Could TikTok and People magazine help solve Washingtons 1st Amber Alert 18 years later?
The 2003 abduction of a Kennewick girl is continuing to draw renewed attention with People magazines coverage of the cold case. Sofia Juarez went missing one day before her 5th birthday after getting a dollar from her mother and following another adult out of the familys Kennewick home. Eighteen years later, as local investigators struggled to get any fresh news on the young girls disappearance, tips started flooding in to the department about a TikTok video that was shot in Mexico and shows a woman with strikingly similar facial features. The woman tells the social media personality interviewing her that she was kidnapped when she was a young child and does not like birthdays. This side-by-side photo shows the woman featured in a TikTok video that police are now investigating as a possible lead in the search for Sofia Juarez, who went missing in 2003, seen here on right at age 5. On Monday night, the unsolved case that has long haunted both current and since retired Kennewick police officers was the True Crime story on People TV, a daily streaming show. The 4-minute segment coincided with the release of a story in the magazine that currently is on newsstands. It asks  Did a viral TikTok video help solve an 18-year missing persons case?  and includes interviews with Kennewicks special investigator, Al Wehner, and Sofias grandmother, Ignacia Juarez. Sofia now would be 23. Here is what has happened in the case to date:   Sofia at 8 p.m. on Feb. 4, 2003, walks out of her familys East 15h Avenue home, believed to be following a relatives boyfriend to a nearby store. A memorial for missing 4-year-old Sofia Juarez sits on the corner of East 15th Avenue and Washington Street in Kennewick in 2003. Molly Van Wagner Tri-City Herald   A witness at about 8:30 p.m. sees a Hispanic boy, between the ages of 11 and 14, approach a young girl on a South Washington Street sidewalk, between East 14th and 15 avenues. He led the girl toward a nearby stopped van, laughing as she was crying.  Sofias mother, Maria Juarez, spends 45 minutes looking for her daughter, then calls Kennewick police. Ten officers join the search, checking yards and convenience stores  not sure if she walked away or was taken by someone. Traffic streams past the intersection where a witness said a boy led Sofia Juarez toward a van stopped on 14th Avenue on Feb. 4, 2003. Bob Brawdy Tri-City Herald   Sofias disappearance became the first Amber alert in Washington state.  The witness contacts police the following day after seeing news reports about a missing girl, and realizing they had seen the initial moments of Sofias abduction. Detectives keep the witness report confidential to help determine if new leads with similar details are credible. Volunteers and police officers line up shoulder to shoulder in a field off West 12th Place in Kennewick to search for clues the day after Sofia Juarez disappeared from her home Feb. 4, 2003. Bob Brawdy Tri-City Herald   Police, firefighters, federal agents, volunteers, dive teams and Army National Guardsman search Sofias neighborhood and homes around the Mid-Columbia and the Columbia River for any sign of the little girls body.  In March 2003, Sofias mother and grandmother travel to Mexico to search for leads in the investigation. Mother Maria Juarez, center, and grandmother Ignacia Juarez carry signs and candles in honor of missing Sofia in 2003. Molly Van Wagner Tri-City Herald   Over the years, the face of the smiling girl with a flower hat and age-progression pictures are featured on the side of a NASCAR race car, on Americas Most Wanted TV show, in New Yorks Times Square and on semi-truck trailers that crisscross the country. The Washington State Patrols Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit unveiled its newest Homeward Bound Trucks at the Kennewick Police Department Headquarters on February 4, 2021. Jennifer King jking@tricityherald.com   Maria Juarez moved to California several years after her daughter went missing. She died in January 2009 from medical complications, and family said shed never given up hope of finding her.  The 18th anniversary of her disappearance is marked in early 2021 with Kennewick police making a renewed push to find her, by getting her face on trailers with the Homeward Bound program and starting a What Happened to Sofia? website.  Detectives in April learn about a 37-second TikTok video with a homeless woman in Culiacan, Sinaloa.  Kennewick police make contact with the womans alleged relatives, who say she is not the missing Sofia and has no connection to the United States.  The woman, who said in the video that she has a drug addiction, checks into a rehabilitation center.  Detectives dont have the authority to just travel to another country. They try to reach out to the woman through the rehab center, but are unsuccessful, in an attempt to confirm her kidnapping story and her identity by comparing her DNA to Sofias on file.  An update on the Sofia website says detectives are trying to find a light blue, silver or gray van that was occupied and sitting on a nearby street that night. The older 1970s to 1980s full-sized panel van looked like a work van with no side windows.  A Kennewick couple offers a $10,000 reward for information leading to the discovery of Sofias whereabouts. Anyone with information is asked to visit the the website, www.go2kennewick.com/1368/What-Happened-to-Sofia. They also can contact Special Investigator Al Wehner at 509-582-1331 or al.wehner@ci.kennewick.wa.us, in addition to calling non-emergency dispatch at 509-628-0333.