ON THIS DAY: The Baffling Disappearance of Marie Blee

The summer of 1979 was an exciting one for Marie Ann Blee. She was 15 years old, had her driver’s permit, and had a lot of friends.

Marie was excited to get her braces off that August. She still wore a retainer, but she was finally free of braces, just in time for her sophomore year at Hayden High School in Hayden, Colorado.

In September, her family took a vacation and traveled to Europe, visiting Germany and Switzerland.

In November of 1979, Marie was looking forward to a Thanksgiving break from school. The day before Thanksgiving, November 21, there was a dance at her school. Marie went with 18-year-old Monty Doolin.

After the dance, there was a party that many of her friends were going to in Craig, Colorado. Craig is a 20-minute drive from Hayden, almost 17 miles.

Once at the party, many of Marie’s girlfriends realized that the party was mostly guys and they were doing drugs. They weren’t comfortable, so they decided to leave. Marie wanted to stay.

Around 1:00 a.m., Marie told Monty she had another ride home. She didn’t mention with whom. Monty said he would leave the party without her.

But Marie never made it home to Hayden.

The next day, Thanksgiving day, her parents reported her missing. Over 40 years later, Marie is still missing.

Where is Marie Ann Blee?

Marie was only 15 years old when she vanished. A teenager with her driver’s permit and excitedly planning for her future.

Marie Ann Blee was born April 16, 1964. She was the youngest of five children and grew up in Hayden, Colorado. Hayden is a small town- today’s population is just 2,000 residents.

In August of 1979, Marie was excited to have her braces taken off. She still had to wear a retainer, but things were moving along nicely for Marie. She was headed into her sophomore year of high school, very active in 4H, and was going to be managing her school’s wrestling team again that winter. Marie was sociable and friendly and loved to get involved in activities.

That September, her family took a trip to Europe. They went to Germany and visited so many places and then to Switzerland. It would be a memorable trip for her family.

On November 21, 1979, there was a dance at Marie’s school. A dance that she would attend with Monty Dean Doolin. Monty was 18 years old at the time, and it’s unclear if he was a friend, or possibly a boyfriend.

It was the night before Thanksgiving, so the kids were looking forward to staying out late.

After the dance, many of the kids would head to a party in the nearby town of Craig, Colorado. This was a 20-minute drive from Hayden, and Monty would drive Marie to the party.

Several of Marie’s girlfriends would also go to the party, although they wouldn’t stay. Once there, they were very uncomfortable because the party was mostly guys, and they were doing drugs. The girls would leave and would ask Marie to leave as well, but Marie wanted to stay.

Marie wouldn’t come home that night, which was very uncharacteristic of her. The next morning, her mom called the police.

They spoke to the person last known to be with her- Monty Doolin. Monty said they went to the dance, then to the party in Craig. He said she told him that she had a ride home with someone else around 1:00 a.m., although he didn’t know who that was. He said he didn’t see her after that.

Her girlfriends also said they left the party shortly after they arrived because they were uncomfortable. They also said that Marie was there when they left because she had wanted to stay.

Authorities did speak to a lot of people who were at that party but didn’t uncover any clues as to Marie’s whereabouts.

Days would go by, and her family, extremely panicked at this point, of course, were reluctant to fear the worst.

That’s when they got a ransom call.

The caller said they had Marie, and they demanded $5,000 for her to be returned.

An investigation into that call happened immediately. Law enforcement was able to trace the call back to someone who knew Marie quite well and had been with her that night- Monty Doolin.

Monty said it was a prank and that he would plead guilty to telephone harassment charges. But he insisted that he had no idea where Marie was, or what happened to her after he left her that night at the party.

Sadly, it was 1979. Investigative techniques weren’t as advanced as they are today. There were no clues leading them to Marie.

At first, authorities believed she had probably just run away, but the family insisted that she never would. This was a well-adjusted teen girl who was very involved in a lot of activities.

Then law enforcement wondered if Marie might have overdosed at the party. She wasn’t known to take drugs, but it was confirmed that there were drugs at the party. Could she have overdosed? This was a theory the police looked at pretty hard, also wondering if perhaps partygoers panicked, not wanting to get into trouble, and took her somewhere afterward.

There were some sightings reported of Marie in the town of Craig on the day of Thanksgiving, the day after the party, but none were confirmed to be Marie.

Both Craig, Colorado, and Hayden, Colorado, are very small, rural towns. They are located north of Denver and just East of Boulder. They are considered farming and agricultural areas and have a lot of undeveloped lands- even today in 2022.

In 1979, searches for Marie led nowhere.

Pretty soon, the case of Marie Ann Blee’s disappearance would go cold.

In 1999, twenty years after Marie vanished, a cold case task force was assigned to her case. They hit the ground running, conducting over 200 interviews, which included kids who were at that party in 1979. Stories never quite matched up, which authorities said could be a sign of something nefarious, or could simply be because 20 years have passed and memories fade, especially if drugs and alcohol were being used heavily at this party as was reported.

Detectives also received some tips and clues, which led them to excavate certain areas looking for Marie’s remains. Nothing would be found.

Marie’s family kept their home, and their same phone number, in the event Marie ever reached out or tried to come home.

The cold case task force was really working the case hard, coming forward and asking for new tips, leads, clues, anything. They did note that the file from 1979 was slim, and not much was retained. They didn’t have much to work with, but they weren’t going to give up.

They did publicly announce three persons of interest in Marie’s case.

Monty Doolin, the young man who was with Marie that night, along with Max Garcia and Stephen Skufca. The connection between them isn’t publicly known.

Stephen Skufca did have some drug charges in his history and spent 12 years in prison. He was released in the early 2000s, and he passed away in 2012.

We don’t have any information on Max Garcia.

Monty Doolin, ironically, was arrested in 2015 on charges of Kidnapping and Sexual Assault. The charges stemmed from an incident that actually occurred back in 1979, the same year that Marie disappeared.

Marty would be indicted on these charges since Kidnapping in Colorado doesn’t have a statute of limitations. Authorities also pursued a charge of Kidnapping against Monty in the case of Marie Ann Blee, but they didn’t find there was enough evidence to pursue those charges.

Authorities have entered DNA into the database for Marie Ann Blee, using DNA they were able to extract from her retainer, over 20 years later.

The cold case unit still hopes to solve this case and will compare any unidentified remains in their area to the DNA on file for Marie.

Marie’s family still wonders every day what happened to their youngest. Her mother, Mona, had this to say in an interview with the media back in the year 2000:

“I’m sure that there’s always that corner, that as long as she has not appeared, maybe she is still alive,Those hopes have diminished over the years, but until we see remains, I guess we know that that’s what we’re going to find, but it’s not an easy thing to accept. The hardest thing, is simply not knowing. It’s terrible. It’s the kind of thing that eats away at you.’’`

“I sometimes wonder what she would look like now, I can’t imagine why, after 20 years, nobody is willing to come forward and say this is what happened. It’s terribly frustrating. I just wish someone would call.”

In 1979, Marie was just a 15-year-old girl. She is described as a Caucasian female, with blonde hair and blue eyes. Marie stood 5’3” tall and weighed around 100 pounds. She was wearing a v-neck top with a purple collar, a brown velveteen vest, blue jeans, a green ski jacket with red and white trim, and a leather rope necklace with three handmade multicolored beads.

Today, Marie would be 58 years old.

This case can be solved with someone coming forward with that one tip. It just takes one.

If you have any information on the whereabouts of Marie Ann Blee, or any knowledge of what happened at that party in Craig, Colorado on November 21, 1979, please contact the Moffat County Sheriff’s Office at 970–824–4495.

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