Haley's Motel owner missing
by Lisa Neff. islander Reporter
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| Sabine Musil-Buehler is missing, according to the sheriff's office. |
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| William Cumber, Sabine Musil-Buehler's boyfriend. |
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| Robert Corona, the man police say was found with Sabine Musil-Buehler’s car. |
Sabine Musil-Buehler, the owner of Haley’s Motel in Holmes Beach,
was officially reported missing early Nov. 6.
Friends
and family on Anna Maria Island say they last saw the
49-year-old woman on Nov. 4, election day.
The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office released its
missing person report on Nov. 6, stating that Musil-Buehler was last seen Nov.
5 in the area of 14th Street West and 26th Avenue West in Bradenton, according
to a news release from the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office.
Her car was found early Nov. 6 in the
area of 12th Street Court West and 26th Avenue West.
The news release stated detectives did not suspect foul play, but
need to verify Musil-Buehler’s well being.
“We have no evidence of foul play,” said
MCSO spokesperson Dave Bristow on Nov. 7. “But there are some things that
concern us.”
A report circulated
on the Island on Nov. 6 that Musil-Buehler’s car had
been stolen and found with several people in the car and in possession of the
keys. An MCSO release said the car had been abandoned, but by Nov. 7 MCSO had
released information that a man had been spotted with Musil-Buehler’s vehicle,
a white Pontiac Sunfire, and was arrested while trying to flee.
A report from
the sheriff’s office stated that the patrol deputy noticed
the vehicle with no taillights and attempted to conduct a traffic stop.
The driver
pulled over, but walked away.
The deputy told him to stop, but the
man continued to walk away, and eventually began to
run.
The deputy, with assistance, pursued and the driver was eventually
found hiding under a parked truck on 11th Street West.
The man, Robert Corona, 38, was arrested
for driving on a license that had been suspended for
failure to pay a fine and resisting arrest.
Corona allegedly told
deputies that he had been partying with Musil-Buehler,
according to a report in the Bradenton Herald.
Corona, described on his arrest
report as a tile setter, later allegedly said he found
the car outside a 14th Street West bar.
Bristow said MCSO deputies searched
the area where Musil-Buehler reportedly was last seen
on Nov. 6 and planned to continue their search until they located the
Holmes Beach woman.
Her husband and co-owner of Haley’s Motel, Tom Buehler,
declined to talk with The islander Nov. 7, other than to say, “There’s
some things going on. It’s really too early to say anything to anybody.
We are right in the middle of the investigation.”
Buehler filed the missing person’s
report on Nov. 6, and had not seen Musil-Buehler, with whom he is separated,
since Nov. 4, election day.
His wife is widely known
on the Island — an active member of the Anna Maria
Island Chamber of Commerce, a member of a garden club, an advocate for property-tax
relief, a participant in Holmes Beach Police Department’s missing children
alert program, and, most recently the host of one of the Island’s largest
Halloween celebrations at the hotel.
Just days after she welcomed hundreds of
people to Haley’s for a haunted
house and party, Musil-Buehler was reported missing.
“Sabine is just a very
wonderful person,” said her friend, islander
Debby Hall. “She’s an upstanding citizen, an outstanding person.… Sabine
thinks she can save the world.”
Hall believes if Musil-Buehler went to Bradenton
to help someone and she was fearing the worst on Nov.
7.
“She would never just not show up for work,
not call her friends, not call her husband,” Hall said. “Something
has happened to Sabine.”
Hall
described Musil-Buehler as petite, about 120 pounds,
5 feet, five inches tall, with silver hair and a German accent.
Hall also said Musil-Buehler is a
fitness trainer, a health enthusiast, and would not
be at a 14th Street bar or partying.
“She doesn’t even drink coffee,” she said.
Detectives have interviewed
friends and family in the case.
They also interviewed
Musil-Buehler’s boyfriend, William J. Cumber, 39,
who has an address in Anna Maria.
Cumber was paroled from prison in September
after serving two years for a felony arson conviction.
Court records indicate several other arrests of Cumber, as well as a
reopened 2002 domestic relations case.
Anyone with information on the
case is asked to call MCSO at 941-747-3011 or to call
Crime Stoppers at 866-634-TIPS. |
