More than a hundred family members and friends of Monica Renee Bowie gathered in the parking lot of Oliver High School last night for a candlelight vigil calling attention to the Pittsburgh native who has been missing for 12 days.

	Annie O'Neill, Post-Gazette Linda Howard, center, is flanked by her sisters, Connie Bennett, left, and Joan Domena, right, during a vigil for Mrs. Howard's daughter Monica Renee Bowie at Oliver High School. Ms. Bowie, originally from Pittsburgh, was kidnapped outside her Atlanta home on July 5. Click photo for larger image.

"She's been gone now since July 5," her mother, Linda Howard, said during the prayer- and hymn-filled gathering. "That's a long time. My baby's a tiny little thing. And she needs to come home to her mother and her family and friends."

Armed with a business degree, Ms. Bowie headed south after college to seek her fortune in Atlanta.

She was doing well, running two successful businesses.

But on July 5, police there believe, Ms. Bowie, 34, was kidnapped outside her apartment after a brief struggle in the complex's parking lot where a woman was heard wailing for help.

Since then, there has been no sign of Ms. Bowie -- no credit card activity, no bank account withdrawals, no ransom demand, no contact with her family back in Pittsburgh.

"We're just really wanting her to come home. We're just hoping someone will step forward and say where she's at," Ms. Bowie's cousin, Lateshya Ellis, 33, of Ross, said yesterday, several hours before the vigil.

Monica Renee Bowie

No one saw Ms. Bowie being abducted. But DeKalb County police hope they have one solid lead -- they arrested the man believed to have driven a car seen speeding from Ms. Bowie's complex at the time of her kidnapping, around 11:10 p.m. Witnesses said they saw two men in that car, but none reported seeing Ms. Bowie.

Police charged Jasper Keels, 24, with theft and several drug violations. Mr. Keels, police said, borrowed the car on July 4 but did not return it to its owner. Police found it abandoned and torched. A fugitive squad tracked Mr. Keels to a motel.

"We are trying to see whether he has any connection to the kidnapping, but at this time we have not been able to make that link," DeKalb County police spokeswoman Keisha Williams said. "He's not a suspect. Are we trying to connect him? Yes. But he's not a suspect."

Investigators found fingernails at the scene, Ms. Williams said, and analysts are testing them to see if they came from Ms. Bowie during a struggle with her attacker.

Ms. Bowie ran a clothing boutique and a company promoting hip-hop music artists. She is one of four siblings who grew up in the Spring Hill section of the North Side. Ms. Bowie attended Perry Traditional Academy, where she was on the drill team, and graduated from Cheyney University of Pennsylvania in 1996.

In Atlanta, Ms. Bowie worked for a time as a stripper. Brenda Watkins, manager of the Blue Flame, recalled that Ms. Bowie danced under the stage name "Honey" off and on during 2006.

"She was a nice girl, real nice, real quiet, kept to herself, very ambitious," Ms. Watkins said. "I don't know if she was a stripper making money to invest in another business or not. ... She would come in the club periodically and pass out new music from new artists."

Mrs. Howard, who spent the past week in Atlanta, where she spoke with investigators, neighbors and friends of her daughter, last saw Monica in June when she returned to Pittsburgh for the college graduation of her sister.

But it was also during June that Ms. Bowie ran afoul of the law in Atlanta. Police arrested her fiance, Shernotta Walters, after finding a handgun and 2.89 ounces of marijuana in the car he was driving. That car belonged to Ms. Bowie.

A police report said Mr. Walters denied owning the gun or the dope. Ms. Bowie did the same, but both were arrested.

Police dropped the charges against Ms. Bowie, according to her attorney, Gerald A. Griggs. And a magistrate dismissed the charges against Mr. Walters when police did not show up for the hearing, his attorney, Dennis Scheib, said.

A spokeswoman for the Fulton County district attorney yesterday said, however, that an investigating grand jury handed up indictments against both on July 10. The charges against Ms. Bowie are possession of marijuana with intent to distribute, possession of a firearm and carrying a pistol without a license.

Mr. Walters, who was on parole from a drug case at the time of his arrest, remains in the Fulton County Jail. Mr. Scheib said he was with Ms. Bowie on the day of her abduction and said she seemed fine, speaking of plans to marry his client and have a child.

"He said he doesn't know anything about it," Mr. Scheib said of Mr. Walters. "Why would he want to hurt her? She's his witness. She's the only way he's getting out of this."

Mr. Griggs said he was unaware of the indictment against Ms. Bowie until informed of it by a reporter.

"That's a surprise to me," Mr. Griggs said. "At this point our contention would be that the police have no evidence whatsoever linking my client to possession of any illegal substance. She was not the driver of that car, she was not in control of that car."

Mr. Griggs said Ms. Bowie did indeed carry a handgun -- but in her other car, and legally, with a permit to carry a concealed weapon. He said she had a gun for protection, but not against any specific or recent threat.

"From everyone involved, Monica was a nice, happy, upstanding member of the Atlanta community. She owned several businesses here which were doing well. She had no problems besides the unfortunate brush with the law, which was brought about through no cause of her own," Mr. Griggs said.

Mr. Griggs said Ms. Bowie worked as a stripper for about six weeks, around 2000 or 2001, in order to make ends meet before going into business. Her ventures into clothing and promotions, he said, were the "joy of her life."

As investigators work to find Ms. Bowie, they are tracking down information on the hours leading up to her disappearance. Ms. Williams said police did not know whether she was going out or coming in that evening.

Mrs. Howard said she has come to terms with what has happened in her daughter's life. She only wants her back.

"Monica was a strong ... she is a very strong young lady," she told those gathered at the vigil. "She had a strong background. She was raised properly. She has a very strong family."

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Correction/Clarification: (Published July 18, 2007) Monica Renee Bowie, a Pittsburgh native who was kidnapped outside her Atlanta home, graduated from Perry Traditional Academy. A headline on this story about the investigation into her disappearance in July 17, 2007 editions mentioned the wrong school. Also, Ms. Bowie's attorney said she worked as a stripper for about six weeks. Some editions gave an inaccurate time span.