Laureen Rahn: The 14-Year-Old Who Vanished From Her Manchester Apartment

Strange Case Files
8 minutes ago
3 min read

A Spring Night in Manchester

Laureen Ann Rahn was 14 years old when she disappeared from Manchester, New Hampshire, during the night of April 26 into April 27, 1980. She lived with her mother in a third-floor apartment on Merrimack Street. At 3:45 a.m. on April 27, Manchester police responded to the building after Laureen was reported missing. More than four decades later, she has never been found, and New Hampshire authorities still consider the case open with foul play suspected.

Black-and-white sketch portrait of Laureen Rahn, the 14-year-old New Hampshire girl who vanished in 1980. — Sketch of Laureen Rahn, who disappeared from Manchester, New Hampshire, in 1980 at just 14 years old.

The Night at the Apartment

That night, Laureen was home while her mother, Judith Rahn, was away. Public case summaries say Laureen had a male friend and a female friend at the apartment, and the teenagers had been drinking beer and wine. The male friend later said he heard voices in the hallway, assumed Laureen’s mother had returned, and left through the back door. The female friend stayed behind in the apartment.

When Judith returned after midnight, she found something immediately strange. According to public case summaries, the lightbulbs in the building’s hallways had reportedly been unscrewed, leaving the halls dark. The apartment door was also unlocked. Judith looked into Laureen’s bedroom and thought her daughter was asleep in bed, but it was actually the female friend. Laureen was gone.

The Early Investigation

There were no public reports of a violent struggle inside the apartment. None of Laureen’s possessions, including her money and clothing, were missing. For a time, police considered the possibility that she had run away, but as time passed and she did not return, that theory weakened. Later reporting on the case says investigators came to believe she may have left intending to come back, and that something happened after she stepped outside. Today, New Hampshire’s official cold case listing says foul play is suspected.

Composite image of Laureen Rahn showing her original black-and-white missing-person photo and a color age-progressed image beside case details. — Composite image of Laureen Rahn with her original photo and an age-progressed image showing what she may have looked like years later.

The California Phone Calls: Laureen Rahn

Months after Laureen disappeared, the case took an even stranger turn. Judith later discovered charges for three phone calls connected to California on the apartment bill. According to public case summaries, two of the calls were traced to motels in Santa Monica and Santa Ana, and another was made to a teen hotline. Those calls were never conclusively proven to have been made by Laureen, but they became one of the most talked-about parts of the case because they raised the possibility that she had survived the night she vanished.

There were also reports of silent calls to the family, often around 3:45 a.m., the same time police first responded on the night Laureen was reported missing. Judith later said she believed her daughter had made the California calls, though that belief was never proven.

Later Developments

In later years, secondary reporting said Judith remarried and moved to Florida. The same reporting also said the male friend who had been with Laureen that night died in 1985 and was not considered a suspect. Those details have been repeated in later case coverage, but they do not appear on New Hampshire’s official cold case page, so they are best understood as reported background rather than core official findings.

The Other Missing Woman

Six weeks after Laureen disappeared, another woman vanished from the same city. Denise Daneault, 25, was last seen in Manchester on June 8, 1980. Over the years, Denise’s disappearance has often been mentioned alongside Laureen’s because the two cases happened so close together in time and place. Reporting on Denise’s case says she disappeared after a night out in Manchester.

Decades later, investigators publicly examined Terry Peder Rasmussen in connection with Denise Daneault’s disappearance. That made Denise’s case even more prominent in discussions about unsolved disappearances in the Manchester area. But no public evidence has established that Laureen and Denise were taken by the same person, and New Hampshire’s public case listing for Laureen does not identify Rasmussen as a suspect in her disappearance.

Other names sometimes get mentioned around Laureen’s case too, including Rachael Garden and Shirley McBride. Those comparisons appear in later summaries because they were young New Hampshire girls who also disappeared and were never found. But law enforcement has not publicly established a direct link between those disappearances and Laureen’s case.