Sara Packer was being held in lieu of $200,000 bail, charged with endangering the welfare of a child and obstruction of justice in relation to her daughter's disappearance, authorities said. Bail has since been reduced to 10 percent of $10,000 bail, and court records indicate she remained in custody Thursday.
Described by her adoptive mother as "overly stubborn," Grace would leave home for "days at a time" and took $300 in cash from the home when she went missing, investigators said, citing an interview with Sara Packer.
Sara Packer told police she'd last seen her daughter the night of July 8, when she sent Grace to her room following an argument over Grace's request to go to a friend's house.
Packer could not provide an address or a name of the friend in the July 8 fight, court records say. Investigators later identified the friend, who told police Nov. 3 that Grace had never been to the home and there were never plans for her to do so, records say.
Packer had moved to the 900 block of East Cherry Road in Richland Township, Bucks County, near Quakertown. On the morning of July 8, the day Packer claims to have last seen Grace, cellphone records show the phone she'd been using traveling from the area of the Abington home to around the Quakertown home, court records say. The phone was back in the area of the Abington home by late that afternoon.
When Packer finally returned a detective's message Sept. 7, she claimed in a voicemail to have "notified every one of her relatives that Grace is missing," court records say. Interviews in October revealed Packer's father and brother last saw Grace alive during a family picnic July 4 in Laurys Station, North Whitehall Township, and had only been told "in recent weeks" the girl was missing, records say.
Authorities said they are interested in speaking with anyone who encountered Sara or Grace Packer, individually or together, from June on forward, particularly in public places such as retail stores in the Abington and Quakertown areas.
Anyone with such information is asked to contact Bucks County detectives at
buckscrimetips@buckscounty.org or 215-945-3100.
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