By Elise Takahama

The Seattle Times

Detectives searching for an 18-year-old Maple Valley woman who vanished last week are now calling her disappearance suspicious and are asking for the public’s help in looking for her.

Gia Fuda’s parents said they last saw her at dinner at their Maple Valley home Thursday evening. On Friday morning, she left the house around 8 or 9 a.m. without mentioning where she was going, although her parents said that wasn’t out of the norm. When she didn’t return and they hadn’t heard from her by Friday night, however, they called the police.

Fuda’s car, a silver 2008 Toyota Corolla, was found on Highway 2 east of Index, Snohomish County on Saturday night by a state Department of Transportation worker, said King County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Ryan Abbott.

Detectives later determined Fuda had run out of gas. They found her purse and wallet inside her car, but her car keys and cellphone — which had been turned off — were gone. Overnight bags she had packed for a visit with a friend were also in the car, according to the sheriff’s office.

Fuda recently graduated from Tahoma High School and was taking online classes at Bellevue College this summer, said her father, Bob Fuda. She’s interested in studying psychology, he said.

“She was getting ready to gear up for college and get the ball rolling,” he said. “She has a lot of dreams … She wanted to get her master’s and the whole nine yards. She’s a very driven girl.”

Her mother, Kristin Fuda, said her daughter is very social and outgoing, and she loves hiking, going to coffee shops and playing sports — she has played soccer for most of her life, and more recently she took up basketball and volleyball.

“Highway 2 is a pretty heavily traveled road,” Fuda’s father said. “Somebody had to see her … Somebody knows something. And God forbid if somebody got her, just let her go.”

A King County Search and Rescue team, along with Fuda’s family, will continue their ground search Friday.

Sheriff detectives are asking anyone with dashcam video from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday on Highway 2 to contact them at 206-296-3311.