Police will today (Weds) renew their appeal to help find a missing best-selling children’s author who vanished from her home a month ago.
Helen Bailey, 51, was last seen at around 2.45pm on Monday, April 11, and is believed to have her dog Boris, a brown miniature Dachshund, with her.
Detective Chief Inspector Julie Wheatley of Hertfordshire Police will today (Weds) be joined by Helen’s brother John, who will read a short statement relating to his sister’s mystery disappearance.
Since she went missing, police have carried out specialist searches of the area near to the £1.3million home in Royston, Herts., she shares with her partner Ian Stewart, 55.
But despite specialist search teams combing septic tanks and the land surrounding her property, detectives say they are still keeping an open mind to try and locate her.
The on-going searches in and around her home address are now being extended into the lesser used dog walking routes in the area, in case Helen took any of these routes.
Officers looking for the author, who was best known for her Electra Brown and Daisy Davenport series of books, said that she had told her family and friends that she had ‘needed a little time to herself’ before she vanished.
Detective Inspector Lynda Coates of Hertfordshire Police, who is leading the investigation, said: “We understand that before Helen was reported missing she had apparently stated that she needed a little time to herself.
“We are keeping an open mind on the circumstances and have been carrying out a number of enquiries in order to try and locate Helen and these are continuing today with specialist searches in the Royston area.
“I would ask Helen to please get in contact with us if she sees this appeal to let us know she is safe and well.”
Mrs Bailey vanished just weeks after the fifth anniversary of the death of her husband John Sinfield, 65, who drowned when he was caught in a rip tide while on holiday in Barbados.
She had written about the grief of losing her husband of 22 years in a blog, Planet Grief, which was later turned into a book called Bad Things Happen in Good Bikinis.
In February, Mrs Bailey uploaded a poignant post to mark the fifth year since her husband’s death, writing: “We never move on.
“Many times, I didn’t want to make it through the next hour, willing my demise and courting fate, feeling desolate when my pleas to spontaneously combust or get hit by a car came to nothing.”
Friends were alerted to the writer’s disappearance when Mr Stewart took to Facebook to ask if anyone had seen his partner.
Helen is described as slim, with long black hair but it is not known what she was wearing at the time she went missing.
Since her disappearance, there have been there possible sightings, which have been investigated by officers.
Police have previously received information that Helen was seen walking Boris, who is micro-chipped, near her home address on the afternoon of April 11.
Helen also has connections to Kent, Northumbria and London.
Anyone who sees Helen, or knows of her whereabouts, is asked to contact the non-
emergency number 101.
