Talk:Disappearance of Maura Murray

Untitled

All the links from southshorexpress.com are broken. This is sad. --71.92.73.170 (talk) 20:58, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
They've been fixed. --Advocate4Maura (talk) 12:10, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for helping improve this article! Jrclark (talk) 16:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

It's really great this article got filled in so carefully. Gephydro (talk) 00:31, 28 September 2008 (UTC)Gephydro

All the links from southshorexpress.net are broken again. Is there a way to fix this permanently? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.185.18.207 (talk) 18:31, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

That's because the South Shore Express is defunct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gephydro (talk • contribs) 20:55, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

At least the remaining links all work. Thanks! This is a fascinating and very sad story.

Citations have been added to prevent deletion. I can add more if needed.--Advocate4Maura (talk) 18:58, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Can we use archive.org to maintain permanent copies of the missing pages? Prell (talk) 19:15, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Re: Londonderry Call?

Hello all. As I cannot find any citation for the claimed 'Londonderry' call, (but have, in my years of research, heard rumours of such.) Accordingly, I feel it should be removed from the page. Respectfully, I request anyone to weigh in? Thank you for your time and all of your efforts creating and editing this page so thoroughly. LightningMcQueenMama (talk) 16:19, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Looks like it was removed prior to your request. There were no real citations to back it up as fact, so IMHO it's better left off anyway. --Advocate4Maura (talk) 18:58, 1 June 2009 (UTC)y

Glad this didn't get deleted. I went to UMass with Maura and it was really scary and sad when she disappeared. --Gephydro

There actually is a source for the "Londonderry Ping": http://mauramurray.blogspot.com/2011/10/search-warrant-and-what-it-implies.html. It's second-hand, sure, but it claims to source a search warrant and the author of the linked-to website has reported that he talked to the police lieutenant that filed it. Prell (talk) 19:21, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Being "second-hand", it plainly doesn't meet Wikipedia's criteria for reliable sourced material. If the police lieutenant had gone 'on the record' (he hasn't), or if the affidavit were published, or a copy of the actual affidavit had been made available to the public and not just a transcript, it would be a reliable source IMHO. --Advocate4Maura (talk) 20:16, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Does anyone know?

Does anyone know how the things in here room were packed, were they packed(boxed) as if she was moving out or packed like she would never see them again or not boxed at all? Was it likely that her school work and running gear was in the car already or did she pack them especially for the trip. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Owain meurig (talk • contribs) 09:41, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Talk pages are for improving the article and are not to be used as a forum. Thanks. --CutOffTies (talk) 10:27, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure the article would be improved by more detail especially when it may concern an unsolved crime, but maybe you know these details are irrelevant? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Owain meurig (talk • contribs) 22:16, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Your question did not seem to appear about improving the article, though if that was your intention I apologize. --CutOffTies (talk) 22:20, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

What I've read (including information obtained through interviews with friends and relatives of Maura Murray) is that MM's belongings were packed up as if she were leaving, in boxes. On top of a box was some kind of letter or print-out that showed that MM knew her boyfriend/fiancé had recently cheated on her. Source: http://mauramurray.blogspot.com. I can dig up the actual pages if requested. Prell (talk) 19:23, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Problems with "In the days before her disappearance"

I'm confused by the first two paragraphs of this section and how they correspond to the linked reference, ["Where could Maura be?"]. This contemporaneous source (a) refers to only one phone call, not two, (b) states pretty clearly (confirmed by both the UMass police and Maura's father) that the upsetting phone call was from one of her sisters, and (c) that it occurred on the evening of February 5th, not the morning of the 6th. Another source (["Maura is Missing: Part 1"] clarifies that there was only one phone call in the evening, from her sister, but that she only became upset hours later in her shift, around 1:20am. Perhaps that's the source of confusion here. There's no referenced source for the first "normal" phone call, so I'm going to go ahead and clean up the text to accord with the references already in place.

However, I'm new to this subject and perhaps there's later sources that reveal two, not one, phone call (although the more I look into this I think the shift of days -- the call before midnight, then breaking down after midnight -- simply confused earlier contributors). If my edits are incorrect, please clean them up, but also include a link to a reliable reference explaining the first phone call and be sure all relevant details are listed. -- Jimbonator (talk) 16:15, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

I've also made some structural changes to the article, consolidating as much of the chronology surrounding the disappearance into a "Timeline" section. I've removed the "Possible sightings" section almost completely, as the alleged sightings of a woman mouthing "help me" or rushing out of a church during a Father's Day sermon, while tantalizing, were not properly sourced at all. The mention of the psychic doesn't add anything either -- the psychic didn't see Maura, hence no sighting. The one bit I did save was Rick Fourcier's sighting of a young person the night of the disappearance, which is relevant and, more importantly, sourced. I moved that into the Timeline section. --Jimbonator (talk) 07:06, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

There have been recent sightings (i.e. in 2014) due to a surge of fliers and other advertisement in cities believed to be related to the disappearance. They all have sources, over at James Renner's MM blog. Prell (talk) 19:47, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Regarding phone calls and when they were placed, the Disappeared episode featuring Maura Murray at one point had a segment of Maura's phone records on screen. I found a screen cap of this on James Renner's blog. You can see them here: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-j_sFGzS0yRw/Tsu64bm5fRI/AAAAAAAAAY4/V7qYi8xUiKQ/s1600/Screen%2Bshot%2B2011-11-22%2Bat%2B10.01.00%2BAM.png. Prell (talk) 19:54, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Removed link for mauramurray.blogspot.com

I removed the link for mauramurray.blogspot.com. This is a blog,which is not a reliable source like a newspaper,news video etc. when you go to mauramurray.blogspot.com the author is now claiming Maura participated in track team orgies. The author claims to have spoke with 3 people at. UMass who stated that Maura went to orgies. 98.240.76.78 (talk) 02:04, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Actually, this site has a page with direct links to primary sources, such as pdfs of scanned police reports and court records. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.101.20.194 (talk) 19:02, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

Actually the site is nothing more than speculation. I have seen where presumably you, the commenter above,h ave wrote she was charged or investigated for Credit card fraud. In the James Renner docs you provided, she was charged with Improper use of a credit card,under $250. There is a big difference between credit card fraud and improper use of a credit card,under $250. 98.240.76.78 (talk) 17:41, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

I've left a link in the external links section which is direct to a documents page. Otherwise, we shouldn't list any blogs or other sites which speculate within the body of the article. Speculations and blogs are NOT part of any ongoing investigation.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 00:17, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Putting the timeline in a bulleted list

Hey, would y'all mind if I put the timeline of the case in a bulleted list instead of paragraph form? (Examples are of this are Murder of Holly Bobo and Timeline of the Casey Anthony case) I find it easier to visualize the timeline when it's in that form and I've gotten a lot of positive feedback on articles where I've done that. Would anyone have any objections to that?Bali88 (talk) 16:03, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Seems like a good improvement to make2.219.27.244 (talk) 03:41, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Mysterious videos: Mr.112dirtbag

Nearly 8 years after her disappearance, a man uploaded several videos on YouTube that appeared to be connected to Maura (channel has been removed, but some of the videos were managed to be saved). According to some accounts, the videos are encrypted with hidden messages, and some believe the man is connected to the case. No evidence has been found, of course, but this story has a ton of coverage around blogs and on YouTube. Fox News wrote about this in 2012, so I think it might be worth mentioning. The man's username is named after the street were Maura disappeared, 112, and after the comments Maura's father made on the disappearance ("I think some local dirt bag grabbed her."). ComputerJA (☎ • ✎) 18:43, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

The "In media" section

The "In media" section should not have been removed since the documentaries are directly related to the case and a media connection had already been made.

Instead of removing the section, a notation of "[citation needed]" should've been added. There are numerous articles/entries in which that notation is used and the info is not removed. So what made this different? There was nothing contentious, just facts.

To me, the info about the existence and broadcasting of the documentaries is common knowledge or easily found. In the case of the second documentary, the Oxygen Channel has been airing commercials for the documentary for nearly two weeks. Doing a Google search on the documentary titles yields lots of hits. To me, the advertising and the many hits equate to "common knowledge."

Someone could've taken the time to check the info and insert the needed inline citations instead of just wiping out another person's contribution/update.

I'll admit that I do not know how to do the citation part nor how to do the brace -- [] -- notations.

In other words, check or verify or validate the submission BEFORE doing a knee-jerk reaction and deleting it just because feathers were ruffled and it wasn't accompanied by "proper" citations. 2600:8800:786:A300:C23F:D5FF:FEC4:D51D (talk) 07:17, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Disappearance of Maura Murray/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Drown Soda (talk · contribs) 20:32, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

@MagicatthemovieS: I will be reviewing this article.

@MagicatthemovieS: I have completed a review for the article in question. Refer to my preliminary notes and additional comments in the review section for suggestions. --Drown Soda (talk) 04:37, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

Preliminary notes

• The lead section could do with some discussion of the cultural significance of this case (i.e. the mass speculation, its role as an internet sensation, coverage in media, etc.) as it does seem to be a unique missing persons case that the public (esp. the online community) has had a great deal of interest in—more than the average missing persons case. This information should be implemented into the "Significance" section as well.

• In terms of coverage here, I did notice a couple of things: Being familiar with the case myself, I found it unusual that Murray's enrollment at West Point was left out of the article. While the article itself is not a biography and is rather focused on her disappearance itself, I think it may be worth mentioning some detail of her life prior to her disappearance, even if it's brief (West Point would be one point of discussion, some details about her early life possibly another). Again, it doesn't need to be extensive as this is not a biography, but I feel for readers, some foundation might be interesting/useful, especially if they are not familiar with the case. I'm open to discussion on this though.

• In many missing persons articles, there are sections dedicated to theories surrounding said person's disappearance. The danger of this as I understand is it can err into original research, but if done cautiously, I think they are useful to include. The fact remains that there are numerous theories and speculation surrounding her disappearance, and acknowledging that is worthwhile IMO. The most obvious one is James Renner's, especially considering he published a major book about it. If done, the main thing to remember is to keep the section neutral (i.e. presenting prevailing theories and their basis without condoning their validity). For an example of a situation like this that I've juggled on Wikipedia myself, see the Black Dahlia page.

• Stylistically, I do notice upon skimming that the "Ongoing investigation" section has a lot of one- or two-sentence paragraphs. This generally should be avoided for readability, and information should be combined into more substantial, cohesive paragraphs. This is a slightly more benign issue in the "Preparations and departure" section, where there are line breaks according to time; this is somewhat useful given that it allows the information to appear along a timeline of sorts, but again, I feel cohesive paragraphs should be the aim.

I'll do more in-depth on this and work on the review below in the oncoming days, but these are just a few notes to think about. --Drown Soda (talk) 20:32, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Review

1. Well written?:

Prose quality:

Manual of Style compliance:

Generally speaking, the article does have clean prose; however, as noted in my preliminary notes, there are a lot of choppy one-sentence paragraphs. The article overall needs to be combed through and information combined into cohesive paragraphs. There are other instances of vague information (i.e. On the anniversary of her disappearance, a service was held where the car was found, and her father met briefly with New Hampshire Governor John Lynch–which anniversary is this referring to?) that needs clarification.

2. Factually accurate and verifiable?:

References to sources:

Citations to reliable sources, where required:

No original research:

This all registers as stable and accurate, and a "sticking to the facts," so to speak. This article specifically runs the risk of veering into fringe theories that are not factual or have no basis in fact. That said, as per my preliminary notes, it may be worth collecting the predominant theories/thoughts in circulation, though, again, this could be riskier than it's actually worth and may have no place here. Source no. 67 (Kimble) is a permanent dead link, so if archive.org doesn't have a snapshot of this, it may be necessary to find an alternate source. Also, the references do need to be combed through and given a uniform citation style (i.e. since this is a U.S. subject and the refs. are already generally this way, make sure each reference date and access date is uniformly Month, Day, Year).

3. Broad in coverage?:

Major aspects:

Focused:

Again, there is good coverage of the facts, but as I said before, I think the "Significance" section needs more detail regarding the cultural momentum of the case and the significant public interest it has garnered (specifically as a case from the post-millennium era that has received the brunt of "internet theorists"). It is a unique missing persons case for many reasons, and the public interest from online sleuths and the publicity/media it has incited is noteworthy.

4. Reflects a neutral point of view?:

Fair representation without bias:

Yes--as said before, the article does stick to the facts, and does not give undue credence to any theories or ideas, which is easy to do here. The details are presented in a factual manner that avoids insinuation or inference, so nice work on this.

5. Reasonably stable?

No edit wars, etc. (Vandalism does not count against GA):

The edit history appears relatively stable, and the article doesn't seem to be shifting significantly from day to day.

6. Illustrated by images, when possible and appropriate?:

Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:

Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

Maps are the only "photos" used as illustrations so-to-speak, so this is a non-issue.

Overall: ✓ Pass Refer to my preliminary notes and points here for the areas where I think this could use some primping. It is near GA status, but there is some work that needs to be done in terms of making the article more "readable" (i.e. combining information into paragraphs). Sources also need uniform citation style, and the "Significance" section could benefit from a bit more information regarding the case's cultural significance, which is intertwined with the internet and internet culture (and honestly probably a large part of why it has received such a detailed Wikipedia entry in the first place). Let me know if there are any questions or clarification needed. Best --Drown Soda (talk) 04:36, 3 October 2017 (UTC)

@MagicatthemovieS: Do you intend to make further edits? I'd do some of the work myself but typically reviewers are not involved in working on articles during reviews. --Drown Soda (talk) 00:16, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

I did intend to help out on this one. I have been very busy as of late; it might take me a bit.

@MagicatthemovieS: I have filled in some of the gaps here and it is more rounded out than before. --Drown Soda (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2017 (UTC)

A picture of the blue ribbon

Can someone go up to the Weathered Barn and get a picture of that blue ribbon that marks the spot of the accident? It's a long drive from where I live and I wouldn't be willing to go all the way there just for it when there are people who live in VT and NH who can do it. It would be essential for the article as not only is it often used to illustrate news coverage, it depicts the accident site. If the image were to be taken in wintertime with snowbanks heaped up on the side of the road, under the same circumstances as the accident, it would be useful to the reader's understanding, since the accident itself has not been immune from controversy (especially lately). Daniel Case (talk) 04:58, 26 October 2017 (UTC)

Note

Note that the web-site mauramurray.com has closed down.

The site mauramurraymissing.org is visible on the wayback machine.

Accident vs Crash

This article repeatedly refers to 'accidents', but 'accident' is a colloquialism. The preferred terms are 'crash' or 'collision'. The Massachusetts DOT specifically has 'Crash Reports' but no 'Accident Reports' Louis (talk) 17:14, 3 May 2024 (UTC)

You didn't change just one instance, but all instances of the use of "accident" and, according to your user page, are intent on doing so across Wikipedia. You should start a Request for Comment at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals) to gauge community consensus for a change that will affect thousands (tens of thousands?) of articles. In this case, while the MASS DOT may have "Crash Reports" now, at the time of Murray's disappearance 20 years ago the document itself is called a Traffic Accident Report and the DOJ calls it an accident.-- Ponyo^{bons mots} 17:28, 3 May 2024 (UTC)

See my comments on User talk:Lominsky#Accident vs Crash. To expand on that entry a bit, "accident" is a well-known and commonly-used term for this type of event, and is the best one to use here. The emphasis is not on things "colliding" (which might argue for substituting "collision") but on the event itself, which the Wikipedia audience understands as the type of accident here. By insisting on hypertechical legal terminology -- even, or perhaps especially, because a government agency uses it -- needlessly injects legal jargon in an article where it is not justified. Unless there is a consensus to make such a change, the change should not be made; and it certainly shouldn't be made across a wide variety of articles. I'm seeing dozens of such edits (usually summarized with some variant of "replaced 'accident' with 'collision'") with no indication that there has been any attempt by the editor to understand context or to seek, or even consider. consensus before imposing his preferred wording. That's not acceptable behavior. TJRC (talk) 22:31, 3 May 2024 (UTC)