New Lead Reopens Search for Afghan Girl Missing in Texas for Two Years

San Antonio police and the FBI renewed their search for a three-year-old Afghan girl who went missing in December 2021. The search began anew this week after investigators received a tip from an as-yet undisclosed source.

Lina Sardar Khil went missing in San Antonio on December 20, 2021, Breitbart Texas reported. Police officials say Lina Sardar Khil, disappeared from a playground near her family’s apartment complex in northwest San Antonio. At the time, Police Chief William McManus told reporters, “We are not treating this as an abduction right now. We are treating it as a missing person.”

The search for Khil carried on for more than three weeks as investigators searched a nearby creek and other areas within a couple of miles of the little girl’s home. Khil lived in the apartment complex in San Antonio after migrating to the U.S. from Afghanistan in 2019, Fox 26 Houston reported.

A new tip this week led to new search activity in the area of the Helix Apartments where she lived, KENS CBS5 reported. Police say they have received other tips over the past two years that also led to additional search activity. The public had not been notified of these previous searches.

“This is not the first time we have been out here doing these kind of searches,” Officer Ricardo Guzman of the San Antonio Police Department told the CBS affiliate. “In today’s case, it is a public space and residents called in, concerned why police were here.”

Earlier on Thursday, people saw officers searching an area behind the apartment complex where Khil went missing. Investigators were spotted with shovels and search dogs about a mile from her home, KSAT 12 reported.

“This tip that we received, we treat serious, just like any other tip. As we have over the last two years, we do our due diligence and follow up on every tip,” Guzman told reporters.

Local child advocate Pamela Allen told the news crew that police were using a type of X-ray equipment used to find bodies in the ground. Allen said the San Antonio Police Department met with Khil’s family on Wednesday evening before starting the search.

KSAT reported Allen’s comments on that meeting:

Today was a long, informative meeting with SAPD and FBI. The meeting encompassed information on behalf of the missing young girl from Afghanistan, Lina Sardar Khil who was abducted here in San Antonio. It was intense and still heart wrenching. Bottom line, we are not any closer to Lina’s discovery. As I sat next to Riaz, his frustration could be felt. There are just so many emotions that go through this families’ hearts. Unbelievable how one family could possess the courage that they have walking into each day without their child.

Allen added that Khil’s father, Riaz Khil, is “very frustrated.”

KSAT added:

Anyone with information is asked to contact SAPD at 210-224-7867 or the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI or tips.fbi.gov.

Crime Stoppers is offering a reward of up to $55,000 for information resulting in the arrest or indictment of a suspect accused of any involvement in her disappearance.