Press Conference
Public Info. Officer - We are here today to provide an update on 16 yr. old Kiely Rodni. Because this is an active investigation, we'll only be providing information on a certain set of information and facts. We realise there will be more questions, but we're directing anybody to contact our unified command centre through our tipline, and we will help answer those questions as best we can. For the operational and investigative side of the investigation into Kiely Rodni I'd first like to introduce Placer County Sheriff's Detective Sergeant.
DS - First of all, thank you everybody for coming out. This is an amazing community. We appreciate the support for the family, we appreciate everybody's concern. Just to let you know from the investigation side, on the missing persons investigation, we are working with local, state and federal agencies. We're using every tactic we can to try to get any information that might help further our investigation. Any tip that comes in, we're taking all the tips from the tipline from any means, whether it's e-mail, called in, through the conversations with kids, that we met here at the community centre. Those are all being chronologically put into our tip spreadsheet and we're addressing those, prioritising them, and we're taking a look at every single one. If you think you have information and you don't know if it's relevant - we want it. We want any information because we'll follow up on any and every lead that we can. Obviously, we have to prioritise them, so that we can focus our resources and so, those who had first-hand contact with Kiely, who interacted with her, near the time that she was last seen, those take priority. But we're looking at, video that people are sending in, anything. We're looking at time-stamps so that we can create the best timeline possible. Take all that information in. We're committing all the resources we can to follow up.
SAR - I want to let you know at this time we have over 16 agencies involved in our search efforts. In the field, right now, we have over 100 volunteers. Those volunteers are searching on foot, we're using K9's, we're using vehicles, including - motorcycles, UTV's, jeeps and such. We're using air assets to assist in the search and we're also searching on the water using boats. As of this meeting, right now, we've logged over 1500 man hours in our effort. We've received information on Saturday of the initiation of the missing person's report. We moved into a unified command with Placer County and started conducting a search and rescue operation in Nevada County. Throughout Saturday and Sunday the incident was handled by Placer County and Nevada County. As the event expanded, we reached out to partners at the state level, and also federally, to assist us in the search.
Search and rescue operates off of the information that we have available to us. The way that we develop that information and design our search areas, and our objectives, is based off of the clues that we receive from the field while we're searching and the second way that we receive our information is through the development of the investigation. What we need, is the community's help in assisting with providing that information on the investigation and what I would encourage you to do is - if you have that information, we need the information from the community. We need you to take advantage of the tipline and provide us with additional information.
FBI - The FBI has and continues to take instances where the most vulnerable in our society are victimised and we're very happy that we're able to come alongside and partner with Placer County Sherriff's Dept., Nevada County Sherriff's Dept. We've been part of the full investigative team. As of today we had approx. 50 other agents up here helping run down some of those priority information and lead that are coming through, and we're going to continue to partner with both agencies as we see this through.
Captain -
NCSO - First off, I really just want to say thank you for the partnership that we've had in our unified command. Placer County is always a great partner and helps us out quite a bit, and is able to help us expand in the abilities of what we can do in a situation like this. I mean there's so many agencies to list, realistically, but Truckee PD, CHP, FBI, the list goes on and on. And we have a lot of people here giving support to folks in the field. Between our 100-150 law enforcement officials, we have about 100 searchers in the field and people, such as yourselves, that are coming out and providing all the community support. That's really what's gonna be needed to help to hopefully find some clues or some solutions on where we're at and how do we move forward. I think the biggest message I can say is that we're leaving no stone unturned. We're really working as hard as we possibly can. Teams are tired, much like the family, and we're trying to do our best so that we're supporting the family. We've tried to meet with them regularly, and make sure that they have our contact information, and we're trying to be as transparent as possible and continue on in our investigation and our search. Again, I just really want to thank everybody for the partnership and that we're going to continue working throughout this process, and hopefully come up with some positive news that we can bring back to all of you.
Captain -
PCSO - We're all here for one reason, and we appreciate the community's support. We care, many of us are parents. We're involved, we're committed and we'll stay committed. I want to reiterate our relationship with Nevada County Sheriff's Office, FBI. We really appreciate their help. They've come in to help us streamline this process, make it more efficient, make sure we're doing the right thing, based on best practices. So thank you very much to them. I'd also like to thank the California Highway Patrol for allowing us to house our operation centre here, for 1 - to be close to the Truckee Community, more importantly to be close to the family. I'll leave you with a point that I want everyone to know. There's a lot of information coming out there, a lot of people are asking questions. If you have to ask yourself whether or not you should share some information about what happened, you've already answered the question. No information is too small. Every piece of information we're going to put together to build a puzzle, to continue to push forward, to allow the machine to turn. We're not going to back down, we're 100% committed and I appreciate the community coming out here. Please, keep the family in mind, realise that when you're in a (inaudible) with a lot of social media stuff that a lot of it turns out not to be true. We need you to push that information to the tipline. Let the detectives do the work, let this family try to work through this process they're going through. So, I want to appreciate, again, my partners in this endeavour and we appreciate your time.
Behavioural Health (
supporting Kiely's family and the community at large. Advises everyone that there is support available, should they need it.)
Public Info. Officer - We'll continue sending out any updates as we get them. We plan to sent out any potential updates and additional information tomorrow morning in a press release. We can't stress this enough, out of the 200-300 juveniles and young adults' who were at that party, at the Prosser Campground, Friday evening. Somebody knows something about Kiely. We are please, urging and pleading with the community, to please come forward. You will remain anonymous. Please contact us through our tipline, that number is 530 591 6320 option 7. Any bit of information can help lead us to Kiely, so we can bring her home safely to her family. The two captains and the FBI will be available for any questions, should you have any.
Reporter - How many tips at this point have you received? I know as of the update yesterday morning is way more than 100. Is there an update on that?
Public Info. Officer - We still have over 100 tips that our detectives are working through. They're exhausting every single tip and lead. Unfortunately, we still cannot locate Kiely, or her vehicle. That's why we're urging anybody who was at that party that evening to please come forward. We need to find Kiely.
Reporter - Unfortunately, people in our region go missing. It's so rare to see this incredible of a response from LE and the community - How and why is this specific case receiving this response?
Public Info. Officer - We want to leave no stone unturned. We take this case, just like any other missing person's case, extremely seriously. Kiely is considered to be highly at risk right now because she is a minor, and she is missing, and we cannot locate her or her vehicle. We want to thank everybody who has helped us thus far, our law enforcement partners, the community, people who have come forward anonymously to try and lead us to her and we will continue to leave no stone unturned until we bring Kiely home to her family.
Reporter - Now that we have federal resources - Are we able to do anything more with her cell phone and find where it came after the party? Are those resources helping?
Public Info. Officer - Those details are under investigation. Unfortunately, I cannot discuss them, but please be rest assured our detectives are doing everything in their power to try and locate Kiely.
DS - I'll speak to that last question a little bit. We are working with the FBI. Right now the last information we have from cellular data is the 6th at 33 minutes after midnight. All of the tips, and we have over 200 now, that we're working, and we're getting a lot of tips that are duplicate so that's why it's important it comes in through the tipline, so we don't have people duplicating resources. But we are looking at all that information and we're having multiple different departments look at that information, with different resources, but nothing has expanded beyond that timeline at this point.
Reporter - Can you talk a little bit more about the investigation - When people post things on social media that may not be true, how that's impacting your investigation? There was false reports last night that her vehicle had been located.
DS - Again, we will prioritise those tips. If something comes in and it seems like a high priority we're going to throw resources at it. We'll divert resources to address that, to check the veracity of it and if it ends up being a false tip... I don't want to say that to discourage people from bringing information in. We don't want you necessarily to have to weigh the veracity of the tips. If you have information, you think it's pertinent, send it to us. We have a lot of people that are just focused on gathering, organising, triaging and disseminating resources. So, allow us to deal with those tips.
Reporter - We've been out to the campsite a few times and the campers said that they saw you guys yesterday morning, today, early in the morning - What areas are you guys concentrating on today?
DS - A lot of this is going to be focused on the search and rescue effort. This is a multi-faceted investigation, so we are working in conjunction with them, but we do also have detectives working with search and rescue. Obviously, the last location known - our search expands from there, and if we get a tip about another location, we will divert resources and work that to exhaustion. But primarily, we're looking at the last known location, we're expanding beyond there. We're starting with vehicles, OHP's, they're using all those resources, down to - foot patrols, aircrafts. Every resource that we can utilise, we are.
Reporter - There are no surveillance cameras in that campground, are there?
DS - No, and we are accepting video from people who were involved. So, that's coming in to a single source so that that team can evaluate it, look through the video, surveillance video from other areas. We did actually have some surveillance video from a store at 6 o'clock the day before, that showed Kiely and so we have that information, but again, it doesn't expand our timeline. It doesn't really tell us anything that we didn't know, but still, it's great, it confirms a timeline that we already have.
Reporter - Can I ask if there's an Amber Alert going out?
DS - No. We've been working with the state, currently an Amber Alert has not been sent out, but we have utilised a lot other resources that are even wider reaching than the Amber Alert system. And so, we're working with multiple agencies, we've sent bulletins out to local law enforcement agencies, nationwide resources, and if the criteria is met, if we get a tip that points us in that direction, that will meet that criteria, we're going to continue to work with the state. If that becomes appropriate we'll utilise that resource as well.
Reporter - Is that the same as borders being closed off...
DS - All those resources to be able to recognise her, or her vehicle, at borders, any sort of location where we can track people and vehicles, those resources are all being utilised.
Reporter - What type of criteria do you need for an Amber Alert? - because that feels like a really important (
inaudible) at this stage of the investigation?
DS - I don't want to speak to the exact criteria of the Amber Alert, but we're looking at the Amber Alert as a system for notification with a suspected child abduction. Right now, we don't have any evidence that supports an abduction. Like we said, we're not ruling anything out and that's why we're kind of pulling out all the stops. If this was a hiker and they were known to be an area, that would be search and rescue effort because we're searching a very specific area. Because we don't know, we just have that timeline, we're considering everything.
Reporter - So, you're not officially saying this is an abduction?
DS - No, no, but we're not ruling that or any other....you know, we have the same fears and concerns that any of the members of the community and the family have, so we won't rule any possibility out.
Reporter - So, at this point are you still investigating this as an abduction? Is that terminology correct?
DS - The terminology is that we're just investigating this. This is a missing persons case, this is a search and rescue effort. We are investigating using every resource under the umbrella of resources that we have access to. So, what we title it is kind of irrelevant. We're doing everything we can.
Reporter - You have hundreds of teenagers here right now who maybe know (
inaudible). Hearing from you - What is your message to the crowd if someone who knows something there's a fear about their future, like getting into college, things like that. What's your message.
DS - When we spoke to a large group of the kids here at the community centre, we made it clear, we are not investigating there conduct on that night. If you want to report anonymously, if you've heard information from a friend and that friend doesn't want to come forward, please come forward on behalf of your friend and tell us that information, so, we're not investigating you, we are partnering with you to receive any information to help find Kiely.
Reporter - (
Asks about the acreage covered).
Public Info. Officer - Unfortunately, the search is still underway and we don't want to compromise any part of the investigation, so we can't discuss that.
Reporter - (
Asks if the Highways have been searched).
Public Info. Officer - Absolutely, they've been searched on the ground and aerially, from the air.
Reporter - How difficult is it, being so close to the border. How difficult is it to cross that border? Find resources to partner with (
inaudible).
Captain, Nevada County - I think that we're fortunate to have technology on our side. In all reality, dealing with some of those pieces of locating say, a license plate, things of that nature, but in relation to Placer and Nevada County, it's been pretty fluid and things have been going pretty well on that end, as far as crossing state lines and things of that nature, if you mean more like a geographical border - We put everything in place that we can for location of the vehicle, and if there's something where somebody knows where she's at or has information, that's what we're needing to put together. And our hope is that we'll get some sort of piece of information from doing stuff like this and people in the community that really care and want to have some help in solving this.