Police hail 'fantastic' community for helping to find missing North Staffordshire OAP
Police have hailed the 'fantastic' response shown by a North Staffordshire community to find a missing woman. Dozens turned out as part of an operation to look for 77-year-old Cheadle pensioner, Julia.
Now officers with Moorlands Local Policing Team (LPT), who were involved in the search, have paid tribute to the efforts of more than 200 volunteers around Cheadle and Tean. It came as the community received the 'fantastic news' that Julia had been found yesterday afternoon.
As reported by StokeonTrentLive, Staffordshire Police had made a public appeal for help in finding her after she hadn't been seen since Thursday afternoon. As news of the missing appeal spread in community social media pages, more and more residents came out to support efforts to find her.
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Draycott Sports Centre lent itself as a base for the operations with locals split into groups and sent out to search. More than 40 search and rescue specialists were also drafted in.
Such was the turn-out, car parks at the nearby church and cricket club were made available while Tesco handed out food to those taking part.
Neighbourhood officers in the Moorlands say 'it truly was a community effort'. Detective Chief Superintendent, Victoria Lee, said: “Community spirit made a huge difference, enabling the emergency services to find Julia and return her to her family. We were given the use of Draycott Sports Centre all day to co-ordinate the search and rescue efforts.
“When local officers went to buy refreshments at Tesco, Longton, the store donated more than 50 meal deals. More than 30 JCB workers stopped work to help with the search.
“Overnight we also had use of Huntley Wood visitors centre as a base. We would like to thank everyone for this heart-warming response, which demonstrates community spirit at its best.”
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