A mystery wrapped in a riddle

A Cheney girl, who went missing Thanksgiving evening, returned home last Sunday, Dec. 7, prompting questions from authorities about why she left and what she did during her 10-day disappearance.

Around 8:30 Sunday morning a family member looked out the front window of their Cheney home to see 15-year-old Jacquelynne Rose Doucette standing outside holding the family cat. Police Department Sgt. Rick Beghtol said they managed to get her to come into the house and immediately contacted authorities.

Beghtol picked Doucette up and took her to Spokane for medical attention. During the first of several interviews she told authorities she had been staying in a camper on the family's property the entire time, a camper Beghtol said had been searched several times.

Doucette apparently survived on a piece of hard candy and some water she had in a gallon jug, half of which was frozen.

"She was dehydrated and she was hungry, but she didn't show much interest in eating," Beghtol said.

Doucette was reported missing around 7:30 Thanksgiving evening. The last known image of her until Sunday was video surveillance footage taken at Rosa's Pizza/Cheney Lanes around noon, Nov. 28.

Cheney authorities listed Doucette as a runaway, noting she had run away from home on several previous occasions but had never been gone for very long. Beghtol said school was her "safe haven," and when she didn't show up Monday morning, authorities knew she wasn't being harbored by friends and that this time was different.

Beghtol said he contacted the Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Olympia to have Doucette put on their list. Factors such as her run away history, having developmental limitations and emotional disabilities that require she take medications to address them, medications she had been without for several days, led to her classification as an endangered youth and put on the national website.

Beghtol also said she had previously expressed a desire to ride in a "big truck and see the country." At this point the local FBI office contacted Cheney Police and asked if they needed assistance, and with all of these factors, Beghtol readily accepted.

"I said yes, because I'm at a dead end," Beghtol said.

The local chapter of the Center for Missing and Exploited Children volunteered to help set up a search, and Beghtol said Cheney contacted Spokane County Sheriff's Office Search and Rescue unit last Friday. About 25-30 volunteers from area search groups, along with Sheriff's Office personnel, assembled Saturday morning at Spokane County Fire District 3 headquarters on Presley Drive.

Search teams also included dogs from Intermountain Search Dogs out of Spokane along with riders on ATVs. Acting on several tips, including one from a psychic who called Cheney Police, Beghtol said the teams searched wooded areas along the railroad tracks from Cheney-Spangle Road south/southwest of the city for several miles.

Teams also searched wooded areas around Simpson Parkway and at Centennial Park, where Beghtol said Doucette spent one night during a previous run away last June.

Early in the afternoon as weather permitted, the county's Air One helicopter was also called in. Eventually the search was called off around 3:30 p.m.

Beghtol said "live scent" dogs from Florida were flown in, arriving Sunday morning. By this time Doucette had returned home.

"It was a perfect storm of resources," Beghtol said. "Contacting them (search authorities) is part of our protocol anyway."

Information on why Doucette ran off hasn't been immediately forthcoming, with "family dynamics" likely playing a part. Beghtol said more interviews are needed to ascertain why she left and why she stayed away for so long, and to help facilitate measures to prevent it from happening again.

"We owe it to everybody, especially Jacquelynne, so that it will make her life easier," Beghtol said.

John McCallum can be reached at [email protected].