Search for girl now homicide inquiry

Press, 27 June 1987, Page 1

Search for girl now homicide inquiry

By

JOHN HARFORD

The search for the missing Napier schoolgirl, Teresa Cormack, has widened to become a hunt for a body and possible grave, said the police in Napier yesterday.

Although they have not given up hope of finding her alive, the police speak of the chance as “very slim.”

The decision to class the inquiry as a homicide was made because, of the time which Teresa,' aged six, has been missing.

Detective Sergeant Murray Jeffries said the inquiry had always been serious but the police now had to consider they were looking for a body. Teresa Cormack disappeared on the morning of June 19 after she turned away from the gates of her school. She had told friends she was going back home. , ■ - :

Several reliable sightings of her have been reported to the police but intensive searching has yielded no other clue. A possible sighting reported to

the police yesterday was of a girl fitting Teresa’s description with two elderly women about 10 a.m. or earlier on June 19. , ’ The girl was crying and the women appeared to be trying to comfort her. A bus pulled in front of the trio at the corner of Barnard Avenue and Bledisloe Road, and they could not be seen again when the bus left. They may have boarded the bus. The sighting will be investigated by the police today. An earlier report. placed Teresa 800 m away about 30 minutes later.

The police and civilian volunteers had looked in all the likely spots where Teresa could have been lost, said Detective Sergeant Jeffries. Hiding places for bodies were now being considered.

“We have asked the public to notify us of any ground that has been disturbed, indicating'a possible grave, or any suspicious activity they have noticed,” he said.

The change in emphasis was expected to produce a surge in the amount of information com-

ing forward. Many possible, sightings and other; information had already been given to the police but few were positive. X - '■ It was still possible that Teresa was still alive in spite of .the time she had been missing,. Detective Sergeant Jeffries ; said. ; :.' ’ .' “It is possible, that maybe she is somehow being looked after by someone. It 'has' happened in the past.

“There might be a woman under pyschiatric stress who has taken her iris thinking she is her own little girl. Perhaps she has had a tragedy in her own family.” Detective Sergeant Jeffries said the theory that someone was caring for Teresa was not a strong lead of inquiry, just a possibility. “It is something we have to consider,'just as we are considering homicide, because we just do not know what has happened to her.”

Much of the inquiry yesterday centred on the Y.M.C.A. building in Latham Street. It was thought Teresa had been seen at the intersection of Riverbend Road

and Latham Street about 10.30 a.m. on June 19.

A temporary base was set up in the Y.M.C.Ar building.- ; - “It is quite a busy area so It was naturaLto set up some sort of base there. Aerobics classes are held in the building so. there would have been a lot of people coming and going about that time,” said Detective Sergeant Jeffries.

Two young Maori men seen in the area were also being sought by the police, although they were not considered as suspects. The men, in their early 20s, had not been seen together or with a child.

“They are just two men who were in the area at the time and we cannot identify them. We have asked them to come forward because they might have seen something, or have some information,” said Detective Sergeant Jeffries. > Identikit pictures of the men had been released by the police. They both had long hair and were roughly dressed. Further report, page 8