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A 13-YEAR-OLD northwestern Wisconsin girl who went missing in October after her parents were killed has been found alive in a rural town about an hour from her home.
The Barron County Sheriff’s Department said on its Facebook page that Jayme Closs has been located and that a suspect was taken into custody.
Sheriff Chris Fitzgerald said Jayme was expected to be reunited with her family last night night.
Fitzgerald said authorities in Douglas County, about 70 miles north of Barron County, located the girl.
The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office confirmed on its website that Jayme was found in the Town of Gordon at 4.43pm, and that a suspect was taken into custody 11 minutes later.
Neither statement gave any further information about the suspect. Jayme’s grandfather, Robert Naiberg, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that Jayme was being treated at a hospital.
Sue Allard, Jayme’s aunt, told the Star Tribune that she could barely express her joy after learning the news last night.
“Praise the Lord,” Allard said between sobs.
It’s the news we’ve been waiting on for three months. I can’t wait to get my arms around her. I just can’t wait.
Conference
The Barron County sheriff’s office plans to hold a news conference this morning to discuss the case.
Gillian Drummond, a spokeswoman for the Wisconsin Department of Justice, and Leonard Peace, a spokesman for the FBI in Wisconsin, declined to comment yesterday evening. Both agencies have been involved in the search for Jayme.
Jayme had been missing since her parents, James and Denise Closs, were found shot to death on 15 October in the family’s home near Barron. Investigators said Jayme was quickly ruled out as a suspect.
Detectives pursued thousands of tips, watched dozens of surveillance videos and conducted numerous searches in the effort to find Jayme.
Some tips led officials to recruit 2,000 volunteers for a massive ground search on 23 October but it yielded no clues.
Fitzgerald said in November that he kept similar cases in the back of his mind as he worked to find Jayme, including the abduction of Elizabeth Smart, who was taken from her Salt Lake City home in 2002, when she was 14 years old.
She was rescued nine months later with the help of two witnesses who recognised her abductors from an America’s Most Wanted episode.
“I have a gut feeling she’s (Jayme’s) still alive. I’ve always been a glass half-full kind of guy,” Fitzgerald said at the time.
The Town of Gordon lies about 40 miles south of the Lake Superior shoreline and 65 miles north of Barron, where the Closs family lived. Gordon is home to about 645 people. The area is heavily forested. Logging is the top industry in the region.
Town Chairman Denny Kline said Jayme was found about six miles east of town. He described the area as a small-town development with single-family, cabin-like homes.
Scanner
He said he first learned Jayme had been found while listening to a police scanner, adding that he heard Jayme was walking down the road and someone stopped near her.
Kline said he heard over the scanner that Jayme told them who she was and they brought her to their home.
“A lot of people were very concerned, did a lot of praying and all that,” he said.
Prayers were answered, for finding her, anyway.
Resident Kristin Kasinskas told the Star Tribune that a neighbour waking a dog knocked on her door yesterday afternoon. Standing with her was a skinny, dirty girl with matted hair, wearing shoes too big for her feet.
“This is Jayme Closs! Call 911!” the neighbor said to Kasinskas. Jayme was quiet, her emotions “pretty flat,” Kasinskas’ husband, Peter, said.
The woman who found Jayme asked the newspaper not to use her name.
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I had two sons and then a daughter,(much later)she is my last,but your outlook on the world changes when you have a daughter to protect..Thank god she is alive…
@Dave Walsh:
Sorry, but I think your outlook on the world changes the minute you have any child…both need protection..
@Geraldine O’Riordan: There are more dangers for my daughter than there are for my sons…I would give my life in defense of both…
@Geraldine O’Riordan: cop on will ya. He was talking about a personal feeling.
Glad she’s been found, such a rare outcome in cases.
That being said, considering the huge work put in by all the investigators I thing the Aunt’s praise is a bit misdirected.
@Bob Earner: Yeah, I hear you. Sheer hard work. But for some people, it is easier to have someone to thank and someone to blame when life and it’s events becomes too big to comprehend. It compartmentalizes emotions which are otherwise too hard to handle. Nothing wrong with it if it works for them.
@Deborah Blacoe: Except the praise and the blame are never directed at the same entity.
The deity gets all the praise and none of the blame. Which, considering it’s supposed omnipresence/omnipotence, isn’t exactly fair.
@Bob Earner: I think that blame is accredited to a deity by way of ‘God’s Will’. It is a coping mechanism. It doesn’t work for me, sometimes I wish it did.
@Bob Earner: I think that blame is accredited to a deity by way of ‘God’s Will’. It is a coping mechanism. It doesn’t work for me, sometimes I wish it did.
The primary concern here is this poor child and her welfare, we can agree she has suffered with the loss of her parents and what she’s gone through in the past 3 months. It seems somewhat trite to thank a god for her safe return, while ignoring that the same god allowed all this to occur in the first place.
@Arch Angel: in the name of jesus, mary and good saint joseph and all the saints and everything holy will you GIVE IT A FLAMIN REST. Getting pretty damn boring!!!
@Marie Broomfield: to thanks an imaginary friend for doing all the work is a bit of a kick in the face for all the actual people whose time and efforts led to finding this child.
@Karen Wellington:
Can you prove that one way or the other.
“Praise the Lord” she’s been found. Er, why didn’t the Lord find her sooner? Or maybe not allow her to be taken? Or maybe not allow her parents to be killed? Or maybe your Lord isn’t all powerful after all?
@Robin Pickering: I also like this by Epicurus:
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?
@Robin Pickering: what business is it of yours who they praise or thank! You should stay out of things you no nothing about!
@Marie Broomfield: seeing as you’re so petty i’ll put in my correction *know
@Marie Broomfield: Robin has as much right to question God as you or anyone has in believing in him. He might not believe, you might believe that is both of your rights and neither of you should attack the other over their beliefs.
@Robin Pickering: The lord works in mysterious ways
@Marie Broomfield: have you ever considered praying to that god of yours for some serenity? Your aggression levels are through the roof.
@Marie Broomfield: start using the brain you were given.
As long as she was found and returned to her family is all that counts. Plenty are never seen again.
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