{"id":17076,"date":"2012-09-27T16:43:15","date_gmt":"2012-09-27T20:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=17076"},"modified":"2012-09-27T16:57:03","modified_gmt":"2012-09-27T20:57:03","slug":"families-need-help-to-find-missing-teens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=17076","title":{"rendered":"Families Need Help To Find Missing Teens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Runaway Teen Has Mother Puzzled<\/strong><\/p>\n

BY GWEN HAYES<\/strong>
\n Sentinel Editor<\/strong><\/p>\n

On Saturday, September 29, 2012, Aniya Marcellus<\/strong> (pictured, left)<\/strong> will turn 15 years old. But her mother doesn\u2019t know how she will celebrate her birthday because she is not at home.<\/p>\n

Ms. Karen Flenders<\/strong> said her daughter ran away from home 3 weeks ago. This is not the first time she has run away, but this is the longest time she has been gone. As a matter of fact, the teen has left home on several occasions over the past 6 months.<\/p>\n

Ms. Flenders<\/strong> said she cannot put her finger on the reason the teen left home. They had not argued, things seemed okay at school. The mother said she had restricted her daughter from dating and having boyfriends. Although she left home with the cell phone, Mrs. Flenders<\/strong> said it is not activated.<\/p>\n

Aniya<\/strong> started at a new high school in August. She now attends Freedom High School. But several checks with the school have turned up negative results, her mother stated.<\/p>\n

\u201cThings happened the same way this time as before. She leaves for school in the morning, but is not on the bus when it returns in the afternoon. But then when she decides to return, she goes back to school and then the school calls to let me know she\u2019s back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Flenders<\/strong>, who has a month-old newborn and 2 other children, said she has not been able to get out and walk the streets to look for her daughter. They\u2019re in a different community in Lutz and Aniya<\/strong> hadn\u2019t made new friends there.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s kind of shy and quiet. She loves music, going to the mall, and said she was going to run track this year at school,\u201d her mom further explained.<\/p>\n

Family members have been assisting with the search, but have not been able to locate her.<\/p>\n

Aniya<\/strong> has been reported to the Tampa Police Department as a missing person.<\/p>\n

If anyone sees her or knows her whereabouts, please contact P. Regalado<\/strong> at (813) 276-3561, or Ms. Flenders<\/strong> at (813) 728-2047.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Aunt Needs Help To <\/strong>Find Missing Teen<\/strong><\/p>\n

In July, Nadia Tulloch<\/strong> asked for help in locating her niece, Nngozi Evans (pictured, right)<\/strong><\/strong>, 15. Ms. Tulloch<\/strong> is the guardian for Evans<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Ms. Tulloch<\/strong> said shortly after she reported Evans<\/strong> missing in July, she was found sitting in the lounge of a motel.<\/p>\n

\u201cI walked in, and she was just sitting there. She was speechless when she saw me, and just came back home.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe talked about her running away, and she said it felt good to be out on her own. She also said she had been prostituting to take care of herself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Tulloch<\/strong> said she found out an adult had rented a motel room for Nngozi<\/strong>, but no one has been able to locate him. Ms.<\/strong> Tulloch<\/strong> said Nngozi<\/strong> has disappeared again.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe left around the middle of August on a Sunday while I was in church. I know she had help, because she took a lot of her clothing. I am in fear of something bad happening to her. She had seen a mental health counselor to talk about her problems, but only for 2 sessions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Tulloch<\/strong> said she was also caring for Nngozi\u2019s<\/strong> two brothers, but when their mother came to visit them, she took the boys with her and never came back.<\/p>\n

\u201cNngozi<\/strong> wrote a letter this time, saying she felt abandoned because her mother took her brothers and left her,\u201d said Ms. Tulloch<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe also said she loved me, but just couldn\u2019t stay with me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tampa Police have been notified, and if anyone knows the whereabouts of Nngozi Evan<\/strong>s, they are asked to contact the police at (813) 231-6130.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Runaway Teen Has Mother Puzzled BY GWEN HAYES Sentinel Editor On Saturday, September 29, 2012, Aniya Marcellus (pictured, left) will turn 15 years old. But her mother doesn\u2019t know how she will celebrate her birthday because she is not at home. Ms. Karen Flenders said her daughter ran away from home 3 weeks ago. This […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":210,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/210"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17076\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}