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Search Continues For Missing Girl

Clay County Deputies Say Girl Never Came Home From School

POSTED: Monday, October 19, 2009
UPDATED: 8:11 am EDT October 20, 2009

Clay County sheriff's deputies are stepping up their search of an Orange Park neighborhood for a girl who they said has been missing since Monday afternoon.

Deputies said 7-year-old Somer Renee Thompson was last seen in the Grove Park neighborhood. They said the girl's mother called police and said her daughter never returned home from school.

Somer is described as 3 feet, 5 inches tall and 65 pounds with brown hair in a pony tail. She was last seen wearing a cranberry-colored jumpsuit with pink striped sleeves. She also had a black, pink and white colored backpack with a skull and hearts.

Early Tuesday morning, Clay County Sheriff Rick Beseler said the search encompassed a one-mile radius around the girl's school, Grove Park Elementary. As daylight breaks, he said the search will be expanded farther.

Beseler said deputies had been out all night using infrared cameras and dog teams to search the wooded areas. Beseler said they have also finished interviewing all the registered sex offenders in the area. Tuesday morning, teams were continuing to search the wooded areas within the one-mile radius.

Beseler added that 10 days ago, the Orange Park Police Department received a call about some people in a blue Nissan trying to lure a girl into their car. The police report said about 10 days ago, a 5-year-old girl on a bicycle was riding about a block from where Somer was last seen. The report said a Hispanic female was drivinig a blue Nissan Sentra with two Hispanic male passengers. The two men approached her and told her to get into the vehicle, according to police. She screamed and rode her bike in the opposite direction. The car sped off in an unknown direction, police said. A woman who witnessed the incident called police. Police said the 5-year-old girl told them that the Hispanic woman in the car told her to get in the car.

Beseler is asking residents in the Grove Park area to look through their yards, parked cars and adjacent properties. He asked if you see anything unusual, then please call police.

Deputies and detectives from every branch of the Clay County Sheriff's Office, approximately 100 personnel, are looking for Somer Thompson. Additional support is also being provided by the agencies surrounding Clay County, such as St. Johns and the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has also assigned a member to assist Clay County, along with staff from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE).

The Clay County Sheriff's Office has utilized reverse 911 as well as the school system's automated phone message system to get information about Somer to as many households as possible as quickly as possible.

Deputies said the girl was last seen at 2:45 p.m. walking home from Grove Park Elementary School near West Gano Avenue and Debarry Avenue with her twin brother and her sister, but separated from them after an argument and ran toward her home.

"We are still hoping she is somewhere in someone's home and we're hopeful we will get more calls on Tuesday," Beseler said. "We haven't ruled anything out yet."

Deputies said the girl's mother was outside in the neighborhood looking for the child when she flagged down a passing deputy and reported the incident. The girl's father lives in North Carolina and has been contacted.

Map Missing Orange Park Girl
The family lives in the 1700 block of Horton Drive in Orange Park.

"We would ask that the public assist us in providing any information that anyone may have about this little girl's whereabouts," Beseler said. "Anyone that's in this vicinity, please be vigilant, be looking, search around the area and call us if you saw anything."

Anyone with information is asked to call 911 or the CCSO non-emergency line at 904-264-6512 or 911.

Somer Renee Thompson

Somer Renee Thompson
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