The Burlington Free Press from Burlington, Vermont • Page 16

THE BURLINGTON FREE PRESS SUNDAY) DECEMBER 31, 2000 NEW ENGLAND Former Concord police officer disappears without a trace questions, no body ft 'r- person knew it and knocked him out, put him in the truck and dropped him off somewhere." There also is the possibility of retaliation by someone Curtis angered when he was a Concord police officer. Cronin doubts it, though. "He was a street officer who, according to Mr. Pishon, just got by in life," Cronin said. "His biggest thing was he stood by the door when a woman's body was found and he let the other officers in and out." His brother told police Curtis might have caused some trouble with his fellow officers.

He said Curtis had affairs with the wives of two other officers. Cronin doesn't believe that's related. What about the workers at the plant? The man Curtis said had threatened to kill him had an alibi, and denied making any threats. Curtis' own report of the incident casts doubt on the theory; it makes no mention of any Curtis told his parents he felt threatened by some Hispanic workers at the plant. He had told his brother he was interested in a Latina woman who worked there, but worried his interest would anger her friends.

Cronin agrees this could be a lead, but says he can't pursue it until video footage of the people and their cars at the convenience store is enhanced enough to make identifications if it can be enhanced enough. For Nicholas Pishon, a career military detective and former state corrections commissioner, being on the sidelines of an investigation so close to his heart has been painful. That has been a source of friction with Cronin, who said his department has given the investigation everything it can, despite what the family might think. No answers. No evidence.

Just questions. Just theories. And so the authorities and Curtis' family are left to wonder. "It seems to us somebody must have seen something. He was wearing his uniform," his mother said.

"The worst thing for a parent is to lose a child. But never knowing what happened is even worse." made from his home phone were to his mother. Police still are waiting to examine the telephone logs from the guard shack. If he did flee, he left everything behind. There has been no activity on his bank accounts or credit cards and his mail isn't being forwarded anywhere, so he isn't receiving his police pension.

And wouldn't he at least have taken his cigarettes and contact lens solution? His father said it's unlikely that he walked to the road and hitchhiked. "Curtis didn't just walk away," his father said. "He couldn't just walk away with his multiple sclerosis. The road was just too far from the guardhouse." State police search dogs found nothing in the area. Had he tried to walk home, the path he would have taken passes near salt marshes.

He could have fallen, jumped or been pushed in. Seabrook Police Chief Paul Cronin said if Curtis ended up in the water, his body should have surfaced by now. There also was no evidence of a scuffle along the path, and Cronin doubts suicide. "Man, that takes a lot of guts to just jump in the water. You don't just drown.

You have to work at it," he said. "And by now he should have come up." His family also doubts it was suicide. His brother told police Curtis had told him that if he ever killed himself, he would do it with a gun. His mother agreed. "He'd have gone back to his room, had a few drinks and shot himself," she said.

He didn't do that. The police and his family searched his hotel room and, beneath months of filth and numerous pornographic videotapes, they found his pistol still wrapped in the brown paper bag in which his father sold it to him. Plus, Curtis had plans and hopes. He had told co-workers he was looking forward to vacationing with his family later in July. He had an appointment that week with a car dealer to talk about buying a new vehicle.

He had a lottery ticket for the July 5 drawing. Maybe he was murdered. That's what his father thinks, despite the lack of evidence. "He did mention that he thought there were drug deals going on down in the parking lot," Nicholas Pishon said. "He probably saw something that night, the The Associated Press Former police officer Curtis Pishon is shown in Concord, N.H., in this undated family photo, wearing his police uniform.

On July 5, Curtis' car was torched and he disappeared. Investigators and his family don't know if he's dead but aren't convinced he's alive. Family left with By J.M. Hirsch The Associated Press SEABROOK, N.H. Every morning Curtis Pishon did the same thing.

Finish up his third shift security' guard job by 5:30 a.m., go to the Xtra-Mart across the street and buy a 12-pack of Miller Light, head to the hotel room he called home, watch pornography, get drunk and pass out. In the evening, he'd get up, go to work and do it all over again. And again. And again. It was a cycle authorities say the 41-year-old former police officer had fallen into years before when multiple sclerosis cost him his job.

This was as close as his shaking hands and withering legs ever were going to let him get to being a cop again. But on July 5, Curtis' routine was broken. His car was torched and he disappeared. Investigators and his family aren't certain what to make of it. They don't know if he's dead, but aren't convinced he's alive.

There are hints of foul play, but no evidence. And if it were suicide, where's the body? "I just don't know what happened," his mother, Astrid Pishon, said in a recent interview. "And the saddest part is I hope I live long enough to find out something." Tracing a difficult past Curtis' story is one of dreams lost, of a life that became a nightmare from which his family doubts they will awaken. The details of it have been assembled from police documents and interviews with family members and authorities. Curtis was the second of the Pishons' three sons.

They grew up moving around the world, following their father and his career as a military police investigator. It was a path Curtis continued to trace even as an adult. The family's last stop before Nicholas Pishon retired and moved to New Hampshire was Hawaii, where Curtis graduated from high school and enrolled at the University of Hawaii. College didn't suit Curtis he majored in television viewing, according to his father and he soon dropped out to join his family in Hopkinton and pursue his dream of becoming a police officer. Too young to apply to the police academy, he took a job as an emergency dispatcher in 1978.

About two years later he joined the Army and was assigned to the military police in Korea. When his enlistment was up in 1984, he was hired by the Concord Police Department, where he worked as a patrol officer for about 10 years. Around 1990, the dream began to unravel. Curtis was diagnosed Something happened between then and 2 a.m., when Curtis called the fire department to report his car was burning. The car was engulfed in flames by the time firefighters arrived.

Firefighters and workers at the plant later told police Curtis was remarkably calm despite what was happening to his car. Then he disappeared. The last entry in the guard log was at 2 a.m., when Curtis reported the fire. The first person to notice he was missing was a worker who arrived at 3:45 a.m. Curtis' burned out car was still parked at the gate, and his cigarettes and contact lens solution were inside the shack.

That's about the same time a night-shift foreman reported seeing two vehicles racing out of the driveway. And the search for Curtis be gan. So far, only questions have been found. Unanswered questions According to insurance investigators, the car fire was arson. If that's true, there's no easy answer as to who set it.

Curtis stood little to gain from setting it himself many of his most valued possessions were inside. But if somebody else set it, how did they do so without Curtis' noticing? The car was parked so close to the guardhouse that the fire singed its walls. Then there is the mystery of where Curtis went and how he got there. There were no deliveries to the plant that night, so he didn't ride off with a trucker, and no taxis made pickups in the area at the time he disappeared. Perhaps he had called a friend and arranged to be picked up? Perhaps, but the only calls he with multiple sclerosis, a disabling nerve disorder that leads to a loss of strength and dexterity.

The condition eventually forced Curtis, then 35, to give up his job and he had little luck finding another. He became withdrawn and depressed, jumping from one dead-end job to another. He had few, if any, friends and dated only rarely. Eventually he ended up on the Seacoast working as a security guard. His drinking, which already had sent him through rehabilitation once while a police officer, got the best of him he was fired after showing up for work drunk.

In December 1998 he persuaded another security company, Reliable Security Guard Agency in Salem, to give him a chance. He was assigned to night guard duty at Venture a manufacturing plant in Seabrook. And so began the cycle of beer, pornography and work. The final night Curtis complained often about his job, but seemed loyal to the company and glad for the steady work. But in the months before his disappearance, the complaints took a different tone.

He told his parents he was concerned about his safety, that he suspected drug deals were made in the parking lot and that some of the workers at the plant worried him. He worried about working alone and unarmed, and said a worker at the plant had threatened to kill him over a parking ticket Curtis had given him. July 3 was the last time Curtis' family saw him. "The day he was here he was upset," his mother said. "He said he had no backup if anything was wrong." That day, he paid his father $200 to buy back his old police gun.

His father had bought it from him several years before when Curtis was low on cash. He had a permit to carry it concealed and loaded. The night of July 4 started as any other for Curtis. He arrived at work about 9:30 p.m., parking his car about eight feet from the guard shack in the parking lot. The guard he was relieving knew Curtis' multiple sclerosis made it difficult for him to walk the grounds, as the guards are required to at the start of their shifts, so he offered to do it for him.

The guard later told police Curtis chatted briefly with him about the Red Sox and did not appear depressed or upset. About midnight, Curtis' supervisor checked on him and found him in good spirits and reported no problems. Another worker later told police that about the time he saw two cars of rowdy Hispanics parked at the Xtra-Mart. -r ireatment Come into Lewis, Drive off a winner! Let Ed Shannon show you the way to quality savings! Drivers 658-2608 ext. 217 (Xfj) 1-888-658-1130 I I Mortgage Rates are Dropping! Call fi julieaJamothefmgc.com 110 MAIN 4" FLOOR, BURLINGT0N.VT 05401 863-1 1 1 3 351-7091 (pager) i rlGGl 8Q0.321 .3546 (loll free) JULIE LAMOTHE 1325 Shebume Rd, South Burlington www.

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