GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) — Wisconsin Missing Persons Advocacy Incorporated has a special request for those taking to the woods for gun deer season:
Be on the lookout for human remains or anything suspicious.
That’s what the advocacy group’s founder, Marsha Loritz, is asking hunters.
“Just a few weeks ago, some people were hiking and they came across remains in one of the state parks,” Loritz told WTAQ. “So it does just happen.”
That was in High Cliff State Park in Calumet County and is believed to be that of a man who died in the 1980s.
Hunters, taking to the deep woods where few normally tread, are in a unique position to look at areas that police typically do not search, according to Loritz.
“If they were to stumble across something, they should not touch anything and contact law enforcement,” Loritz said Monday.
Loritz says hunting season brings hope for the families of the over 240 missing Wisconsinites–including herself. Loritz is the daughter of Victoria Prokopovitz, who went missing in 2013 and whose body has never been found.
“I hold on to hope every year,” said Loritz. “That someone will find my mom. We’ve done so many searches that we don’t even know where to look. It’s a needle in a haystack.”
Victoria’s husband, James, was convicted of killing her earlier this year.
“In my case we have a conviction, but we still don’t have her back. We don’t know where she is,” Loritz added.
There are 248 Wisconsinites currently listed as missing. 48 new cases were reported this month alone, and while many were eventually found, some, Loritz says, were not.
