Authorities spent 20,000 man-hours hunting for Kiely Rodni before she was found by hobbyist divers
Authorities have come under pressure to explain how they spent 20,000 hours in the search for Kiely Rodni – only for a volunteer dive team to allegedly find her body.
Placer County Sheriff’s office put out an update early on Sunday showing how they had seven officers and seven helicopters in the hunt for the missing 16-year-old.
They also said they had scanned through nearly 2,000 tips in the two-week hunt for the youngster after she disappeared from a party near Truckee in California.
But diver group Adventures With Purpose claimed they had found her in a sunken car in Prosser Lake – a stone’s throw away from the party she was last seen at.
On Sunday night, the sheriffs said they were still working to identify the body and would release more details on Monday morning.
The body of water was an area cops had previously ticked off the list of possible places she had ended up after the event.
Rodni was last seen on August 6, and texted her mother to say she was driving home to Truckee. She never arrived.
She disappeared from the Prosser Family Campground where she was attending a party and was due to drive home in her 2013 silver Honda.
Her cell phone last pinged around 12:30am near the campground’s reservoir after she texted her mother to say she was heading back.
Her family run The Lost Trail Lodge, a small hotel on the property where they live. It is around 12 miles from where she was last seen.
They said through a police statement they were waiting until official confirmation before releasing anything in full.
Rodni was last seen on August 6, leaving a party she had attended with other high school graduates near Lake Tahoe, and heading home
The red dot on the lake shows where the Adventures with Purpose team were searching
Volunteers with Adventures with Purpose can be seen searching near the red float, where they suspected Rodni’s car may be
The area of interest, shown by the red float, was close to the shore
Divers claim that they have found Rodni’s car, a silver 2013 Honda CRV, in Prosser Lake. The license plate number is 8YUR127
Jared Leisek (right) and Doug Bishop (left) traveled to California from Oregon to assist with the search. On Sunday they said they believe they have found her
An updated graphic from the police showed they had spent 19,000 hours searching for the missing child
Adventures with Purpose: Oregon-based YouTuber who was an eco-warrior cleaning dirty lakes but has now solved 23 missing persons’ cases
Jared Leisek began Adventures with Purpose for fun, to hunt down objects and potentially return them to their owners
The Oregon-based group is a search and rescue dive team, specializing in finding missing people. Their website states they have solved 23 missing persons cases since 2019.
Jared Leisek, the founder, began the YouTube channel as a hobby, recording his adventures as he located cans of soda, cellphones and sunglasses while diving – something he saw as a chance to clean up the environment and find things that others had lost, with the hope of returning them. Leisek found his first submerged car, in Portland, Oregon, by accident. He was then contacted by a family in Warrenton, Missouri, and managed to find the car of Nate Ashby, 22, who vanished in July 2019.
Leisek then paired up with Doug Bishop, who owned a towing company, to start pulling vehicles from the water for environmental purposes. They also used sonar equipment, which Bishop said separates their work from that of law enforcement.
Doug Bishop (left) joined Leisek in his endeavors, and has led the search for Rodni
Bishop told Fox that many police departments may have sonar equipment but may not understand all the technicalities that go along with it. The 10-member group consists of divers and production crew, who film every search and rescue, posting videos on YouTube and other social media pages.
Their services are free for law enforcement and families. They now have 2.42 million subscribers on YouTube, and 1.3 million on Facebook: they are funded by donations, ads on social media, and merchandise sales.
Bishop (left) and Leisek (right) are seen with their equipment, readying for a dive
NOTABLE CASES:
Missouri, December 2019
Their first request was from the family of Nathaniel ‘Nate’ Ashby, who went missing in Warrenton, Missouri, in July 2019. The family found Leisek and Bishop on YouTube, and asked them to come and help. The group found Ashby’s Chevy Silverado in the Missouri River in December 2019.
Leisek told Missouri sheriffs it was probably the most difficult and dangerous operation he had conducted, due to the force of the Missouri River currents. He was also surprised at how quickly the conditions began to deteriorate while he was in the water: the river rose two feet during the nine-hour operation to remove the truck.
Oregon, May 2020
The group set out to recover a car from 80ft below the river in Portland. But they also came across another vehicle, a silver Mazda, which contained the remains of a man who had been missing for 12 years. Timothy Robinson, 56, disappeared in November 2008.
Arkansas, October 2021
The group were dispatched to Russellville, Arkansas, to investigate a tip about the possible remains of a woman who disappeared with her daughter 23 years previously. Samantha Hopper was traveling in her blue Ford Tempo in September 1998 to drop off her daughter, Courtney Holt, before heading to a concert in Little Rock. The car with the pair’s remains was found in eight feet of water in the Illinois Bayou, off of Pleasant View Road.
Texas, January 2022
The group was sent a message, informing them about a missing person case that they felt Adventures with Purpose could help with. Leisek got in touch with Bianca Torres, whose mother, Stephanie, disappeared in Waco in December 2017.
The group began searching near the East Boat Launch of the Brazos Valley, and found the missing 43-year-old. Relatives said she was depressed and suicidal, due to the pain from Fibromyalgia.
Adventures With Purpose wrote on Facebook on Sunday afternoon they had found a car with Rodni in it.
They said: ‘WE JUST FOUND KIELY RODNI. Car is upside down in only 14′ of water. We have CONFIRMED Kiely is inside.’
They added on the page: ‘Family Notified. Law Enforcement on their way. More updates to follow.’
A source within the group said that they had found the vehicle with human remains inside, according to KCRA.
Josh Cantu, 31, a spokesman for the dive group, told The New York Post: ‘Police told us they did a rigorous search of this body of water. They gave us a grid map and made us confident we didn’t need to search here.’
But he said within just minutes of looking again fellow diver Nick Rinn, 48, found the car and a body inside.
He said: ‘I went down and did my inspection. I saw the vehicle upside down, verified the license plate and that there were remains in the vehicle. Then I came out, we called the family and authorities and let them take it from there.’
He added: ‘Now the water has receded and we’re seeing the vehicle went farther into the water than maybe [police] thought. When a vehicle goes in the water, it has air trapped in it for a while so it will float for a little ways before it fills with water and sinks.’
A spokesman for the family said: ‘At this time, the family has no statement on the social media rumors from this afternoon.
‘If and when law enforcement has a response, we will proceed accordingly.’
Placer County sheriff’s office said on Sunday night: ‘This afternoon, we were notified by volunteer search group Adventures with Purpose they have found a car and a body in the Prosser Reservoir.
‘The Nevada County Sheriff’s Office, Placer County Sheriff’s Office, FBI and allied agencies are at the scene to investigate the findings.
‘The identity of the decedent has not been confirmed.
‘This is a developing situation, and we will provide updates when we can.’
They will hold a press conference at 11am on Monday morning in Truckee.
Adventures with Purpose began searching for her on Saturday. The group travels around the country helping solve cold cases.
‘When you miss a loved one or a friend and you don’t know, it’s a nightmare,’ said Doug Bishop, Adventures with Purpose Team Leader.
He told Fox 40: ‘What we provide is those answers, when we’re able to. That’s what we’re hoping to do in this case.’
The team was in contact with local authorities and Rodni’s extended family, Bishop said.
Bishop led a six-man team, which immediately began searching Donner Lake, believing that their approach and fresh eyes could be of use.
‘With 15 to 20 million viewers per month, there was an overwhelming demand, not only by multiple different agencies, all of our supporters,’ he said.
Nick Rinn a certified diver, told Fox they were trying to find new areas to explore.
‘We’re taking our resources and the intel that we’ve been provided and we’re trying to see different avenues,’ he said.
‘Different place to look.’
On Saturday they searched Donner Lake for more than two hours, investigating several areas where Rodni’s car could have entered the water.
The team checked out a couple of ponds in the Cold Stream area, but Bishop said they were too shallow.
They then went on to Boca Reservoir, putting two boats in the water, where they searched for several more hours.
‘There’s multiple roads that lead here, directly from Prosser,’ Bishop said.
Adventures with Purpose said on Saturday they were thinking out of the box, concentrating on areas that have not been checked out yet.
‘It’s tough,’ Bishop said. ‘I don’t want to find her.
‘If she’s here and something has happened to her, I do.
‘I want to be able to provide the family and this community answers so they can properly lay her to rest.’
On Sunday they moved on to Prosser Lake, and found her remains, they believe.
California and Nevada police combed local sex offender lists for suspects in the disappearance, as investigators exhausted more leads in the frustrating search for the missing teen.
The FBI pitched in as well, helping area cops chase down 1,562 dead-end leads in the search for the blond-haired Truckee teenager.
None of the sex offenders investigated have been linked to Rodni’s disappearance, investigators said, although one unnamed man was found to be in violation of the terms of his release.
Further details of that crime have not been shared.
Sheriff’s detectives, probation officers and Auburn Police swept local sex-offender lists for suspects and even arrested of one of them on an unrelated charge.
Truckee police also combed their database of sex offenders, but found no one out of compliance with probation or parole terms.
There were 200 to 300 people at the party, mostly teens and young adults, like Rodni, who was an early high-school graduate.
The Placer County Sheriff’s spokeswoman said investigators had interviewed close to a third of the party attendees, but hope to talk to more.
Nevada County authorities have ‘pulled in a ton of resources toward that goal [of finding Rodni],’ Captain Sam Brown said.
Investigators have logged a cumulative 18,810 hours in the search.
Rodni was wearing the pink-and-white ‘Odd Future’ sweatshirt posted to the Placer County Sheriff’s Office Facebook page the night she went missing.
Whether she was wearing a separate black sweatshirt has not been confirmed.
Information regarding Rodni’s sweatshirt followed another tip that led to the FBI spending Friday digging up a ‘potential burial site’ that only contained a dog carcass.
Investigators confirmed that the last known ping from Rodni’s cell phone came at 12:30 a.m. on August 6 near the campground’s reservoir, after texting her mother she would be straight home.
She was last seen on local surveillance footage wearing a black bodysuit and green Dickies pants on August 5. She vanished the next day
Rodni (pictured) disappeared on August 6 from the Prosser Family Campground where she was attending a party
‘We just want her home,’ the teen’s mother, Lindsey Rodni-Nieman, said. ‘We’re so scared, and we miss her so much’
Authorities are seen on the fourth day of searching for Rodni
Authorities have sent dive teams into the nearby lake and into Lake Tahoe after a tip Rodni may have driven her car into the water
Search and rescue party gathers in the area where Kiely Rodni went missing in Truckee, CA, on August 9
The ping was located near Prosser Lake, which surrounds the campground, though Brown said that because of lost data, the phone could have continued to ping after 12:30 a.m.
‘Just because it was last pinged there, that doesn’t mean that’s where the phone stopped pinging,’ he added.
‘There’s lots of reasons why those notifications or data points could be lost.’
The last person to have heard from the teen was her friend Samantha Smith, 18, who spoke with Rodni on the spoke at 12:36 a.m.
Shortly after, Rodni’s phone was turned off.
‘At 12:36 a.m. she called me…and this is the last call anybody had with her. We said: ‘Love you, good night. Get home safe,’ and that’s the last thing we heard of her,’ Smith told the Independent.
Her boyfriend, Jagger Westfall, said he texted Rodni to ‘be safe’ and ‘don’t do anything stupid’ before she went to the party.
Westfall, who did not attend the party for unknown reasons, texted her to complain about his day and heard back hours later.
‘At 10:30 she responded to what I was saying, [she] said: ‘Oh, I’m sorry you’re going through that.’ And that’s the last I heard from her,’ Westfall told Fox 40.
He also told the outlet he and her father had taught Rodni how to ‘get out of sticky situations’ and said she would not ‘put her life at risk.’
Kate Cuno, another friend, said she had hung out with Rodni just hours before the party and the pair had made crème brûlée.
‘Everything was normal,’ Cuno said. ‘I don’t think she ran away or anything. I would have noticed if something was slightly off.’
Police released a surveillance image showing the missing teen hours before she vanished at a nearby campground.
Smith told The Sun that some of the other attendees of the party might be scared to go to police because they fear the consequences.
‘I think a lot of them were scared to talk,’ she said.
‘They were engaging in illegal activity in the woods, it’s like this Lord of the Flies space where they can just be.’
Lindsey Rodni-Nieman, the teen’s mother, pleaded in an online video shared by authorities for anyone with information to come forward.
‘We just want her home,’ Rodni-Nieman said. ‘We’re so scared, and we miss her so much.’
Her boyfriend, Jagger Westfall, revealed earlier this week he had texted his girlfriend to ‘be safe’ and ‘don’t do anything stupid’ before Rodni went to the party
Some teenagers may be afraid to come forward for fear of possible consequences, one of Rodni’s friends said
Authorities confirmed Rodni was wearing a white-and-pink ‘Odd Future’ sweatshirt (pictured) the night she went missing
Police released an image of the sweatshirt (pictured) she was loaned the day before she disappeared. It featured eerie Lana Del Ray lyrics, reading: ‘You don’t want to be forgotten, you just want to disappear.’ Police believe the hoodie is ‘still in her possession’ and it’s unknown who ‘loaned’ her the coat
