Dateline: Missing in America podcast covers the 1980 disappearance of Nancy Snow from Baltimore, Maryland

NBC News

2 days ago

Play the episode ' The Cold Case of Nancy Snow ' of the Dateline: Missing in America podcast below and click here to follow.
November 4th, 1980, was an election that changed America. The polls were still open on the West Coast when NBC's John Chancellor called the race.
Crowd: 'We want Reagan! We want Reagan!'
Announcer: 'There he is, the president-elect.'
Across the country, Republicans were toasting their win. In Baltimore, Maryland, 44-year-old Nancy Snow was celebrating at a victory party. Occasions like this were her sweet spot. Kimberly, Justine, and Stacy Snow are her daughters.
Kimberly Snow: "She was just so full of light."
Stacy Snow: "She was so amazing!"
Justine Snow: 'She always made you feel like you were the most important person in the room.'
Those memories of their mother are vivid. They are also frozen in time. Because not long after that party ended, Nancy Snow vanished.
Justine Snow: 'I have been obsessed my entire life with finding my mom.'
Kimberly Snow: 'You go down these rabbit holes and you spend years just researching, researching, researching.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'This kind of takes over your life, doesn't it?'
Justine Snow: 'Oh, absolutely.'
Nancy's missing-persons case is one of the oldest — and maybe the coldest — at the Annapolis Police Department. And her daughters cannot understand why.
Stacy Snow: 'It seemed too obvious that something happened. Why couldn't they solve it?'
They are convinced they know who is responsible for their mother's disappearance. The detective assigned to Nancy's case has his eye on someone, too.
Cpl. William Noel: 'He's still alive. So, to me, no one has gotten away with anything until they're unavailable for prosecution.'
To tell Nancy's story, we had to reach back into the distant past — and that's where things got unexpectedly personal for me.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'I had a strong sense when I heard her name that I had met your mom.'
Justine Snow: 'Wow.'
People talk a lot about six degrees of separation. It turned out, there are fewer than that between Nancy Snow and myself.
Please listen closely, because you or someone you know may have information that could help Nancy Snow's family find the answers they're still looking for.
In her daughters' memories, Nancy Snow is a young and vibrant mother whose energy was boundless.
Kimberly Snow: 'She was fearless and she was really funny.'
That's Kimberly, the baby of the family. And Justine is the middle sister.
Justine Snow: 'She loved adventure. She loved travel.'
Stacy is the oldest.
Stacy Snow: 'My mom not only spoke English and French, but she knew German. She knew Portuguese, Spanish, Greek, Italian. And she knew some Russian because part of my dad's job was to deal with Russian dignitaries back in the day.'
Their father, Bob Snow, was an Army intelligence officer who also worked in the foreign service. His career took the family across the globe, and Nancy relished her life abroad. She shared the family's exploits with relatives back in the States. It was the era of letters, postcards, and cassette tapes.
Nancy Snow (recording): 'I thought rather than try to write to you tonight, I'd make you one of these quick tapes.'
In the spring of 1973, Nancy sent her father this recording from Berlin.
Nancy Snow (recording): 'I've never seen a big city so full of parks and trees and gardens and flowers. And it is just breathtakingly beautiful.'
By early fall 1974, the Snows had moved back to the States and settled in Carmel, California. Nancy got involved in local politics and worked for the March of Dimes.
Justine says her mom was always volunteering for something.
Justine Snow: 'Sand castle contest, pumpkin-carving contest, field trips.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'She was volunteering and she was bringing you along.'
Justine Snow: 'She was bringing us along.'
Life was full and busy, but beneath the surface, Nancy was restless. In 1978, she and Bob separated, and Nancy moved into a condo in downtown Carmel.
Justine Snow: 'It was so devastating for me. It was the first heartbreak of my entire life.'
About a year later, Nancy shook things up once more. She announced she was moving to Annapolis, Maryland.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'What did she say about moving to the East Coast? Why'd she want to do that?'
Kimberly Snow: 'Politics.'
Justine Snow: 'She wanted to get into politics — big time.'
She began working for the Republican National Committee, traveling and making connections in the big leagues of national politics.
In June 1980, her divorce became final and later that summer Nancy moved to an apartment at 91 East Street in downtown Annapolis.
It was close to the harbor, and she enlisted a man named Paul Collins to help her with the move. They'd dated casually and stayed friends.
It was a scramble because the RNC was sending Nancy to Missouri to work on candidate Gene McNary's Senate campaign. She would be based in St. Louis for two months, and Paul was going to house-sit for her.
Justine Snow: 'She asked him if he could just, please, just, you know, watch over the apartment, just make sure everything's OK — It doesn't get broken into.'
Nancy sent a steady stream of letters and postcards to all three of her daughters while she was in St. Louis. Her tone in those dispatches is loving and playful. Her paragraphs are sprinkled with smiley faces and exclamation points. Here's Kimberly describing a postcard she received:
Kimberly Snow: 'She complimented my ninth-grade photo from school. She said it was merely fantastic, all in caps, and noted that I was smiling in it and said, 'A first, I think.'
Her daughters — who were by then 14, 15, and 19 years old — were happy. And so was she. Because right around then is when some kind of romantic lightning struck Nancy Snow.
In a letter Nancy wrote to Stacy in September 1980, she shared this piece of news: 'I must tell you I am deliriously in love with a big-time political TV producer from Baltimore. Probably won't last — but for the moment, we're bonkers. Neat!'
Election Day 1980 drew closer, meaning Nancy would soon face some choices. When the McNary for Senate campaign ended, she would be out of a job. What would she do next? What would become of her relationship with that new man? And would she stay in Annapolis?
Nancy told her daughters she was sure about this: She wanted to get out of politics and try something different, like working and living on the water.
Justine Snow: 'She said, 'I'm just gonna start a charter business. I'm gonna run the show. I'm gonna take people to the islands and I'm gonna live a peaceful life.' She actually told me that.'
Financially, Nancy was in a position to make some big choices. Her father's recent death had given her an inheritance, plus she had money from the divorce.
Nancy seemed serious about this change of course. In a letter to Kimberly, she mentioned a job prospect on a boat as a cook. Kimberly read me an excerpt:
Kimberly Snow: ''Paul seems to think I have the boat cook job in my pocket. It's a 52-foot Swan, a big boat. It's supposed to go between Fort Lauderdale and the islands. I don't know if I'll take it or not.''
Part of her hesitation may have involved Stacy, who was set on going to the University of Maryland for college. And she was going to live with Nancy. She planned to come to Annapolis after Nancy returned from St. Louis.
Announcer: 'Let's recap the Senate races which we've been able to project so far tonight. First of all…'
On November 4th, Election Day, Nancy's candidate Gene McNary was losing his Senate race, but Republicans were on the verge of a big win nationally. Nancy's family says she called them in Carmel before she left St. Louis and told them she was going to a political event that night in Baltimore and would call again when she came home to Annapolis the next day.
On November 5th, Nancy did not call again, as she had promised. A couple more days went by and there was still no word from her. Now, in 1980, cell phones barely existed and it was not unusual for people to go days without calling — unless you were Nancy Snow. Justine urged her father to check with Nancy's house sitter, Paul Collins. Maybe he knew where she was.
Justine Snow: 'So, my dad did call and talked to Paul Collins. And he said that my mom had gone on this boat trip. And — 'She'll be home by Christmas.''
Justine says Paul told her father not to worry, because Nancy was sailing with friends of a friend. Christmas came and went, and Nancy had not returned. Stacy went ahead with her plans to fly to Maryland. She arrived two days after Christmas and Paul picked her up from the airport. When they got to Nancy's apartment, Stacy expected him to hand over the keys — but she says he did not.
Stacy Snow: 'He goes, 'No, no, I stay here. I'm watching the house.' And I'm like, 'What?' He goes, 'Yeah, I sleep in your mom's room.' And I'm like, 'What?''
Stacy had just met Paul for the first time at the airport. She was not happy with the arrangement, but felt she did not really have a choice. A few more days went by with no sign of Nancy, and by now Stacy was really worried. So Paul said he'd alert the Coast Guard to keep an eye out for Nancy. And then he suggested they take a road trip to look for Nancy themselves.
Stacy Snow: 'He heard that if we go down to Fort Lauderdale — where he thinks Mom got on a boat — we could talk to the Fort Lauderdale police. He goes, 'So let's drive down there and let's check it out.''
Paul and Stacy piled into Nancy's turquoise Volkswagen Beetle and drove through the night down I-95 to Fort Lauderdale. When they got there more than 16 hours later, Paul went to the police station to file a missing persons report.
Stacy walked around town showing people photos of Nancy and asking if they'd seen her. No one had.
A few days later, they drove back to Maryland. Stacy says a few of Paul's friends were hanging around the apartment, and that made her uncomfortable.
Stacy Snow: 'They would come over and they would be smoking pot. They would be doing stuff, and that — that's not my thing.'
Stacy decided to go back to California. She says Paul told her he had also filed a missing persons report with the Annapolis police — which meant two police departments in two states would be on the lookout for Nancy.
Soon, the search for Nancy Snow would shift to international waters and become a quest to find another person... a mysterious character known as Captain Jay.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Let's talk about the Captain Jay story.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'OK.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Anybody ever speak with him?'
The answer to that question... is complicated.
April 1981. Nancy Snow's family had not heard from her for more than five months. By then, her daughters were certain she was not on a boat trip in the Caribbean, because deep in their bones they knew their mother would absolutely have told them all about it.
Kimberly Snow: 'She would let us know. She always kept us informed.'
All three daughters knew how much Nancy was looking forward to Stacy coming to live with her in Annapolis.
Stacy Snow: 'She talked me into moving out there and going to college there instead of California. Why would she just then — just go poof, you know?'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'At the very least, Stacy, she would've said to you, 'Hey, plans have changed.''
Stacy Snow: 'Yeah.'
Josh Mankiewicz: ''I've taken this boat job.''
Stacy Snow: 'Exactly.'
With her mother missing, Stacy scrapped her plans to attend the University of Maryland. Now she faced the task of moving Nancy's belongings back to California. Stacy's godfather — a family friend who lived in Washington, D.C. — was going to help her pack up the apartment. As they were making their plans, Nancy's house sitter, Paul Collins, phoned with some bad news.
Stacy Snow: 'Paul called my father and me and said, 'Oh, you don't need to come out because — I hate to tell you this — it was a terrible flood and your mom lost everything.''
To Stacy, that made zero sense. Nancy's apartment was on the third floor of a brownstone, and there were no reports of a biblical-level flood in Annapolis. Of course, it was possible a water pipe had burst, but Paul had not said that — and to Stacy and her father, the timing of the call seemed suspicious. So Stacy called the Annapolis police. And that is when she learned something that stunned her. It turned out Paul Collins had not reported Nancy missing to local police back in January — after they'd returned from Fort Lauderdale.
Stacy Snow: 'Yeah. I mean, you're 18, you know, you're expecting adults to do the right thing.'
Stacy had barely absorbed this news when she got a call that set off more alarm bells. A friend in Annapolis said she'd seen someone driving Nancy's car and had spotted friends of Paul Collins wearing Nancy's clothes. Stacy got on a plane and headed to Maryland.
By then, Paul Collins had filed a missing persons report with Annapolis police, but only two days before Stacy arrived on the East Coast — and five and a half months after Nancy's disappearance. In that document, Collins told police he had reported Nancy missing in Fort Lauderdale in January and did not know he needed to file another report with Annapolis authorities.
By that time, Paul had moved out of Nancy's apartment on East Street. Stacy says when she and her godfather went there to check on Nancy's belongings, police came with them. The landlord unlocked the door.
Stacy Snow: 'So the police had me stand in the hallway and they came in first.'
After the officers checked out the apartment, Stacy walked in — and her heart sank.
Stacy Snow: 'There was nothing — nothing there.'
Stacy says her mother's clothes and furniture were gone. So were the belongings Stacy had shipped from California for college. Other than a small amount of food in the refrigerator, the apartment was empty. There was no sign of that flood Paul had mentioned either. So why were Nancy's belongings missing? And where were they?
Stacy says she and her godfather, along with police, tracked down some of the people who had her mother's possessions — which Paul Collins had apparently given away. At one point, they visited a woman who was a friend of Paul's, and who, when she opened the door to Stacy, was wearing Nancy's nightgown.
Stacy Snow: 'She's wearing my mother's nightgown — my mother's nightgown. And we go upstairs and they're eating off my mother's plates. They're watching TV on my mother's TV. They're sleeping on my mother's bed.'
None of that supported the story that Nancy had left on a boat adventure and was planning to return in late December. It was quite the opposite. Everything Stacy had seen and heard only deepened her gut feeling that something terrible had happened to her mother.
Police wanted to ask Paul Collins more questions, but according to the case file, they had trouble locating him in the months after he filed that report in Annapolis.
Station ID: 'WJLA. Washington.'
That station ID was part of the soundtrack of my life in April 1981. Right around when Annapolis police were first learning that Nancy Snow was missing, I was a very green TV reporter at WJLA-Channel 7 in Washington, D.C., about 35 miles from Annapolis.
I don't remember if I did stories about Nancy's case, but it is the kind of thing we covered, which could explain why, all these years later — when we at Dateline decided to feature Nancy's story in Missing in America — Nancy's name and face seemed familiar to me.
There is another possible explanation. Before I went to WJLA, I was an off-air reporter for ABC News assigned to national politics. I very closely covered the 1980 campaign, especially the congressional and Senate races.
As I told Nancy's daughters, given their mother's work in politics, it is quite possible — maybe even likely — that Nancy Snow and I crossed paths.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'I had a strong sense when I heard her name that I had met your mom at some point.'
Justine Snow: 'Wow.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Now I'm not telling you that I remember meeting her, or that I — that we were friends, or that I can tell you what the interaction was, but we were absolutely in the same circles that year.'
Someone I definitely did not encounter back then is Corporal William Noel. When Nancy Snow went missing, he was 3 years old. Today, he's the Annapolis police detective working to solve her case. He's gone through the case file, including the missing persons report Paul Collins made in April 1981.
Cpl. William Noel: 'So, early part of November 1980, we have Nancy returning — from all accounts, a pretty grueling stretch of campaign work.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You're convinced that was her on the plane. She flew from St. Louis to Baltimore?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Yes. I'm convinced.'
Piecing together Nancy's movements after she left the airport was a challenge for Annapolis police, especially because by the time Paul Collins reported Nancy missing to them, the trail was more than five months old.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'All of the sort of traditional avenues of investigation that we think of first today when we're trying to find somebody or figure out where they were — you know, tracking their phone, getting their emails off their computer, doorbell cameras, license plate readers, security video at the airport — none of that existed.'
Cpl. William Noel:'Zero. And the lack of a footprint for such a busy woman is, in today's terms, just unthinkable. But it was the norm.'
There are conflicting accounts of when Nancy returned to Maryland from Missouri. However, our reporting points to her being in the Baltimore area on election night.
In his April 1981 missing persons report, Paul Collins told police when Nancy returned to Maryland on November 4th, she stayed with a friend named Bobby at a 'fancy hotel near Towson.'
Towson is a suburb of Baltimore, and Bobby was Bobby Goodman, the political TV producer Nancy had written about to Stacy. He's the man Nancy said she was deliriously in love with — the same man who hosted the party she went to on election night. He's also someone I knew back when I was a political reporter. Back in the '70s and '80s, Bobby Goodman was a very big deal in the world of political campaigning and advertising.
His son was my college classmate, so I knew him, too.
Police knew Bobby Goodman played some part in Nancy Snow's last recorded days. The question was what part — and whether he wanted to talk about it.
Cpl. William Noel: 'I believe there's indication that he may have been.'
According to the April 1981 statement Paul Collins gave police, Nancy asked him to meet her on November 5th at that fancy hotel where she was staying. Paul told the detective he did not remember its name.
Cpl. William Noel: 'Paul says he waits for her in the lobby. And he sees her possibly traveling in a green BMW and a gentleman driving that BMW, and at which point, Nancy gets out of that car and joins Paul for the return trip back to Annapolis.'
Corporal Noel says the original case detectives interviewed Nancy's boyfriend, Bobby Goodman, who corroborated parts of the story told by Paul Collins.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'And he was helpful?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Yeah. He was helpful. The detectives at the time — they were satisfied.'
Paul told police that after picking up Nancy, they stayed at her apartment in Annapolis for a couple of days. Then he said something significant happened on November 8th, in the middle of the night.
According to Paul, Nancy had gone to a local bar a couple of blocks from her apartment. At 3:30 a.m., she came home and said she was going to drive in a van to Fort Lauderdale with a boat captain she had met that night. His name was Jay, and they would be transporting boats between islands in the Caribbean and Fort Lauderdale.
Paul said Nancy's plan was to return sometime between December 17th and December 27th. Remember, he'd told Nancy's family she would be back by Christmas. Paul said she packed some clothes, they had some coffee, and then he walked her to the corner of East and Fleet Streets near her apartment. The report does not mention if Paul saw Nancy drive away.
Noel says police started looking for the mysterious Captain Jay. Their search stretched from Maryland to the Caribbean. Law enforcement in Fort Lauderdale assisted.
Cpl. William Noel: 'The Annapolis Police Department called in anyone they could, given our proximity to the Naval Academy. They used resources to call Coast Guard, naval records — anyone that may have set foot on a ship or vessel with a name or nickname Jay.'
And it sounds as if one investigator was onto something.
A police report filed in Fort Lauderdale May 6th, 1981, notes that one Annapolis detective believed Captain Jay was actually a man he said had been the subject of a drug investigation by the DEA.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Is it in the files whether he was ever spoken to and whether he acknowledged knowing Nancy?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'So, I didn't see any interview or any contact being made with him.'
Back in 1981, even as the hunt for Captain Jay continued, investigators kept their focus on Paul Collins — and something he said in that missing persons report caught their eye. He had told police he and Nancy were close friends and casual lovers, who at one point had dated for about six months. Police wondered if their relationship might have been more complicated than Paul described.
Justine met Paul while she was with her mom in Annapolis. He was 15 years younger than Nancy, and Justine did not think he was her mother's type.
Justine Snow: 'And I was like, 'What is your attraction to this guy?' And she's like, 'Well, I'm not attracted to him. It's just that he's helpful. You know, he's a handyman and, uh, he's easy because I don't have to think too hard when I talk to him.' Those were her exact words.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'OK. But there was clearly a time when they were, I don't know — involved might not be the right word, but seeing each other, dating? Something was going on.'
Justine Snow: 'I think they were casual drinking buddies.'
Stacy had a different impression.
Stacy Snow: 'My takeaway with Paul is that my mother was kind of enamored with the fact that a younger man was schmoozing her, and she had a weakness that way with — with men outside my dad. And she didn't make some good choices after my dad.'
In that April 1981 missing persons report, Paul told police Stacy gave him permission to put most of Nancy's belongings in storage and to sell some items to pay off her debts. Stacy says that is not true. Police subpoenaed Nancy's bank records and discovered Paul was writing checks on her account. Corporal Noel says from a law enforcement standpoint, the fact that Paul was Nancy's house sitter complicated the picture.
Cpl. William Noel: 'Paul maintained that he had that permission to pay her bills, give himself a quick stipend as needed. The issue is we have nobody to refute it because Nancy is, you know, missing and we don't have any way to confirm with her that those things were true or not.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You're convinced that Paul Collins was continuing to pay Nancy's bills after she disappeared.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'We have records of some of the canceled checks where he did pay some bills.'
Corporal Noel says Paul Collins did not have access to all of Nancy's accounts, and he was not withdrawing huge sums of money at a time from her checking account.
Cpl. William Noel: 'Maybe once a month, once every other month, there was an amount drawn to him. He never withdrew an amount that would say, 'OK, he's taken off,' or, 'He's trying to clean out her account.''
Josh Mankiewicz: 'One of the things Mr. Collins apparently told Nancy Snow's daughters was that there had been a flood in her apartment building and a lot of her stuff got ruined and he had to throw it out.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Yes.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Was there a flood in her building?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'We've not been able to corroborate whether a flood occurred or didn't.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'He's told conflicting stories about when he reported her missing. He's given away her possessions. He's writing checks on her account.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Yep.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'That's not enough to arrest somebody? The state's attorney couldn't persuade a jury?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'That's a — a separate conversation. In the investigative world, circumstantial is great. It lets you know you're on the right path. But in terms of handing that baton off to the prosecutor, they have a set of needs that they have to have kind of lined up before they say, 'Hey, we'll bring this to a grand jury.''
Nancy's family tried to keep on living their lives.
Stacy returned to California with the belongings she'd recovered from Paul's friends and then joined her sisters, who'd moved overseas with their father, stepmother, and stepsiblings. Bob Snow, Nancy's ex-husband, had a new job in Germany.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You all came to believe that whatever had happened, she wasn't alive anymore.'
Justine Snow: 'Of course. She would never not call us.'
Nancy's teenaged daughters remained determined to find out the truth about her disappearance. They just had no idea how long that quest would last.
Nancy's case file stayed open, and someone besides Paul Collins stayed on the law enforcement radar. A detective at the county prosecutor's office would be paying another visit to Nancy's boyfriend, Bobby Goodman.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You spoke with him?'
David Cordle: 'Yes, I did.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Cooperative?'
David Cordle: 'Cooperative in the sense that, uh, he was very, very careful with his thoughts and his words.'
In 1988, Nancy Snow was legally declared dead. And a year later, at the urging of her daughters, Nancy's case was reclassified as a homicide. David Cordle of the Anne Arundel County State's Attorney's Office caught it. And during the nearly 30 years Cordle worked Nancy's case, he chased hundreds of leads and re-interviewed dozens of witnesses. One of those interviews was with Bobby Goodman — Nancy's new boyfriend at the time of her disappearance. And as far as police can tell, one of the last two people to see her alive.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You spoke with him?'
David Cordle: 'Yes, I did.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Cooperative?'
David Cordle: 'Cooperative in the sense that, uh, he was very, very careful with his thoughts and his words. We interviewed him at his home and, uh, his wife was present, so I had to make sure that we were kind of segregated from her. But I think that may have had something to do with his reluctance. But, overall, he was cooperative.'
Cordle says Goodman's wife was briefly inside the house while the two men talked outside, on a patio, about the evening of November 4th, 1980, and the next day.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'He confirmed that he was having an affair with Nancy.'
David Cordle: 'Yes, but maybe not to the extent that Nancy was perceiving it.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'He spent the night with Nancy.'
David Cordle: 'From the original reports and stories from witnesses, yes.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'And they had breakfast together the next morning.'
David Cordle: 'That's correct.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Then he reports Nancy getting in a car with Paul Collins?'
David Cordle: 'He couldn't identify who she got into a car with because he did not know who it was. He just saw a — a male subject with Nancy getting into this car and driving off, and that's the last, uh, that the witness says he saw of her.'
Of course, Cordle says he was eager to interview Paul Collins, too, but unlike Goodman — Paul was not cooperating.
David Cordle: 'I think I spoke briefly with him on the phone. Anything else, uh, he chose not to talk with us. Numerous attempts had been made.'
In 2005, Paul Collins was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury. At that proceeding, he took the Fifth.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'He got an attorney and he didn't speak with you and he wouldn't speak with a grand jury?'
David Cordle: 'Correct.'
Four years later, Collins did agree to speak with a detective and a prosecutor under a ' use immunity ' deal — meaning anything he told them could not be used against him, but he could still be charged if they found other evidence to connect him to Nancy's murder. With his attorney present, Collins sat for a two-hour interview, which was not recorded. According to a written summary by the detective who conducted the interview, Collins gave a brand-new account of his interactions with Nancy.
The detective wrote, 'I asked Paul Collins to tell me what he remembers about picking Nancy Snow up when she returned from Missouri. He advised that his memory is that he picked her up at BWI airport arrivals. I told Paul Collins that he had previously said that he picked Nancy Snow up at a hotel in Towson and that he saw her get out of a car. I further told him that he had previously told us the make and color of said car. Paul Collins advised that he does not remember any of that and that in his memory he picked her up at BWI airport.'
According to the detective, Collins also said Nancy returned from St. Louis one or two days after the 1980 election — not on Election Day, as he had told the police in his original missing persons report.
Over the years, Stacy, Justine, and Kimberly have spent countless hours replaying what they say Paul Collins told their father about a boat trip back in November 1980, when they had not heard from Nancy for days.
Justine Snow: 'He was trying to make it sound like my mom went off with friends, not strangers — so that we wouldn't worry. Like, that was his first contact with my dad.'
That is what Nancy's family says Paul Collins first told them. But more than five and a half months later, Paul told police a different story. That version had Nancy running off with the elusive Captain Jay, not with friends.
Kimberly Snow: 'He made it clear that he did not know who these people were, that he did not know this Captain Jay. He told investigators he knew nothing about it until that night, when my mom told him.'
Corporal William Noel, the Annapolis detective now trying to solve Nancy's case, does not believe this 44-year-old mystery has anything to do with a Captain Jay.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You don't think Nancy ever went to sea. You don't think Nancy ever got on a boat. You don't think she made it out of Annapolis.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'No, to all.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'You think she died the day that Paul Collins picked her up?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'I believe that whatever happened to Nancy Snow happened very soon after she was picked up from that hotel in the Baltimore area.'
Bobby Goodman died in 2018, leaving investigators without one of their key witnesses.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Is or was the boyfriend ever a suspect?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'The investigators' reporting from anything I've seen at that time, never indicated him as a firm suspect. The only person that drew the raised eyebrow of anybody that investigated this case is Mr. Collins.'
Corporal Noel wanted to sort through all those inconsistencies in Paul Collins' stories, among other things. And in March 2021, Paul Collins agreed to talk with Noel by phone.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Tell me about that call.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'It was brief, but Paul struck me as somebody who is very familiar with how investigations go. I want to say he was cooperative in so much that it served him. And then when we get to the nuts and bolts of, 'Are you available to speak with me?' he advised me that he wouldn't be doing that and that he wished her family — her daughters— nothing but the best. And that if I could, to offer them some words of comfort. And I told him I wouldn't do that. I could set up a call, but I wouldn't do that on his behalf. And that pretty much ended our conversation.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Paul Collins remains a person of interest?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Absolutely.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'But not a suspect?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Can't call him a suspect yet, but I will say that he's a person of interest — nearly a suspect, but I can't say that he's a suspect because right now we're circumstantial. I don't have my PC yet.'
By 'PC' he means probable cause. To build a criminal case, detectives and prosecutors need to establish evidence that a crime was committed.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'If Paul Collins killed Nancy Snow, what was the motive?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Tough to theorize that out in the open, but it's not unknown that Paul was romantically fond of Nancy. It's unclear what the nature of their relationship was after an initial courting of Nancy by Paul. And from all indications, Nancy saw him as basically a nice guy, but not a guy she wanted to have a relationship with.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'And very clearly, it seems she was much more interested in the guy in Baltimore.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Yes.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'The man she met at the hotel.'
Cpl. William Noel: 'Correct.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'So maybe Paul Collins is angry that she's not interested in him, or maybe Paul Collins wants to get his hands on the money that Nancy has recently inherited?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'There's a possibility of some jealousy — that he's not the main guy in her life. It could be a financial desire on his part. The issue for me, as an investigator, is getting in front of Paul Collins in a setting where he would even talk to me about it, and that's where we've run into a pretty big brick wall.'
Paul Collins has never been arrested or charged with anything connected to Nancy Snow's disappearance. He is now 74 years old, and living near Washington, D.C. We reached out to him, and he has not responded to our requests for comment.
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Do you think you're gonna eventually solve the disappearance of Nancy Snow?'
Cpl. William Noel: 'You know, I really would like to deliver that for her family and for Nancy. I think I've got enough years left at the agency to see it through.'
Any cold case detective will tell you this: Time is both their enemy and their friend. With every passing year, evidence can get lost, witnesses can die, memories can fade. And also over time, witnesses — and sometimes even perpetrators — can change in unexpected ways.
David Cordle, who labored over Nancy's case for almost three decades, knows that firsthand.
David Cordle: 'I've seen it before. Over periods of time, relationships change, people grow up, people grow old, people get religion. People want to get things off their chest.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'And sometimes, 'The alibi I gave you X number of years ago — I'm no longer going to lie for you.''
David Cordle: 'Absolutely.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'That's what you're hoping for here.'
David Cordle: 'Absolutely.'
As the years passed, all of Nancy Snow's daughters got married and became mothers themselves. Today their own mother would be 88 years old, making it 44 years since any of them have heard her say their names. All they have now are those cassette tapes Nancy left behind.
Nancy Snow (recording): 'I was concerned about Justine and Kimberly not being, you know, strong swimmers yet, so I have a young man who's a lifeguard at the pool working with them three times a week. Kimberly, in one lesson, has learned to swim. And Justine is — is coming right along, too. We're so pleased with both of them. Now, Stacy already knows how to swim and she's going off the board and doing all kinds of tricks and things.'
Justine Snow: 'She would sing me to sleep. She would read me stories. And I think maybe most of all, I — I really miss that voice. Sorry.'
Stacy Snow: 'I think what my sisters don't realize is when I listen to them talk — when I don't see them and I listen to them — they sound like my mom. I hear her through some of their mannerisms and what they say and how they say it and their intonations. I can hear it.'
Josh Mankiewicz: 'Your mom wouldn't have wanted this to take over your life.'
Stacy Snow: 'No. I don't think so. That's why I tried to change and become the mother that she was to me for my kids and pour my love and my heart and my time into them and make — mold them to be like my mom, because she was so amazing. And I have her pictures all over the house. And I tell stories all the time. And I wanted to pass on her spirit to others.'
Like her sister Stacy, Kimberly holds on to the things her mother gave her that can't be taken away.
Kimberly Snow: 'She just believed that I was extraordinary, and that I was capable of anything. So, I think of all the things that she taught me, I think the most powerful is how to believe in myself, and how to love myself, and how to be present in the moment, and to soak in the life around me.'
We let Justine have the final word, because what she told us goes for her sisters, too.
Justine Snow: 'I want justice to be served. I want to know the truth. I will never stop looking for our mom.'
Here is how you can help...
Nancy Snow was 44 years old at the time of her disappearance in 1980.
She was 5'6' and 120 lbs., with blue-gray eyes and short, graying dark hair.
If you have any information about her disappearance, please call the Annapolis Police Department at 410-268-9000 and ask for Corporal William Noel.
To learn more about other people we've covered in our Missing in America series — and to see photos of Nancy Snow — go to DatelineMissingInAmerica.com. There, you'll be able to submit cases you think we should cover in the future.
Thanks for listening. See you Fridays on Dateline on NBC.