Australia Police find missing four-year-old girl alive at campsite in Australia more than two weeks ago
"My name is Cleo." The girl, held in her arms by a policeman, whispers to an officer who asks her name for the third time. In the video recorded by the agents, the words of the four-year-old baby who had been missing for 18 days are barely heard clearly. "We will take you to see your mom and dad," says the officer. The girl smiles and clings tightly to the jacket of
one of the men who has rescued her from a kidnapping
.
After midnight on Wednesday, Australian police broke down the door of a house in Carnarvon, a small coastal town in western Australia.
In there was Cleo Smith, the girl who had disappeared at a campsite 30 miles north of Carnarvon.
"Our family is whole again,"
wrote on Instagram Ellie Smith's mother, who has been posting non-stop posters and videos crying out for help finding her daughter.
The disappearance of little Cleo caused a huge media stir in Australia.
So much so that the case was compared to that of the British minor
Madeleine McCann,
who disappeared in 2007 in Praia da Luz (Portugal) when she was on vacation with her parents.
"We were looking for a needle in a haystack and we found it," Deputy Police Commissioner Col Blanch said in an interview with local radio on Wednesday.
"Obviously we had real concerns for Cleo's well-being.
And as time went on, they got worse. The happy ending to this story was just amazing,"
Blanch said.
In the rescue operation, a 36-year-old man has been arrested.
Little more information has been disclosed except that he had no connection to the family and that he was
a suspect "known to the police."
"He was not in the house at the time of the raid and there is no other suspect who is involved in Cleo's disappearance," Blanch said. The house where the girl
was found was a short distance from the family residence
where Cleo's distraught parents had followed the police investigation since their daughter's disappearance on October 16.
Cleo, her mother, her stepfather and her older sister had camped with a tent and sleeping bags at the isolated Blowholes campsite, located just behind a beach and surrounded by dunes. Ellie, the mother, told officers that Cleo
had woken up at 1:30 a.m.
to ask for some water before continuing to sleep. When Ellie woke up again at 6:00 AM, Cleo was no longer inside the store.
The police arrived quickly at the campsite. Several drones and even a helicopter flew over the entire area to a coastal walk where the waves crash against the cliffs.
"When we had not found her in the first two hours, we automatically thought that they had taken her,"
said one of the agents who participated in the search operation. Cleo's sleeping bag had also not appeared and
the tent's zipper was at such a height that the police assumed she had been kidnapped.
Less than a week after the search, the Western Australian government offered a reward
of A $ 1 million
(650,000 euros) for leads leading to Cleo.
Many arrived.
The police received in a few days more than 200 reports about possible sightings of the girl.
1,000 calls, tests and social networks
One of the few clues came from witnesses who reported seeing a
car heading south
on the main road from the camp to Carnarvon around 3:00 a.m. on the day Cleo disappeared.
Investigators viewed and investigated many hours of CCTV footage from some reported locations.
They also
searched hundreds of garbage bags
collected from roadside containers to the north and south of the camp and visited several homes in the Carnarvon area, looking for any sign of the girl.
Throughout the more than two weeks of investigation, the police said they had no suspects and repeatedly ruled out that Cleo's family was involved in her disappearance.
In addition to police work, thousands of
volunteers
were mobilized through social networks, especially Facebook,
who printed more than 50,000 posters
and brochures throughout the state of Western Australia, where the campsite is located and where the Smith family lives.
Over 18 days, the police collected a large amount of evidence, including interviews, CCTV footage, phone data and 1,000 calls from people offering information that, once analyzed, pointed in the direction of the house.
"Seeing her sitting there the way she was was incredible,
" Sergeant Cameron Blaine, one of four officers who entered the one-story home with a search warrant
,
said at a news conference Wednesday. Cleo in a bedroom.
"I just wanted to be absolutely sure it was her, so I asked her her name.
I had to do it three times before she answered. Then we took her out of the house and called her parents. It was a wonderful feeling to be able to do. that call, "said Blaine in detail, adding that
the officers involved in the case" broke down and cried "
after finding the girl. Blaine was able to witness Cleo's subsequent reunion with her parents. "She is a very trusting and open girl.
All the agents wanted to take turns hugging her,"
said the sergeant.
"They have found Cleo Smith and she is safely home. Our prayers were answered. Thanks to the many police officers involved," Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison wrote on his Twitter account.
Hours after the rescue, Western Australian Prime Minister Mark McGowan posted a photo of Cleo - sitting on a hospital bed and smiling.
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