Girl Gone, Mother Held

Young Lillian Gill, raised in a woodsy small town on the outskirts of Big Bear Lake, was last seen two years ago.

Since that time, her mother had assured relatives that her 4-year-old autistic daughter was perfectly happy at a special facility in Milan, Italy, where she was being treated for behavioral problems.

That was a lie, authorities said.

Sharon Gill, 47, was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of murdering her adopted daughter -- because, detectives believe, she couldn’t cope with Lillian’s condition. For two years, authorities say, she fooled her friends and family with a story about sending her daughter abroad.

Lillian’s body has not been found, but “there’s no doubt that the child is dead,” said Sgt. Gerrit Tesselaar, who is leading the investigation for the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department.

One friend told authorities that Gill admitted killing her daughter and gave a detailed description of how she killed her, authorities said. Tesselaar would not elaborate on the friend’s allegation.

Authorities are still trying to determine whether her husband, John Gill, 47, was involved in the disappearance and death of the couple’s daughter.

“His role and culpability are still being investigated,” said Sheriff’s Department spokesman Chip Patterson. “He obviously had knowledge that she was gone.”

He could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The couple’s white-and-red-trimmed home, on a quiet residential block along the eastern edge of Big Bear City, was empty Thursday. Neighbors said they had not seen anyone there in several days, and a blanket of fresh snow covered the entryway, undisturbed.

On Saturday, several dogs were brought to sniff around the Gills’ yard for Lillian’s remains but found nothing.

Lillian had been missing for more than a year before authorities were tipped about possible foul play. In October, San Bernardino County child welfare officials received an anonymous letter warning that the child might be in danger, and the Sheriff’s Department was called in to investigate.

Investigators interviewed Sharon and John Gill at their home and became suspicious because of the couple’s uncooperative behavior, Patterson said. “They were evasive in their answers,” Patterson said. “They went so far as to question why the department was even at their home.”

The mother told detectives that Lillian was staying with a family friend in Milan so she could attend a school for autistic children. When the investigators asked the couple for that friend’s address, the couple told them to leave, they said. The Gills hired attorneys soon afterward.

“It didn’t make any sense that she would be sent away at such a young age,” Patterson said.

The investigation stagnated when wildfires began raging through the San Bernardino National Forest in late October but was revived about two weeks ago when a relative of the Gills contacted the Sheriff’s Department and said the girl may have been murdered, Patterson said.

Homicide investigators conducted hundreds of interviews with Sharon Gill’s friends, family and co-workers, and contacted federal and international authorities in an effort to find Lillian. The U.S. State Department had no records showing that Lillian had left the country, and the international police authority Interpol determined that the “family friend” Sharon Gill said was caring for her daughter in Milan did not exist, officials said.

“We’ve completely disassembled [Sharon Gill’s] story.... It didn’t hold any water at all,” Tesselaar said.

Lillian and her younger brother, James, were adopted by the Gills about 1999, Tesselaar said. Authorities are working to obtain Lillian’s adoption records to determine whether she had been diagnosed with autism, attention-deficit disorder or another condition that required extra care. James was taken into protective custody after his mother’s arrest.

“We believe [Sharon Gill] couldn’t cope with her child’s behavior -- whether there were any problems at all,” Tesselaar said. “God only knows where that child is, but the focus of this investigation is to provide her a proper burial and to prosecute the person responsible for her murder.”

Sharon Gill was arrested near Anaheim, at the home of a relative.

She is being held without bail at the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga and is scheduled to be arraigned today.

Neighbors said she didn’t work and that John Gill, a Texas native, restored Chris-Craft boats at a Big Bear marina.

“They were quiet neighbors,” said Nona Muro. “They kept to themselves. I hadn’t seen Sharon outside the house for a year. You would see John mowing the lawn, but you never really saw anybody over there as far as company.”

Muro said Sharon Gill also had a 27-year-old daughter but didn’t know where the daughter lived.

The arrest, next-door neighbor Jeff Butts said, was a major topic of conversation Thursday in Big Bear.

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Times staff writer Allison Hoffman contributed to this report