, 2006. The video image
showed a dark haired woman, fitting Maitland’s description, next to
a man at one of the casino’s table games. Only part of the woman’s
face is visible.
The Vermont State Police
were contacted after a man, returning from his New Jersey vacation,
that claimed he saw a woman that looked like Maitland patronizing
the Atlantic City casino. The man is a resident of Maitland’s home
town. He made his report on January 19th.
Chief investigator Lt. Brian
Miller of the Vermont State police said, although the man that made
the report did not make an immediate call to the authorities when he
first spied who he thought to be Maitland, he did present very
helpful and detailed information to the Vermont State Police. He
gave them the time he saw her at the casino, the date, and what
table she was hanging around.
Both the Vermont investigators and Maitland’s parent viewed the
tape, provided by the Caesar’s casino, of the hour long period
during which the woman remained at the table. Kellie Maitland,
Brianna’s mother, said the woman’s mannerisms reminded her of her
daughter’s, according to Detective John Donegan. Donegan, an
officer of the New Jersey Police, is a missing persons
investigator.
Donegan says, “There hasn’t
been too many leads with Mom and Dad saying they believe it’s her.
Whether it’s legitimate or not, if Mom and Dad are telling me
they’re pretty certain it’s her, it’s incumbent on me to follow
through.”
Bruce and Kellie Maitland made the trip to the Atlantic City casino
to see the originals of the footage. They where unable to say for
certain that the woman in the images was their daughter. Maitland’s
parents currently live in DeKalb, New York. They have issued a
$20,000 reward for the return of their daughter.
Many casinos have facial recognition software. Facial recognition
gives camera operators the ability to capture faces from video
stills and compare them digitally to the thousands of photo in a law
enforcement database. Caesar’s, unfortunately, was not equipped
with such helpful software.
The New Jersey State Police released a still from the video. It is
hard to make the woman out. It shows her eyes, forehead, and the
very top of her head as the photo was taken from the ceiling of the
casino.
Brianna Maitland went missing on March 19, 2004. At the time she
was 17, living in Sheldon, Vermont. On the day she went missing she
had just finished working a shift at the Black Lantern Inn,
Montgomery, Vermont. Her vehicle, a 1985 Oldsmobile 88, was found
the next day with its rear end crashed into a deserted barn. As of
March 19th, Brianna Maitland weighed about 110 pounds and
stood at 5 feet and 4 inches.
Alyce Parker, spokesperson
for Harrah’s Entertainment, owners of the Caesar’s casino, says “We
want to be extremely helpful to the state police both in New Jersey
and in Vermont in assisting them with their ongoing investigation
and will provide any support we can possibly provide.” To the best
of Parker’s knowledge, none of the casino employees working in the
area of Maitland’s table have yet to be questioned about the night
of the sighting.
Miller and the Vermont authorities are suspicious of the
disappearance circumstances. “The circumstance in which her vehicle
was found makes you tend to believe there was some foul play
involved. If not, then it was a carefully planned thing. Based on
her age, it seems unlikely but not impossible that she would have
staged her own disappearance,” said Miller.
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