CANTON — Richard Moreau stood by the road Thursday as authorities searched property owned by a man who police say was one of the last people seen with his 17-year-old daughter, Kimberly, before she disappeared nearly three decades ago.

On a utility pole across the street from Brian Enman’s 5-acre property on Route 108 in Canton hung a poster that Richard Moreau put up years ago with a picture of his blond, blue-eyed daughter on it.

Kimberly Moreau

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Maine's Missing Children

Kimberly Moreau, 17 when she disappeared, is one of six children reporting missing in the state since 1971 who have not been found. Moreau was reported missing May 11, 1986, from Jay.

She was last seen leaving her house with an unknown person driving a late-model white Trans-Am car. She was wearing a white blouse, blue jeans, white high-top sneakers and a men’s class ring engraved with “Mike ’87” and “Mike Staples.” She had a surgical scar on her back.

• Ayla Reynolds, 20 months, disappeared overnight from her father’s house at 29 Violette Ave. in Waterville. She was reported missing the morning of Dec. 17, 2011. She was wearing one-piece pajamas with the word “Daddy’s Princess” on the front and her left arm was in a cast. The case has been called the biggest law enforcement effort in the state’s history and it’s still considered an active criminal investigation.

• Bernard Ross, 18, was reported missing from Ashland on May 12, 1977. He drove off in his aunt’s pickup truck in Presque Isle. The truck was later found, but he wasn’t.

• Kurt Ronald Newton, of Manchester, was 4 when he disappeared Sept. 1, 1975, from a campsite at Chain of Ponds in Eustis. He was camping with his family and was last seen riding a Big Wheel tricycle. The tricycle was found near a campground dump area.

• Cathy Marie Moulton, of Portland, was 16 when she was reported missing Sept. 24, 1971. She was last seen in downtown Portland, wearing a navy blue all-weather coat, navy blue pants and brown leather shoes.

• Douglas Charles Chapman was reported missing on June 2, 1971, in Alfred. He was 3 years old at the time and was last seen playing in a sandbox in his front yard.

 

Information from National Center for Missing & Exploited Children website (missingkids.org) and published reports.

“(Enman) knows where my daughter is and I need to get her home,” said Moreau, who lives in Jay.

Kimberly Moreau disappeared on May 10, 1986. She had argued with her boyfriend and canceled her plan to attend the Jay High School junior prom with him. Instead, the Jay teenager went out with a female friend and met a pair of 25-year-old acquaintances, one of whom was Enman, police said. She was last seen getting into a white Pontiac Trans Am with at least one of the two men at 11 p.m.

Kimberly Moreau’s mother, Patricia Moreau, told the Morning Sentinel in a July 1986 interview that her daughter “said she was going out for a ride and would be back within an hour.”

The teenager never returned home and was declared legally dead in 1993.

Maine State Police haven’t named Enman as a suspect in the 29-year-old case or said what led them to his property Thursday, but they said their search is connected to her disappearance. Richard Moreau said Enman is “the No. 1 suspect” in his daughter’s disappearance “and always has been.” Moreau said he has been putting up missing-person posters in the area for years.

Moreau said he felt many emotions Thursday, including relief that the case might soon be resolved after so many agonizing years. But he has gotten his hopes up before and was trying to “not let these emotions get me in trouble,” he said.

SEARCH WARRANT HAS BEEN SEALED

Patricia Moreau, who died of cancer in 1988, told the Sentinel in the interview that she found four pills in her daughter’s pocketbook and feared her daughter’s disappearance might be drug-related. A Jay police officer, however, said in the article that the pills were not relevant to the case.

Enman wasn’t home during Thursday’s search and hadn’t returned by early evening. Oxford County Sheriff Wayne Gallant said Enman has no prior record of arrests with his agency. The Maine State Bureau of Identification also listed no criminal record for Enman.

Detective Sgt. Mark Holmquist with the state police major crimes unit said Thursday that Enman “has been cooperative throughout the years” with police. Holmquist said police obtained a search warrant for the property earlier this week and will be there through Friday.

A clerk at the Oxford County courthouse said the search warrant has been sealed, and Holmquist wouldn’t say what evidence led officials to the home, only that it was a culmination of “good legwork” by investigators who have followed the case over the years.

“We’re hopeful that eventually, someday, we’ll be able to find Kim and bring her back home to her father,” Holmquist said.

Authorities on the scene Thursday represented several agencies, including state police, the sheriff’s office and Jay police. Holmquist said officers were using ground-penetrating radar and will likely use cadaver dogs on Friday.

Richard Moreau said he was alerted to the search Thursday. By afternoon, police were still probing the ground as he and other family members watched from the road.

Enman’s home off Route 108 has a dirt driveway and is obscured by trees, although lawn tractors and a portable above-ground pool could be seen in the yard.

INVESTIGATION ONCE FOCUSED ON SERIAL KILLER

Kimberly Moreau’s disappearance has meant a long struggle for her family, who created a website to publicize it, offered a reward for information and distributed business cards with her name and their phone numbers on them, according to a 2004 story by the Morning Sentinel.

The investigation has continued in fits and starts since 1986. A biography of Kimberly Moreau on a website dedicated to cold-case crimes said a convicted serial killer from Massachusetts was investigated in connection with the case, but police have said it’s unlikely he was involved.

That same online biography alleges that an unnamed person of interest told authorities that he dropped Kimberly Moreau off at 3:45 a.m. the following morning about a half-mile from home – a story that her father doesn’t find credible because “it was a cold night and she was afraid of the dark.”

Richard Moreau said Thursday that he doesn’t care whether anyone is convicted of the crime. He said at one time he asked the district attorney if suspects could be offered immunity in exchange for disclosing the location of his daughter’s remains. He said he won’t be at court hearings on the case unless he’s subpoenaed.

“If I get her home, my job is done,” he said.

Portland Press Herald Staff Writer Matt Byrne contributed to this report.