A 12-year-old girl who went missing in Arizona has been found alive and safe in South Carolina.
Betty Sue Taylor was found 2,000 miles away on Hilton Head Island 10 days after she was reported missing in Arizona on 20 March.
A 23-year-old suspect, Timothy M Schultheis, was arrested and charged with kidnapping and custodial interference, according to a statement from Graham County Sheriff’s Office.
“Betty Taylor was found to be with him and is now safe,” the statement said.
Mr Schultheis, of South Carolina, was located with the help of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and is awaiting extradition to Arizona, the Sheriff’s office said.
The pair were discovered using location-tracking technology, Graham County Undersheriff Jeff McCormies told local newspaper The Copper Era.
Authorities are making arrangements to unite Betty with her family. The nationwide search was launched after Betty never returned from a Sunday morning walk near Safford, about a three-hour drive southeast of Phoenix.
Family began looking for Betty when she had not returned home by about 6 pm that evening, and formally reported her missing two hours later at 8pm, according to a Graham County Sheriff’s Office statement.
Betty had moved from Kansas in the summer of 2021 to live with her father, Justin Taylor, near the foot of Arizona’s Mount Graham and the Pinaleño Mountains.
Mother Bonnie Jones, who travelled down from Kansas to join the search, told ABC 15 News that Betty loved the area and living with family, but she wasn’t as happy with her new school.
"She hated school so much that she was getting physically sick because going to school stressed her out so much," Ms Jones said.
She added that Betty was connecting with strangers unknown to the family across several social media accounts.
“And she had promised over and over again that she would get rid of them, and I checked her most recent Facebook, and she has her friends hidden, except for the mutual friends," Ms Jones said.
Betty attended Safford Middle School, according to one of the multiple Facebook accounts she kept in her name.
Betty’s uncle, Danny Taylor, told Oxygen.com that he lives with Betty and that the disappearance was out of character.
He told the outlet before she was found that they didn’t feel she was still in the area.
“She went for a walk Sunday, and we were all sitting there. It was a beautiful day outside, a sunny Sunday morning, and she said she was gonna go for a walk and never came home," he said.
“It’s a vast area. It’s not a safe area to walk… But we don’t feel that she’s here. We hope she’s still in Arizona, but honestly, we don’t know anything. That’s the hard part.”
Betty reportedly had only a couple of water bottles in her backpack when she left for her walk in the rocky, desert region of southeast Arizona in late March.
Graham County authorities were joined by hundreds of volunteers, coordinated by local couple James and Rachel Shotts.
They told ABC15 the search is being conducted by foot, 4-wheelers, dogs, horses, drones and a helicopter.
