Um… Did Maura Murray Really Call Her Boyfriend After Her Disappearance?

So, Billy Rausch has this story about going through airport security to fly to New Hampshire to join the search for his girlfriend, Maura Murray. A call came in he wasn’t able to answer. And when he later checked his voicemail he hears a “whimpering” sound that he believed was Maura. If this is true, it means Maura was alive for a time after her disappearance, which would be a very significant fact.

I had written this off for a couple reasons. 1. Billy is, in my opinion, a habitual liar. And 2. The police detective in charge of the case for many years was adamant that the call in question came from a Red Cross worker who did not hang up properly before the voicemail picked up.

Then yesterday, I learned about this weird phone number that pops up in both the Maura Murray and Teresa Helbach disappearances – 720-587-9978. Back in 2004/2005, if you had an AT&T calling card, it would register as that number (or a couple others) when you were making calls. And Billy’s mother, Sharon, has said that she gave Maura two AT&T calling cards not long before she vanished. It got me thinking about that whimpering phone call again.

You can kind of see where this call might have happened on Wednesday morning, when Billy was supposedly at the airport on his way to New Hampshire. Here’s a part of Billy’s cell phone bill:

See that incoming call at 5:05 a.m.? It’s the only incoming call that lines up with this story. Billy knows a call came in but could not get to it fast enough. Whoever it was left a 5 – 6 minute voicemail. (correction – calls that go directly to voicemail are not logged in the bill, see further explanation in update, below). At 5:15 Billy then checks his voicemail twice. He checks his messages twice again, around 5:47. Immediately after this, he calls that 9978 number, and learns that it is an AT&T calling card and it will not connect him directly with the person who made the call. He immediately calls Fred Murray after this.

It gets a bit more complicated so hang tight.

The day before, Tuesday, Feb. 10, Rausch also received an incoming message around 5 a.m. And then another one around 9 a.m. Then he calls Maura on her cell phone and she does not answer. Now, according to Billy’s story, he did not know that Maura was missing until around 4:30 that day, when he was contacted by Fred Murray.

Also, Rausch and his mother, Sharon, would not have had reason to contact the Red Cross until after 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, since they didn’t know she was missing, so the Red Cross could not have been any of these incoming calls from that morning.

On February 17, 2004, while his memory is still fresh, Billy Rausch is interviewed by Soledad O’Brien for CNN. Billy says, “I received, Tuesday morning last week, right after the accident, another voice mail, a chilling voice mail, that was what I believed to be Maura whimpering and crying in the background. I could only hear breathing and then towards the end of the voice mail I heard what was apparent to be crying and then a whimper, which I’m certain was Maura.”

That same day, the UMass student newspaper also reported on the disappearance, stating: “Murray called her boyfriend, Army Lieutenant Bill Rausch Tuesday morning.”

And here’s an excerpt from a 2007 article in the Whitman-Hanson Express: “While a search was beginning in Woodsville N.H., Billy Rausch was walking through security in a Dallas airport. He had just shut off his phone when he received a voice message.”

And that’s been the story ever since. Sometime between 2004 and 2007, the date of the call switched from Tuesday to Wednesday and this seems to have created the confusion about whether it was the Red Cross or Maura.

So, what the hell is going on here? It’s one of two possibilities:

1. The “whimpering” call came in Tuesday morning, as Billy told Soledad a week after the disappearance. If that’s the case, the state police are right about the Wed morning call being the Red Cross. It would also mean that Billy was not going through the Dallas airport when the call came through (unless he’s leaving for NH before he even knows Maura is missing.)
2. The “whimpering” call came in Wed morning and Billy was either forgetful or lying when he told the story to Soledad. And in that case, was it really a Red Cross butt dial?

Whenever the “whimpering” call came in, if it was Maura using Sharon’s calling card, why? Why isn’t Maura using her cell phone? Or a land line? If she’s in distress, it would take extra time for all that. And it would be pointless if she’s calling because she wants to be found. However, it does make sense if she’s using a payphone and wants to hide the number, I guess.

Some of this was uncovered in a Reddit post two years ago. And a commenter with the moniker DS_JoeFriday was quick to reply with the explanation about the calling card being untraceable. That commenter later deleted their account, after it was revealed that DS_JoeFriday was actually… wait for it… Billy Rausch.

UPDATED:

An astute reader pointed out that the “whimpering” call from Maura cannot be the 5:05 a.m. call on Wednesday, as you could not leave voicemails of that length, then. There is a gap between 5:34 and 5:43 a.m. when Billy could have been going through airport security, if that part of the story is true. He’s said before he shut off the phone going through security and this is when the call came through.

If that is the case, then he would have learned of this call when he checked his voicemail minutes later, and then he begins calling the calling card and Fred.

And if this call was in fact from an AT&T calling card, as it appears, then, in my opinion, it is more likely it’s someone using Maura’s calling card than a Red Cross worker and Billy was right all this time. And if he’s right, then the time of Maura’s disappearance has little to do with what ultimately happened to her.