BRING CLEO BACK
Cleo Smith cops offer $1MILLION reward to find ‘Aussie Maddie’ as they say missing girl, 4, WAS snatched
POLICE searching for Cleo Smith are offering a $1million reward to help find her - as they admit she was likely snatched from her tent.
Cleo, four, vanished from her family's remote camp site in Western Australia early on Saturday morning.
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A huge six day search - named Operation Rodia - has uncovered very little with police now admitting they believe she was kidnapped as her parents slept.
Detective Superintendent Rod Wilde said police "hold great fears for her safety".
He added: "The information we have received, we have not been able to locate her, we imagine we would locate her given the amount of resources and the detailed search that is taking place, that leads us to believe that she was taken from [the campsite]."
Deputy Police Commissioner Col Blanch said “the likelihood of [Cleo] being taken and removed from the area” is now higher, reports
West Australian Premier Mark McGowan said cops are searching "around the clock" for the little girl while announcing the $1m reward.
He said: "It is a sad situation and very difficult situation.
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"We have ensured that we have delivered all the resources that police have requested in relation to this case. Police are looking around the clock to try and find Cleo right now.
“We’re going to offer a $1 million reward to anyone who provides information that leads us to finding Cleo."
The family's camp where Cleo was last seen is located 47 miles from Carnarvon and 544 miles from Perth.
Cleo's mum Ellie says her daughter woke up at 1.30am on Saturday morning asking for a drink of water - and that was the last time she spoke to her.
Ellie and partner Jake woke up again at around 6am to find Cleo had gone, reports say.
The child along with her pinks pyjamas and red sleeping bag were nowhere to be found.
More than 100 cops, soldiers, volunteers and local Aboriginal bush trackers are currently involved in an “extensive land, sea and air search”.
Members of the homicide squad reportedly joined the search for the girl at the weekend.
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Cops have quizzed all the local registered sex offenders as well as nearby campers - with the probe coming to a standstill, reports say.
Cleo's biological father Daniel Staines has also been questioned as part of standard police procedure but he is not a suspect.
Daniel lives more than 600 miles south of where Cleo was last seen.
The next step for police is to try and trace missing CCTV and dashcam video taken from the area in the hope it could uncover clues.
Locals have been urged to check bins and roadsides for the red sleeping bag that Cleo was using the night she disappeared.
The local land search for Cleo is expected to end in the next 24 hours with the hunt for the child going nationwide.
Detective Superintendent Wilde said: ";We have got the nation looking for Cleo.
“Today’s announcement is to say everyone needs to be looking for Cleo.
“Look at people who have acted strangely since the 16th (of October), look at people who have been in that area … ask questions.
“We are keeping a very open mind in this investigation.”
Inspector Jon Munday said yesterday that a new piece of information suggests Cleo was snatched by someone.
He told reporters that the four-year-old was too short to reach the zipper to open her tent on her own.
This rules out the theory that Cleo left the camp site on her own.
Munday said: "One of the major circumstances that has given us the cause for alarm for Cleo’s safety is the fact that one of those zippered entryways was opened.
Four key clues
POLICE searching for missing Cleo Smith are faced with four crucial lines of enquiry that suggest she may have been snatched.
Missing sleeping bag: Not only was there no sign of Cleo when her parents woke, but her red and black sleeping bag was also gone. Experts question whether she would have taken it with her if she had simply wandered off on her own. Police released a photo of a similar bag, along with Cleo's distinctive pink pyjamas. They urged local residents to check their bins in case evidence had been dumped inside.
Tent zip "too high": The door flap on the family tent was had been zipped so high it would have been impossible for a four-year-old to reach, said Inspector Jon Munday. He added: “The positioning of that zipper for the flap is one of the circumstances that has caused us to have grave concerns for Cleo’s safety. That tent has been thoroughly examined by our forensic team.”
"Screeching car tyres": Deputy Police Commissioner Darryl Gaunt confirmed cops were looking into a camper’s report of a car heard screeching about 3am - 90 minutes after Cleo's mum last saw her in the tent. “It’s a little bit unsubstantiated but we’re not ruling it out,” he said, adding it was just one of several reports from people who noticed odd activities and noises overnight.
Usual suspects: Police said between ten and 20 sex offenders were known to be in the area around the Blowholes campsite, near Carnarvon, Western Australia. Detectives said they have spoken to them all to check their movements, and none are suspects at this stage. They also conceded said any kidnapper could have left the area before police set up roadblocks.
“The positioning of that zipper for the flap is one of the circumstances that has caused us to have grave concerns for Cleo’s safety.”
Munday confirmed that police had not identified any suspects.
Her mum Ellie said her daughter would never have run off by herself
She said: “She’s lazy when it comes to walking. She would never leave that tent alone."
Dr Graham Hill, an ex-Scotland Yard detective who worked on the Madeleine McCann probe, agrees that the child was probably kidnapped.
He children usually only disappear for two reasons: either they wander off or have an accident, or they are taken.
Dr Hill said: “Bearing in mind she’s only a small little girl, she’s not going to get that far.
“Little girls and boys get tired really quick and in the middle of the night they are half asleep anyway.
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“The real complication, from what I can see, is the fact that her sleeping bag’s gone missing.
“I would say it’s a remote chance that she’s got up wandered off and taken her sleeping bag with her.
“But I think that’s highly unlikely because there’d be some disturbance.
“You’d see where she dragged the sleeping bag, and how far is a four-year-old child going to get in the dark?”
Police said they are investigating reports that a car was heard screeching around the area at 3am on the morning Cleo vanished.
Deputy Police Commissioner Darryl Gaunt said: “It’s a little bit unsubstantiated but we’re not ruling it out."
He added it was just one of several reports from people who noticed odd activities and noises overnight.
Gaunt said police had “investigated and responded to the vast majority” of these reports and had been able to explain “most of them”.
Speaking about the search for her daughter earlier this week, mum Ellie said: "We’re going to find her — we have to."
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Asked if someone may have taken the four-year-old, Ellie said someone has to know where she is.
"It's been four days - they have to," she says.
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