I think it is bizarre how some people just go missing without a single trace. Whatever became of them is just a giant question mark. Like Barbara Holik, Atonette Antonia “Toni” Padilla is one such case. She vanished without a trace from her Silver City home on July 3, 2020. There has been no sign of her since, though police have executed a few home search warrants and even an arrest based on circumstantial evidence. No one has been officially charged in her death as of yet.
Padilla was 58. She had a lot of family in Silver City, with whom she was very close. Her family remembers her as a very nice person who wouldn’t have selfishly cut off contact with her family or deliberately hurt herself. She didn’t drive and she relied on family for rides; she was also wise about refusing rides from people she didn’t know.
She caught a ride with a friend from her Silver City home around 1 pm on July 3. She was dropped off at a friend’s house. Around 3 pm, she left the friend’s home and went for a walk by the waste treatment plant on Broken Arrow Road. She was believed to have been taken at this time.
The last ping from her cell phone was at her house which doesn’t help narrow down where she may be now. It isn’t clear if the ping was from earlier, before she went to the friend’s house, or after she went missing.
Police and Padilla’s family have searched all over Silver City, concentrating on the area of the sewage treatment plant. They have employed dogs, drones, and ATVs. They have also searched along the highway toward Lordsburg based on a tip that her body could be found out there. Yet no traces of Padilla or her body have been found.
Oddly, someone declared that Padilla had been found and so her missing posters were taken down in March of 2021. Who this person was is unknown. The family had to create new posters for Padilla and plaster them all over Silver City. Whoever this person was, their actions do seem suspicious.
Padilla’s family have heard many ugly rumors about what happened to their loved one. They report each one to the police. Melinda Hobbs of the Silver City Police has followed every lead and tip.
One tip was that Padilla was seen at the Alon Station. Police reviewed security camera footage without finding her on it. Another tip claimed that Padilla was killed in a car accident and police confirmed that an accident took place on July 3rd. They gathered forensic evidence from the vehicle involved. So far that has not been definitively tied to Padilla. Yet another tip says that Padilla was buried between Silver City and Lordsburg, but police failed to turn up her body along that road. Hobbs says that now they are conducting more aggressive interviews with some of the people already interviewed earlier in the case.
There has been some promising forward motion in the case, but after several years, it still hasn’t been solved. Police do believe Padilla met with foul play. Her family also believes that. They say they just want this to be over, for one person to come forward with the missing puzzle piece.
There is currently a $1500 reward for information that leads to Padilla’s discovery. You can call Central Dispatch at 575-388-8840, or by calling Hobbs at the Police Department at 575-538-3723.
https://www.scdailypress.com/2021/03/09/padilla-missing-posters-mistakenly-taken/
https://www.scdailypress.com/2020/07/13/foul-play-suspected-in-womans-disappearance/
https://www.scdailypress.com/2021/03/19/intensive-search-fails-turn-missing-woman/