‘She could have gone in any direction.’ Police search for missing Macon teen
A 17-year-old Macon girl who was last seen shortly after midnight Saturday may have run away from a house where she was spending the night in neighboring Monroe County , officials said.
Monroe Sheriff Brad Freeman on Monday morning said that was the best version of events pieced together so far in the disappearance of Jorja Ethridge, a Tattnall Square Academy student who lives in the Bowman Road area in northern Bibb County.
If Ethridge somehow became lost in the woods around Bolingbroke there below the split at Interstate 75 and I-475, she may now have spent two nights in subfreezing weather as temperatures both nights dipped into the 20s.
Sheriff’s officials were alerted in the wee hours of Sunday morning that Ethridge had left her cellphone behind and run away from a house on North Rivoli Farms Road. Teams of searchers on the ground and a Georgia State Patrol helicopter and a drone using thermal imaging turned up no signs of Ethridge on Sunday.
“For all we know, she flagged down a ride. ... But we just don’t know,” Freeman said, adding that he hoped that maybe the teen, if now hiding, found somewhere warm and hunkered down.
The sheriff said it appeared that Ethridge had of her own volition fled into the night early Sunday after returning with friends to the house where she was staying only to see that her parents had shown up to check on her.
Freeman said Ethridge’s family had tried to call her and grown concerned when she didn’t answer her phone. He said the parents went to the house on North Rivoli Farms, not far from U.S. 41 on the south side of Bolingbroke.
Freeman said that when Ethridge rode up and saw her parents’ car there she “jumps out of the car (she was in) and flees on foot.”
The sheriff said the teen had been out with friends at a party maybe 10 minutes away by car in the Lake Tobesofkee area in northwestern Bibb County until returning to the North Rivoli Farms house at about 12:30 a.m. Sunday.
“She could have gone in any direction,” Freeman said Monday, noting that search teams were going to focus on areas south of where Ethridge was last seen. The area lies along U.S. 41 near the Bibb County border, within a mile or two of Howard High School.
The 5-foot, 8-inch Ethridge was described as having brown or blonde hair with brown eyes. She was last seen wearing a purple sweatshirt and possibly a black jacket.
Anyone who might have seen her or know where she is was asked to call the sheriff’s office at 478-994-7010.
This story was originally published January 24, 2022 at 11:10 AM.