Police are investigating the Nov. 8 disappearance of a local plumber as a missing person’s case, but Jeffrey Meek’s mother isn’t buying that her son simply vanished.
“I do believe there’s more to it than that,” Sandra Meek said Wednesday from her Hacienda Heights, Calif., home. “He was looking forward to the future. I had just bought the land at Pepeekeo. This month, I was paying it off. We were gonna build two houses on the land. One for my granddaughter and her husband, the other for Jeffrey and his wife. She’s expecting a baby; she’s five months pregnant, now. And he adored his (young son) and took him everywhere.”
Sandra Meek described her son’s wife, Marylou, as “in shock.”
“She’s not a drama queen. Mary is at a loss at how to handle things,” she said.
The 44-year-old Keaau man was clearing a 21-acre Pepeekeo Point Subdivision property where his family planned to build a pair of houses when he called an employee to help free his pickup truck, which was stuck in a patch of mud.
Friends, family members, and fellow parishioners of his church combed the parcel and the nearby shoreline. Two days later, they found one of his boots. The other was found the following day, about a mile and a half away, near a shoreline access point.
“It doesn’t fit,” Sandra Meek said. “The shoe was a mile and a half away from where the truck was stuck in the mud. Now, c’mon. Why would he walk a mile and a half while he’s waiting for somebody to come and help him get out of the mud? His cellphone records show the calls that he made for someone to come and help him. Why would you walk away to go swimming while you’re waiting for someone to come and help you get your truck out of the mud?”
Sandra Meek said reports her son had confronted former employees about alleged thefts from the company were true, and added, “They all quit.” She said her son had hired new staff and she spent three weeks with him in late October and early November going over the plumbing business’ books.
“Financially, I would say he was in debt approximately 50- to 60-thousand dollars. But his gross receipts were in the hundreds of thousands per year. He had a successful company.”
The missing man’s mother is a realtor who owns two Berkshire Hathaway offices in Southern California. She said she offered to help her son financially, but he declined.
“He knew that if any time he needed it, Mom was there to give it to him,” she said.
Jeffrey Meek was seeing a psychiatrist and was taking medicine for attention deficit disorder, his mother said, but added he wasn’t depressed and had “absolutely no reason” to disappear.
“She (the psychiatrist) said he was optimistic, in a good mood, looking forward to the future because of the land and the baby, and that he was at the best place he’d been in his life,” Sandra Meek said.
Police Lt. Robert Wagner, commander of the Hilo Criminal Investigation Division, reiterated Wednesday that Meek’s disappearance still is a missing person’s investigation.
“We have no evidence to indicate he was (a victim of) foul play at this time,” Wagner said.
He added there also is “no evidence” Meek disappeared on his own.
Sandra Meek said in addition to the police investigation, she has spent thousands of dollars on a private investigator.
“Would I spend that money if I thought he had gone swimming and drowned?” she asked, rhetorically.
Police renewed their request for information. Meek is described as Caucasian, 5-foot-8, 185 pounds with blue eyes and balding brown hair. He usually wears a white cowboy hat and blue jeans. Anyone who might have seen him and his faded blue 1986 Ford truck Nov. 8 or who might have information or know his whereabouts is asked to call the police nonemergency line at 935-3311 or contact Detective Wendall Carter at 961-2378 or wcarter@co.hawaii.hi.us. Those who prefer anonymity may call Crime Stoppers at 961-8300.
“Somebody knows something,” Sandra Meek said. “And if they would just come forward and call Crime Stoppers, it’s anonymous and it’s (free).”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
