ap

Skip to content
Aarone Thompson was reported missing on Nov. 14th, 2005.  Police now believe she may have been dead for as long as a year and a half.
Aarone Thompson was reported missing on Nov. 14th, 2005. Police now believe she may have been dead for as long as a year and a half.
Jeremy P. Meyer of The Denver Post.
PUBLISHED: | UPDATED:
Getting your player ready...

Aurora – Police continued Wednesday to look for evidence to support their belief that missing 6-year-old Aaroné Thompson was killed months ago, including resuming work at the family’s central Aurora home and traveling to Florida.

Police spokesman Marcus Dudley said investigators had been to Florida to check out reports related to a family vacation to Orlando.

Also Wednesday, Jasbir Singh, landlord of the home at 16551 E. Kepner Place, returned with police to walk through the house looking for any modifications. When he emerged, Singh told reporters he didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary.

Dudley said that search is focused on the basement. He added that the NecroSearch team – volunteer scientists who search for human remains – would return Saturday.

“That is the center of our investigation,” interim Police Chief Terry Jones said Tuesday. “We’re not done with that house. We’re working it very methodically. This is going to be a very difficult investigation.”

Police remain convinced that Aaroné hasn’t lived in the home for several months and may have been dead for as long as 18 months. The last known photograph of the girl was taken 1 1/2 years ago, when she would have been 4. She would turn 6 on Wednesday.

The family and friends in the community are organizing a search of their own for the missing little girl.

The Rev. Acen Phillips, whose congregation is assisting the family, said that following a worship service for the family at 10 a.m. today at Friendship Baptist Church, there will be a meeting to organize a search this weekend. He said Richard Berrelez, whose granddaughter, Alie Berrelez, was abducted and killed in 1993, has agreed to organize the search.

Searchers will set out in the neighborhood at 7 a.m. Friday, and again at 7 a.m. Saturday, Phillips said.

No arrests have been made in the case that began when Aaroné was reported missing Nov. 14 by her father, Aaron Thompson, 38.

Police searched for more than 48 hours before receiving a tip from someone close to the family that made them believe Aaroné had been killed. On Nov. 17, when the case was declared a homicide investigation, police seized the home for a search, and the seven other children in the home were put into protective custody.

Police dubbed Thompson and his live-in girlfriend, Shelley Lowe, people of interest they would like to interview.

Thompson gave a formal interview with police the day he reported Aaroné missing, but has refused to talk further with police, including failing to arrive for a scheduled polygraph test on Tuesday, according to authorities.

“Why do you put someone out of their house, and now you want to talk to them?” Phillips said.

Thompson is a security guard for Securitas. The company confirmed he is still an employee but wouldn’t comment further.

Aaroné’s mother, Lynette Thompson, is in Detroit and hasn’t seen her daughter since 2001. The children in Aurora have allegedly told detectives they haven’t seen Aaroné in months – though police wouldn’t say exactly what the children have said.

Aurora Public School officials say Aaroné was never enrolled. A family spokesman, Sam Riddle, told The Denver Post that her father said he tried to enroll Aaroné in August at Tollgate Elementary School but was turned away because the child lacked proper shot records. Aurora school officials say that is unlikely because the family would have been given a shot waiver and Aaroné would have been allowed to enroll.

According to a Genesee County, Mich., official, Aaroné’s shot record was up to date through February 2003 and she most likely would have needed only booster shots. The official said that if her father didn’t have a copy of Aaroné’s shot record, he could have called and one would have been provided.

Meanwhile, Aaron Thompson Jr., had an awkward beginning this school year. He enrolled for the Aug. 16 start of school. But he was absent for more than two weeks and had to re-enroll in September. School officials couldn’t say why he was not in school.

Records show Aurora police were contacted Sept. 28 about Aaron Jr. running away. He apparently went to a neighbor’s house and returned to the home shortly thereafter. Police made a follow-up visit Oct. 20.

Phillips said Aaron Jr. was gone from the house two to three days.

He added that the family recently reported another runaway from the home, Shelley Lowe’s 15-year-old brother. But no police record of that incident exists. The only other call made to police by the Thompson/Lowe family before Aaroné’s father reported her missing was a hangup 911 call on May 6, 2003.

Police say they want to talk with Thompson and Lowe about inconsistencies in their statements and the facts of the case – specifically why no one else can report seeing Aaroné in the past 18 months.

The family says they believe police have given up the possibility that Aaroné may be alive.

“We’re asking the entire community … to do what you can to start looking for that child,” Phillips said Tuesday. “We ought to keep searching for a live child until we find a dead one.”

Staff writer Jeremy Meyer can be reached at 303-820-1175 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com.

Staff writers Elizabeth Aguilera and Jim Kirksey contributed to this report.

RevContent Feed

More in News