LUMBERTON — A year to the day after the disappearance of a Robeson County sheriff’s deputy’s teenage daughter, the FBI is offering up to $5,000 for information about what happened to Sara Nicole Graham.
In a 7 a.m. press conference today at the Sheriff’s Office, the reward was announced and then FBI investigators and deputies headed to the Fairmont area where Graham disappeared, stopping motorists and handing out fliers with her photograph and that of the vehicle she was driving.
“It’s been a year since Sara disappeared so we are out this morning doing a traffic check to canvass the area and try to get some tips,” Robeson County Sheriff Kenneth Sealey said this morning.
Graham was last seen Feb. 4, 2015, at about 6:30 a.m., after leaving her family’s home on Centerville Church Road in Fairmont to go to work at Walmart in Pembroke. Graham, who would now be 19 years old, never arrived at work and the white Chevrolet Astro van she had been driving was found about four hours later, abandoned on East McDonald Road near Chicken Road. According to an FBI press release, witnesses reported seeing the van abandoned in that location at 6:45 a.m, leading investigators to believe she may have disappeared in that 15-minute window.
“Investigators are hoping the public can help complete an exact timeline of the van’s travel route that morning,” the statement says.
Graham is the daughter of sheriff’s Sgt. Hubert Graham. Her stepmother, Connie Graham, is a former employee of the Sheriff’s Office.
“Her location is secondary only to if she’s OK,” Hubert Graham told The Robesonian last February. “… This would be worthwhile just to hear those words, “I’m all right.”
Dozens of law enforcement agencies have assisted in the search for Graham. A week after she was last seen, more than 140 volunteers also helped sweep the area around where her vehicle was found and her possible routes of travel — from her home in Fairmont to her job, and from where her car was found to Interstate 95. Graham ’s cell phones records and computer were searched multiple times.
The FBI joined the effort in March and began circulating a missing-person poster. News of Graham’s disappearance spread throughout the country as reports from people saying they’ve seen Graham came in from Florida, Georgia and Tennessee.
Sealey said the investigation has been ongoing “for a solid year” as FBI and Sheriff’s Office investigators followed up on leads. Sealey declined to elaborate on the information that has been received, but said there are no persons of interest in Graham’s disappearance at this point.
Graham is an American Indian, about 5 feet 4 inches tall and weighs 160 pounds. She has short, dark brown hair, brown eyes and wears glasses and has braces. She was last seen wearing her blue, Walmart employee vest.
Anyone with information should call the FBI at 704-672-6100 or the Robeson County Sheriff’s Office at 910-671-3100.
