WOODSTOCK, Ont. – Ontario provincial police have shifted the focus of their search for the remains of eight-year-old Tori Stafford to a pair of lakes in southern Ontario.
Police diving teams were brought in today to the Guelph area east of Stafford’s hometown of Woodstock, Ont., to scour Belwood and Guelph lakes.
A suspect in the girl’s abduction and murder had been helping police search fields and wooded areas in the Guelph region for several days.
However, a judicial order allowing Terri-Lynne McClintic, 18, to leave jail to accompany police expired on Sunday at 10 p.m.
McClintic’s lawyer, Jeanine LeRoy, said in an email to The Canadian Press that she did not expect McClintic to have any “direct participation in the search” today.
She said her client is being held at the Elgin Middlesex Detention Centre in London, Ont.
McClintic and Michael Rafferty, 28, who is charged with first-degree murder and abduction, are scheduled to appear in court Thursday.
Police say the vehicle Tori was abducted in was likely a 2003 blue Honda Civic that had been partially spray painted black.
Police have the car, but are now looking for the grey rear seat, which had been removed, and may contain valuable evidence.
If it’s found, police are asking that it not be touched and be covered and protected from the elements as it could become a key piece of evidence.
