PINKHAM NOTCH, N.H. — Investigators are hoping that visitors to the White Mountains this holiday weekend might turn up new clues in a nearly 13-year-old unsolved death.

On Nov. 15, 2001, 52-year-old Louise Chaput left home in Sherbrooke, Quebec, and traveled to New Hampshire for a solo hiking trip.

Chaput, who often hiked alone, had a reservation at the Appalachian Mountain Club Pinkham Notch camp the night of Nov. 15, but never checked into her room. The last person reported seeking her was an employee at the visitors center. She asked him where she could go for a short hike, and he directed her to the Lost Pond Trail.

She was reported missing four days later. She was found stabbed to death on Nov. 22 off the Glen Boulder Trail in Pinkham Notch, south of the lodge, near Mount Washington.

WMUR-TV reports the attorney general’s office is asking hikers to be on the lookout for items belonging to Chaput, such as her car keys and a pendant with an “S” design. Also missing are her sleeping bag and a blue backpack with a Canadian insignia.

“Somebody may have been in a relationship with an individual who said something or knows any little detail about what had happened to Louise,” Assistant Attorney General Ben Agati said. “And those relationships haven’t changed, they might be in a place where they can come forward now. We really hope that they do.”

Chaput was a psychologist who specialized in marital counseling and had worked with inmates at a Sherbrooke detention center, but police said they do not believe she had been stalked to New Hampshire.

Anyone with information on the case is asked to in touch with the state’s cold case unit at 603-223-3856.


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