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Friends offer reward for info in missing man case

F.T. Norton, Tribune News Service

Friends of a Carson City man missing since Friday are offering $1,000 for information that leads to him.

Michael Roberts, 55, a dealer for the past 25 years at Harrah’s in Stateline, left his home Friday morning to go to the store and pick up a greeting card and paper towels.

He never returned.



His wife at first feared Roberts, who was on medication for depression, may have driven into the desert to harm himself. Now, a week after he was last seen, she fears foul play.

“He came home about three weeks ago and said a man at the roulette table had gotten very angry. He told me, ‘That man lost of lot of money and he hated me,'” Suni Roberts, 60, recalled.



“Maybe someone has done something to him.”

Investigators from the Carson City Sheriff’s Department were in Lake Tahoe talking with fellow employees of Roberts at Harrah’s trying to unravel the mystery.

A close friend of 20 years, who asked to not be identified because she didn’t want to field phone calls from people “who are just nosy and don’t have information,” said the Roberts she knows would never leave like this.

“He just wouldn’t do this. He wouldn’t go off with another woman; he wouldn’t just leave,” she said.

The couple, married 16 years, had recently sold their Kingsley Lane home for its asking price and put money down on a Stateline apartment, which they are scheduled to move into on June 1.

Without Roberts, Suni is unable to close escrow on the home and can’t afford to stay there by herself.

She only recently returned to work as a dealer at the Hyatt in Incline Village after gallbladder surgery .

Because she missed two months of work recovering, she said she kept her husband’s disappearance a secret.

“I didn’t want everyone to think I always have problems. I just kept it inside. Sometimes people would say something to me and I would want to cry, but I just grind my teeth.”

With the support of a steady stream of friends to drive her around and help her distribute fliers, Suni has been able to keep herself occupied.

Any time alone, she finds herself fearing the worst, she said.

Roberts left with only the clothes on his back, without his medication and carrying $30 and two credit cards, neither of which have had any activity on them in the past week.

“I’m so upset. I don’t know what to do,” she said. “Where is he? I need to find him, either way, I need to know where he is.”

He is described as a white adult male, 55 years old, 5 feet 8 inches tall, weighing about 140 pounds, with silver hair, blue eyes and large-rimmed prescription glasses. He was last seen wearing a baseball cap and a light colored long-sleeve button-up shirt. He was driving a gold 1984 four-door Toyota Corolla with license plate number 156 CDX.

Anyone with information is asked to call the Carson City Sheriff’s Department at 887-2020, ext. 1400.


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