Canton Police officers were looking for a child who might have been hiding or who had perhaps gone to a friend's house without her mother's permission after getting a call last month that 7-year-old Jorelys Rivera was missing.
It would be three days before the grim truth was confirmed: Somewhere between her home and the playground at the River Ridge Apartments, Jorelys was snatched.
A friendly child with an independent streak, Jorelys had a history of running away, according to Canton Police Chief Jeff Lance. He talked exclusively and in detail with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution this week about his department’s response to the crime and revealed, for the first time, details of the investigation that have yet to be made public.
The police department's handling of the search for Jorelys has drawn criticism from inside and outside law enforcement, and launched a city inquiry into the investigation. Lance took time off from work during the search. Cherokee County Sheriff's deputies who missed blood evidence have been reprimanded. But Lance said it was a the work of the Canton Police that ultimately broke the case.
The investigation made national news as it played out over five days, her sexually molested body discovered in a trash compactor on day three, an apartment maintenance man charged on day five with stabbing and bludgeoning her to death.
A question posed by the public is why it took so long for officers to treat this as an abduction case.
Investigators, according to Lance, were told Jorelys had an argument with her mother the previous evening and she had probably run away from home. And things weren't perfect at home.
The Division of Family and Children Services says Jorelys' mother, Joselinne Rivera, was investigated several months ago for improper supervision of the children. Neighbors told police Joselinne Rivera's children had gone unsupervised.
Additionally, a runaway kid was not an uncommon occurrence for police, who two weeks earlier had responded to a report of a young girl about the same age who disappeared from the same apartment complex. The girl was discovered a few hours later hiding behind a dumpster.
Lance said his department's response wasn't perfect, but he would give it an 8 out of 10. He pointed out that officers found the crime scene, located the body and made an arrest within five days which he said is statistically rare in law enforcement.
He said that since the arrest of Ryan Brunn, a 20-year-old maintenance worker at the complex, charged in the crime, it has been very difficult for him and his department to hear rumors that the case was mishandled.
“If people doubt my devotion to this city,” Lance said, “it is a punch to me because I’ve spent a large amount of my time here and my devotion to the city has been the same from day one.”
On Thursday, Jorelys Rivera's father, Ricardo Galarza, who lives in Puerto Rico, told Mundo Hispanico the authorities haven’t kept him informed of the investigation and prosecution of the man charged in her killing. "I have learned how things were going through other people," said Galarza.
Lance dismissed the father's criticism. He treasures a card that the Rivera and Torres family sent to thank the department for their care and concern, and for all the sleepless nights they spent on the case.
Lance said Mayor Gene Hobgood, and city Manager Scott Wood, and the city council, have also been supportive of his and the department’s handling of the Rivera case, and so have people he runs into on the street.
“I was coming out of Wendys' and some guy came up to me and said ‘hey, you’ll make it through this,’ because they know me,” said Lance.
But former Canton Police Chief Billy Cantrell, who considers Lance a friend, said, given what he knew about the case, that a 7-year-old girl was missing, Lance should have canceled his morning off even though he had a team in the field supervising the search.
“A seven year old girl that is missing is very serious and you’ve got to take care of it, you cancel your time off,” said Cantrell.
The former chief said what is most important coming out of the review of Lance’s and the department’s performance is that it “clear the air with the citizenry. Let the political aspect of it take care of itself. But if he loses the community he’s going to have a hard road.”
City manager Scott Wood and mayor Hobgood said their decision to ask for an outside review of the department’s handling of the case was mainly to address questions raised by the media and to determine if the search and investigation might have been handled better or differently. “We’re calling this a review for a reason,” said Wood. “This is not an investigation of an investigation.”
The Chief said, after he got a call from investigators, he actually cut short time off that he was spending with his son on Saturday Dec. 3 (the day after Jorelys vanished) and got to the scene at around 10 a.m.
By then, officers had already partnered with volunteers from the Cherokee Search and Rescue Team, the Canton Fire Department and Cherokee County Sheriff's Department to go door-to-door questioning residents.
Cadaver dogs searched the trash compactor where Jorelys body was discarded and picked up a scent. But, because it was a windy day, they alerted on a nearby wall with a storage room. The puzzled officers kept searching the storage room and finding nothing, Lance said.
But what most of the public didn't know, said Lance, was that -- even with the GBI and FBI assisting in the investigation by the third day, it was work by the Canton police detective who finally broke the case open when they discovered the crime scene and realized she was not simply missing.
It was the same day that the GBI Child Abduction Response Team was called to assist in the search by Cherokee County Sheriff, Roger Garrison.
A day later, Jorelys' body was found in a trash compactor.
Garrison, who has said the GBI should have been called in sooner, said he supports the review.
Garrison said he looked at Jorelys' body when it was pulled from the trash compactor and what happened to her troubled him deeply.
"I saw her," Garrison said. "I saw her and I wonder if she stayed in that dumpster 48 hours longer than she had to."
Lance said that he didn't summon the state's CART team sooner because he didn't know it was an available resource. The team had never been needed before because child abductions occur so infrequently, Lance said.
Nothing the police could have done would have saved Jorelys. An autopsy found she died within two hours of her disappearance and before the family notified police. However, Lance believes that if officers had not flooded the area and kept close watch over the comings and goings of complex residents, her body might have been smuggled out of the complex and disposed of someplace where it may never have been found.
“I take it as a learning experience,” Lance said of the criticism and inquiry by the city. “We’re going to make what’s bad out of it become good, bottom line.”
Jeffrey Lance
Age: 45
Occupation: City of Canton Police Chief
Professional Experience: Employed by Canton Police since 1991. Over the next two decades he rose through the ranks occupying a variety of roles including traffic enforcement officer, shift sergeant, narcotics investigator, field training officer and eventually the administrative roles of lieutenant, assistant chief and chief.
Education: Lance graduated high school in Richmond, Va.; he attended two colleges and a technical school in Virginia.
Salary: $80,608
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