Family’s desperate search

A Rockingham woman is praying the 2016 National Missing Persons Week awareness campaign will help deliver the answers she craves surrounding her missing brother.

Stephenie Fielding has been left devastated after her brother Rigby’s disappearance last August and hopes that the week-long national event, which takes place from July 31 to August 6, will raise awareness and potentially help provide closure.

Rigby Fielding was last seen in East Perth on Saturday, August 15, 2015.

He told his mother on the phone that he was on his way home.

However, the alarm was sounded when Mr Fielding did not return to Rockingham.

He has been missing ever since.

Ms Fielding toldThe Telegraph her brother’s disappearance came as a massive shock. “You just don’t think it is going to happen to you, you really don’t,” she said.

“It always happens to the least suspecting person; it certainly was never going to be my brother.

“Before my brother went missing I probably wouldn’t have paid attention.”

Police discovered a number of Mr Fielding’s personal belongings in Anketell bushland last December.

Ms Fielding said she felt her brother had been murdered.

“He wouldn’t just go missing; this is completely out of character,” she said.

“Something has happened to him.

“We have given up hope that he is alive. We know him and know something bad has happened to him. He hasn’t just fallen over.”

Ms Fielding said that not knowing what had happened to her brother was the hardest thing to deal with.

“It just has to be that closure for families; not knowing is hell,” she said.

“You see on the news that there is a missing person or a body has turned up and you are praying that it’s your brother so you have definitive answers.

“It’s a weird and pretty sick way to think but that is how your brain ticks when you want that answer.”

Ms Fielding said the Missing Persons Advocacy Network, based in Melbourne, had helped her with problems such as her brother’s unpaid phone bill going to debt collectors while he has been missing.

She said she hoped National Missing Persons Week would provide the spark for someone with information to come forward.

“Somebody knows what has happened,” Ms Fielding said.

“Our plight now is just continuing to plead to the public.

“I am just really pleading to someone who knows something to come forward, even if it is anonymously. We need to know where he is and put it all to rest.”

Detective Sergeant Steve Perejmibida called on members of the public to come forward with information.

“Despite extensive investigations, the complete circumstances surrounding Rigby’s disappearance are unknown and he is still missing,” he said.

“The inquiry is ongoing.”

Anyone with information on Mr Fielding’s case should contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or make a report online at www.crimestoperswa.com.au .