LAURINBURG, NC (WBTW) – Investigators in Scotland County enter day three of the search for a missing 4-year-old boy.
Raul Johnson was reported missing Wednesday after the young boy’s grandfather lost track of the child. Raul’s mother, Annie Johnson, says she was at work when her father called her to say the little boy was missing.
“I told him to call 911,” Johnson says with tears in her eyes. “I thought maybe he was just hiding because he likes to hide, but he never stays gone this long. He always comes back. If I holler for him, he comes back, and this time he didn’t come back.”
Scotland County deputies and investigators began searching for the 4-year-old around 2 p.m. Wednesday. Since that time, teams searched a two-mile radius of the family’s home to find the missing child, with no luck. The search has since expanded in hopes of finding the child.
Wooded areas were combed, neighbors were questioned and tracking dogs were brought in to assist. After three different dogs led investigators to the same pond near the family’s home, divers were deployed.
After hours of searching, the divers were unable to find anything. Scotland County Sheriff Ralph Kersey says he refuses to have any shred of doubt about the investigation and plans to drain the pond.
“Cause I’m not going to leave with any doubt in my mind or any other officers out there minds,” explains Sheriff Kersey. “It’s not that the divers didn’t do a good job, but he’s a small child – weighs about 35 pounds – and if I don’t drain it, if we don’t drain it, then that doubt will always be there.”
Friday, FBI and the Sheriff explained they have not drained the pond because they need permission from the landowner. Scotland County Emergency Services Roylin Hammond says divers used sonar in the pond.
North Carolina state troopers have set up a checkpoint on the road that leads to the family’s home. Troopers are stopping each vehicle that travels on Crestline Road in Laurinburg to hand out flyers about Raul’s disappearance and to check tags of those incoming vehicles.
Peggy Bowen woke up to a checkpoint in her front yard.
“It’s not a very good feeling to know that a little boy from our neighborhood is missing,” said Bowen.
Bowen believes he was kidnaped because she was on her way home Wednesday around the same time Raul went missing.
“If he hadn’t have been picked up or in a wooded area, that I would have seen him and I did not see him anywhere,” said Bowen.
Since then Bowen and her neighbors have been searching for Raul.
“It’s just very heartbreaking and devastating to think about… it’s been so cold the last few nights,” said Bowen.
Raul Johnson stands around 3 feet tall and weighs 38 pounds. He has black hair and brown eyes. Johnson was last seen wearing a white and orange tiger striped shirt with tigers on it and white pants with rocket ships printed on them.
Anyone with information regarding the case is asked to call the Scotland County Sheriff`s Office at 910-276-3385, call 911 or *HP.
