Oklahoma police are investigating the “suspicious disappearance” of two moms after the car they were traveling in was found abandoned on the side of a rural road.
Veronica Butler, 27 and her friend Jillian Kelley, 39, drove together on Saturday but “never made it to their location,” according to an advisory the sheriff of Texas County, Oklahoma sent out over the weekend.
ABC News reported Monday, citing Butler’s church, that the two women were on their way to pick up Butler’s children for a birthday party.
Their vehicle was later located abandoned in a rural neighborhood in Texas County, according to an announcement by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
The vehicle was found a “a little south” of the Yarbrough School, a pre-K -12 school, school Superintendent Jim Wiggin said in a statement.
The school was closed on Monday “out of an abundance of caution,” according to a statement shared with local news outlet KWCH, and reopened but remained on lockdown Tuesday, “given the unknown nature of the missing persons incident.”
A spokesperson for the state bureau of investigation told HuffPost in an email there was no update in the women’s case as of Tuesday morning and they are still considered missing and at-risk.
In an interview with local news station KSNW, Kelley’s mother said her daughter is the secretary at Hugoton First Christian Church in Hugoton, Kansas and runs all the children’s program at the church. Kelley, a mother of four, is beloved by the community, she said.
A close friend of Butler’s told KSN that she is a kind person who is good with kids.