In September 2006,
police acting on a tip tore up the concrete floor of the garage and used a cadaver dog to search unsuccessfully for DeJesus's body. Investigators confiscated 19 pieces of evidence during their search but declined to comment on the significance of the items then.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/3-ohio-women-missing-for-years-found-alive-1.1391759Search for Gina DeJesus comes up empty Almost 10 hours after police began combing through a house on Cleveland's West Side, the anxious family of Gina DeJesus got word that the missing girl had not been found.
The news, delivered by an FBI agent who stayed with the family all day, gave the girl's parents some relief but rekindled the heartache they have felt every day since April 2, 2004 – the day she disappeared on her way home from Wilbur Wright Middle School.
“I know deep in my heart that my baby's still out there,” Gina's mother, Nancy Ruiz, said.
Certain that her daughter is still alive, she pleaded for whoever has Gina to “let her go. Just let her go so she can come home.”
Gina's father, Felix DeJesus, looked drained and close to tears when the search ended about 7:30 p.m. He said the news didn't make dealing with Gina's disappearance easier. He said the hardest part remains not knowing what happened to his daughter.
She was 14 when she disappeared.
The house police searched belongs to Mathew Hurayt, a 35-year-old registered sexual predator, who was arrested Thursday.
Police had received a tip that Gina's body was buried under the garage.
Police also arrested John McDonough, a man who lived at Hurayt's house. They were both held on suspicion of aggravated murder. But by nightfall, Cmdr. Ed Tomba said neither man would be charged in Gina's disappearance.
Hurayt and McDonough, however, were kept in City Jail overnight.
This is at least the fifth time police have executed a search warrant in the case only to come up empty-handed.
“We're disappointed that the search wasn't as fruitful as we hoped,” police Lt. Thomas Stacho said. “But we would have been remiss if we didn't investigate this lead.”
Early in the day, Mark Marein, a lawyer representing Hurayt in a separate case, guaranteed that his client was innocent and police were wasting their time searching the house. News that his client had been cleared Friday night raised his ire about how the search was handled.
“Well, isn't that a surprise?” Marein said. “Did they find Jimmy Hoffa instead?”
He chastised police for causing irreparable harm to Hurayt's reputation.
“They ought to be ashamed of themselves,” Marein said. “He's already been tried and convicted in the media. It is insulting how they could do this to this man. Terribly insulting.”
Stacho defended his department's actions. He said that after receiving the tip, investigators were morally and ethically obligated to conduct the search.
He said public records laws prevented police from withholding the names of the men and that the media made the decision to name them without waiting for charges to be filed.
With the help of the FBI, police began to search the house about 10 a.m. The presence of dozens of police, several media trucks and TV helicopters hovering overhead drew hundreds of people.
Among them was one of Hurayt's childhood friends, Tamara Keener, who no longer lives in the neighborhood. She said she didn't believe Hurayt was capable of murder.
“Yeah, he's a sex offender. But he served his time and learned his lesson,” she said. “I can't believe he would do anything like that.”
During the search, detectives and FBI agents went through each room of the house collecting evidence. City public service workers cut the garage's cement floor into sections and removed the pieces. A backhoe scraped away the sandy foundation. In all, police dug nearly 5 feet. They also dug nearly 3 feet beneath a doghouse.
They found nothing to connect Hurayt or McDonough to Gina's disappearance. About 7:30 p.m., they concluded they were in the wrong place.
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2013/05/search_for_gina_dejesus_comes.html
