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A $15,000 reward is being offered in the desperate search for a New Jersey teen who vanished during a trip to a deli near her home.
Jashyah Moore, 14, was last seen at Poppie’s Deli on Central Avenue in East Orange on Oct. 14, according to the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office, which announced a $10,000 reward for info leading to her safe return on Tuesday.
East Orange Mayor Ted Green said a local business owner also chipped in $5,000 to bring the reward to $15,000 as Moore’s family held a search party for the missing girl late Tuesday, CBS New York reported.
“Jashyah is one of our own,” Green told reporters. “She is only 14 years old, and we know she needs our help. We’re asking this community, as we have been since day one, to help us in locating this young lady.”
Jashyah’s mother, Jamie Moore, told CBS New York she sent the teen to the deli and that she returned home, but went back to retrace her steps after losing a debit card she took with her. Jashyah hasn’t been seen since, Moore and authorities said.
“She did not run away, she was abducted,” Moore said Tuesday. “I don’t know who did it, but we’re looking for you.”
Moore said she’s growing angry that there’s no sign of her daughter more than three weeks after she vanished.
“You know you my baby and I know you would’ve called me by now,” Moore said to her daughter. “Something happened to my daughter.”
Surveillance video showed Jashyah entering the deli with an older man who helped pay for her items. But police have interviewed the man, as well as the teen’s stepfather – a former East Orange police officer – who is involved in a domestic violence case against Moore, and both are cooperating with investigators, CBS New York reported.
Police said they do not expect foul play in the teen’s disappearance, the station reported.
Moore, meanwhile, led a search party for her missing daughter late Tuesday in East Orange, where some residents said streets weren’t safe for youngsters. Some also said missing people of color are largely ignored by the media, especially when compared to their white counterparts.
“We are ignored,” Shamira Butler told the station. “We are definitely ignored. Black girls who are missing every day, and we don’t get to see them on the news or anything.”
Acting Essex County Prosecutor Theodore Stephens is set to provide an update in the search for Jashyah at 1 p.m. Wednesday, a spokesman told The Post.
Moore has been questioned by the FBI in the case, WPIX reported. She had been grilled by investigators for hours who asked her to take a polygraph test as part of the probe.
“They swabbed my mouth and took my DNA,” Moore said.
Moore, her daughter and her 3-year-old son had been staying with a close friend following a domestic violence incident last year in Irvington involving her and her estranged husband, WPIX reported.
Jashyah, who is 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighs 135 pounds, was last seen wearing khaki pants, a black jacket and black boots. Anyone with information on her whereabouts should call (973) 266-5041.
An online fundraiser set up by Moore had garnered more than $7,500 as of Wednesday.
“As a mother, there are no words that can describe what my family and I are going through,” the website reads. “It’s hard to eat, sleep or even function with every day that passes.”
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