Missing woman feared slain

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This article was published 11/06/2009 (6187 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

WINNIPEG — RCMP say the case of missing Portage la Prairie woman Amber Lynn McFarland is now being treated as a homicide.

And officers have returned for a second search, both inside and out, of a home in the community that once belonged to the 24-year-old’s former boyfriend. She was last seen at a Portage la Prairie nightclub on Oct. 18, 2008.

"Our investigation is considered a murder investigation," said RCMP spokeswoman Sgt. Line Karpish Wednesday. Karpish said investigators resumed searching a property on Yellowquill Trail on Wednesday morning. The Forensic Mobile Response Unit was on scene, she said, and officers were still at the property Wednesday evening.

"We do remain very confident that we’re going to get some kind of conclusion," Karpish said.

"Someone will be charged and face the consequences, or we will find her body at least to give some closure to the family."

Karpish did not identify the home, but said it has previously been searched by police.

Amber’s mother, Lori McFarland, said the home was formerly owned by Amber’s ex-boyfriend, one of the last men seen with her.

Lori McFarland said Wednesday was the first day she’d been told the investigation was being treated as a homicide. The news was difficult but not surprising, she said.

"You always want to maintain some shred of hope," she said. "I guess in your mind you know where it’s headed.

"It’ll be eight months on June 18. Short of a miracle… I wouldn’t say that we’re surprised, you know?"

Karpish said a combination of factors led officers back to the Yellowquill Trail property, but didn’t offer specifics. She said there are no suspects in custody in connection with the case.

Lori McFarland said she’s aware police vehicles were outside the home Wednesday, but said she didn’t know what was happening on the property.

It "gets to be a lot of public speculation," she said.

"We have to filter that out, and we rely on the RCMP to give us the latest as to where the investigation is at."

Amber McFarland was last seen in Portage la Prairie at the Cat and Fiddle Nite Club and reportedly left with a former boyfriend. Surveillance footage captured her buying beer there at a vendor in the company of two men.

Her car was found in the parking lot of a Portage hotel, where she had left it before going out that evening.

When McFarland did not come back to her parents’ home, her friend and family said the ex-boyfriend told them McFarland called someone on her cellphone and they picked her up at his home on Yellowquill Trail.

They said he told them he did not know who picked her up, and he never saw McFarland again.

McFarland was the subject of a frantic search following her disappearance last fall, including draining part of the Assiniboine River diversion. Amber’s purse and cellphone were never located. "We just want to have her found, and bring her home," said Lori McFarland. "She’s loved and she should be with people that love her."

lindsey.wiebe@freepress.mb.ca gabrielle.giroday@freepress.mb.ca