New searches for two young children who went missing in rural Nova Scotia more than four months ago are on the way, involving police dogs trained to look for human remains.
Jack and Lilly Sullivan, four and six years old at the time, reportedly wandered away from home on Gairloch Road in Pictou County May 2 – they have not been seen since.
In a news conference Friday afternoon, RCMP spokesperson Guillaume Tremblay said hundreds of volunteers searched the area.
“We definitely did search thoroughly. Could we have missed something because of the foliage, because of a downed tree, because of the weather, because of daylight hours? Absolutely,” said Tremblay.
Police used dogs earlier in the search but these ones are specifically trained to find human remains.
Investigators are keeping their options open and pursuing “every investigative avenue.”
“Certainly, there’s a lot of work in missing persons investigations, and this is, you know, the next step with our resources,” he said.
He would not say where the searches are happening but they will start soon.
Searches
The disappearance of Jack and Lilly touched not only the community of Pictou County, but the province and beyond.
There have been several searches since they vanished.
RCMP told us in an email, all 8,060 functioning videos of Landsdowne Station and surrounding areas have been reviewed.
In addition to that, over 819 tips have been received and more than 80 people interviewed: some with a polygraph, including those close to the children.
There have been 1,071 tasks assigned, and several items seized including a pink blanket.
$150,000
The province’s major crime unit is leading the investigation under the Missing Persons Act.
They are being assisted by RCMP units in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Ontario along with other national, provincial and municipal police agencies.
It also part of the Nova Scotia’s major rewards program.
If you provide information on where Jack and Lilly are, you could receive up to $150,000 depending on how useful the information is to the case.
with files from Jacob Moore
