What to Know
- Relisha Rudd was last seen March 1, 2014, at a Northeast D.C. motel with a 51-year-old janitor.
- Rudd hadn't been at school since the month before her disappearance.
- Dive teams are searching the Anacostia River.
A new search for Relisha Rudd began on the banks of the Anacostia River before sunrise Friday, after new information led police to an area near the homeless shelter where the child lived, multiple sources told News4.
Relisha was 8 years old when she vanished nearly four years ago. Her disappearance was a stain on city agencies tasked with protecting children.
Police boats, dive teams, cadaver dogs, cadets and numerous police officers gathered at 6 a.m. Friday at a portion of the river that's just a few hundred yards from D.C. General, the dilapidated shelter where Rudd lived with her family. Only News4's cameras were there.
The search Friday was focused on a portion of the river near a sewer outlet and a CSX train bridge. At one point, a dog trained to sniff for cadavers appeared to hit on a spot under the train bridge. A sonar device then inspected the spot.
Massive search along Anacostia river. Dive teams and cadaver dogs searching for Relisha Rudd pic.twitter.com/wwUVPGvfiw
— Mark Segraves (@SegravesNBC4) January 26, 2018
Police also searched the woods along the banks of the river.
Cadaver-sniffing dogs being used in the search can smell through water and hard ground.
Relisha was last seen March 1, 2014, at a motel in Northeast D.C. with Kahlil Tatum, 51, a janitor at D.C. General.
In the years since her disappearance, there has been no sign of Relisha, who would now be 12 years old.
Her grandmother, Melissa Young, said the discovery of her body would be heartbreaking.
"I would be highly upset because I would feel as though she was just thrown away like some garbage," she said.
Relisha's disappearance revealed dangerous shortcomings in several city agencies and prompted the planned closure of D.C.'s largest homeless shelter.
The 8-year-old's family had allowed her to spend time with Tatum before her disappearance. She appeared to have been missing for weeks before officials realized she was gone. Rudd, a second-grader, hadn't been seen at Payne Elementary School since the month before her disappearance.
Police have said Rudd's mother, Shamika Young, knew her daughter was with Tatum and did not report her missing.
Local
Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia local news, events and information
But Young told News4 she did not leave her daughter with Tatum.
"I wasn't under the impression she was missing. I thought she was at my sister's house," Young said. "I didn't want to lose my other three kids. That's why I didn't call the police."
Investigators said on March 10, 2014, Tatum posed as a doctor, telling city officials who were concerned for the girl's safety that she was sick with a neurological disorder and was undergoing treatment. When they asked for documents, "Dr. Tatum" said he would leave them at the shelter.
When officials went to the shelter on March 19, 2014, to pick up the paperwork, they couldn't find "Dr. Tatum" or Rudd. Shortly after, a missing persons report was filed with D.C. police.
The next day, Tatum's wife, Andrea Denise Tatum, was found dead in a motel in Oxon Hill, Maryland. Then, on March 31, 2014, Tatum was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in Kenilworth Park.
Police have said Tatum purchased a shovel, lime and contractor-sized trash bags, and spent a significant amount of time at Kenilworth Park around the time Rudd was last seen. Investigators have looked into the possibility Tatum killed Rudd and buried her in the park, but her body was never found.
In the years since she vanished, investigators and K-9 teams have searched multiple sites, including a construction site and the Anacostia River. It's not known whether they've searched the area that was the focus of Friday's search before.
After Rudd's disappearance, D.C. officials examined how they handled her case. Their report found the District could not have prevented the child's disappearance, citing, in part, misleading information provided by Rudd's family.
The report did suggest, however, more than two dozen policy changes, including matters related to how schools deal with unexcused absences, background checks for homeless shelter employees and fraternization between families and shelter staff.
