What Happened to Brenda Lambert? The West Virginia Mom Vanished After Her Son's Birthday Party

At 22 years old, Brenda Lambert was a devoted mother of two.

“Her entire world revolved around her kids,” Brenda’s sister, Christy Kennedy, tells A&E Crime + Investigation. “She was just so proud.”

Like any doting mom, there were major milestones Brenda anticipated. Her daughter, Krista, was about to start kindergarten. And her son, Raymond Jr., was marking his first birthday.

On July 26, 1992, Brenda hosted the birthday celebration attended by friends and family at the Bluewell, W.Va., home she once shared with her estranged husband, Raymond Lambert.

It was the last night anyone ever saw Brenda.

“She wouldn’t have just walked off,” Kennedy, who was 14 years old at the time, maintains.

Thirty-four years later, Brenda’s whereabouts are unknown to law enforcement, and her case remains open.

“I just know that she’s dead,” Kennedy adds.

Growing up, Brenda and Kennedy butted heads.

“We didn't really get along,” Kennedy admits. “I pushed her out of the ‘baby spot’ and she resented me.”

But nine years later, at the age of 17, Brenda welcomed a baby girl—Krista.

“She named her after me,” Kennedy recalls. “That’s when things really turned around, and I finally realized how much she loved me.”

Brenda’s venture into motherhood strengthened their sisterhood.

Kennedy remembers her older sibling as compassionate, feisty and fun.

In their short time together, Brenda created some of Kennedy’s favorite memories.

“When the Wayne's World movie came out, she dressed up as Wayne, and I dressed up as Garth, and we went through town headbanging to ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’” Kennedy remembers. “She was just such a little firecracker.”

However, Brenda’s relationship with her husband, Raymond Lambert, wasn’t as jubilant.

According to Kennedy, Raymond was cheating on Brenda with their cousin, who was also at the little one’s birthday.

“I didn't realize until we were on the porch the night of the party and Brenda blurted out, ‘Raymond is screwing Tammy,’” she explains.

According to an arrest warrant obtained by A&E Crime + Investigation, Brenda also accused Raymond of physical abuse.

She filed a protection order against him two weeks before the party, but later dropped it, police records show.

“I could tell she was sad and nervous because of the domestic violence and her husband cheating,” Kennedy says.

The infidelity and abuse allegations led to the couple living separately, with Raymond taking their kids to stay with him periodically at his parents’ house and Brenda contemplating divorce.

“She had an appointment on July 30 with a divorce attorney to seek custody of her kids because he was keeping them from her,” Kennedy claims.

Brenda never made it to the appointment.

“Raymond told people that he would kill her before he let her have the kids,” she alleges.

Before the birthday party ended, Brenda asked her siblings to sleep over.

They turned her down.

“The guilt I felt for not spending the night with Brenda...” Kennedy trails off.

She says Raymond and the former couple’s two kids were the last ones to leave the celebration that night.

When loved ones couldn’t get a hold of Brenda the next morning, they drove to her home, where they found her car parked in the driveway and her belongings still inside the house.

But there was no sign of Brenda.

Two days later, Raymond filed a missing person's report for his estranged wife.

Although he was initially considered a person of interest, Raymond denied any involvement in Brenda’s disappearance and alleged she ran off with another man named Mark Cook.

Five months later, Cook, 24, vanished from a bar in Bluefield, W.Va.

While there has been speculation that the pair were romantically involved, Kennedy disputes this rumor; however, she believes their disappearances may be connected.

Cook remains missing.

“The party was the last time I really remember our family being whole, and less than a week later, our cousin Tammy moved in with Raymond,” Kennedy explains. “That was kind of the end of me seeing Brenda's two kids.”

She says she and her family immediately rejected the idea that Brenda would ever willingly abandon her children.

Her sister’s sudden absence left an irreparable hole.

“When Brenda disappeared, there was nothing but misery and listening to my mother cry herself to sleep every single night,” Kennedy says. “She ended up getting cancer, and we got to watch her die very slowly.”

While awaiting resolution, their mom, Maggie Rowe died in 1996, and their dad, Adam Rowe, died a year-and-a-half later.

According to Kennedy, Brenda and Raymond’s daughter, Krista, died from a drug overdose in 2020.

Decades passed, and little progress was made in Brenda’s case, according to Kennedy.

But in 2020, she says now-retired Mercer County Chief Deputy Joe Parks breathed new life into Brenda’s investigation.

“We started interviewing people, and it just painted a picture of a domestic violence-type issue that went too far,” Parks tells A&E Crime + Investigation.

Kennedy says she always suspected Raymond was responsible for Brenda’s disappearance and presumed death.

“I agree with that,” Parks says.

Brenda’s remains have not yet been found, but she was declared legally deceased in September 2022.

Kennedy believes her sister is buried on a sawmill property owned by Raymond’s family.

It’s unclear if investigators plan to search the property. Raymond did not respond to A&E Crime + Investigation’s requests for comment.

Raymond has not been arrested or charged in connection with the case because there’s “no body,” Parks believes.

“I always heard that the life of the party is the one that usually gets murdered,” Kennedy says, “and I really believe that.”