MONUMENT — Residents in this bedroom community north of Colorado Springs fear the body of a young girl found in the crawl space of a vacant home is that of the quiet and sweet child who once rode her bike and played with neighborhood children.
While residents wait for investigators to determine the dead girl’s identity, authorities have launched a search for the house’s former renters.
Hanif Sims and Monique Lynch, both 29, arrived at a Los Angeles homeless shelter in March 2009 after moving from the house. Sims’ daughter, Genesis, was not with the couple even though she had been in their care in Monument.
The girl’s biological mother, Jopetia Garretson of Newark, N.J., told the Gazette that Sims had custody, and she thought her daughter was in Colorado.
