Renee MacRae is a Scottish

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 woman who is missing

Missing person

A missing person is a person who has disappeared for usually unknown reasons.Missing persons' photographs may be posted on bulletin boards, milk cartons, postcards, and websites, along with a phone number to be contacted if a sighting has been made....

, presumed to have been murdered. Her disappearance along with her son is currently Britain's

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 longest running missing persons case, and in Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 the case is as notorious as Glasgow's

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

 Bible John

Bible John

Bible John is the nickname of a serial killer who is thought to have operated in Glasgow, Scotland, in the late 1960s. Three murders were attributed to him, but it is not clear if they were the work of the same person.-Murders:...

 murders. Nobody was charged with the murders, and the case has remained open.

MacRae lived in Inverness

Inverness

Inverness is a city in the Scottish Highlands. It is the administrative centre for the Highland council area, and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands of Scotland...

 and was married to Gordon MacRae, though the couple were separated. She had two sons, 9-year-old Gordon and 3-year-old Andrew. On Friday November 12, 1976, MacRae left her home in Cradlehall

Cradlehall

Cradlehall is a residential area in the east of Inverness, Scotland. In addition to housing, Cradlehall has a business park and a number of small businesses. The area was expanded recently with the development of Kessock View....

 with both her sons. She dropped her elder son Gordon at her estranged husband's house and turned south on to the A9 in the direction of Perth

Perth, Scotland

Perth is a town and former city and royal burgh in central Scotland. Located on the banks of the River Tay, it is the administrative centre of Perth and Kinross council area and the historic county town of Perthshire...

 to visit her sister. Neither MacRae nor her son Andrew have ever been seen again. Later the same night, 12 miles away, a train driver spotted MacRae's burning BMW

BMW

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG is a German automobile, motorcycle and engine manufacturing company founded in 1916. It also owns and produces the Mini marque, and is the parent company of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars. BMW produces motorcycles under BMW Motorrad and Husqvarna brands...

 car in an isolated lay-by

Rest area

A rest area, travel plaza, rest stop, or service area is a public facility, located next to a large thoroughfare such as a highway, expressway, or freeway at which drivers and passengers can rest, eat, or refuel without exiting on to secondary roads...

. When the police reached the vehicle, it was charred and empty, apart from a rug stained with blood matching MacRae's blood type

Blood type

A blood type is a classification of blood based on the presence or absence of inherited antigenic substances on the surface of red blood cells . These antigens may be proteins, carbohydrates, glycoproteins, or glycolipids, depending on the blood group system...

.

One of the most intensive searches ever mounted in Scotland failed to find a trace of them. It was concluded that they had been murdered, that the murderer had made careful plans and had disposed of the bodies without leaving any clues. Witnesses on the A9 reported seeing a man dragging something they thought was a dead sheep not far from the car, while others saw a man with a pushchair near the quarry. MacRae was reported to have been wearing a sheepskin coat when she disappeared.

As police investigated it became apparent that MacRae's personal life was not straightforward. Circa 1971, unbeknownst to her husband, MacRae began to have an affair with Bill McDowell, who was married with two children and worked for Gordon MacRae as an accountant and company secretary. Nobody knew about the affair except Valerie Steventon, MacRae's best friend. She revealed that MacRae was not visiting her sister that night, but was going to Perthshire to visit MacDowell, who happened to be Andrew's biological father

Father

A father, Pop, Dad, or Papa, is defined as a male parent of any type of offspring. The adjective "paternal" refers to father, parallel to "maternal" for mother...

. MacRae told her friend about her affair in the spring of 1973 when she was pregnant with Andrew. According to Steventon, "Renee was completely besotted by Bill", and he had told her that he had a job with Texaco

Texaco

Texaco is the name of an American oil retail brand. Its flagship product is its fuel "Texaco with Techron". It also owns the Havoline motor oil brand....

 in the Shetlands and had found a house where they could live. Though, according to Steventon, these details "turned out to be a pack of lies." MacDowell admitted their affair but has not spoken about the case again except to deny any involvement.

The police investigation, carried out by the Northern Constabulary

Northern Constabulary

The Northern Constabulary is the territorial police force responsible for Northern Scotland, covering the Highland council area along with the Western Isles, the Orkney Isles and the Shetland Isles, which comprise most of the Highlands and Islands area...

, was considered flawed. Detective Sergeant

UK police ranks

Most of the police forces of the United Kingdom use a standardised set of ranks, with a slight variation in the most senior ranks for Greater London's Metropolitan Police Service and the City of London Police...

 John Cathcart coordinated the search and after eight months he had a breakthrough. While excavating Dalmagarry quarry he was hit by a stench after removing a layer of topsoil

Topsoil

Topsoil is the upper, outermost layer of soil, usually the top to . It has the highest concentration of organic matter and microorganisms and is where most of the Earth's biological soil activity occurs.-Importance:...

. Convinced it was a sign of corpses, he continued digging, but was told by a superior officer to stop as the bulldozer

Bulldozer

A bulldozer is a crawler equipped with a substantial metal plate used to push large quantities of soil, sand, rubble, etc., during construction work and typically equipped at the rear with a claw-like device to loosen densely-compacted materials.Bulldozers can be found on a wide range of sites,...

 they were using had to go back to the contractors due to short funds.

The inquiry was wound down two years later. However, a 2004 Grampian Television

Grampian Television

Grampian Television is the ITV franchisee for the North and North East of Scotland. Its coverage area includes the Scottish Highlands , Inverness, Aberdeen, Dundee and parts of north Fife...

 documentary, Unsolved

Unsolved (TV series)

Unsolved was a regional television documentary series produced by Grampian Television...

, screened throughout Scotland, renewed interest in the case and the investigation was reopened. In 2004, Chief constable Ian Latimer launched a cold case review, which led to £122,000 being spent on an excavation of Dalmagarry quarry in August. Over the course of three weeks, 20,000 tons of earth from the quarry had been excavated and 2,000 trees were removed. All that was found were two crisp packets, some men's clothing and rabbit bones. As of August 2006, £250,000 has been spent reinvestigating the case.

Northern Constabulary named a suspect in a report to the procurator fiscal in October 2006, but the Crown Office declared there was insufficient evidence to go to court.

In recent years speculation has focused on the bodies having been buried under the A9, which was in the middle of a major programme of upgrading at the time of the disappearance. An 80 year old farmer with divining skills took his divining rods to Dalmagarry and declared the bodies to be under a track, 12ft down. He now thinks the bodies are under the A9, at a spot he has marked with a yellow circle. In 2010, the Scottish Government announced that a £2.6 million contract had been awarded for an overtaking lane at the location, which renewed interest from the farmer, who claims to have discovered anomalies in a radar survey of the area. However, a spokeswoman for Northern Constabulary said that after studying aerial photographs taken by the RAF during the construction of the A9, they were satisfied the bodies were not buried under the road.

External links

• The Scotsman article - A 2004 article on the case, including a picture of Renee MacRae's charred BMW.
• Renee MacRae's case on The Doe Network
• A website with newspaper cuttings, maps, and pictures of the excavation of Dalmagarry Quarry
• Quarry May Hold Key To Renee Mystery - A BBC News article on the reopening of the case
• The Sunday Herald article - A 2004 article on the case
• A Scottish Television article on the case.