Family questions police’s commitment to finding missing Hanover woman

WESTERN BUREAU:

The family of a young woman from Hanover, who went missing some five months ago, is accusing the parish’s police of negligence in the effort to find her.

The missing woman is 18-year-old Amanda Anderson, who was 17 years old when she went missing on August 9 last year. According to the missing woman’s aunt, Sancia Anderson, she disappeared during a routine shopping visit to Lucea with her elderly grandmother.

The aunt explained that alarm bells went off after her niece, a past student of Green Island High School, did not turn up at their home in Brissette, Hanover, after her visit to Lucea. She lived with her grandparents because her mother is currently in the United States. Amanda was slated to join her mother last September.

“She and her grandmother went into the town, and she said she was going to buy something. Her grandmother realised that she was taking a while. She thought that she was going to take about 10 minutes, but she was taking too long. When she saw evening come and nuh see her, she started to worry. The next day she was even more worried,” Sancia told The Gleaner on Tuesday.

Amanda was reported missing at the Lucea Police Station the following day. At the same time, her aunt says that her family attempted to investigate by calling cell service provider Flow. Amanda’s SIM card was reportedly purchased in her aunt’s name, so the family requested the last numbers she contacted before going missing. She further stated that the family learned that Amanda called an older male cousin.

“Flow gave me the number and mi type it inna my phone. Mi see say a one of mi male cousin name come up. Mi even type it over because mi a say a cyaa this ya number because a mi cousin number,” she said.

Concerned by this information, the family contacted the cousin, who informed them that Amanda had supposedly called to request a trip to Montego Bay for a job interview. However, her aunt told The Gleaner that she is not convinced by his statement. “Mi think say something wrong because he claimed to [have] carried her on an interview, but there is no way a person can go to an interview in a [camouflage] shorts and a top. Mi start ask questions and then he said that he dropped her off in MoBay at a hotel,” she said.

DISAPPOINTED

The aunt said the family reported this information to the police, but the cousin was never questioned by law enforcement. She said she is disappointed and believes that the Hanover police are not doing enough to locate her niece.

“When a person is missing and you’re the last person known to be with them, even if you are a family member, they are supposed to lock you up and further the case. They did not do anything about it,” she said.

Superintendent Andrew Nish, the police commander for Hanover, told The Gleaner that the investigation into the disappearance of Amanda is currently ongoing. However, he said the girl’s family is not giving the expected cooperation.

“We are stilling looking into the matter but unfortunately, we are not getting the full cooperation of the grandmother, and she was the one who reported the child missing. We have reached out to the child’s mother and from what we are seeing, she has no real interest in that matter. We have even contacted the child’s grandfather, but he seemingly has not been in contact with the family members,” he said.

Nish stated further that police investigations have revealed that Amanda ran away in 2023 and returned home after “several months.”

“We are still looking into the matter, and we hope to have the matter resolved,” said Nish.

However, Amanda’s mother, Nicola Hadden, is rejecting the claim that the family is not cooperating with the police, saying her father has never been contacted by the police.

“The police have never reached out to me. I had to reach out to the police in Montego Bay because Lucea police are not doing anything. If they had reached out to my dad, he would have done everything to assist. Everybody knows my dad because he sells in the Lucea market. Every time my dad saw her school uniform, he got sick, so I don’t know why he wouldn’t want to help the police,” said Hadden.

Hadden, too, has questioned her cousin’s assertions and is requesting police assistance in locating her daughter.“I don’t know what to believe because my cousin told me that he took her to Montego Bay to look for a job. He said he left her at a particular hotel and when he got back there, she was gone.”

She further accused the police of ignoring the probe since Amanda had previously left home.