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A North Carolina woman whose disappearance in 2001 triggered a 24-year search is now facing criminal charges from the year she vanished.
Michele Hundley Smith, now 63, was located Feb. 20 at an undisclosed location within North Carolina after detectives received new information about her case, the Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office said.
Smith was 38 when her husband reported that she left their Eden home Dec. 9, 2001, to go Christmas shopping in Martinsville, Virginia, and never returned. Her vehicle was never found.
An extensive investigation followed, and, despite years of investigative work, her whereabouts remained unknown until last week.
Authorities said Smith told investigators she left on her own accord and referenced “domestic issues.”
Sheriff Sam Page told Fox News Digital the sheriff’s office had no prior record of domestic incidents at the home. No criminal charges are expected in her disappearance. However, following her identification, investigators discovered an outstanding order for arrest dating back to 2001.
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In a statement, the Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office said that, after consultation with the District Attorney’s Office and further investigation, authorities identified an outstanding order for arrest for Smith for failure to appear.
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The order stemmed from a DWI charge issued by the Eden Police Department Nov. 11, 2001. Smith failed to appear in court Dec. 27, 2001, for that charge, the statement said.
On Feb. 25, 2026, Smith was taken into custody by the Robeson County Sheriff’s Office at the request of Rockingham County authorities. She later posted a $2,000 bond and is scheduled to appear in Rockingham County District Court March 26, 2026.
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On Thursday, the New York Post reported it had located Smith in a trailer in a rural community near the South Carolina state line. Smith told the outlet she is trying to make amends with her daughter and the family she walked out on decades ago.
“My daughter is forgiving me. We are in contact, so leave me alone,” she told the outlet.
Smith’s neighbors said she had “been here for years and years” and mostly keeps to herself.
“We asked why she didn’t come out of the house much, and she said her husband passed. He passed last year. … She was really sad about it. She said she was depressed and stayed inside,” the neighbor said.
In a 2018 interview on “The Vanished Podcast,” her daughter, Amanda Hundley, said her mother’s marriage was unraveling under the weight of alcohol abuse, infidelity and escalating marital arguments.
Smith had recently lost her job at a veterinary practice after being fired for drinking on the job, Hundley said.
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“My dad didn’t like the fact that my mom hid her drinking. I knew about it, and I was the only one. And I felt, you know, I was young, and I felt obligated not to say anything to betray my mom,” Hundley said on the podcast.
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According to Hundley, her father suspected the drinking but did not fully understand the extent of it until after Smith vanished.
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“He said, ‘Do you know where she kept the bottles at?’ And I showed them we had a little red building outside, and it was full of rum bottles, the empties, the ones that she had already drunk,” recalled Hundley, who was 14 at the time.
The couple’s relationship had also deteriorated. Hundley said both her parents had affairs during the marriage. She described frequent arguments that “got physical a few times.”
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