GREEN COVE SPRINGS, Fla., March 11 (UPI) -- Florida police could have found the body of a 7-year-old girl at a trash dump instead of a Georgia landfill had the search not been halted, an official said.
Sheriff's deputies combing a suburban Jacksonville, Fla., trash site for Somer Thompson, who vanished while walking home from school last Oct. 19, stopped searching Oct. 20, mostly because of a backup of trash trucks, Clay County, Fla., Manager Fritz Behring told The (Jacksonville) Florida Times-Union.
Halting the search also prevented deputies from immediately finding the truck that held Somer's body, which could have narrowed the location where the girl was killed and dumped, the newspaper said.
Deputies found Somer's body Oct. 21 mixed with tons of trash at a landfill in Folkston, Ga., about 67 miles north of Green Cove Springs, Fla., where she disappeared.
A Jacksonville man, Jarred Harrell, 24, whom police call a person of interest in the case, pleaded not guilty Wednesday to 55 charges of possession and production of child pornography and lewd molestation.
Those charges were related to a case involving a 3-year-old girl Harrell is accused of molesting, prosecutors said.
Harrell was held without bail and is due back in court April 8.
