Once and a while something happens that just makes you think.

Last night on the news they showed a story about an armed robbery at a gas station near the lake in Wakefield that happened around 7pm Monday night. I was watching the news this morning and they said there was an arrest. Then they said who was arrested.

Eugene Bertini.

I went to school with Gene. I remember him well. And I remember the rumors. The really really bad rumors. The rumors that were even featured on ABC's 20/20 about a year and a half ago... for the 20th anniversary. That episode was called "Vanished".

Back in 1989, life was different, but I remember it. And I remember the posters. I remember seeing one at Sunnyhurst Farms on Main St up in the window. The top said "MISSING" with a picture of Melanie.

After watching the news and seeing Gene and all that again, I did a google search. Melanie disappeared just before Halloween in 1989, about a week before she turned 15. I had turned 15 less than 2 months earlier.

She was a year behind me in school and I remember her at the middle school in Stoneham before she moved in with her grandmother in Woburn. Even on the 20/20 special, she had the big "S" on her cheerleading uniform from Stoneham. She had just started her freshman year of HS at Woburn High.

She was invited to a party in the woods. Everyone from Stoneham and Woburn partied in those woods. It was off the road, hard to get to, and no one bothered you. Melanie went to the party. She was never seen again.

Per all the witness interviews, it was down to Melanie and 2 other people. One was Gene. Both guys said, no.. it was the other guy that was last with her.

Melanie's body was never found.

Tonight on the 6pm news Fox finally put it all together. Gene Bertini who was arrested for the armed robbery last night was the same Gene Bertini who was one of the last people to see Melanie alive.

This Halloween will be 22 years. Her parents are both dead, so is her grandmother. I can't imagine what her family had gone through all that time. 22 years. She was 2 months younger than me.

The Fox News story was a really good story.
http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/crime_files/last-man-to-see-missing-girl-alive-arrested-in-robbery-20110426