The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors re-established one $20,000 reward Tuesday for information regarding the disappearance of Mitrice Richardsona 24-year-old woman who disappeared in 2009 after being released from a Malibu sheriff’s station in the middle of the night and was found dead a year later.
The episode began when Richardson failed to pay an $89 tab at Geoffrey’s restaurant in Malibu. The Sheriff’s Department was called and Richardson was arrested and taken to the Lost Hills/Malibu Sheriff’s Station.
She was released from custody in the early morning of September 17, 2009, without her car. She also did not have her purse or cell phone on her. She was never seen again.
“My hopes are that for the people who live in that community … maybe they will find it in their heart to remember something and bring closure to the family,” said Michael Richardson, Richardson’s father.
Richardson’s mysterious disappearance, which lasted almost a year, ended in August 2010 when her skeletal remains were discovered in Malibu Canyon. Although her death has not been ruled a homicide, her family has previously insisted she was a victim of foul play.
Her family blamed the Sheriff’s Department for letting Richardson in at night even though she suffered from a mental illness, they said.
She had acted strangely at the restaurant before her arrest and LAPD investigators subsequently determined that she had likely suffered from severe bipolar disorder.
A friend said that in the weeks before she disappeared, Richardson had gone around saying she knew Michael Jackson, who was dead, and that she was going to Mars.
When she was at Geoffrey’s restaurant, she also talked about being from Mars.
Despite her erratic behavior, sheriff’s deputies at the station had “no legal justification to deprive her of her liberty,” according to a report of the Office of Independent Review.