Ariz. family: We won't stop looking for Isabel

A flyer for missing 6-year-old Isabel Celis is placed on a volunteer's car in Tucson, Ariz., Sunday, April 22, 2012. / AP Photo/Terry Tang

(CBS/AP) TUCSON, Ariz. - The family of an Arizona girl who went missing from her bedroom over the weekend said they will never give up looking for the 6-year-old.

"We appreciate everyone's interest in finding our daughter, Isabel, and thank all the volunteers who have come out to search for her," the family of Isabel Mercedes Celis said in a statement Monday evening in their first public comments. "We love Isabel and will never give up finding her."

Tucson police are trying to determine what happened to Isabel. Her parents say they awoke on Saturday to find her missing. Police said a window was open with the screen pushed aside.

Since Saturday, investigators and volunteers fanned across Isabel's neighborhood and an area landfill searching for clues. Volunteers posted fliers with a photo of Isabel -- about 4 feet tall with brown hair and hazel eyes -- holding a school award.

Her parents, identified by friends as Becky and Sergio Celis, told investigators they last saw the first-grader at 11 p.m. Friday. Her mother, a nurse, was at work Saturday when her father went to wake her at 8 a.m. and discovered her missing, police said.

Police call the case a "suspicious disappearance/possible abduction."

"We're not ruling anything out of the investigation at this point because we really need to keep our mind open about all the information that's been brought to us," Police Chief Roberto Villasenor said.

Officers have been interviewing sex offenders in the area -- a practice that has become standard in all abduction investigations.

On Monday, FBI dogs -- one that can find human remains and the other used for search and rescue -- went through the family's home and turned up information that required a follow-up, but police declined to say what that was.

Members of the Tucson Police Department search a landfill at Craycroft Road and Interstate 10 for 6 year-old Isabel Celis, Monday April 23, 2012 in Tucson, Ariz.

/ AP/Arizona Daily Star, Benjie Sanders

Family of Isabel kept from home as FBI probes disappearance
"Suspicious circumstances" at home of missing Ariz. girl

The family said in the statement that they are fully cooperating with authorities.

Experts say abduction from the home is relatively rare, with just over 18 children taken each year.

"It's unusual, but it's not unprecedented," said Ernie Allen, president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which is involved in the search.

Experts: Child home abductions are rare

CBS Affiliate KOLD reports Tucson residents are coming together to contribute to the search. Family friends and employees of Tucson Medical Center - where Isabel's mother is a nurse - started a mass campaign to distribute flyers.

The volunteers set up a tent in a parking lot across from the police command post, distributing flyers and collecting donations. Dozens of people stopped by to pick up stacks of flyers to distribute in their neighborhoods; Local businesses stepped up as well. .

"It hits home, it really hits home," one mother told KOLD correspondent Sonu Wasu.

New protocols for investigating missing children

Each year, 58,000 children are abducted by strangers and released, according to the most recent statistics. Of those, 115 were "stereotypical" kidnappings carried out by strangers who either killed the children or held them for ransom. And 16 percent of those were taken from home.

Nearly three quarters of the victims are girls, and 38 percent of them are 12 to 14. At 24 percent, the second largest victimized group is the one Isabel belongs to: girls ages 6 to 11.

When 12-year-old Polly Klaas disappeared during a slumber party in 1993 in California and was strangled by a man with a long criminal record, there were no police protocols, said her father, Marc Klaas.

"Every time a child would disappear, they would invent that wheel all over again," said Klaas, who travels the country speaking about child abduction. "Now almost every agency in America has some handle on how to launch a missing child investigation."

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[betty42254]

Protocols or not....sadly when the child is found....it is to late and they have been killed. I vote to make it 1 strike...hurt or molest a child and 1st offense is mandatory 25 years with no early release!!!! Kill them and it's life/no parole...or execution...

[pak31]

I really want to know when the mom left for work and if she looked in on her daughter before leaving. The police won't say. I think that if they both say they last saw her at 11pm then she probably didn't. The articles says her parents woke to find her missing but then states the mom was at work and her dad noticed. So it was only the dad who noticed her missing. Might be trivial on my part but why the confusion. I could help narrow down the timeline of her missing. If mom went in at 6 and she was still in her room, then it only leaves a 2 hour gap. As a mother I would peek in on mine prior to leaving but whether she did or not means nothing really.

[perfectionist13]

Is always an inside job, if is not a family member is a family friend or neighbor.

[amerilatino]

This is why I don't encourage adult neighbors to get too chummy or let strangers on my property. I have a 14 year-old daughter and I've taught her how to inflict real, incapacitating pain to people who attempt to touch her without her permission, and I've let her teachers know in no uncertain terms that she will. As soon as she is old enough, I will teach her how to handle a handgun, and how to get it licensed.

[smittyc]

I would be looking at the teachers and coaches where she attends school. They are privy to a lot of details concerning the home life and they have certainly been on the radar a lot lately as regards the young children. I remember in the Smart case, there was previous contact with her abductor.