The last time anyone saw Brianna Maitland was March 19th, 2004 and that was 17 years ago.

“It’s not unsolvable,” said VSP Detective Sergeant Angela Baker. “I think that the answer lies somewhere and I think that we just haven’t, you haven’t either asked the right question or we haven’t asked the right person yet.”

Maitland was last seen leaving work in Montgomery, Vermont where she was a dishwasher at the Black Lantern Inn and she was 17 at the time.

“It was an upscale bed and breakfast at that time in a ski town. It wasn’t a noisy bar that people were hanging out at was an upscale bed and breakfast. She remained in the back of the restaurant, for the most part, doing the dishes,” said Baker.

Maitland clocked out around 11:20 pm and drove off in her 1985 Oldsmobile. That car would later be found backed up into an abandoned building just a mile away off of Route 118.

“That’s the main route up there and that’s how she would have gone back to 105 to get back to Sheldon.”

Brianna was supposed to go to Sheldon, Vermont where she was staying with a childhood friend, Jillian Stout.

She left a note saying she would be back that night, but Brianna never came back and Stout was out of town and didn’t see the note until a few days later.

“That car was reported the next day by someone who lived in the area as being backed into the bar,” said Baker. “A trooper responded up to that area and sees the vehicle. For anybody who knows this area, a vehicle stopped abandoned on the side of the road is not unusual. The trooper looked into the vehicle saw that there were paychecks in there with Brianna’s name on it for the Black Lantern. He went up to the Black Lantern, but it was closed at the time so he wasn’t able to make contact with anyone and the car was eventually towed from that location.”

After Stout contacted the Maitlands’, they all realized something was wrong. No one had seen or heard from Brianna and that’s when she was reported missing.

“Jillian wasn’t at home that weekend,” said Private Investigator, Louis Barry. “That’s why there was a two-day lapse and when really no one knew she was missing because Jillian assumed that she was at Jillian’s house and Jillian was staying with her sister. That’s a good reason for part of in the delay of her being reported missing, just like no one realized that she was missing.”

Her father, Bruce Maitland said Brianna had a zest for life.

“Well, she certainly was a free and independent spirit type. She always was that way from the time she was, you know, golly, two or three years old. Just very, very vivacious and be people liked her,” said Bruce Maitland.

Brianna had recently dropped out of high school, but on the day she disappeared she completed her GED test.

“We got all the results after she disappeared,” said Bruce Maitland.

Bruce said not knowing what happened to his daughter has been hard on the family.

“It’s a bizarre thing not knowing it really is,” said Maitland. “The chances of knowing decrease every single day and then you have to kind of deal with the fact that you may never know.”

According to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons (namus) database, more than 600,000 persons of all ages go missing every year.

With that information and knowing what other families experience, Bruce launched Private Investigations for the Missing.

“For people to have help in finding their loved ones. Police investigations vary from all around the country and how to tell they’re investigated. In a lot of cases, they investigate for a little while, and then it’s kind of like goes into what I call the reactive stage, where they’re just waiting for information to come in,” said Maitland. ” I’ve heard horror stories from people that have taken second mortgages on their houses and done things like that to pay investigators and paid thousands of dollars and still have gotten nowhere. I started this organization really to be able to help people.”

Private Investigator, Louis Barry said Brianna was at the core of Bruce creating this foundation.

“He actually took the expired reward money from her case and started a nonprofit just because in many instances families can’t afford to hire private investigators,” said Barry.

if you have any information regarding the disappearance of Brianna Maitland please contact the Vermont State Police or even private investigator, Louis Barry.

Information can also be submitted anonymously at vsp.vermont.gov/tipsubmit, or by texting the keyword VTIPS to 274637 (CRIMES).