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Cynthia Anderson mysteriously vanished from her job as a secretary at a law firm in August 1981. She had received threatening phone calls from a stranger for months leading up to her disappearance, and authorities immediately assumed that foul play was responsible for Anderson vanishing.
However, the lack of physical evidence in the case and the mysterious circumstances under which Anderson disappeared have baffled investigators for years. What happened to Cynthia Anderson forty years ago?
Cynthia was born in 1961 to devout Christian parents. Her family encouraged her to stay active in the church, and her friends told the authorities that the Anderson house was notoriously strict. Cynthia’s parents had high expectations of their daughter regarding who she would spend time with and who she could date.
In 1980, while still living with her parents, Cynthia began experiencing vivid nightmares in which she was abducted and killed by a stranger. She shared these dreams with her mother, who disregarded them as little more than nightmares. However, Cynthia began noticing signs that someone was stalking her.
Cynthia worked at a law office as a secretary, where she was alone for hours every morning before the lawyers arrived at noon. In 1980, a vandal spray-painted “I love you Cindy” in large red letters on a wall visible from the law firm’s window. A client of the law firm, Larry Mullins, would later tell investigators that he saw Cynthia answer the phone the day before her disappearance and swiftly hang it back up.
While Cynthia wouldn’t talk about what she heard on the line, Mullins insisted she looked very frightened by the call. He dismissed this at the time, thinking she was simply having troubles with a boyfriend.
On August 4, 1981, two lawyers who worked at the firm arrived to work around noon. They found the air conditioning on, the doors locked, and several lights on inside. It wasn’t unusual for Cynthia to keep the doors locked in the morning while she was alone, as a precaution against her suspected stalker.
Within, the lawyers found Cynthia was missing, along with her purse and car keys. The book she was reading was open on her desk, with a passage regarding the protagonist being abducted at knifepoint showing. This struck investigators as unusual, as it was the only violent passage in the book Cynthia was reading.
Some investigators believe that Cynthia was abducted by a stalker and likely murdered. Others speculate she might have disappeared on purpose in an attempt to get away from her strict family. Either way, the case remains unsolved to this day.
