One of the frontrunners on the current season of The Bachelor is 22-year-old Bekah Martinez, who is notable in that she’s literally the first contestant in the history of the show to rock a pixie cut (and a brunette one, at that!) as well as the fact that she’s 14 years younger than this season’s leading man, Arie Luyendyk. Also, until very recently, the Fresno, California native was listed as a missing person on the California Department Of Justice website.
Martinez was reported missing by her mother to the Humboldt Sheriff’s Department back in November of 2017, coincidentally just around the time her season wrapped filming. Her photo then appeared in a cover story in the North Coast Journal on Thursday about how Humboldt County has the highest rate of missing persons reports in the state of California, and was quickly spotted by an eagle-eyed reader.
Subsequently, after matching her missing persons photo up to Martinez’s public Instagram account and finding out that indeed, it was a match — the publication reached out to the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office.
Ten minutes later, the deputy emailed [Public Information Officer Samantha Karges] back: “I just got off the phone with Rebekah. She is in fact the same person. She has been removed from (the Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit).”
Responding to some follow up questions, Karges told the Journal via email that Martinez was reported missing at 1:06 a.m. on Nov. 18 by her mother. “Martinez had reportedly come to Humboldt County to work on a marijuana farm. Her mother hadn’t heard from her since Nov. 12, 2017,” Karges wrote.
It would sort of make sense — in as much as any of this makes sense — if Martinez had simply run off to the Bachelor mansion without telling anyone. However she alerted her followers to a social media blackout on September 17th, presumably at the start of filming; and resumed posting on November 23, 11 full days after she was reported missing. The whole thing is just bizarre.
(Via North Coast Journal)