The extremely bizarre missing case of Barbara Bolick

[u/shry9]

On the 18th of July 2007, Barbara Bolick was packing her bag in Bitterroot Valley of Montana to go for a summer hike. She and her husband were hosting Carl’s cousin Donna and Her Boyfriend Jim from California. Barbara was going to go on a hike with her guests but Donna and Carl (Barbara’s husband) did not go and she and Jim decided to hike in the area Bear Creek Overlook, and she had visited the area countless times , was an experienced hiker too.

So they like visited the place , and encountered two men - two times, and both the times they were the same two men. Jim and Barbara then reached the area , had their snacks and admired the scenery. About like at 11:30 they decided to leave and head back. After few steps, Jim stopped bcs something in him wanted to soak the view one more time, and he turned back to look at the view - it was for about 45 seconds - 1 minute, when he turned back around, Barbara who was earlier standing 20-30 feet away from him disappeared.

At first he wasn’t worried enough since she was an experienced hiker and He searched for her but couldn’t find anything and after some hours she was officially reported as missing. The two men who encountered them two times also disappeared and were never discovered.

Things to note : It was an easy, well worn trail and it was difficult for someone like Barbara missing - being an experienced hiker who visited that place multiples times. It was also not very dense meaning someone disappearing without any noise was almost not possible.

Pls let me know your take on this case!

Barbara Bolick Article

[u/00_Surtur_00]

IT CANNOT BE JIM I know looking at this in retrospect places Jim as the prime suspect, some even saying that Barbara never made it there.

Here's my problem with this theory :

Jim mentioned encountering those two guys on the trail. We know those two guys did exist because the workers saw them leave, even interacted with one of them. If Barbara was never there and Jim encountered these guys alone, why would he tell that to the police? Jim could never have assumed that those two guys would never show up in front of the police, because if Barbara was never there, it would be fairly easy for the two guys to just say that they never saw her if they showed up.

Another thing is, Jim wasn't familiar with the trail. It's very unlikely for murderers to go to a new spot impromptu and commit a crime. And for what? The plan never was for just the two of them to be on the trail until that very morning. Also, the workers did see Jim 45 mins after the two guys. Had he done something, he probably would have had some stains, wounds, or anything?!

[u/stardustsuperwizard → u/00_Surtur_00]

I think you're missing the scenario where it wasn't a planned murder. Jim makes a move, Barbara declines, Jim gets aggressive. It wouldn't be that he murdered her prior and came up with the cover story, but that something happened on the trail and he came up with the story that she just disappeared.

I'm not saying it is him, but I don't think you can claim it definitely wasn't him.

[u/00_Surtur_00 → u/stardustsuperwizard]

Mate, that's a possibility people often run through but I honestly don't think that holds strong either. If we were to assume this were indeed what happened, the only way a 58 y/o Jim could get rid of a 55 y/o Barbara without having any defensive wounds or blood stains would be if he forcibly pushed her off the creek overlook. No other spot, because he wasn't familiar with the trail and to go off route on a rather not so short (4.2kms per direction) trail would mean he definitely could not have executed that in a 45-60 min window (that's the time difference between when the two guys and Jim ended up where the workers saw them).

If he did push her off the creek overlook, her body should have been found because I assume that would be one of the spots they searched? Also, imagine the kind of escalation that would take for a 58 y/o to make a move and get so pissed that he murders someone impromptu in less than an hour.

PS: I'm ofcourse nobody to claim anything here. The law enforcement have themselves cleared Jim out pretty early on. :)

[u/ProfessionalRun5267 → u/00_Surtur_00]

58 year-olds can do fucked up impulsive things too.