LUMBERTON — The FBI now is asking any Robeson County resident who may have surveillance video that may help investigators find a 13-year-old girl who was kidnapped on Nov. 5 to call so the recording can be studied for helpful information.
The search for video recordings and still photographs had centered on Rosewood Mobile Home Park, where Hania Noelia Aguilar was kidnapped while waiting outside her home for her ride to Lumberton Junior High School, and the intersection of Quincey Drive and Alamac Road, where the Ford Expedition used in the kidnapping was found Nov. 8.
The FBI and the Lumberton Police Department continue to ask for the public’s help as the investigation enters a critical phase, said Shelley Lynch, Public Affairs specialist for the FBI Charlotte Division. Anyone with video or information is asked to call the dedicated tip line at 910-272-5871 or the Lumberton Police Department at 910-671-3845.
The clock is ticking.
“If we do not reach everyone with video soon, that video could be lost as many systems will purge the older footage automatically,” Lynch wrote in an emailed statement. “We are desperately trying to locate additional footage of the stolen SUV to determine when and how it got to Quincey Drive where it was found on Nov. 8. Today, we are expanding our plea for video to all of Robeson County, specifically along Highway 41/Elizabethtown Road and any side streets, especially along Popes Crossing Road, Wire Grass Road, and Lovett Road.”
Investigators are following leads wherever they take them, inside and outside of Robeson County, according to Lynch. No bodies of water have been dragged.
“We have used specially trained dogs and will again likely in the future,” she said. “I’m not going into the nature of their training.”
The FBI is offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information that leads to the finding of Aguilar or that leads to the prosecution of the person or people involved in Aguilar’s kidnapping. The state of North Carolina is offering a reward of up to $5,000.
Aguilar was kidnapped while she was outside her home in the mobile home park located at 3525 Elizabethtown Road in Lumberton. A witness reported seeing a man dressed all in black and wearing a yellow bandana over his face force the teenager into an SUV and drive away.
The SUV was processed by an FBI’s Evidence Response Team the day it was found. Evidence was flown to the FBI lab in Quantico, Va., to be examined.
Investigators continue to ask for the public’s help in identifying a man seen in a surveillance system video walking down Lambeth Street and then turning left on Elizabethtown Road and walking toward Rosewood Mobile Home Park. The man, who appears to be wearing light-colored shoes, a light-colored shirt, and a hoodie walking, was recorded one-quarter mile from Rosewood Mobile Home Park about the time Aguilar was kidnapped.
The FBI has released the video and it can be viewed online at www.fbi.gov. Anyone with information that can lead to the identification of the man in the video is asked to call the tip line. The man in the video also is asked to call the tip line.
