164. Smells Like A Vanishing On Route 19 - Diane Augat's Long Walk To Nowhere

Published: Nov. 10, 2020, 5:01 a.m.

Diane Louise Augat did not have an easy life.\xa0 Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in her early 30s, she lost her marriage and custody of her children as she was forcibly institutionalized 32 times between 1990 and 1998.\xa0\xa0Living the best life she could, protected and watched over by family who cared for her, Diane was living with her sister in Odessa, a tiny town located in Pasco County, just north of Tampa, Florida when, on April 10, 1998, the sister left the house briefly and returned to find Diane gone.\xa0\xa0At least one witness reported seeing Diane wandering on U.S. Highway 19 the following day, April 11.\xa0\xa0On April 13, Diane\u2019s mother received a telephone call from Diane in which it sounded like her daughter was in a struggle for the phone and pleading for help \u2013 and then quickly hanging up.\xa0\xa0Then, two days after that, on April 15, a stranger on her way home along Route 19 spotted what looked like a dismembered finger on the side of the road \u2013 and fingerprinting confirmed it had belonged to Diane.\xa0 But no blood.\xa0 No other body part.\xa0 Nothing but the tip of a finger.\xa0\xa0Then things get really weird.\xa0\xa0Two weeks after the disappearance, a bag containing some of Diane\u2019s neatly-folded clothing was discovered in an outdoor freezer behind a convenience store where Diane\u2019s sister worked.\xa0\xa0But wait.\xa0 Get this:\xa0\xa0TWO YEARS LATER,\xa0 a local newspaper ran a story on the continuing search for Diane \u2013 and the VERY NEXT DAY after that article was published, Diane\u2019s brother walked into a completely random convenience store in Pasco County and there, on the counter next to the lottery tickets, with zero explanation, sat a plastic bag with the name \u201cDiane\u201d written on it \u2013 and inside the bag were a container of black eyeliner, a bottle of Taboo perfume, a tube of bright pink lipstick, and a tube of generic toothpaste \u2013 all things Diane\u2019s mother said she would have been carrying.\xa0\xa0Are you the person who can unravel this wild mystery and provide the clue that will finally lead to the truth about what happened to Diane Augat?\xa0 If so, send an email to jhatcher@pascosheriff.org or call the Pasco County Sheriff\u2019s office at (800) 854-2862, ext. 7723.