Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Scott Lee never ceased to amaze his family and friends. As a teenager he worked the snowboard circuit in California.
When he was 18 he hitchhiked with a surfboard through South America, then all of the sudden he was a river guide in Utah, the next thing his family knows, he's enrolling in college and graduates with his master's in physics from the University of California at San Diego.
CMI photo: Christina Calloway
Missing Air Force 1st. Lt. Scott Lee's sisters,Tessa Lee, front, and Dana Martino, were laughing at the books their brother keeps in his Clovis apartment. His sisters traveled from California to help with the search of their brother. Lee was last seen leaving his Clovis apartment around 11 a.m. March 12.
That's why his siblings found it bizarre that the 31-year-old airman stationed at Cannon Air Force Base was reported missing.
Air Force officials said Lee, a first lieutenant, was last seen about 11 a.m. March 12 leaving his apartment in Clovis. He was scheduled to report for duty at the base the following day.
Lee pilots a PC-12, family members said.
"He's the one person that you never thought you'd have to pray for," said Lee's sister, Tessa, of Clovis, Calif., as she fought back tears Friday at her brother's apartment.
Tessa Lee and her sister Dana Martino and husband Al Martino arrived in Clovis early Thursday morning to help in the search for the missing airman.
Sara Busby, a childhood friend of the Lee's, came from Virginia to help, and even Lee's brother, who he's never met before, flew in from Alaska.
Cannon officials contacted Dana Martino on March 13 when Lee failed to report for duty.
CMI photo: Christina Calloway
Family and friends of Cannon Air Force Base Lt. Scott Lee are distributing fliers, such as the one shown above, throughout New Mexico, California and West Texas.
The family's goal is to get the word out about their brother by passing out fliers all over New Mexico, and from West Texas through California as Martino drives back.
The base's Office of Special Investigations is working the case.
The commander of the 27th Special Operations Wing, Col. Buck Elton, says investigators are committed to finding Lee.
Lee's sisters found many items at the apartment Friday that brought laughter and good memories of their brother.
"He's brilliant. His idea of light reading is physics," Tessa said about some of the books she found in his house. "These equations that don't even look human."
His sisters also found helmets and other sports equipment, music and cook books, and his guitar.
"He is the full package," Martino said. "He's very good looking and humble and there's no cockiness about him. That's what makes him so cool. I'm his older sister and I admire him."
Lee told his family that he joined the Air Force to get out of his comfort zone, but his sisters are convinced that he really wanted to be a pilot.
"He's one of those guys that masters everything," Tessa said. "He's so intelligent and calculated that you would think nothing bad can ever happen to him."
And his sisters are doing their best to keep hope alive. In addition to passing out flyers, they have used social networking and other forms of media such as television and radio to get the word out of their missing brother.
Martino says the support of the local communities here as well as back home in Dana Point, Calif., has been amazing.
There are also people in Lee's hometown, McCall, Idaho, wishing for his safe return, according to his sisters.
Dana Martino keeps a picture real close by because she says the picture keeps the hope real and makes her want to fight harder to find her brother.
"If he can hear us, if he's out there, we love him and we want to get him home," Martino said.
Fast facts
If anyone has any information on 1st Lt. Scott Lee's whereabouts they can contact:
