POLICE LOOKING FOR CAPE GIRL MISSING SINCE OCT. 1

Fifteen-year-old Amanda Kridelbaugh has been missing for a month, which is unusually long for a runaway, Cape Girardeau police said."Normally we recover them much more quickly than that," said Lt. John Brown. Police are sure the girl ran away from home by her own choice, as is her mother, Julia Stanley. But no one can say why she hasn't come home yet."At first she was probably having a good time, but she has gotten mixed up in bad crowds before," Stanley said. "I think she is just afraid to come home now. I just want her to know that she can come home."Amanda was last seen at Cape Girardeau Central High School on Oct. 1, police said. She is 5 feet, 5 inches tall with blue eyes and brown hair that may be shoulder length, police reported.

The same day, she called her mother after school to ask if she could go to a friend's house, Stanley said. "I said OK, but I'd be checking up on her," she said. "Then I called the home later, and the girl wasn't even in town that weekend."This isn't the first time Amanda has run away from home, Stanley said. She has left on weekends without saying where she was going and once was gone for seven days, her mother said. "I can't understand why she has been gone so long," Stanley said.

Based on prior experiences with runaways, Amanda is probably in a safe haven in or out of town, Brown said. She might be staying at the house of a friend's parents or with college students who don't even know that she has run away from home, he said."They might not know until they see it in the paper," Brown said.

Since her daughter's disappearance, Stanley has received threatening voice messages on her pager, she said. She believes the voice is that of an older girl who Amanda has been friends with before, despite Stanley's disapproval.

During their investigation, police have followed up on leads in Memphis and Nashville, Stanley said. This week police planned to knock on doors at Cape Meadows apartments, she said.

Stanley is becoming frustrated."People tell me she is in Memphis or Nashville," Stanley said. "It's different every time I talk with someone."A week ago Stanley began putting up flyers around town. "If I had more money I'd have hired a private detective already," she said.

Anyone with information about Amanda is asked to call the police department at 335-6621.