Police: 12-year-old girl who has been missing for a week may have been trafficked

A missing 12-year-old girl at the center of a Houston-area AMBER Alert could be a trafficking victim, according to police.

>> Read more trending news

E’minie Hughes was last seen on Feb. 22 at her home in Missouri City, Texas. According to her mother, she had asked to be woken up early for school the next day.

“Thirty, 35 minutes after, my daily routine I go check my kids’ room to make sure they’re OK or whatnot, and she wasn’t there,” Shannon Williams told KHOU.

According to police, home surveillance video shows a girl who appears to be E’minie running toward a dark Dodge Ram parked near her home around 1:40 a.m. on Feb. 23.

Police on Thursday said that E’minie may still be in the area. They said they had a tip that she may be using a social media app called Tagged.

“With the surveillance video, she willingly went into the vehicle. So she knew, or she thinks she knows who she’s going with,” Jacquelyn Aluotto, the president of No Trafficking Zone told Fox 26 Houston.

 “The fact that she had a different type of digital device, and she was on a dating app, says that she’s on social media. She’s talking to other people that her parents aren’t aware of.”

Williams said her daughter loves dancing and sharing content on social media. The two shared a TikTok account but E’minie didn’t have a cellphone, she said. According to Williams, E’minie left the house with her Andriod tablet.

“That’s what we were trying to see if we can find somebody to at least track the tablet down or try to find a way to get inside the tablet,” Williams said.

E’minie was reported missing on Feb. 23. The AMBER Alert was not issued until Thursday.

“Everybody is depressed,” Williams said. “It’s depressing at this moment because we don’t have anything right now and the AMBER Alert is just being issued out.”

Anyone with information on E’minie’s whereabouts is urged to call the Houston Police Patrol Division at 713-884-3131 or the Houston Police Missing Persons Unit at 832-394-1840.

© 2024 Cox Media Group