The father of a St James teenager who has been missing now for almost a month, does not believe she is dead.
Emela John has been missing now for almost a month.
William John believes his 18-year-old daughter, Emela, is being held against her will. He is appealing to the public to reach out to relatives or police with any information they may have regarding her whereabouts.
Preparing to go searching for Emela, as he has done in recent weeks, a desperate John told Barbados TODAY the fact that his child is missing is beginning to make him “sick”.
“I just want somebody to say them see she someplace and I would go for she myself,” John declared.
What has him suspicious that the girl is being held against her will is that she used to be active on social media and owns a number of communication devices. However, she has not been seen on any since her disappearance.
“Emela is a girl that would lay down home a whole day and just be on her computer or tablet talking to her friends. She knows three different languages,” he said.
The 41-year-old dad said he is uneasy during the day and at night and whenever he finds the strength, he is busy printing posters to put up around the island, especially the Christ Church area where his daughter was known to frequent.
“If Emela was dead, probably they would have find she body already because this is almost a month now that she is missing,” John said.
“I don’t feel she dead. I would got to see the body to believe that she dead. So I telling myself that somebody got she against she will. But I searching every single day.”
Emela John, a resident of Payne’s Bay, St James, was last seen on October 7 sometime between 8.00 a.m. and 10.00 p.m. She is slim, of light brown complexion, five feet seven inches tall, has a round face, small mouth and a growth and birth mark on the right side of her back.
John said police officers working on the case are in constant contact with him. He praised them for the role they have been playing in trying to find the young woman.
“For me, them doing a good job because them ain’t leaving no stones unturned. Them keeping in touch with me,” he said.
The last time John saw his daughter, with whom he maintained a good relationship, was on October 6 when he cut her hair, along with her boyfriend’s, for them to attend a cruise.
“I didn’t know she was missing until the boyfriend come here the Friday night and ask me about she and I called the Police and report she missing,” he said.
“But what happen is everybody saying this and saying that but all I want to do is see my daughter. It playing on my nerves now and I just ain’t feel right,” he added.
John, who declined to have his picture taken for specific reasons, said the family is looking at the possibility of offering a reward to anyone who may have information on his daughter’s whereabouts.