Sherin Mathews missing: Police find a child's body near home, await confirmation

By fleme f | First Published Oct 23, 2017, 7:19 AM IST

Police are most likely to have found Sherin Mathews' body on Sunday
The body has been sent for forensic examination and identification purposes
Sherin's parents Wesley and Sini Mathews have been notified about the discovery

It has been over two weeks since three-year-old toddler Sherin Mathews was found to be missing from her home in Richardson. Sadly, her body was found on Sunday after an exhaustive search. Police are still hesitant to confirm if it is her body but say they have no reason to believe it is not hers. The body has been sent for forensic examination.

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The little girl's body was found at about 11 am in a culvert near East Spring Valley and South Bowser roads, east of U.S. Highway 75, with the help of search dogs, police Sgt. Kevin Perlich said. The place is less than a mile from the Richardson Home.

Her father, Wesley Mathews, had admitted to sending her out of the house at 3am on October 7 as punishment for not drinking milk. When he went to get her 15 minutes later, he claims, she was missing. Wesley was arrested a day later on charges of abandoning or endangering the child and was released from jail later that day on a USD 250,000 bond and was made to wear and ankle monitor.

Wesley and Sini Mathews both hail from Kerala and also have a four-year-old daughter. Sherin was adopted from an orphanage in Nalanda. However, she had limited development issues and was malnourished.

The Richardson police department had been on a manhunt since October 7, analysing every clue they could get their hands on. The search was becoming difficult because Wesley Mathews informed the police five hours after his daughter went missing. Even Sini, her mother, was refusing to cooperate with the police. She claimed she was asleep when the incident took place. The husband and wife hired separate lawyers in the case.

As part of the search in the last week the FBI had seized the family car for inspection, since between 4am-5am, an hour after Sherin went missing, the vehicle was seen being driven out of the house. The FBI also seized the passport of Wesley Mathews after officials found crucial evidence in the car. Along with that the FBI had taken the family’s washing machine and vacuum cleaner for forensic tests, after executing another search warrant at the house of the child's adoptive parents. Wesley had told the police he had a done a round of laundry waiting for his daughter to come back home.

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