By Rod Hansen
Staff Writer

Goffstown News/Bruce Preston Classmates of Laura Mackenzie, from left, Liz Cote, Alise Greenfield and Heidi Dolan, participate in a candlelight vigil at Goffstown High School. Nearly 100 friends, family and community members attended the event wishing for the return of the missing teen.

Enid Mackenzie remembers going for a walk on the night of Wednesday, April 5, and looking first at the sky, then in every direction at the land around her.

“I wondered where my daughter could be, and if I look in one direction, is that the direction where she is?” asked Mackenzie.

Her thoughts were on her daughter, Laura, as they have been constantly for more than one month. Laura, an 18-year-old senior honors student at Goffstown High School, has been missing since March 8.

Close to 100 people gathered for a candlelight vigil at the Goffstown High School parking lot on Thursday, April 6, marking four weeks since Mackenzie’s disappearance.

Bill and Enid Mackenzie were the two primary speakers at the event, but several other friends and family members also put out kind words for the missing teen.

Police continue to search for Laura on local, state and national levels, and the family is now offering $5,000 for information leading to her return.

Laura Mackenzie

Mackenzie’s disappearance came at a time when the teen was facing criminal charges.

Court records show Mackenzie was scheduled to appear on March 8 in Manchester District Court on a felony shoplifting charge involving the alleged theft of $956.91 in clothing and jewelry from Filene’s at the Mall of New Hampshire on Feb. 15.

The case went to the Northern District of Hillsborough County Superior Court in Manchester. She was scheduled for arraignment there on April 4, but was missing at the time of that court date and did not appear. Although an order has been issued to produce a warrant for Mackenzie on charges of failure to appear, the warrant had not been issued on that charge as of Monday, April 10, a clerk at the court said.

Police have offered no speculation regarding causes for Mackenzie’s disappearance, but Goffstown police Capt. Glenn DuBois has said police believe Mackenzie left of her own volition.

Several speakers at the vigil for Mackenzie acknowledged her legal problems, but all offered messages of encouragement for their friend and family member.

Goffstown News/Bruce Preston Laura Mackenzie’s friend and classmate Liz Cote, who is an aspiring artist, presents her own drawing of Laura to Craig Mackenzie, Laura’s brother, during a candlelight vigil at Goffstown High School. Nearly 100 friends, family and community members attended the event wishing for the return of the missing teen.

“Four weeks ago, Laura went missing, and for the past four weeks we’ve been missing her,” said family friend H.A. Schade, who attends the First Baptist Church of Amherst along with the Mackenzie family. Schade has been acting as the family spokesperson throughout the ordeal.

“You hear in the news every day about missing people,” said Schade. “But this is different. This is one of our own. This is one of our children,” Schade said.

The reward for information leading to Laura’s return takes place among numerous other efforts to bring the teen back home. Foremost among these is a national flier campaign, featuring a picture of Laura Mackenzie and contact information.

The 18-Wheel Angels, a collective of long-haul truckers who aid in the search for missing persons, have also joined in efforts to post information about Mackenzie across the country.

Such efforts elicited heart-felt emotion from Mackenzie’s friends and family at the prayer vigil. In many cases, speakers chose to speak directly to the missing woman in their pleas to have her return home.

Goffstown News/Bruce Preston Enid Mackenzie, mother of missing teen Laura Mackenzie, participates in a prayer during the vigil.

“My message to Laura is, I know you’re running from problems in your life,” said Craig Mackenzie, Laura’s older brother. “But those problems aren’t too big, and when you come home it will be the happiest day of my life.”

A popular student at Goffstown High School, Laura Mackenzie also inspired several classmates and teachers to come out to show their support for the missing young woman.

“We all miss Laura, and there’s a high level off concern,” said Krista Scarlett, a marketing teacher who taught Mackenzie in a Principles of Marketing class and wrote her a letter of recommendation for college.

“Laura’s a very smart girl, very sociable. She’d come up to me to talk sometimes after class,” said Scarlett.

DuBois said the FBI is now also involved in the search for Mackenzie, and that her name has been added to a database maintained by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

There is also a Web site devoted exclusively to finding Laura Mackenzie. For more information, visit www.findlaura.org.

Mackenzie is described as being 5 feet, 4 inches tall, with blue eyes and brown hair. She was last seen driving a 1995 black, four-door Volkswagen Golf with a Marines sticker on the rear and with New Hampshire license plate 211 0126.