Post by LadyBlue on Sept 7, 2007 15:57:16 GMT -5
Life in Bathurst hasn't been the same since popular resident Janine Vaughan vanished six months ago.
The 31-year-old menswear shop manager was last seen early on December 7 getting into a car after leaving the Metro Tavern nightclub.
Friends and family say she would never accept a ride from someone she didn't know.
That assertion has the residents of the normally laid-back community questioning one another.
"Everyone knew her through work or through her wide range of friends," said her best friend, Rebecca Medhurst, who has lived in the central west town for all of her 26 years.
"I know she wouldn't have gotten into the car with a stranger, which means I probably know them as well, through her or a mutual friend, and that makes it so much worse, to think that it's someone connected with me. I think that someone out there must know more than they're letting on."
Police yesterday conducted a massive search of Mount Panorama, using dog squads, divers and 60 State Emergency Service workers.
Standing by for information were Ms Medhurst, Ms Vaughan's uncle Jeff and mother Jenny.
Blonde, petite, immaculately presented and always smiling, Ms Vaughan was the eldest of four children raised in Muswellbrook, in the Hunter Valley, by Jenny and Ian Vaughan.
She moved to Bathurst three years ago, following her then boyfriend.
That relationship didn't work out, but she remained, developing a close network of friends and a good job.
At the time she disappeared, she was renewing an interest in abstract drawing and wanted to buy a house in town.
"Janine was a great friend," said MsMedhurst, who worked next door. The two spoke every day.
Ms Vaughan came to all of her best friend's pre-natal classes, practising massage and breathing techniques and planning the birth of her daughter, Paris, now aged six months.
"She used to get so excited when Paris would kick, anyone would think it was her baby as well," Ms Medhurst said, speaking to the media for the first time.
"She was really disappointed that she had to miss the birth because of complications, as we'd been working towards it for so long. She was my rock."
The women were meant to go on a Christmas shopping trip to Orange the day after she disappeared.
Ms Medhurst said: "She was so fun-loving and outgoing, always there to lend a hand for anyone that needed it and always putting herself last. She was a social person, she liked going out to meet people, she liked to drink."
Security cameras show Ms Vaughan walking and conversing outside the nightclub at 4am.
Detective Inspector Paul Jacobs said earlier suspicions of a repeat offender - after several women reported being attacked in Bathurst around the same time, as well as the disappearance of Jessica Small, 15, from Bathurst five years ago - had largely been discounted.
The police have interviewed more than 1,000 people and taken hundreds of official statements, and yesterday searched 30ha of bush and four dams including one on the Charles Sturt University campus.
Her uncle Jeff has had to leave his hospital car parking job because he has difficulty concentrating for more than 30minutes.
"We're all just going through the motions, trying to keep going," he said.
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