The body of a missing 16-year-old girl has been found not far from where she disappeared, police say. Jackie Bensen reports.
A body found Friday morning in a park in Fairfax County, Virginia, has been identified as that of Jholie Moussa, the 16-year-old girl who went missing from her home in the county two weeks ago, officials say.
The teenager's death is being investigated as a homicide.
Multiple police departments and the FBI searched for Moussa, who was last seen leaving home under mysterious circumstances.
Moussa left home in the Alexandria section of Fairfax County on Friday, Jan. 12 after telling her twin sister she was going to a party in Norfolk, nearly 200 miles away, her sister told News4.
Her family reported her missing the next day, and the FBI joined the investigation four days later, on Jan. 17.
The day Moussa disappeared, she seemed distracted after classes at Mount Vernon High School, her twin, Zhane Moussa, said.
"She was doing my hair and then she stopped, for a good minute, to text some more. Then, out of nowhere, she was like, 'I gotta go, I gotta go!'" she said.
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Moussa told her sister she needed to go out for a minute.
After she left, Zhane Moussa sent her a concerned text and got an odd response.
"She texted me that she was going to Norfolk," Zhane Moussa said. "And I'm, like, isn't that more than 3 hours away?"
Later that night, the girls' mother, Syreeta Steward, missed a call from her daughter. Then, she heard nothing. It wasn't like her.
"Normally, she would have responded back to me. If she calls me and I don't answer, she always follows it up with a text," Steward said.
They never heard from her again.
The body that police believe is Moussa's was found 14 days later in a wooded area of Woodlawn Park, less than a mile from where she was last seen in the 4200 block of Sonia Court. An officer found the body, almost entirely covered by leaves, about 11 a.m. Friday.
The preliminary identification of Moussa's body was based on her appearance, including a tattoo, police said. On her right shoulder, she had a tattoo of an infinity loop with her name and her twin's name.
Fairfax County police had entered Moussa into the National Crime Information Center database as a runaway juvenile.
"Based on the facts of the case, there is nothing that indicates that Moussa is in any danger," county police previously said in a statement.
An FBI representative previously said there was not a specific reason why the agency joined the investigation, but they had available resources to help.
Police previously said detectives spoke to about 20 people who had recent contact with Moussa. Many of her friends were not fully cooperating with investigators, police said.
Anyone with information on the case was asked to call Fairfax County police at 703-691-2131, or the FBI at 202-278-2000.
