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Breaking News
No Match Between Rilya Wilson and Body Found in Kansas City
Aired May 10, 2002 - 10:02 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We want to start this hour with some breaking news out of south Florida, and it is the case of the missing little girl, Rilya Wilson. She is the five-year-old, who slipped through the cracks and has been missing for a year, and she was missing for year before child welfare officials even realized it.
DNA tests are complete. There is not a match, there is no match between Rilya and the headless body of a little girl who was found in Kansas City, Missouri.
Our Susan Candiotti has been following the story for us, and she joins us now with the latest -- Susan, hello.
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn. This information is coming to us from a source who is very familiar with the case. However, Kansas City police officials will not comment on our report until a news conference, which is scheduled for this afternoon at 2:00 Eastern Time.
This information, the fact that there is no DNA match between Rilya Wilson and the unidentified body of that murdered little girl, a little girl who has come to be known as Precious Doe in Kansas City, really brings things back to ground zero for police investigators here in Miami-Dade County, because if they had any hope at all of at least identifying or making a match, they don't have that hope any more. So that means that they are continuing with their investigation, talking to all of the parties involved.
Just to recap here, you will recall that Rilya Wilson is a missing five-year-old little girl, who last had a recorded visit with the child welfare agency here in Florida back in January of 2001. The reason they thought there might be a match between her and Precious Doe is that Precious Doe disappeared in April of 2001. And so the timeframe was a little bit close. However, fingerprints and palm prints did not match. Now, this DNA test that was conducted is conclusive evidence that there is no connection.
Now, to recap, in January of 2001, a caseworker, according to the caretaker of Rilya Wilson, came by to pick up the little girl for tests. And that is the last time the woman, who says she is the grandmother of Precious Doe, that's the last time she saw -- or rather the grandmother of Rilya Wilson, she says that's the last time she saw her. Now, the reason we say the woman, who calls herself the grandmother, is because there was no blood test ever done to determine exactly who the father is. This woman believes she is the paternal grandmother of Rilya Wilson.
Now, there was a news conference earlier this day at police headquarters, Miami-Dade police headquarters, and we do have some new information coming to us from the director of police here. And he tells us that, among other things, they have been talking to a lot of different people.
They also conducted lie detector tests of the women who were taking care of Rilya Wilson. And he revealed that the lie detector tests, to which the women submitted themselves voluntarily and without having a lawyer present, that according to the police chief -- quote -- "They showed deception, and that they failed the lie detector test."
However, they stress that they are not calling anybody a suspect in this case. And we do know, according to the lawyer who represents the grandmother, that she is on medication. And the lawyer has said that no matter what the test results are of the lie detector, that he believes that they cannot be thoroughly trusted, because she is taking a lot of medication.
Again, lie detector tests, polygraphs are considered to be an investigative tool, and police stress that it is one of many tools they are using as part of the investigation. And they continue to say that at this time, they do not consider the grandmother and her sister to be suspects in this case. They haven't ruled anybody in or anybody out, they say -- Daryn.
KAGAN: Susan Candiotti in Florida. So we know that it is not a match with Precious Doe in Kansas City, but that leaves two big questions. One, where is Rilya Wilson? And who was the little girl who had her tragic ending in Kansas City, Missouri? The story goes on -- Susan, thank you so much.
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