Patterson resident Donna O’Connor continued to hold out hope for her daughter who has been missing since July 22 after sending her mother a disturbing text message that read “I’m scared.”
Dana Lauren Bonanno, a 1998 Carmel High School graduate, was last seen by her roommates on Freeman Street in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn where she lives. O’Connor said the text she received from her only child came about 11:10 that night.
“I can’t stop to think about what’s going on and get upset. What good is that going to do,” said O’Connor, who was driving home from Florida on Thursday. “We just need to find her.”
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Friends have taken to social media and posting missing-person fliers throughout New York City to help police in the search. A New York Police Department spokesman said Thursday that Bonanno was reported missing July 27 with the 94th Precinct in Brooklyn .
O’Connor said she contacted police July 23 but was told her daughter could not be reported missing at that time because she was 33 years old and had no history of abuse. O’Connor continued to call police each day and said it was either July 26 or July 27 that they went out and spoke with her roommates, and they declared her missing July 27.
O’Connor said Bonanno was laid off in April from her job as a paralegal at A&E Networks. She had worked as a legal secretary for the White Plains law firm Bleakley, Platt and Schmidt from 2001 to 2005, a representative confirmed.
While Bonanno was upset about losing her job, her mother said she was not prone to taking off during difficult periods and that they spoke every one to two weeks.
“This is not typical of her behavior,” she said.
Bonanno’s friend, Daniel Mandelbaum, reiterated that the disappearance is not like her.
“She’s a very outgoing and positive girl,” Mandelbaum said. “That’s why we’re all so worried. This is completely out of character for her.”
Mandelbaum, who lives in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, said he and Bonanno have been close friends for two years and that they bonded over music, often frequenting the same nightclubs. She’s interested in pursuing a career in electronic music, he said.
Greenpoint is generally a safe neighborhood, but police were searching for a suspect there in late June in the sexual attack on a young woman at knife-point.
Bonanno did not normally go out on Monday nights, mostly just weekends, Mandelbaum said. She was part of a group of friends called Supporting Our Underground Properly, promoting music events throughout the city, member Liz Rivera said.
“We’re like a family. We’re always together. She would at least contact one of us,” said Rivera, who last saw Bonanno briefly Monday afternoon. “She was sad that she was unemployed, but I don’t see her just taking off for that.”
Rivera added that Bonanno has a cat named Love Song and that she would never leave the cat unattended.
Both Mandelbaum and Rivera started a Facebook page for Dana Lauren Bonanno to post information and to update friends and family.
