Unsolved TN: What happened to Nashville mom who vanished 42 years ago?
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — Nearly 42 years ago, Metro Nashville police made a “rather disturbing” discovery when they found a pair of glasses left behind inside 29-year-old Veda Lou Powers’ car.
By the time her glasses were found, Powers had already been missing for four days. According to her family, she had “very bad vision” and couldn’t see without her glasses. Her car was also parked several blocks away from her home on 9th Avenue South.
‘It was unusual’: 41 years after Nashville mom vanished, police are still looking for clues
“There really wasn’t any particular reason for her car to be parked down there, or at least parked where it was at. It was unusual. It was almost like somebody parked it there to hopefully kind of conceal it,” Metro Nashville Cold Case Detective Matthew Filter said in an interview last year.
More than four decades later, police are almost sure there was foul play involved in her disappearance, but who did it is still unclear.
The morning of May 26, 1982, had started out just like any other. Powers began her normal morning routine by dropping her two young daughters off at day care. She then picked up her sister and drove her to her job on Murfreesboro Road.
According to investigators, Powers told her sister that she had taken the day off from her job at Saint Thomas West and was going home to get some rest. No one knows what happened to her after that as Powers was never seen again.
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“She never went and picked up her kids or contacted anybody at all,” Filter said. “On May 28 the family finally made a missing person’s report on her and the police got involved searching for her. May 30, they got their first big break.”
May 30 is when detectives found Powers’ car parked on 14th Avenue South near Edgehill. Since then, there’s been a couple persons of interest developed in the case, but according to Filter, there’s not enough evidence to say they were actually involved in her disappearance.
Over the years, tips in the case have run dry, but investigators are still trying to obtain more information from people Powers may have known back in the 80s’. According to Filter, Powers was very close with her family and spoke to them regularly.
Most of the known information in the case comes from interviews with her family, but police believe some of Powers’ former coworkers or close friends could be the key to finally bringing her family justice.
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“The people that would’ve been close to her and maybe known some things about her, things that you don’t always share with your family; or you might confide in a really close friend; or might talk about with coworkers, that’s the kind of information that we really don’t have,” Filter said.
Anyone with information regarding the case is asked to contact the Metro Nashville Police Department’s Cold Case Unit at 615-862-7329. Anonymous tips can also be shared by calling the police department’s Crime Stoppers Division at 615-74-CRIME (615-742-7463).
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