Missing Owl Mystery Deepens
By Doug Miller
December 2006
Sierra Vista, AZ –
The Cochise County Sherriff’s Department called off the search of a vacant field behind the Oasis Apartments today. Bubo, the beloved mascot of Borderline Mensa has now been missing for 32 days. Bubo is believed to be a Short-eared Owl (Asio flammeus) originally donated to the group by Joe Davis, who befriended the owl about 25 years ago while in Hawaii.
Stephen Wilhelm, Scorpio, has been trusted with the care of Bubo for nearly two years without incident. “I don’t know how I could have abandoned him at the restaurant. This is so unlike me,” Wilhelm stated.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid!” Wilhelm added, while repeatedly striking himself in the face.
Bubo was last seen in the company of Doug Miller, Virgo, at a Happy Hour on Friday, November 3rd at the Windemere Hotel. Miller was taken into custody the following Sunday when officers attempting to serve a warrant entered his creepy one bedroom apartment and found him passed out in bed with a box of cheap wine and a bag of Fritos.
“Sure Bubo was with me, we’ve been roommates in the past,” Miller stated, a corn chip stuck to his eyebrow. “I told him he could crash on the couch. When I got up the next day he was gone. I think he may have used the phone, but I have no idea who he might have called. He could be kind of a loner sometimes.”
“Yeah, I know,” Miller added. “I tried pulling the [corn chip] out but it’s stuck in there pretty good. I’ll try soaking it whenever they let me out.”
Three ransom notes have been received by Wilhelm in recent days, none of which is considered credible.
“There are a lot of gold diggers out there who’d like to cash in on this situation,” stated Deputy Tom Grinnel. “But we’ve already traced one of the leads back to the source and proved it was just some punk kid.” Grinnel was referring to the e-mail Wilhelm recently received from the somewhat menacing hostage@server.com address which, bewilderingly, included Christian Richards’ name in the header information.
“Still, you have to admire the kid’s moxie,” Grinnel added.
For the past week Wilhelm has been combing the fields behind Oasis apartments with a group of about fifteen volunteers. “If there’s a clue to be found, we’ll find it or I’ll never forgive myself,” a visibly distraught Wilhelm vowed while holding his hand over the flame of a cigarette lighter.
“There’s nothing in that field,” Grinnel reported. “But that Wilhelm guy just seems to be holding on by a thread and it’s difficult to disappoint someone with such sad eyes. When we had the canines search the area last week I told him they were ‘rescue dogs’ because I just didn’t have the heart to tell him they were cadaver dogs.”
“Such sad, haunted eyes,” he added.
“The desire to maintain an optimistic viewpoint is common in situations such as this,” stated Dr. Connor Spellman, supervisory psychologist at Hooters, a nationally known owl research facility. “Such persons ultimately set themselves up for even greater spirals of misery as the days turn into weeks, time that could be better spent drafting a book proposal to cash in on the tragedy.”
“This is America, after all.” Spellman added.
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