Reported runaway found safe in Jackson
Published 8:52 pm Tuesday, April 18, 2017
In the end, 15-year-old JaMiya Lee has been found safe and will be reunited with her family.
But, there are plenty of questions about her 20 days missing that still need to be answered.
Vicksburg Chief of Police Walter Armstrong reported Tuesday evening that Lee had been found safe in the Jackson area and was being taken to a Jackson medical facility to be examined.
Following that examination, Lee, who was reported missing on March 28, would be brought back to Vicksburg and her family.
“We are absolutely ecstatic that this ended the way it did,” Armstrong said. “There are a lot of similar situations across the country that do not have a positive result like this.”
According to police reports, Lee was reported missing from her home in the 300 block of Shady Lane on Tuesday, March 28 by her grandmother. She had last been seen in her bedroom between 1:30 a.m. and 2 a.m.
According to her grandmother, Lee has been living with her for the past two months and did not have a cell phone.
She left several handwritten notes saying she was leaving, and one of the notes indicated she was headed to the Atlanta area. She took articles of clothing with her.
Lee was been entered on the National Crime Information Center as a runaway.
From there, investigators followed a list of tips and leads that took them into Louisiana and Grambling State University.
There, they ultimately received information that sent them back to the Jackson area, where she was found Tuesday evening.
“Our investigators continued to work this case and work this case,” Armstrong said. “They ran into a lot of dead ends, but they were finally able to get the information that led to us finding her in the Jackson area.”
Who she was found with is a question Armstrong and his investigators are not willing to answer now, as the investigation is continuing.
“We know that she does not own any property in Jackson, nor does her family,” Armstrong said. “That is all we will say at this time.”
As for the medical examination, Armstrong said that is merely a precaution.
“We do not have any information that she was injured or anything else,” Armstrong said. “We just felt it was a good idea to have her examined by medical professionals before bringing her back to Vicksburg and reuniting her with her family.”