Theresa Parker Update: Personal Property Search

Walker County residents could have a part in helping find Theresa Parker.

The missing 9-1-1 dispatcher hasn't been seen in three months and up until now, there have been very few leads in the case.
But the Georgia Bureau of Investigation hopes that will change.
And the agency is asking people to search for clues in their own backyards.

Searching his 15-acre property for items relating to missing dispatcher Theresa Parker wasn't originally in Benny Voiles' weekend plans.

Voiles: "I will...probably sooner than this weekend, well when I get home tomorrow from work." 

Walker County Sheriff Steve Wilson and the G-B-I are asking Walker, Catoosa and Chattooga county residents to comb their personal property, looking for a cell phone, a purse, or the clothes Theresa was last seen in.

Wilson: "We feel like that the property owners know their property better than anyone they've been over that property, maybe some of it has been in the family a generation or two and they know the grounds that they're going to be walking upon."

And they would know if anything looked out of place or suspicious.  Areas of interest include abandoned wells, mine shafts -- anywhere there might be an old, deep hole.
Voiles says as a member of the community, he feels a duty to look.

Voiles:"My girlfriend and I read a lot and talk about Theresa a lot wanting to find her, you know if we could find anything that would be wonderful, and the neighbors also."

Wilson recognizes asking residents to conduct their own search is unorthodox.

Wilson:"We are pulling out all types of different things trying to generate information that would help us locate Theresa Parker."
    
Voiles: "We want her home whatever we have to do in this community to get her home or find her, for her family."

A challenge Voiles and many other residents take to heart -- and now to their own backyards. 

Wilson says if an elderly or disabled person wants to search their property, deputies will help them do so.
     Also, if anyone finds anything they think is related to Theresa Parker, leave it where it is and call 911.