Creature Bones Found in Search for Girl Who Disappeared Fifty-Five Years Ago
A specific zone flagged in a community-driven search for the body of a English child who vanished in Australia 55 years ago has proven to be a false alarm, local authorities said.
A volunteer team who used cadaver detection dogs in the quest for Cheryl Grimmer had hoped their finding would represent a breakthrough in the case, which has remained a unsolved puzzle since she disappeared in the year 1970, when she was just three years old.
But skeletal fragments that were uncovered in the area belong to an non-human creature, police stated in reply to questions, noting that the search had "ended."
Investigators suspect Cheryl, who had moved from Bristol with her family, was abducted from a coastal area in the city in the start of 1970.
Recent Search Efforts
Thursday's search happened in a local suburb, on a small pocket of woodland mentioned in a admission made by a teenage boy.
In the year 2019, a trial of the accused, known only by a codename, the pseudonym, who'd been indicted with the crimes against Cheryl, collapsed. The man, in his sixties then, had rejected any wrongdoing.
Prosecutors later withdrew accusations against him as a judge disallowed the confession he made as a juvenile.
Ongoing Mystery
Authorities have conducted many searches in the years since Cheryl went missing, but have uncovered limited leads as to what occurred to her.
Local officials have announced a one million Australian dollar reward for tips on the case of Cheryl's disappearance and presumed death.
Family's Perspective
Cheryl's brother Ricki Nash, sixty-two, has publicly highlighted what he thinks are errors in the police investigation going back to the time she disappeared.
He was seven then. He last saw his sister in the changing rooms at Fairy Meadow on the day she disappeared.
Public Response
A formal request asking the state parliament to establish an inquiry into cases of disappeared individuals overseen by the police force, such as this one, gathered more than ten thousand signatures this summer.
It was debated in the legislature, but in a response addressing petitioners, state authorities made no promise to conducting an inquiry.
