Missing California Mom Heather Gumina Waters Disappears After Explosive Fight With Husband
She drove off and never returned.
Facebook 33-year-old Pleasant Valley, California resident Heather Gumina Waters has been missing for nearly a month now. She was last seen on July 16 driving away in a 2005 black and pink Infiniti G45 that was found on August 9. The car was abandoned in a remote area. Police won’t disclose the precise location, but a local source says it was close to Mormon Emigrant Trail. Reports say she fled after an explosive fight with her husband, but he’s adamant that he had nothing to do with her disappearance.
1. Heather disappeared a day after she was released from the hospital where she was being treated for a broken collarbone.
Family members expressed concern that she was released too soon. They feared she was in more pain than she let on. Now they have bigger fears because Heather, who they describe as “a devoted and loving mother,” left three children, ages 14, 10, and four behind. Family members are currently taking care of the children while they wait for more information to come through.
2. Her husband
Her husband, Anthony Gumina, told DailyMailTV he has been looking for his wife every day even though search party members say he is not involved in their search “I want her to just show up and be OK and for everything to be alright. I didn’t do anything [to her]. I married her because I love her,” 44-year-old Anthony Gumina told DailyMailTV. “Look, this marriage is not going to work out but I would never do anything like this [harming her]. I’m a lover. I’m not that kind of guy. ‘The sheriffs [deputies] were here for like 30 hours doing an investigation. They took my car. They walked every piece of land so I’m cleaning up again and again and again and I’m dealing with my wife. I don’t deserve this.”
3. The two have only been married a few months.
The DailyMail reported that Heather and Anthony got married in March. Currently, Anthony is serving a five-year probation term after being convicted of burglary and witness intimidation in February 2017. Gumina is also reportedly facing a domestic violence case. He’s scheduled for trial next month after allegedly headbutting Heather back in February. He’s also been accused of using meth and opiates during the alleged altercation while trying to stop Heather from calling the police. Shortly after her disappearance, Gumina filed a restraining order against Heather, claiming that she punched him in the face and “tried to tip a wheelbarrow full of sand on my legs.”
4. Her car was found in El Dorado county.
El Dorado has a population of roughly 42,500. One statistics site, neighborhoodscout.com, gave the county a crime index of 56 (with 100 being the safest), which is about 56% safer than U.S. cities in general. The overall crime rate is about 12 per 1,000 residents. Compared to other communities of similar population size, the site reports (using “exclusive analysis of FBI crime data”), El Dorado Hills’ crime rate is lower than average and actually safer than most. In other words, Waters’ fate is not necessarily written in stone.
5. A woman with a similar story in Stamford, CT has been gone for three months.
Jennifer Farber Dulos of New Canaan went missing on May 31. Police Lt. Jason Ferraro said last month that investigators had stopped actively searching, but they’ve now resumed the search. Like Waters, Dulos also left children behind in the wake of her disappearance. In her case, though, she and her husband filed for divorce two years ago, and in the time since, the two oldest of the five children, twin boys, have grown into young teens. Her husband, Fotis, is arguing that they’re old enough “to choose whether to live with their father while the search for their missing mother continues.”
May both Jennifer and Heather be found soon. Anyone with any information about Heather’s whereabouts is urged to call the El Dorado County Sheriff’s Office at 530-621-6600.
Leah Scher is an ENFP and recent graduate of Brandeis University. She's an alumna of the Kenyon Review Young Writer's Workshop the Iowa Young Writers' Studio. She's passionate about Judaism, poetry, film, satire, astrology, spirituality, and sexual health