Page 13 - Win Panama News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Cher's aunt mary called the us embassy in panama, and begged for help. >> the embassy -- made a big point of saying people disappear all the time. and if she wants to be found, she will contact you. and so i had a hard time shouting into the darkness of the embassy saying "help me, help me." >> reporter: things got worse. cher didn't call her father on his birthday. it was a huge alarm bell. >> i knew how she felt about her dad. and she would never, ever miss his birthday. so something had happened to cher, for sure. in my heart, i knew then. >> reporter: after two months, it was staring every...

Did she immediately investigate some. >> no. they just put it in a file. and they go just yeah, yeah, yeah. people get lost in panama all the time. >> she reached out to someone she thought could help, another ex-pat, don winner, a man that runs a website for foreigners living in panama. >> i was contacted by one of her friends that was concerned that she was missing. and they asked for my help. >> don has lived in panama for 23 years and is our consultant on this story. he came here with u.s. military intelligence back when noriega now he turns his attention to the two missing americans. >> i...

>> i imagine you were calling? >> calling. >> leaving messages? >> texting, facebooking. and then i started reading her facebook. and it's, like, "cher, where are you?" people who were in panama, in bocas, "haven't seen you around town, where you at, gimme a call." and we started wondering. >> reporter: when cher's husband keith realized she'd left town, he was surprised. but he thought he might know why. cher had been talking about spending time in panama city. a place where she could blend into the scenery more easily, and wrap her head around their breakup. >> she told me she wanted to have...

Years for the wheels of justice to turn in panama. during that time, holbert's wife divorced him while they sat in separate panamanian jails. cher's family finally got the news they had long waited for. in august, 2017, william dathan holbert, the man the people knew as "wild bill cortez," was found guilty of the robbery and rom honorable -- and homicide of five people according to a tweet from the panama department of justice. he was sentenced to 47 years in prison. the woman once known as jane cortez, she was sentenced to 26 years for her role in the crimes. for cher's sister, judy, there ar...

>> panama's auxiliary prosecutor reached out to other countries to see if any of their missing persons may have crossed paths with wild bill. >> translatranslator: once they and confirm any persons who have had contact with him and disappeared, they will take measures to verify where they are. >> if there are other victims out there, they may be hard to find. wild bill mostly targeted loners, people whose disappearance might not be noticed. ♪ it wasn't until bill killed cher, the woman who had a smile for everyone, that he was caught. >> his mistakes of targeting cher is what was his downfal...