On September 14 2009, 17 year old Mariam Makhniashvili vanished into the thin Toronto air.

According to Makhniashvili's brother, they walked to school as normal that day, and parted ways in front of the school. They entered by different doors. But Mariam never made it to class.

A few weeks later on October 9 2009, the Toronto Police Service announced that Mariam's black backpack had been discovered by a citizen at a location on the street, a short streetcar ride away from where she was last seen.

The backpack contained her books, lunch and other personal items. 

Residents in the area where the backpack was found remember seeing the backpack, and apparently even handled it thinking that some school child would be back looking for it.

But Mariam remains missing.

Police appear to be concentrating their efforts on schoolchildren, attending schools in the area and trying to shake loose memories and information that might lead to her whereabouts.

As well, the TPS is using Twitter to keep publicity about her disappearance alive.

Here is a TweeterBrowser diagram depicting the connections between 40 randomly selected Twitter accounts that sent tweets containing the text #Mariam. These messags were tweeted between October 7 and October 15, 2009.

The diagram indicates that this is a highly connected group, with most users connected to dozens of other users, each sharing multiple interconnections between them.

Police request that you call Toronto CrimeStoppers at 416-262-TIPS if you have information relating to this case.