The 13-year-old has been missing since Nov. 5.

LUMBERTON — The body found off Wire Grass Road in Robeson County was preliminarily identified Wednesday as 13-year-old Hania Aguilar, bringing a sad ending to a more than three-week search since the Lumberton girl was kidnapped from outside her home.

"This is sort of heart-wrenching. We are absolutely devastated," Lumberton police Chief Michael McNeill said, his face stern. "I wish we had a different outcome for Hania's family, for the community she lived in, and for the hundreds of law enforcement officers and searchers who put everything they had into finding her alive."

There is no person of interest or anyone in custody, Andy de la Rocha, a senior FBI supervisor said.

"We believe we found Hania," de la Rocha said, "but our work is far from over. We have to find out how she died and who did this to her. We have to bring the person responsible to justice.''

The Lumberton Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation were told by the state medical examiner that preliminary tests indicate the body was Hania, McNeill said. Final confirmation will be made through a dental record comparison.

The body was found at 4:45 p.m. Tuesday in a pond off Wire Grass Road, about 11 miles south from her home at Rosewood Mobile Home Park on East Elizabethtown Road. She was kidnapped just before 7 a.m. Nov. 5 from outside her home, investigators said.

McNeill and de la Rocha made the announcement at a news conference outside the Police Department.

De la Rocha declined comment when asked if the suspected killer was still in the area.

He said he met with Hania's family Tuesday night to tell them a body had been found.

"This isn't about us today. This is about Hania," he said. "This is about a person's life."

Earlier in the day, some of the residents at the mobile home park where Hania and her family live waited to learn if she had been found.

Christian Santos, 18, said his brother, Jair, dated Hania after meeting her at a birthday party.

"He's devastated," Santos said of his brother. "She was a good girl, though. She liked to dress."

Hector Velasquez, 30, has lived in the largely Hispanic park for six years and knows the Aguilar family.

"Even if the body's not her, it's kind of sad these things happen," Velasquez said, speaking through a translator. "They (residents) are feeling sad after what happened. Really sad."

De la Rocha said at the news conference that he didn't have any information at this time on whether Hania was killed where the body was found.

Authorities had been targeting Wire Grass Road because of a number of tips that had come into the tipline, according to de la Rocha.

As for where the body was located, he noted, "It was not something that was obvious. Where she was, was not visible from the road."

The medical examiner, McNeill said, will determine the cause of death.

"She's a child. My heart goes out to her family," Anita Hunt said after the news conference, which she attended with her 20-year-old son, Anthony. She said she could relate to what the family was going through.

Hunt, who is 51 and from Orrum, was the stepmother of Bruce Lee Hunt, who was reported missing in Lumberton and later found dead in 2010.

"I'm hoping her family gets a little closure from it," she said.

McNeill declined to discuss the circumstances surrounding the recovered body or the condition of the body.

"This is the outcome we all feared would happen," he added.

After the Tuesday evening discovery, authorities closed off a roughly mile-long portion of Wire Grass Road. De la Rocha said investigators returned to the scene at dawn Wednesday and recovered additional evidence.

He did not say what evidence was found.

Late Wednesday morning, the portion of Wire Grass Road remained closed to traffic but reopened to traffic late Wednesday afternoon. A Robeson County Sheriff’s Office deputy was positioned at the corner of Wire Grass and Pinewood roads to keep people from entering.

Based on footage shot Wednesday morning from a WRAL helicopter, the N.C. Highway Patrol and the FBI were searching around a pond off Wire Grass Road. The body of water, known in the community as Hal Stephens Pond, is in a swampy area.

Teresa McNeill, 53, lives no more than a mile from where the body was found in what is known as the Hog Swamp community, named after the Hog Swamp Baptist Church. She sat on her front steps, her 5-year-old chihuahua Pinki wrapped in her arms, as she talked about the unsettling case.

“I was very surprised,’’ McNeill said. “I was shocked. You feel like you’ve been violated, as if your home has been broken into. Your safety net, where you feel safe.’’

Julia Martin is the daughter of the late Hal Stephens, who owned the pond where the body was found. “It’s sad. It's disturbing to know it’s in your community,’’ she said. “You know crimes are around, but it is always different when it hits home.''





Relatives have said a man dressed in black clothing with a yellow cloth on his face forced his way into the vehicle and drove away with the young teen. The SUV was found three days later, off Quincey Drive, south of Lumberton, about eight miles from the mobile home park. Quincey is about 3 miles east of the intersection of Wire Grass and Pinewood roads.

The FBI said last week that Wire Grass Road, near N.C. 41, was where authorities were seeking video surveillance from the public .







Staff writer Michael Futch can be reached at mfutch@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3529.

.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }