Fort Pierce, Florida: Girl, 5, Found Dead in Pond After Search

A dive team found a missing 5-year-old girl dead in a retention pond near her Fort Pierce home on Saturday afternoon, about three hours after her father reported her missing, Fort Pierce police said.

The girl, Mayra Glory Odelus, had autism and was non-verbal, police said. The St. Lucie County Sheriff's Office dive team found her at about 3 p.m. in a pond in the 5100 block of Portofino Landings Boulevard, not far from the family home, Maj. Michael Santiago of the Fort Pierce Police Department told reporters. She was about 20 yards out in the water. The pond is shaped like a boomerang and sits behind homes in the subdivision, north of Okeechobee Road and east of South Jenkins Road.

A morning search that ended at the water

Her father noticed her missing at about 11:10 a.m. and the family started searching the area, Santiago said. He reported her missing at 11:39 a.m., according to police spokesperson Juliana Walker. Mayra always carried a tablet, and the family kept trying to reach the device, which gave off a signal near the water, Santiago said. The tablet itself was never found.

Port St. Lucie police brought a bloodhound that tracked toward the water. Fort Pierce police flew drones over the neighborhood. The sheriff's dive team then went into the pond and found her.

Santiago said there were no signs of trauma on the body, and police do not know how long she was in the water. The investigation is still open and an autopsy will be performed. Police asked anyone with information to call 772-467-6800.

Why police keep warning about water

Santiago used the briefing to press two points that officers in Florida repeat after cases like this one. Families need to know where their children are at all times, and doors need to stay secured, he said. He added that children with autism are often drawn to water.

The risk is documented well beyond this one case. Drowning is the leading cause of unintentional death for Florida children ages 1 to 4, according to the Florida Department of Health, and Florida's Department of Children and Families has counted 104 child drowning deaths in the state so far this year, figures reported in coverage of a similar death in Riverview last week, where another 5-year-old boy with autism was found in a neighborhood retention pond. A Columbia University study found that children with autism are about 160 times more likely to die from drowning than other children. Retention ponds sit in the middle of subdivisions across Florida, most of them unfenced and a short walk from front doors.

What happens next

Detectives are still working the case and the autopsy should establish when and how Mayra died. Police have given no sign that they suspect a crime. For the Portofino Landings neighborhood, the open questions are the ones Santiago left on the table: how she got out of the house, and how she reached the pond without anyone seeing her.