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CNN Live At Daybreak

Missing 4-Year-Old Girl Found Alive

Aired August 14, 2002 - 05:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: A happy, if bizarre ending in California. A missing 4-year-old girl has been found alive two days after she disappeared from a park. Jessica Cortez was reunited with her family less than two hours after she was found.
As Gigi Graciette of CNN affiliate KCOP reports, workers at a health clinic discovered the girl.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GIGI GRACIETTE, KCOP CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was the news that so many had hoped for.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This turned out to be a great day and our prayers were answered. Little Jessica was found.

GRACIETTE: Four-year-old Jessica Cortez, missing since late Sunday, found alive and well today at a children's medical center in Los Angeles.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A woman that was very well dressed brought a girl into the clinic. Her hair had been cut somewhat jaggedly, which also raised our suspicions. She was dirty and she had no shoes and no socks.

GRACIETTE: Police have been looking for this man, but it was a woman who brought Jessica to the clinic.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She asked for us to do a physical exam on the child.

GRACIETTE: But the nurses recognized Jessica. They asked her if the lady was her mother and she said no.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's looking straight to my eye and she said my name is Jessica.

GRACIETTE: That's when they called 911.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were scared and happy at the same time, because she was safe.

GRACIETTE: The little girl had last been seen at Echo Park two days ago. Earlier today, over 300 officers took to the streets to continue searching for her. Bloodhounds were brought in to sniff for clues and underwater divers scoured Echo Park's lake for Jessica's body, just in case. But this story now has a happy ending. Jessica's back with her parents.

ACTING CHIEF MARTIN POMEROY, LOS ANGELES POLICE: The mother, as you might expect, was weeping hysterically and little Jessica threw her arms around her mother and began to laugh hysterically.

GRACIETTE: In Los Angeles, Gigi Graciette for CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: And police did activate the amber alert system in the search for Jessica Cortez. California's emergency alert system gets the word out quickly on radio, on television, the Internet and electronic traffic signs. Amber alert was successful in its first use last week, helping locate two kidnapped teenage girls. The system was created after the kidnapping and killing of 9-year-old Amber Hagerman (ph) in 1996.

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