Police Ask for Help in Finding Retarded Diabetic Woman, 22

Police Wednesday asked the public for help in finding a 22-year-old, mildly retarded diabetic woman who fled a Tustin home for the mentally handicapped last weekend.

Valorie Ann Rice left the Nichols Group Home for Mentally Retarded Adults Saturday afternoon because she “felt she was being confined too much,” Tustin Police Detective Jim Hein said.

Mental health care sources said that Rice is schizophrenic and has an IQ of about 70, but they believe she has a greater mental capacity than that of an 8-year-old, which Nichols workers previously told detectives.

Police and mental health officials said the woman is probably not dangerous to herself or others but has unstable judgment and could be vulnerable to abuse.

Rice took a bottle of insulin with her, but police said they do not know whether it was enough to prevent her from lapsing into a diabetic coma, nor whether the woman is capable of taking care of herself.

“We definitely don’t suspect foul play. We have letters she wrote. She tried to get rooms over here at the Six-Pence Motel but couldn’t because they were all filled up,” Hein said.

He added that the notes indicated that Rice was unhappy at the home and had a boyfriend she wanted to see more of. Officers speculated that Rice may have tried to follow her boyfriend, who had gone on a trip to Colorado.

Flyers with a picture of Rice have been distributed in the community, officers said.

Rice is described as five feet tall, 120 pounds with shoulder-length brown hair and hazel eyes. She was wearing purple pants and a purple shirt, a heavy pink cardigan sweater and carrying a striped purple duffel bag when she ran out of the home Saturday about 2:30 p.m., police said.

Anyone with information about the woman is asked to call Tustin police at (714) 544-5424.