Missing Girl, 2, Is Found in Southeast S.D.

Twenty-one CB-wielding citizens and 15 San Diego police officers helped find a 2 1/2-year-old girl Tuesday after searching a 3-square-mile area.

Police believe that Christian Smith, who was staying with her aunt, crawled out of the house sometime between 11 p.m. Monday and 8 a.m. Tuesday and walked toward her mother’s house half a mile away.

The citizens band radio group, called the CB Emergency Response Team, narrowed the search Tuesday morning. But it was the girl’s 15-year-old sister who spotted Christian being dragged by a man behind a fast-food restaurant on 54th Street about 12:30 p.m., a mile and a half from where she disappeared.

The sister, Damisi Matlock, was in a parking lot across the street after having her hair done when she saw Christian.

When spotted, the man dropped the child and fled. He was described as white, about 30 years old, 5 feet, 9 inches tall, 145 pounds with long brown hair, and wearing cutoff shorts and a T-shirt.

Police do not know when the man met up with Christian, but she did not appear to be injured.

The CB team canvassed the neighborhood of the aunt’s house, going door to door and circulating photocopies of the girl’s picture. The effort turned up a witness who had seen the girl, leading the search in the direction where she was eventually found.

“They were able to expand our search resources,” Sgt. David Berridge said of the CB team. “They found the witnesses, but the family members were the ones that found the child.”

The CB organization has helped in about half a dozen searches for missing children and invalid adults in the last three years.

“The idea is that we can saturate a search area with lots of people at no cost to the city,” said R. H. Westray of the CB organization.