About 100 officials and volunteers have been mobilised, supported two police sniffer dogs, GPS tracking and blood trace detection devices, in the expanding search for the 2-year-old Lahu tribe boy, who has been missing for nearly 10 days from his home in the Muang district of Chiang Rai province.
Yesterday, the search effort focused on and around the hill-top house of the boy’s parents, in Mae Yao sub-district, and reeks in the village, as well as the spot where he was last seen. No clues to either the whereabouts of the boy or how he disappeared have been found so far.
Aekkaluck Loomchomkhae, chief of the Centre for Missing People of the Mirror Foundation, said that the areas which were searched yesterday had been searched before but, this time, it was more thorough.
Pol Col Sa-nga Srivichai, superintendent of Mae Yao sub-district police, said that scenes of crime officers from Chiang Rai joined in the search yesterday and brought with them blood detection equipment.
He said that police have not ruled out the possibility that the boy might have be abducted, become a victim of domestic violence, is the subject in a conflict over his guardianship or has had an accident.
The driver of a black pickup truck, which is reported to have left the village on March 23rd, when the boy was last seen, will be questioned, although the village head has assured the police that he is a villager, said the police officer.
The search today may shift to places through which the boy could have been smuggled out of the village in an abduction scenario, as well as a large cave close to the village.
