Authorities in Alabama have uncovered no evidence of the mysterious toddler Carlee Russell described in a 911 call before her brief disappearance.
“The Hoover Police Department has not located any evidence of a toddler walking down the interstate, nor did we receive any additional calls about a toddler walking down the interstate, despite numerous vehicles passing through that area as depicted by the traffic camera surveillance video,” the press release sent out Tuesday night.
Russell, a nursing student, vanished from the side of I-495 in Birmingham Thursday night after calling 911 to report a child walking alone along the side of the road. After speaking with dispatchers, Russell phoned her sister-in-law and reiterated what she saw, telling her she was pulling over to help the unaccompanied child.
The family member then “lost contact with her, but the line remained open,” police said.
When authorities arrived on the scene just minutes later, they found Russell’s car abandoned as well as some personal items — including her wig, phone and purse — but no sign of Russell nor the child she described.
Prior to her disappearance, police noted Russell stopped in at a Target on Highway 280 to buy some “snack food type items.” Those groceries were not found anywhere in or around Carlee’s car.
Russell returned home over the weekend, some 49 hours after she disappeared. In security footage taken from her neighborhood just before she arrives, she is seen “walking down the sidewalk alone,” police said.
While the details of Russell’s whereabouts while she was missing were not provided, police said “numerous evidentiary items” are still being processed. They are “key in the processes of determining exactly what took place in the approximately 49 hours Carlee was missing.”
Her mother, Talitha Robinson-Russell, during a recent appearance on the TODAY show alleged her daughter was kidnapped, but police have not confirmed this.
