The mother of a gifted nine-year-old abducted from her bedroom a week ago issued an open letter today pleading for her daughter’s safe return.
Outside the girl’s suburban home, where candles flickered on the doorstep, family friend Jack Jia said her family hopes the letter will play on the conscience of whoever might be keeping little Cecilia Zhang.
“A mother will (gain) tremendous sympathy from the abductor, or the abductors,” Jia said. “Hopefully the abductor will use their own conscience and release Cecilia.”
He added that the letter was directed to three Chinese-language daily newspapers, Sing Tao, Ming Pao and the World Journal, in an effort to reach out to the Chinese community.
“It could be anyone but there is a suggestion that maybe it’s an Asian abductor,” said Jia.
The letter, issued only in Chinese, was not immediately available in translation.
A police spokesman said he didn’t know whether investigators had a part in writing the letter, or whether officers were focusing their search on members of the Chinese community.
Police reported no developments in their investigation over the weekend. “I don’t have any new information,” said police spokesman Sgt. Jim Muscat.
A grid search was still underway and investigators were focusing their efforts on more than 700 calls made to a special tip line. Officers completed a door-to-door canvas of the suburban neighbourhood on Friday.
Community members have opened a TD Canada Trust bank account under the name Help Return Cecilia in an effort to prompt tips that could bring the girl home.
Jia said today the outpouring of community support, including many visitors to the family home and a tearful candlelight prayer service last week, have been well-received by the troubled family.
“I believe there is a big comfort that so many people care about this case,” he said shortly after paying a visit to the family.
On Friday, the girl’s mother made a heartrending first public appearance since Cecilia was discovered missing from her home last Monday morning.
Sherry Xu and her husband Raymond Zhang read from prepared statements Friday. Xu sobbed as she told the girl how much she loved her while assuring the youngster that her parents “never hurt anybody.”
The case has attracted international media attention. On Friday, the couple told their story to America’s Most Wanted, a U.S. television show that features high-profile ongoing criminal investigations. That broadcast was expected to air soon, although a date was not immediately available.
Jia said he had also been contacted for an interview last week by a newspaper in Shanghai.
Over the weekend, the last of the students who had shared the family home moved their possessions out. The students, all originally from China but studying at nearby Seneca College, had been living in the home to help the family pay their mortgage.
Cecilia, a gifted Grade 4 student described as an avid reader and budding pianist, was discovered missing Monday morning when her mother went into her bedroom to wake her for school. A broken screen window at the rear of the top floor of the two-storey home suggested an abduction.
Police soon ruled out that the abduction was the random act of a predator, and said that the possibility Cecilia was kidnapped for profit was one of the “themes” they were exploring.
