Police, FBI search Pa. basement for remains of woman missing for 27 years

MILTON, Pa. — Investigators cut into the basement wall of a home Friday that they believe may contain the remains of a Pennsylvania woman who went missing nearly 28 years ago.

Over two days, seven cadaver dogs all indicated there were human remains on the premises of a duplex in this central Pennsylvania borough of barely more than 7,000 people.

On Friday, investigators were sawing away at a thick cement wall in the building’s basement. The FBI has joined local police in their investigation.

Sunbury Police Chief Tim Miller said that wall, or perhaps the ground below, may be where the remains of 30-year-old Barbara Miller — who disappeared after attending a wedding in 1989 — are hidden. 

According to police, Miller was reported missing July 5, 1989, by ex-boyfriend and former police detective, Joseph Walter “Mike” Egan, identified in the search warrant as the lead suspect in the case from the time of the disappearance to date. Though named by police as the main suspect, no arrests have been made.

The case went cold, and Miller was declared legally dead in 2002.

Chief Miller, who is not related to the victim, was hired in 2016 and revisited the case with local officials. After months of reviewing thousands of case-related documents and receiving new leads, in part through a Facebook page established for the investigation, Chief Miller applied for and was granted a search warrant. 

The warrant, issued Tuesday, cites a 2009 report and recent information obtained from confidential sources that led investigators to at duplex at 751 N. Front St., once the residence of Cathy Reitenbach, Egan’s late sister. 

Ownership of the property has turned over several times over the years. The current owners are not involved in the investigation, police said.

“The (confidential informant) advised that Reitenbach became very upset and began trembling advising that she was one of the last people to see Barbara Miller alive,” the warrant reads. “The CI thought that Reitenbach’s reaction was peculiar and wondered if Cathy Reitenbach was one of the last people to see Barbara Miller alive if she was also one of the first people to see her dead.”

According to the warrant, Miller found at least three references from different people interviewed as part of the cold case investigation who claimed Egan would “get high on cocaine and drive by a home in Milton to ‘check on his old lady.’”

On May 17, Chief Miller and Milton Police Chief Curt Zettlemoyer visited the property and were invited in by the current occupant.

According to the warrant, Chief Miller became suspicious of the basement’s construction.

The exterior walls are made of dirt and stone consistent with similar homes constructed in the area.

But the property didn’t have a dirt basement floor. Instead, a concrete floor was installed — inconsistent with the original construction — and portions of the floor appeared to have been constructed using hand-mixed concrete. A small room in the basement had two interior walls made of thick concrete, the only solid concrete walls in the basement, the warrant said. 

 

Chief Miller said what he found most odd was the installation of a stove top exhaust fan in the room that was vented out of a window at the rear of the basement.

After his girlfriend’s disappearance, Egan told city investigators he last saw her get into a vehicle with two unidentified males, saying their destination was a motorcycle rally in Woolrich, Pennsylvania.

After reporting Miller’s disappearance, Egan moved into the missing woman’s home and began using her vehicle.

 

Miller had contacted Sunbury police several times in previous months prior to her disappearance concerning domestic disputes with Egan. 

At the time, Sunbury police did not list Miller’s disappearance as a homicide. Instead, investigators believed Miller left the area. It was nearly a year later when Sunbury police announced they were investigating Miller’s disappearance as a homicide investigation.

Miller’s mother, Martha Stump, who died in November, told The Sunbury, Pennsylvania Daily Item in 1990 that she did not believe her daughter left without taking her 14-year-old son, Eddie Miller.

Police reopened the case in 2002, and detectives conducted additional interviews and searches. The investigation continued on a limited basis through 2008 when the last search was conducted in a home in Lithia Springs, where Egan once lived.

As investigators search, Susan Zimmerman, Barbara Miller’s adopted sister, paced in an alley to the rear of the duplex, seeking any available information.

She’s holding out hope her sister’s remains are found.

“I hope she is in there,” Zimmerman said. “I want our family to get closure.”

Zimmerman said she is contact with Lynn Miller, Barbara Miller’s sister, who lives in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

“She is waiting by the phone,” Zimmerman said. “We are all just so grateful and so happy police are continuing the efforts to find our sister.”

 Scarcella and Scicchitano writes for the Sunbury, Pennsylvania Daily Item.

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