A woman kidnapped at a Montana rest stop in broad daylight spoke with her family and police by cellphone before she was found dead in the trunk of her car 325 miles away from where she disappeared.

Rita Maze, 47, of Great Falls called her husband on Tuesday evening and said she had been struck on the head at an Interstate 15 rest stop north of Helena and that she was in the trunk of her car, Lewis and Clark County Sheriff Leo Dutton said.

Maze’s husband reported her missing. Dutton said that he spoke with her several times as cell coverage allowed.

“She didn’t know her location, but she was able to talk to them over her cellphone, sporadically, as coverage faded in and out,” Dutton said.

Rochelle Maze told the Great Falls Tribune her mother was “hysterical” and hard to understand when they spoke on the phone for about 10 minutes.

“I told her that I loved her,” Rochelle Maze said. “That’s the last thing she heard.”

The phone then went dead or lost a signal, and the two were unable to reach each other again.



A Helena police officer also talked to Maze shortly before she died, Dutton confirmed.



Law enforcement tracked the use of her cellphone and eventually found the vehicle with her body in the trunk near Spokane international airport at 12.30am on Wednesday.



Dutton said there was a person of interest in the case and authorities were looking at surveillance video from a convenience store.



The car’s license plate was captured automatically near Post Falls, Idaho.



The FBI was investigating because interstate travel was involved.



Maze was a longtime cook at Morningside elementary school in Great Falls, the Great Falls Tribune reported.