Free Republic

OCILLA - When Kenyatta McDonald's house burned down this summer and she lost everything, it was Tara Grinstead who made sure the high school senior had what she needed. "I was mainly worried about school and how I was going to pay for things because we were struggling," she said. Grinstead bought her things she wanted and things she needed, such as clothes and shoes. "She was right there, even if I needed a hug or a shoulder to cry on she was there," McDonald said. This year, she saw Grinstead three times a day - before school and on...

Ocilla, GA (Crime Library) - As the hunt for Tara Grinstead enters its third week, investigators over the weekend combed the shoreline and waters near Paradise Lake, looking for any clue to the young woman's fate or whereabouts, and recovered a woman's t-shirt. Spokesmen for the Ocilla Police Department and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation could not immediately be reached for comment. But according to sources familiar with the probe, authorities recovered the T-Shirt, an oversized garment emblazoned with the words "Irwin County Woman's Softball." And have forwarded it to a crime lab for testing. "It's the kind of thing...

OCILLA - More than 100 people gathered Wednesday to search parts of rural Irwin County for any trace of Tara Grinstead, a high school history teacher reported missing Monday. Grinstead, a 30-year-old Hawkinsville native, was last heard from Saturday, law enforcement officials said. Friends describe the former beauty queen as a bubbly, vivacious and outgoing person who never met a stranger. She decided on a teaching career, they said, because she wanted to help people. Grinstead, a former Miss Tifton and a contestant in the Miss Georgia pageant, was last seen at a beauty pageant she attended Saturday in Fitzgerald,...