Search For Missing McAlester Mother Enters Third Week

The search for a missing McAlester mother is stretching into its third week.

No one has seen or heard from Holly Cantrell since January; her family says they fear the worst.

McAlester police say detectives are working every day to find Cantrell, and her family said they're doing the same.

Holly Cantrell's picture is posted up in places all over McAlester.

“We've put fliers out everywhere,” said Cantrell’s stepdaughter, Charity Clayton. “All the way from Kiowa to Wilburton to Muskogee, everything.”

Her family hangs each one hoping Cantrell's sweet smile will trigger someone's memory.

“We just want her to come back home,” Clayton said.

Clayton said her stepmother vanished two weeks ago. She had gone to work that day, like any other, at the McAlester hospital where she's a physical therapist.

“She goes to work, she comes home, takes care of my dad and that's basically everything she's done for 17 years,” Clayton said.

But, she never made it home from work on January 20th.

Police say Cantrell got into someone's green truck and left the hospital on her lunch break.

Right now, detectives are looking through hours of security footage following a tip that Cantrell was dropped off at the Braum's off Highway 69.

Her disappearance has left Cantrell's family to play out every possible scenario.

They say the mother of three boys would never just leave; she was dedicated to her family and the miniature donkeys and goats she raised.

Clayton said, “We just have faith that she's out there somewhere.”

But that faith fades with each passing day.

“At first the fear wasn't there, but the longer it goes, the fear keeps coming, and it's getting more intense now that something's happened to her or that somebody's done something to her,” Clayton said.

Police ask that anyone with information about Cantrell call the department at 918-423-1212.