Summer Wells isn’t first family member to disappear

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) - Summer Wells, the 5-year-old at the center of an East Tennessee AMBER Alert, is not the first member of her family to go missing.

Rose Marie Bly, the aunt of Summer Wells, has been the subject of a missing person cold case since 2009, a report from the Charlie Project confirms. Rose Marie Bly is the sister of Candus Bly, Summer Wells’ mother.

The Charlie Project is a database that has cataloged over 14,000 missing person cases mainly from the United States. The project focuses on cases that were never solved.

Rose Marie Bly was last seen in St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin on August 21, 2009, according to the report. She left her home that night to meet a cousin at a bar about five miles away. Rose Marie Bly told her husband that she would be back before midnight, but she never made it to her destination, the report says.

Officials found Rose Marie Bly’s vehicle five days later in a parking lot used by truckers to park their tractor-trailers, a release from the FBI confirms. The parking lot is located around 30 miles from Rose Marie Bly’s residence, according to the release.

The Charlie Project mentions that the lot where the vehicle was found is normally used by semi-truck drivers to park tractor-trailers and that there was no sign of foul play. Rose Marie Bly left home with little money and no credit or debit cards, according to the report.

Rose Marie Bly and her husband reportedly had a troubled relationship and three weeks after her disappearance, he filed for divorce and sought a court order to prevent her from returning and taking their two children, the report said.

Prior to her disappearance, police had made at least one house call to address a domestic dispute. During the visit, her husband accused her of slapping him, and she accused him of putting her in a headlock and banging her head on the ground, according to the Charlie Project.

Rose Marie Bly’s husband passed a polygraph test after her disappearance and is not considered a suspect in the incident, the Charlie Project’s report says. His divorce and custody petition was granted and he has sole custody of their children, the report stated.

Her mother speculated that she became disoriented and wandered away from her vehicle due to an injury she had sustained a week before the incident, but there is no evidence to support this theory, the report says.

Rose Marie Bly was never found and the case remains unsolved.