On May 25, 2011, nine-year-old Maleina Luhk and her 10-year-old sister, Faloma, vanished from the island of Saipan while they waited to board a school bus.
The Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) Department of Public Safety received a call that afternoon after the sisters failed to report to—or return home from—school. The FBI was brought in the same day to help find the girls.
But after more than a decade of searching—an effort conducted in lockstep with the community and federal and commonwealth partners—Faloma and Maleina are still missing.
As the 14th anniversary of their disappearance approaches, FBI Honolulu is encouraging the public to share any information they may have about what might’ve happened to the girls.
The field office is also reminding the public that the Bureau is offering an award of up to $25,000 for information that leads to Faloma and Maleina’s whereabouts.
Faloma and Maleina Luhk were born and raised in Saipan and called the village of As Tao home.
“They were two girls of Chamorro descent and daughters of Jermaine Quitugua, who is from the Quitugua family,” said retired FBI Special Agent Haejun Park, who led the FBI’s investigation into their disappearance for more than a decade. “They were children of the community, meaning we probably saw them at some point or another, being a small island. And when they went missing, everybody kind of knew who they were.”
When the Bureau spoke to personnel from the girls’ school, he recalled, “they were utterly shocked.” The sisters—especially Faloma—were known for their pleasant demeanours and constant smiles, he noted.
“People want to find out what happened to these girls,” Park said. “They want to bring these girls back.”
At the time of their disappearance, nine-year-old Maleina stood about 4′ tall, weighed about 65 pounds, and had a birthmark on her left cheek.
She has brown hair and brown eyes and was last seen wearing a white blouse and blue jeans. Her birthday is February 13. You can view Maleina’s Missing Person poster to learn more about her.
Ten-year-old Faloma stood about 5’1″ tall and weighed about 90 pounds. Like her little sister, she has brown hair and brown eyes.
She was last seen wearing a light green shirt with a butterfly design and blue jeans. Her birthday is February 9. You can view Faloma’s Missing Person poster to learn more about her.
The FBI has been investigating Faloma and Maleina’s disappearance since May 25, 2011.
The Bureau has legal jurisdiction to investigate federal crimes in U.S. territories like the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (or CNMI), where Saipan is located. The FBI’s Honolulu Division even has a satellite office on Saipan.
Since May 2011, federal agencies, including the U.S. Marshals Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Department of Homeland Security, have partnered with the FBI and CNMI authorities to search for the girls.
The local community also played a major role in the early part of the investigation, helping scour Saipan’s unique terrain for signs of Faloma and Maleina. “We had law enforcement officers and government agencies flying to Saipan to support us, but it took people on the ground to help us look further into the jungle, where they knew the land, they knew the woods, they knew the back jungle, back beaches,” Park said.
The FBI has also searched the waters surrounding Saipan and conducted aircraft and seafaring vessel inquiries—since the island is only reachable by air or sea—for signs of the girls.
Unfortunately, these exhaustive efforts and extensive witness interviews haven’t yielded any answers.
“There is no conclusion to where these girls might’ve ended up,” Park said. “Our hope’s we find these girls alive somewhere.”
The girls’ disappearance has profoundly impacted Faloma and Maleina’s families and community, investigators said. “They left a big hole in a lot of people’s hearts, left a lot of questions unanswered,” Park said.
