The Disappearance Of Nancy Paulikas Inspired A County-Wide Program That Uses Trackable Bracelets To Help Find Missing People.

Nancy Paulikas was brilliant, humble, polite and considerate. She was a devoted fan of Nine Inch Nails, a passionate conservationist and an accomplished business woman. She was also an animal lover, a skier, an adventurer, and she loved to walk. Nancy spent her whole life in the mountains, starting as a kid and into her 50’s, up and down the Sierra Nevadas,

She was born as an only child to George and Joan.

During her childhood, She'd watch TV’s “Dark Shadows”,a daytime vampire soap opera that became an odd pop-culture phenomenon, after school with her friend Diane Bassett. Nancy also had a unique collection of puppets, growing up. Nancy and Diane would perform puppet shows from behind the orange sofa in Nancy's living room.

Nancy studied veterinary medicine at UC Davis, and later switched to computer science.  After she earned her degree in computer science, she attended graduate school at Stanford University and UCLA. 

Nancy met her husband, Kirk Moody, when they worked at TRW. Together they had a daughter.

At age 55, Nancy was a private pilot and an engineer  when she was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease. 

On October 15th, 2016, 58-year-old Nancy was with her husband at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art on Wilshire Boulevard in West Los Angeles. Nancy wandered off and vanished.  The last glimpse of her was on video captured by security cameras on nearby streets.

Kirk began visiting skilled nursing and residential care facilities throughout Southern California and offered a $100,000 reward for information and airing ads on television. A massive search with police dogs failed to locate her. 

More than two years after she vanished, a skull and other remains found on a burned Southern California hillside were determined to be Mata. Her remains were found when firefighters that were battling a brush fire at the park on March 11th, 2017. 

Investigators don't know how she got to such an obscure location. Nancy's cause of death remains undetermined. Authorities have no idea if foul play is involved.

Nancy was the inspiration for LA Found, a county-wide program that uses trackable bracelets to help find missing people.