The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children released a new age progression photo of Relisha Rudd this week, six years after she disappeared from a D.C. family shelter.
The 8-year-old was last seen in 2014 in the care of Kahlil Tatum, a janitor at D.C. General Family Shelter. Rudd’s disappearance got national attention after an employee at her elementary school realized that 18 days had passed since she was last accounted for.
A manhunt ensued, and police found Tatum’s wife dead of a gunshot wound in an Oxon Hill motel room. Tatum himself was later found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in Kenilworth Park.
Rudd was never found, and the investigation remains open.
The case prompted a major reckoning in D.C., and her disappearance motivated the city to finally work to close the decrepit shelter at the former hospital D.C. General (it closed in the fall of 2018, though all of the replacement shelters have not yet opened).
At the time, the city also commissioned a report regarding city social services, though it absolved the city of responsibility in Rudd’s case, and lawmakers introduced a ‘Relisha Rudd Law’ to punish parents that don’t report missing kids, though it never passed.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children updates age progression photos for missing children every two years until they turn 18.
This March will mark the sixth year since Rudd’s disappearance. Today, she would be 14.