Newtown Allies For Change (NAFC) has partnered with journalist Lisa Peterson, who has been tracing the last known days of Regina Brown for decades, for a special program this month.

Brown was a Newtown resident of color who disappeared nearly 38 years ago — on March 26, 1987 — just four months after the “Woodchipper Murder” of Helle Crafts.

Brown was an American Airlines flight attendant. At the time of her disappearance she was 35 years old and the mother of three children.

According to the Newtown Police Department Cold Case File, Brown is an African-American of Creole descent with very light skin. She was often believed to be Caucasian.

At the time of her disappearance she had shoulder length brown hair which she usually wore pulled back in a pony tail.

In 1987 Brown was involved in a divorce and had dropped off her daughter and baby sitter at LaGuardia Airport. She was then supposed to have returned home to Newtown.

Brown’s vehicle was found, but her whereabouts are still unknown.

She was last seen wearing a white fleece jacket, white sweater, white pants with light tan stripe, size 7½ tan snake skin type shoes, size 34B bra, and a gold rope style chain with a diamond pendant.

Peterson will be doing a presentation at C.H. Booth Library, 25 Main Street, on Wednesday, March 26, at 6 pm. Her 90-minute program will be based on her 20-year investigation into Brown’s disappearance and will pose the questions: Did race, the “missing white woman syndrome,” and the Woodchipper murder create the perfect storm for inequality in the criminal justice system? Could this happen today?

Registration is requested and available at lisanpeterson.com/regina-brown/ Questions to be considered during the Q&A portion of the evening can be submitted through that page.

Lisa Peterson was a Newtown Bee cub reporter in 1987 when she became aware of Regina Brown’s story. Brown had disappeared four months after the “Woodchipper murder case” in town.

“The similarities between the two missing women — both flight attendants, married to pilots, and mothers of three young children amidst a divorce — were striking. The only difference I could see between them, besides there were no dead bodies, was that Helle Crafts was white, and Regina Brown was Black,” she said recently when asked about the case for this month’s NAFC Allyship in Action column (Newtown Bee, March 7, 2025).

“During the Woodchipper murder case, I barely covered Regina’s case, falling victim myself to pack journalism and the missing white woman syndrome focusing on Helle Crafts and not Regina Brown. Decades later, after a chance meeting with a Newtown detective, I began to investigate Regina Brown’s case so she would not be forgotten,” she added.

Newtown Allies For Change is a grassroots organization that promotes anti-racism work in Newtown. NAFC’s mission is to center and serve Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) in Newtown through education and advocacy.

NAFC regularly hosts community gatherings, educational opportunities, and monthly youth group meetings. Each month NAFC also honors individuals or businesses that have demonstrated authentic allyship.