GIRL'S FAMILY FINDS HOPE AS SEARCH IS NARROWED
Newspaper
February 18, 2000 |
Charlotte Observer (NC)
Author: AILEEN SOPER,
Staff Writer * Contributor:
Staff writer Karen Cimino
contributed to this article.
|Page: 1A
|Section: MAIN998 Words
A trail that was growing cold offered new clues in the case of a missing 9-year-old Cleveland County girl when relatives identified her hair bow and other items Thursday. Investigators called the discovery of the bow, candy wrappers, and a pen and pencil in an outbuilding just a mile from Asha Degree's house the first tangible evidence in her Monday disappearance. It lifted the flagging spirits of family members, investigators and searchers.
The family is very hopeful," said Maurice Jackson, Asha'smaternal uncle who is acting as the family spokesman."It's the first evidence they've seen that they think might be Asha's." Volunteers and investigators have combed an area along N.C. 18, about 1 1/2 miles south of Asha's home north of Shelby every day since her disappearance. Motorists told police they'd seen the girl walking south on N.C. 18, near the intersection of N.C. 180, about 4 a.m. Monday. The break came late Wednesday, when investigators brought one motorist back to where he reported seeing Asha. Jeff Ruppe, of. Fallston, a truck driver for Sun
Drop Bottling Co., pointed out a spot near a field owned by Charles Turner. As part of its investigation, the FBI gave Ruppe a polygraph test, which he passed.Investigators believe Asha likely left home on her own,then met trouble. Her parents reported her missing at 6:30 a.m. Monday, after her mother went to wake her for school."My biggest fear is that she is somewhere, hurt, not able to get help," said Cleveland County Sheriff Dan Crawford."What if she is only a tenth of a mile from where we looked?"
Turner, who runs Turner's
Upholstery, said he and his family found several items in a rickety outbuilding on their land near where Asha was last seen. Among them was a wallet-sized photograph of a young girl. On Tuesday, they gave it to police, who showed it to Asha's family. But the girl's relatives could not identify. the photo. The Turners did not give investigators several other items they found next to the picture. They held onto them,thinking they. didn't matter because Asha's. family hadn't recognized the picture, said Turner's son, Charles Turner Jr. On Thursday morning, a member of a search party looking for Asha found a candy wrapper near the Turners' outbuilding, Crawford said. Asked about it, Turner's wife and daughter gave searchers the other items, which they had kept in a pile on their porch, Crawford said. Asha's relatives recognized the items. "The parents were just tore all to pieces because they said`Yes! Yes! It's hers," said Cleveland County sheriff's Detective Wayne Thomas.Crawford said he believed the most significant find was the pencil that had "Atlanta" on it. The Degree family held its reunion there last year.
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