Katharina Buczek
Given that the wheels of her car were also covered in dirt and snow, investigators believed whoever committed such a heinous act must have driven Stefanie out of town. So, they tried searching for her remains.
“The amount of irrigation wells that are still open that are abandoned. The amount of water wells from old settler days that are still available. The fact that we have a river changing course every day in southwest Kansas within three miles of town. There are a plethora of places a body could be placed,” Jones detailed.
So, despite conducting helicopter searches, calling in cadaver dogs, and even using heat-seeking equipment, Stefanie was never discovered.
According to her father, Jeff Petersen, Stefanie would not have just abandoned her sons.
“There was money left in her car she’d been driving. She would have never left those boys without taking them with her because she loved those boys more than anything,” he said.
As for what Jeff misses the most? Hearing his daughter’s voice.
“I just miss her voice. She’d say, ‘Hi, Daddy,’ and she was always so upbeat.”
While foul play is suspected in Stefanie’s disappearance, and her case was classified as a homicide a year after she went missing, it remains unsolved.
Stefanie was five foot eight, weighed 190 pounds, and had brown hair and blue eyes.
If you have any information regarding her case, you are urged to contact the Kearny County Sheriff’s Office at (620) 355-6211.
