Amber Alert: Relisha Tenau Rudd 8yrs Old missing 3/2/14 Washington DC

[MuffyBee]

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/report-adult-body-found-in-search-for-missing-dc-girl/
Police chief: Adult body found in search for missing DC girl
March 31, 2014

Police have found an unidentified male body in the search for missing Washington, D.C. girl Relisha Rudd, Washington Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy Lanier said at a press conference Monday afternoon.

The body was found in Northeast Washington's Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens, where authorities began searching for Rudd last Thursday, Lanier said.

Rudd, 8, was last seen March 1. The man under investigation in her disappearance -- Kahlil Tatum, 51 - has been charged in his wife's murder after the woman's body was discovered in a Maryland motel room, reported CBS DC.

Lanier said the cause of death of the man appeared to be suicide, and authorities may be able to identify him later Monday afternoon. She couldn't speak as to whether the body may be Tatum.

The search for Relisha, she said, was continuing.
 

[klaasend]

It's him

http://www.wjla.com/articles/2014/03/relisha-rudd-search-adult-body-found-near-search-location-101692.html

Relisha Rudd Search: Adult male body found near search location
By Jennifer Donelan, Jeesoo Park, Richard Reeve, Stephen Tschida
March 31, 2014 - 01:55 pm

WASHINGTON (WJLA) - At a press conference held Monday evening at approximately 6:20 p.m., D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier thanked volunteers who have helped in the search for Relisha Rudd.

She stated that the adult male body found has tentatively been identified as Khalil Tatum – as it is “consistent with his appearance.” Lanier also added that she was “pretty comfortable” in concluding that the death was a suicide. But Rudd remains missing.

 

[Green Eyes]

It's him

http://www.wjla.com/articles/2014/03/relisha-rudd-search-adult-body-found-near-search-location-101692.html

Relisha Rudd Search: Adult male body found near search location
By Jennifer Donelan, Jeesoo Park, Richard Reeve, Stephen Tschida
March 31, 2014 - 01:55 pm

WASHINGTON (WJLA) - At a press conference held Monday evening at approximately 6:20 p.m., D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier thanked volunteers who have helped in the search for Relisha Rudd.

She stated that the adult male body found has tentatively been identified as Khalil Tatum – as it is “consistent with his appearance.” Lanier also added that she was “pretty comfortable” in concluding that the death was a suicide. But Rudd remains missing.

 

Good riddance to the scum bag. But where is little Tenau Rudd.  I pray they find her body soon. She deserves a proper burial. 

[MuffyBee]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/foot-search-missing-girl-8-resumes-park-article-1.1740561
Body of abduction suspect found in D.C. park, 8-year-old girl still missing: police
March 31, 2014

 
Police said they were slow to issue an Amber Alert for the missing girl, because no one immediately contacted the authorities. Investigators first learned of Relisha’s disappearance after school officials reported she had been absent for several days.

Authorities began searching the District of Columbia park for 8-year-old Relisha Rudd after investigators learned Tatum spent time in the park on March 2, after buying supplies likely used to bury the child’s body.
AP
Authorities began searching the District of Columbia park for 8-year-old Relisha Rudd after investigators learned Tatum spent time in the park on March 2, after buying supplies likely used to bury the child’s body.
Police say Relisha’s mother, Shamika Young, allowed her daughter to be with Tatum before the pair disappeared.
But Young told WRC-TV she didn’t know her daughter was missing.

“I thought she was at my sister’s house,” Young told the local NBC affiliate. “I didn’t want to lose my other three kids. That’s why I didn’t call the police.”

Tatum was considered armed and dangerous.

[cookie]

Mother/egg donor is a loser!~!!!!!!
she needs to take part of the blame for this little childs disappearance... she makes me sick....
if this offends anyone, it is my true feelings...

[MuffyBee]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/search-continues-for-missing-8-year-old-girl-police-spending-7th-day-in-park/2014/04/02/bb58b8ae-ba53-11e3-9a05-c739f29ccb08_story.html
Search continues for missing 8-year-old girl; police spending 7th day in park
April 2, 2014

The week-long air, ground and water search for missing Relisha Rudd in a 700-acre Northeast Washington park continued Wednesday with more police, firefighters and volunteers.

D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said search teams are expected to finish their work in the park by the end of the day Wednesday or mid-day Thursday. She stressed, however, that “the investigation will not end when the search [in the park] ends.”
Assistant D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham was scheduled to brief the media on the search on Wednesday afternoon.
 

[MuffyBee]

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/25142199/police-volunteers-continue-search-of-dc-park-for-missing-relisha-rudd
Police, volunteers continue search of DC park for missing Relisha Rudd
April 2, 2014

UPDATE: D.C. POLICE WILL HOLD A NEWS CONFERENCE AT 4:30 P.M. WEDNESDAY REGARDING THE SEARCH FOR RELISHA RUDD.  WATCH IT LIVE IN THE VIDEO PLAYER ABOVE, OR CLICK HERE TO WATCH IT LIVE ON YOUR MOBILE DEVICE.  (Clickable link in article)

[MuffyBee]

http://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/2014/04/02/7193961/
Relisha Rudd 'could still be alive' says police chief
April 2, 2014

See video

[Green Eyes]

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/25153410/police-end-search-of-park-for-missing-relisha-rudd#axzz2xqWlETNW


Police end search of Kenilworth Park for missing Relisha Rudd

WASHINGTON - Investigators have ended their search of Kenilworth Park for 8-year old Relisha Rudd.

Crews had been searching the park in northeast D.C. since last Thursday. D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier held a press conference Thursday to discuss the investigation.

[MuffyBee]

http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/investigations/russ-ptacek/2014/04/03/relisha-rudd-swimsuit-motel/7271399/
Suspect bought Relisha Rudd swimsuit prior to motel stay
April 4, 2014

WASHINGTON (WUSA9) – Relatives of Relisha Rudd say videotape of her at a DC motel was taken on a night the now dead suspect had purchased her a swimsuit and said he was taking her to a swimming party.

Note: An earlier version of this story reported that the relatives saw the suspect with Relisha Rudd March 1st, after the swim party. Grandmother Melissa Young says that was a misunderstanding and that they actually saw Relisha after the pool party with her mother on March 1st, not with suspect Kahlil Tatum.

In surveillance video from the motel, you can see Relisha holding shopping bags as Tatum leads her into a motel room.

Relisha's grandmother, Melissa Young says Relisha was already with Tatum that day, February 26th, when the two stopped by to see if Relisha had a swimsuit at her aunt's home.

Young says when they told Tatum Relisha didn't have a swimsuit, Tatum said he would purchase one.

He told the relatives he was taking the girl to the motel for a swimming party that would be attended by his wife and another girl.

During the visit, Relisha dropped off the swimsuit Tatum purchased, which family members say is now in the possession of the FBI.

She wasn't reported missing until several weeks later.

The relatives say it wasn't unusual for Tatum to purchase gifts for the girl or for them to spend days on end together unsupervised.
 

There has not been one reported sign of Relisha since March 1st.

[MuffyBee]

http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/health/2014/04/04/relisha-rudd-missing-disappearance-persons-of-interest/7307159/
AMBER ALERT: Man wanted for questioning in Rudd case
April 4, 2014

WASHINGTON (WUSA9) -- Police want your help identifying a person who may know something in the case of missing 8-year-old Relisha Rudd.

The person can be seen in this video: http://youtu.be/owtTKpCYa6o

Police officials say they can't share the location because it may "negatively impact the investigation." They say this man may have information and they only want to speak with him.

[MuffyBee]

http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2014/04/was_missing_homeless_girl_reli.html
Was missing homeless girl Relisha Rudd sold into human trafficking network? National group thinks so
April 4, 2014

[MuffyBee]

http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/04/police-seeking-to-identify-man-in-video-regarding-missing-relisha-rudd/
Police Ask for Help IDing Man on Video Regarding Relisha Rudd
April 4, 2014

LANHAM, Md. — D.C. police is asking for the public’s help in identifying a man as part of their investigation into the disappearance of 8-year-old Relisha Rudd.
The man can be seen in this video.
The police department released video footage Friday of the man stepping off the bottom of an escalator. Police say they believe the man may have information in Relisha’s case and that they are only seeking to speak with him.
Police said they were unable to share the location where the video was captured as it might negatively impact the investigation. However, the shape and color of the tiles on the floor in the video look like those used at Metro stations.
 

[MuffyBee]

Where is Relisha??



http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/04/police-seeking-to-identify-man-in-video-regarding-missing-relisha-rudd/

An Amber Alert has been issued for 8-year-old Relisha Rudd. (credit: Metropolitan Police Department)

[MuffyBee]

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Relisha-Rudd-Police-Seeking-Man-Who-May-Have-Information-in-Case-253926681.html
Police Seeking Man Who May Have Information in Relisha Rudd Case
April 4, 2014

Police have released video of a person who they want to talk to as they continue the search for missing 8-year-old Relisha Rudd.

Police only want to speak to the man, saying he may have information relevant to the case. And police won't say where the video was taken, saying that the location could hurt their investigation into Relisha's disappearance.

But the video appears to have been taken in a Metro station. In the video, a man, dressed in a dark hoodie, with dark pants and a black bomber-like jacket, strolls off an escalator and walks to the left.

Anyone who can identify the person or knows where he is should call police at (202) 727-9099 or text the Department's tip line at 50411.
 

Watch video

[cookie]

Where is Relisha??



http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/04/04/police-seeking-to-identify-man-in-video-regarding-missing-relisha-rudd/

An Amber Alert has been issued for 8-year-old Relisha Rudd. (credit: Metropolitan Police Department)

What a beautiful child..

[Nut44x4]

VERY!!

[MuffyBee]

http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/local/dc/2014/04/04/relisha-rudd-cash-facebook/7319811/
Relisha Rudd mom, grandma explain wads of cash
April 4, 2013

WASHINGTON (WUSA9) -- Wads of cash posted on the Facebook page of Relisha Rudd's step-father in February and the $4,000 the mother received shortly after the disappearance came from legitimate confirmable sources, say Relisha Rudd's mother and grandmother.

Because the cash is stacked in the Facebook photos, it is difficult to estimate the amount of money, but it appears to be about twenty $50 bills, or about $1,000.

Relisha's grandmother, Melissa Wheeler says the stacks of money on step-father Antonio Wheeler's Facebook page came from cashing two checks, one of which she described as a Social Security disability check.

Wheeler is Relisha's maternal grandmother.

In a very brief conversation, Relisha's mother, Shamika Young, said the other check was a tax refund and that money she received was from a car accident.

The grandmother says Shamika Young received $4,000 three weeks after Relisha disappeared because of an insurance settlement.

Wheeler says she and Relisha's mother, both received $4,000 settlements for injuries suffered in an April 10, 2013 car accident.
 

[MuffyBee]

http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/local/dc/2014/04/04/relisha-rudd-cash-facebook/7319811/
Relisha Rudd mom, grandma explain wads of cash
April 4, 2013

WASHINGTON (WUSA9) -- Wads of cash posted on the Facebook page of Relisha Rudd's step-father in February and the $4,000 the mother received shortly after the disappearance came from legitimate confirmable sources, say Relisha Rudd's mother and grandmother.

Because the cash is stacked in the Facebook photos, it is difficult to estimate the amount of money, but it appears to be about twenty $50 bills, or about $1,000.

Relisha's grandmother, Melissa Wheeler says the stacks of money on step-father Antonio Wheeler's Facebook page came from cashing two checks, one of which she described as a Social Security disability check.

Wheeler is Relisha's maternal grandmother.

In a very brief conversation, Relisha's mother, Shamika Young, said the other check was a tax refund and that money she received was from a car accident.

The grandmother says Shamika Young received $4,000 three weeks after Relisha disappeared because of an insurance settlement.

Wheeler says she and Relisha's mother, both received $4,000 settlements for injuries suffered in an April 10, 2013 car accident.
 

Why would anyone post photos of wads of cash on FB?  And especially why would the step-father of a missing child post photos of wads of cash said to belong to the mother and grandmother of Relisha, soon after she was reported missing?  Whether the money was legitimate or not, it's dumb to post cash on FB in the first place, but I find it especially abhorrent in light of Relisha being missing.  I mean, what were these people sitting around doing while a child is missing?  Cashing checks, taking cash and putting photos of it on FB?  I don't get this at all.    

[MuffyBee]

So sad...   

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/before-relisha-rudd-went-missing-the-8-year-old-longed-to-escape-dcs-homeless-shelter/2014/04/05/e21a020a-bc19-11e3-9a05-c739f29ccb08_story.html
Before Relisha Rudd went missing, the 8-year-old longed to escape D.C.’s homeless shelter
April 5, 2014

Relisha Rudd called it the “trap house.”

For nearly two years, the missing 8-year-old had been living in the shelter for homeless families at the former D.C. General Hospital, a grim place with bedbugs and no playground. Relatives said the second-grader, who slept with a teddy bear she named “Baby,” wanted out so desperately that she would fake asthma attacks to stay at their homes. Adults who were close to her at her old school described her arriving with filthy clothes, dirty hair and an empty stomach, and they said she often didn’t want to leave
“She was like, ‘Can I stay?’ ” said Regina Pixley, a security guard at Ferebee-Hope Elementary School, which Relisha attended from pre-kindergarten until last June, when the school closed. “And we were like, ‘Baby, you have to go home.’ ”
 

But whether Relisha is alive or dead, the instability of her life — evictions from apartments where gunfire was common, weeks at motels and then months at the homeless shelter with a troubled mother and three brothers — put her on the radar of school administrators, social workers, shelter employees and volunteers, who make up the safety net for the city’s vulnerable children.

The signs of a child struggling were there: A cheerleading coach at times helped her wash up in a restroom at school, where clean clothes were kept on hand for her. Social workers responded to at least three reports of abuse or neglect within the family, with police called at least twice. Shelter volunteers noticed a little girl who was eager to participate in two after-school programs but who often wasn’t there. And family members were aware that the girl who dressed as a princess for Halloween was being swapped among them and that, in recent months, a new person had joined her rotation of caregivers: Kahlil Tatum, a 51-year-old shelter custodian who took her for sleepovers at his house and on outings to the movies and the mall. Then simply took her.

A deep look at Relisha’s life — and the adults she came in contact with before walking away with Tatum, who was found dead last week — shows that the details of her disappearance may be unique but the circumstances of her life were not. In recent days, officials have used the phrase “other Relishas” to describe children who live on the edge but whose chances of falling are hard to predict, even by people supposed to catch them.

“Who failed Relisha?” said Shannon Smith, the cheerleading coach who looked after her. “I believe everybody failed that girl. The school, the system, the doctors, the police and everybody else that should have had something to do with her.”
 
Shortly after Relisha was born — on Oct. 29, 2005, at Washington Hospital Center — the family moved into an Edgewood apartment complex where gang members were neighbors and shootings were common. Once, police descended on the Northeast D.C. apartments when a man pulled a gun from behind an outdoor air-conditioning unit and, according to a witness, “began firing at everyone around Edgewood.” Seven people were wounded.

The family left in 2007. Public records show that at least five of Young’s former landlords filed cases against her for breaching tenant contracts, with the latest eviction notice coming shortly before the family wound up at a motel off Bladensburg Road for three months and then entered the shelter in 2012.

Relisha, who sometimes called the shelter “the G,” hated it there, relatives said. She would tell them that it was “infested and the food ain’t good,” said her aunt Ashley Young, 26.

The shelter, run out of an old public hospital beside a morgue and a methadone clinic, was intended to be a temporary solution to overcrowding elsewhere when the city started moving homeless families there more than a decade ago. Now, nearly 600 children call it home. In a report last year, the Washington Legal Clinic described complaints from residents about heating outages, mice, and bedbugs and other insects. Raccoons have been spotted inside bathrooms and closets.

Ashley Young said her niece would fake illnesses to stay at her place or beg to go to her grandmother’s home, where she had a cat named Missy. When Relisha began spending time with Tatum, her aunt said, she viewed it as another “escape route” for the girl.

Shamika Young said that she met Tatum in 2005 and that her daughter considered him a godfather. Relisha would come back from their outings with a new outfit or a manicure, relatives said. For Christmas, he bought her a tablet device. Few in Relisha’s family questioned his generosity.

“I never got a bad vibe about him,” said Antonio Wheeler, 28, the father of Relisha’s two youngest brothers. Irving Rudd, the father of Relisha and another brother, did not respond to efforts to contact him.

When Relisha couldn’t spend time with Tatum, she would make her aunt call him, Ashley Young said. “She would say: ‘Why, God-daddy? Why don’t you come get me?’ ” Young said. Whenever Tatum took her, she added, he “always brought her back when he was supposed to.”

Until the day he didn’t.

On March 19, police began the search for Relisha after a social worker from Payne Elementary School, concerned about her mounting absences, showed up at the shelter and discovered the truth about Tatum, who had been listed on school records as Relisha’s doctor. By that point, Relisha had been with Tatum since Feb. 26, police said, but no one had reported her missing. On March 20, police found Tatum’s wife, Andrea Tatum, facedown on a motel bed in Oxon Hill, shot in the head. Tatum was found 11 days later in a Northeast Washington park shed, dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Relisha’s grandmother Melissa Young, who signed Relisha up for Girl Scouts and laughs about how she ate more shortbread cookies than she sold, now questions why the shelter staff didn’t notice that her granddaughter was gone. Every night, staff members knock on doors and ask how many kids are in each room, but they don’t open the doors to look, she said. If they had, they would have seen Relisha’s bed empty many nights.
 
Smith and Pixley, the security guard at the school, said there were many days when they saw Relisha and one of her brothers waiting for a ride home long after most of the other children had left. Smith recalled how once, when she returned late from chaperoning a school trip and found the two there, she called their mother and offered to drive them home. Smith said Young didn’t give an address and hung up. Young then called the school and directed her children to leave on foot, Smith said.

What happened next could not be corroborated with authorities, but Smith and Pixley said that the children were found late that night at a nearby laundromat and that the police and the District’s Child and Family Services Agency (CFSA) were notified. Melissa Young denied that her grandchildren were ever found at a laundromat and said Shamika would often go hungry so the children could eat.

Shamika Young also said she has been a good mother to Relisha and her brothers. “Think what you want to think,” she said. “Only God knows the truth.”

Mindy Good, a CFSA spokeswoman, said that by law she can’t speak about individual cases. But confidential files read to The Washington Post show that the agency sustained complaints at least three times involving Young’s children. The first was lodged in July 2007, when Relisha was almost 2 years old. A social worker noted “great concern” for the girl, who showed signs of abuse, according to the file. But authorities “were unable to determine how these injuries happened.” Two law enforcement officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly about the case said police were called but an investigation concluded that no assault had occurred.

Three years later, in April 2010, a social worker noted that one of Relisha’s brothers was not getting the medical attention he needed after surgery. The file says the family was living in “environmentally unsafe conditions,” with debris and cigarette butts scattered throughout the apartment.

The last incident occurred in November, while the family was at the shelter. A social worker, according to the file, noted a “lack of supervision and abuse.” One of Relisha’s brothers had been “thrown to the ground” and slapped until his lip bled, the report says. The law enforcement officials said police intervened but got conflicting stories about who hit the boy. No charges were filed.

Relisha’s relatives described all three reports as exaggerated or false. In each case, the children remained in the home. Only after Relisha went missing were her three brothers placed in foster care.

CFSA Director Brenda Donald declined to be interviewed. But in a letter to The Post, she wrote that “the fact that CFSA does not remove a child as a result of a substantiated abuse or neglect allegation does not mean we do not provide any services.”

When Donald took over the agency in 2012, the District had one of the nation’s highest removal rates and one of the lowest in placing children with relatives once they were taken from the home, Good said. A year earlier, the city’s Citizen Review Panel, which is charged with monitoring the agency, issued a report that called for “significant reforms to prevent unnecessary removals — and to prevent the unnecessary harm they cause to children and families.”

As of April 2, the agency was serving 2,973 children. Of those, 61 percent were at home with their families, the result of an intentional effort. Good said a particular challenge for the agency comes in dealing with families who teeter constantly between stability and crisis; they aren’t in dire enough straits to require drastic interventions, but they remain troubled. Social workers have to rely on their best judgments, she said, “without the benefit of any foolproof method for predicting human behavior or other variables.”

“All of us in social services work to serve so many fragile families,” Good said. “We know the stakes are high. Succeeding makes a wonderful difference. But when even best efforts aren’t enough, it’s devastating.”
 

Shamika Young, who has been accused of giving police conflicting information about her daughter’s whereabouts and lying to the school about her many absences, is now under investigation by a grand jury for obstruction of justice. She has gone into hiding but said she wants the public to know: “It’s not my fault.”

Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson has also pushed back against critics who say Payne failed Relisha. One school official said Payne’s social worker, who noticed how Relisha and her brothers struggled to adjust to their new classrooms, had Payne staffers check in with them and referred Relisha’s family to a community-based group for more support.

Although Relisha was absent more than 30 days before a school social worker alerted child welfare officials, most of those absences were excused by family members who said the child was in the care of a “Dr. Tatum.” Henderson said the only reason anybody started looking for Relisha is because a school social worker went to the shelter and realized that “something was not right.”
 

 
The Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, the nonprofit agency being paid $13 million a year by the city to run the shelter, has also come under fire. At a recent D.C. Council committee hearing, Sue Marshall, executive director of the agency, defended the shelter’s policies. She acknowledged that the shelter had fired at least four employees for having inappropriate relationships with residents. But not Tatum, who gave toys and money to shelter children before Relisha’s abduction.