For seven days, Lucilla Rawsaw Harris’ family had no idea where to find the 72-year-old woman with dementia. But on Saturday morning, she was found dead in Henry County, where she may have been for nearly a week after leaving her southeast Atlanta home, police said Monday.
A police officer spoke to Harris within hours of her driving away from her home. But at the time, Harris had not yet been reported missing. And once she was reported missing, it took two days for Atlanta police to issue a statewide alert, GBI records show. Atlanta police declined to say Monday why the Mattie’s Call, created to alert the public to missing elderly or demented people, was not issued the same day Harris was reported missing.
It’s not known if an earlier alert would have led to a happier ending. Harris’ death remained under investigation Monday, as law enforcement in two counties worked to fill in the gaps between when she was last seen alive and when she was found dead in the woods.
Hours after she was last heard from on the afternoon of Nov. 23, a Henry County police officer pulled Harris over after spotting her weaving on East Fairview Road around 11:40 p.m., according to Sgt. Joey Smith. Harris told the officer she was trying to get back to Atlanta, and the officer gave her directions, Smith said.
Harris hadn’t been reported missing then, and the officer had no way of knowing she was in danger.
Then, early Nov. 24, a home surveillance camera near Stockbridge captured Harris shuffling across a back deck wearing slippers, a nightgown and light coat, according to police. Shortly before 4 a.m. that morning, the camera showed Harris walking to a door of the home but walking away without knocking, the home’s resident told Channel 2 Action News.
On Nov. 25, Harris’ 2005 Saturn was found abandoned, but the missing-person report had not been completed then, police said. It would be several days before police determined the car was associated with a Mattie’s Call alert.
“(If we) have evidence to show it’s connected to a crime or a missing person, we’ll impound it immediately, but in this case we just didn’t have that information,” Smith told Channel 2.
Around the same time the Saturn was found, Harris’s niece called 911 on Nov. 25 to report that she hadn’t been heard from in two days, according to an Atlanta Police Department report obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Harris’ southeast Atlanta home on Grange Drive was empty and her car was gone, according to police.
Harris’s niece told police the woman suffered from dementia and had once been missing several years ago, but was later found in good health, the police report states.
“As a result of the officer’s investigation, a police report was completed and Ms. Harris and her vehicle were placed on GCIC (Georgia Crime Information Center) as a missing person at the conclusion of the on-scene investigation by approximately 6:30 p.m.,” Officer John Chafee with APD said Monday in an emailed statement.
But it was two days later that Atlanta Police Department requested a Mattie’s Call for Harris, according to the GBI, which publicizes the alerts once it receives the information. Late Friday, Harris’ car was found abandoned in Henry County, about 15 miles from her home, according to that county’s police department. The next morning, her body was found about 50 feet away.
Mattie’s Call alerts, established in 2006, are used for elderly or disabled people, according to the GBI. Local police agencies determine if cases require such an alert. Individuals with dementia or other cognitive impairment meet the criteria.
Harris most likely died from exposure to the elements, Henry County Coroner Donald Cleveland said Monday. Routine toxicology tests are pending, he said. It’s not possible to determine exactly when Harris died, Cleveland said.
Harris’ family declined to speak about the investigation Monday. Funeral arrangements have not yet been finalized.
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