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Volunteers Invited To Search For Missing Mother Today

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By LISA A. DAVIS, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 17, 2007

NEW PORT RICHEY - Family and friends of a young mother who disappeared Nov. 5 from her Colony Lakes Estates home have organized a search for her that will begin at 8 a.m. today.

Stefanie Francique, 24, vanished that evening from the home she shared with her father and stepmother, leaving behind her 4-year-old daughter and few clues.

Janet Mears, her stepmother, last saw her that night when Mears went to bed. As was Francique's usual routine, she was spending the evening outside using her cell phone and smoking cigarettes because smoking was not allowed inside the home.

When Mears awoke the next morning, Francique's car was still in the driveway; her purse, makeup and other personal items she usually would take with her were in the home; but she was gone. Her cell phone and car keys also were not found.

Nobody has reported seeing or talking to her since. Family and friends say she wouldn't just walk away, especially from her daughter, Alyanna, who was described as her mother's little shadow.

"Stefanie does not abandon her daughter," Francique's father, Ardell Mears, 60, said Tuesday. "I think she's met some foul play."

The Pasco County Sheriff's Office is investigating, but detectives have not found any evidence of a crime.

Deputies searched the family's home, 11910 Old Tuscany Place, on Nov. 6 as well as the community's clubhouse, pool area and the woods around the house.

Anyone interested in joining today's search can meet at a home in the Colony Lakes Estates at 12033 Infinity Drive, off Colony Lakes Boulevard. For information, call organizer Tammy Richardson at (727) 514-1561.

Organizers recommend that volunteers wear long pants and sleeves, boots or closed-toe shoes, and gloves. Bring along long sticks to poke brush, shovels and a whistle.

Two Pasco deputies will be on hand in case any evidence is found so it can be properly handled, or if a crime scene must be established, sheriff's office spokesman Doug Tobin said.

The family has been told Francique's cell phone has not been switched on since the night she went missing, Mears said. Detectives were combing through telephone records and planned to search Francique's computer, Mears said.

The sheriff's office had not had any tips about Francique's whereabouts.

She is 5 feet 9 inches tall, weighs 200 pounds and has long, wavy blond hair and blue eyes. She has a white tiger tattoo on her upper right arm.

Anyone with information may call Detective Kevin Macomber at 1-800-854-2862, Ext. 7462.

Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083 or ldavis@tampatrib.com.

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