Disappearance of Melissa Casias (2025)

On June 26, 2025 — four days after Monica Jacinto Reza vanished — Melissa Casias, an Administrative Assistant at Los Alamos National Laboratory, disappeared near Taos, NM.

That morning she drove her husband Mark to LANL at ~6:15 a.m., returned home citing a forgotten badge, stopped at the post office, and delivered a Subway sandwich to her daughter at a Taos Plaza café before leaving around 1 p.m. Both personal and work phones were found at home, factory-reset. Her wallet, vehicle, and ID were all left behind. She was last captured on a security camera at Kit Carson Electric Co. on NM-518 at ~2:18 p.m. walking eastbound toward Carson National Forest.

Anomaly: Factory-reset phones imply either pre-planning or third-party access to her devices.

Reports surfaced that Casias may have lost her national security clearance prior to the disappearance. Status: missing (endangered). $5,000 family reward; $2,500 from Albuquerque Metro Crime Stoppers.