‘A Devastating and Heartbreaking End’: Search for Missing 4-year-old Autistic Girl Called Off After Body Found
‘Heartbreaking End’: Search for Missing 4-year-old Autistic Girl Called Off After Body Found
A tiny body believed to be that of a young autistic girl that went missing in Indiana has been discovered. While police believe the corpse is of the toddler, they have handed it over to the county’s coroner for official confirmation and have ended their search.
On Thursday, Sept. 1, a state-issued Silver Alert was enacted to locate Fiedwenya “NeeGee” Fiefe, a 4-year-old girl on the spectrum who had gone missing from her family.
Last seen in a long pink nightgown, NeeGee was said to have wandered off from adult supervision in Plainfield, Indiana, Legacy Farm neighborhood, which is about 17 miles southwest of Indianapolis. A woman claiming to be her mother contends she thought the child was with her grandmother but due to a miscommunication she was tragically mistaken.
Law enforcement issued a Silver Alert versus an Amber Alert because the child had special needs and was not suspected to be kidnapped. Originally the alert designation of silver was for vulnerable adults believed to be in danger. However, in 2018, the alert criteria were expanded to include children whose caretakers affirm they are “incapable of returning home without assistance because of mental illness, intellectual disability or another physical or mental disability.”
Because NeeGee was non-verbal (as a consequence of her autism) and attracted to water, her family and authorities were increasingly worried as time ticked away and she was not returned.
According to ABC News, the young girl has gone missing before. Plainfield Deputy Chief Joe Aldridge, in a conversation with reporters the morning of Friday, Sept. 2, “She has a history of leaving the residence unattended but they generally find her quickly and get her back.”
“The family, as you would imagine, is very devastated,” Aldridge said, adding the family had been “cooperating” with law enforcement.
To help find her, police asked neighbors in the area to look around their property to check if she was there, also inquiring residents to look through any exterior home videos or surveillance cameras. One resident had footage that showed NeeGee walking down her street Thursday a little after she was reported missing.
Sadly, at the end of the second day of the search, around 7:30 p.m., authorities within the Plainfield Police Department released a statement on its Facebook page saying the department had ended their search, after finding a body of a child that matched NeeGee’s description in a pond near the Legacy Farms neighborhood.
It read, “Despite the valiant efforts of our citizens, volunteers, police, fire, along with local and state agencies, the search for missing NeeGee has come to a devastating and heartbreaking end.”
“This evening a body of a child that matches the description of NeeGee was located in a body of water in the Legacy Farms subdivision,” the statement continued. “Exact confirmation as to the child’s identity will be determined by the Hendricks County Coroner’s Office.”
The note asked the public to “keep Fiedwenya Fiefe‘s family in their thoughts and prayers and respect their privacy at this time.”
FOX 59 reported between 50 to 100 police officers and firefighters gathered on Friday, Sept. 2, to search for the young girl.
Members of the community also responded to a call for volunteers, bringing the total of first responders and volunteers up to close to 500.
The search party started on Friday at 2 p.m. and minutes later, the PPD wrote on their social media, “Due to the overwhelming response of help from a great community we have all the volunteers we can take into the field areas at this time.” The search was led by “foot, ATV and horseback.”
The group canvassed 14 ponds in three neighborhoods around the child’s home, hoping to find the child alive and well.
