By Madina Toure
The search for a Whitestone woman who has been missing since September 2015 has been reignited.
The NYPD re-released an alert May 5 for Maria Brabazon, 55, who was last seen Sept. 5., On that day, a neighbor’s home surveillance camera recorded her walking on 14th Avenue toward the intersection with 152nd Street in Whitestone.
About a month later, Beau Dietl & Associates, a private investigation company in Manhattan, announced at a news conference in Bayside that the 109th Precinct Detective Squad and the NYPD’s Missing Persons Unit had launched a search for Brabazon in collaboration with the firm.
Peter Brabazon, Maria’s husband, said Detective Santos of the Missing Persons Unit has been working on the case. But no new information has yet emerged.
“The NYPD has shown a renewed interest and Detective Santos has been doing additional things,” he said. “They did aerial searches in New York City and other things. He said the case is very active and they are looking very hard.”
Brabazon said the family plans to add more information about the case to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, a missing persons database, to which Maria was added.
He said the status of the investigation has remained the same. “It’s been over eight months since we’ve seen Maria,” he said.
The family also has a website, www.maria
Mark Pucci, executive vice president of Beau Dietl & Associates and the lead investigator in the case, previously said the firm had performed standard investigative protocol, which entails reviewing the initial response from the NYPD, interviewing family members and neighbors, searching for video cameras in the area and canvassing stores in the Whitestone Shopping Center.
Pucci could not be reached for comment.
In early November, Pucci said the firm used three separate dog teams as part of the search. The firm put out National Crime Information Center alerts and got help from police in the Nassau County and Massapequa-Amityville area.
The firm also searched the public and park areas in the vicinity of the Throgs Neck Bridge, including Little Bay Park, Clear Bay Park Golf Course and open areas near Fort Totten.
At the time, the firm received an alert about a woman who looked like Maria at a store in the Amityville-Massapequa area, where she shopped frequently at thrift stores and antique shops. But it turned out to be a Polish woman. Maria has a Bavarian accent.
Brabazon was described by police as 5-foot-5, weighing 125 pounds, with blonde hair and blue eyes. She was last seen wearing black leggings and a white shirt.
Reach reporter Madina Toure by e-mail at mtour
