5-year-old Utah girl goes missing, sparking massive search
Police and the FBI are searching for a 5-year-old girl in Utah and suspect she may be in danger. The Logan City Police Department said Elizabeth Shelley was last seen at 2 a.m. Saturday and she was reported missing at around 10 a.m.
On Monday morning, police said over 200 officers from a dozen local, state and federal agencies were working on the case. Authorities suspected Elizabeth was in the company of her uncle, 21-year-old Alex Whipple, who was at the family's home Friday night.
When the family woke up a little after 9 a.m. Saturday, they noticed that Elizabeth and Whipple were gone, Logan Police Capt. Tyson Budge told reporters Monday. The family searched for the pair before contacting police.
Police said they found Whipple Saturday afternoon without Elizabeth. He was located walking alone in the Logan area, and the police said he's been uncooperative in their investigation of the girl's whereabouts.
Investigators interviewed Whipple for several hours, Budge told reporters. "He made some statements that we were able to verify as untrue very quickly into this interview because of the knowledge that we had of his whereabouts previously," Budge said. "Everything he has done has been quite deceptful, and we have no reason to believe anything he told us was accurate."
Whipple was jailed on a probation violation with a $25,000 bond, CBS affiliate KUTV reports. He had received a prison sentence for leading police on a chase in a stolen truck while intoxicated in 2017.
His sentence was suspended and he was placed on probation for five years. Police were serving additional search warrants Sunday and asked residents to check home video surveillance footage from 2 a.m. to noon Saturday.
Police said Elizabeth is 3 1/2 feet tall with curly, shoulder-length brown hair, bangs, brown eyes and was last seen wearing a red tank top and blue jeans. During Monday's press conference, Jill Parker, a victim advocate with the Cache County Attorney's Office, read a statement from Elizabeth's family saying they are overwhelmed, scared and saddened by her disappearance.
