| Houseguest Questioned in Connection With Missing Girl |  |
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 VALLEY PARK, Mo. — Authorities in the St. Louis area said they were questioning a man who had been staying in the home from which 6-year-old Cassandra Williamson disappeared Friday morning.
Police refused to identify the man, who was sleeping on the couch of the home in suburban Valley Park, but Cassandra's grandfather said he was a 20-year-old homeless man named Johnny Johnson whom the resident of the house had taken in. Soon after Cassandra vanished, police said they wanted to speak to a white male, about 25 years old, about 5'10", with red hair, a goatee and a thin build, wearing a white shirt, red shorts and black tennis shoes. Cassandra's father, Jim Wideman, told Fox News Channel that Johnson fit that description. "I got one look at him," Wideman said. "I'd never let him stay in my house." Wideman said that Johnson's sister was a friend of Angela Williamson. Several sources said the houseguest had disappeared at the same time Cassandra had, but had returned three hours later, soaking wet and stating that he had gone for a swim. Police said they were questioning him, as well as several other individuals. "We do not have anyone in custody," Eckhard told Fox News Channel. "We are talking to everyone and anyone." Cassandra, called Casey, is blonde, 4 feet tall, and weighs about 48 pounds. She was wearing a white nightgown with red flowers and was barefoot when last seen by her father at about 7:30 a.m. CDT. Her mother, Angela Williamson, said, "She never walks off without telling me she's going somewhere. She doesn't even go to her friend's house without telling me she was going. I just want my baby." Angela Williamson said she and her husband Ernie had recently separated but had been trying to reconcile while she and their children stayed with her parents. Ernie Williamson was staying at a mutual friend's home across the street from Angela's parents' house Thursday night and invited the children to stay with him. Angela then decided to stay, too. Cassandra was in the kitchen of the house at about 7:15 a.m. CDT Friday morning with her father when he left the room briefly to go the bathroom, police said. When he returned, she was gone. He reasoned that she might have gone back across the street to her grandparents' house, but she wasn't there. "We are calling this an abduction and treating it as such," said St. Louis County police spokesman Rick Eckhard. "It was not in her character to leave the home. She's still in her nightgown." Eckhard said there were four adults in the house Cassandra vanished from — apparently her parents, their mutual friend and the houseguest, whom Eckhard said they were questioning but whose name he would not confirm as Johnny Johnson. "No one has been eliminated as a suspect," Eckhard said. Wideman said volunteers and police were searching the woods behind a nearby glass factory. Two police helicopters were being used in the search and a command post was set up not far from the girl's home. As word of the possible abduction quickly spread, volunteers began joining in the search. Many were looking around an area along the Meramec, which runs through Valley Park in southwest St. Louis County. The small town, about 20 miles from St. Louis, also sits along Interstate 44. Several cases of child abductions involving young girls have been in the news in recent weeks. On Tuesday, police said a kidnapped 7-year-old girl, Erica Pratt, escaped from an abandoned rowhouse in Philadelphia. Also this week, a man was charged with kidnapping and killing 5-year-old Samantha Runnion of Stanton, Calif. It also follows the high-profile kidnappings of 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart in Salt Lake City and of two San Diego children, 7-year-old Danielle van Dam and 2-year-old Jahi Turner. Elizabeth and Jahi remain missing; Danielle was slain. |
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