Northern California town ‘devastated’ after missing girl’s body is found

A surveillance camera caught the bubbly, 8-year-old girl skipping down a street in Tracy, Calif., after a play date on the afternoon of March 27. She never made it home.

After a 10-day search that saw law enforcement officers pour into the small Central Valley city, investigators Monday pulled a suitcase that held Sandra Cantu’s body from an irrigation pond.

An autopsy was conducted Tuesday to determine the cause of Sandra’s death, but it could be weeks before the results, said Deputy Les Garcia, a spokesman for the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Department.

Hundreds of volunteers had joined the search after the little girl with brown hair and eyes vanished that Friday afternoon from Orchard Estates Mobile Home Park, where she lived with her mother, grandparents and three siblings.

Well-wishers dropped off cards, balloons, stuffed toys and flowers Tuesday near a tree at the entrance to the park, where candlelight vigils had been held every night since the girl disappeared, residents said.

“We’re all just devastated,” said Barbara Sokoloski, a neighbor reached by telephone. “We’ve never had anything like this happen in Tracy.”

There was no immediate comment from the family.

Sandra’s disappearance shook the city of 78,000 in an agricultural area about 60 miles east of San Francisco.

“This is very difficult for everyone to accept,” said Sgt. Tony Sheneman of the Tracy Police Department.

Search-and-rescue crews from 16 agencies had scoured the surrounding fields and waterways while residents circulated fliers and posted pictures of the smiling girl in storefronts and on car windows.

The suitcase was found by farmworkers when they drained a pond to irrigate a field at a dairy farm about 2 1/2 miles north of her home, Sheneman said. Investigators from the Police Department, Sheriff’s Department and FBI combed the area for evidence for hours before pulling the suitcase from the water about 5:40 p.m.

When Sandra’s body was examined at the San Joaquin County morgue, Sheneman said she was found to be wearing the clothes in which she was last seen -- a pink “Hello Kitty” T-shirt, black leggings and “Hannah Montana” flip-flops.

Police are treating the death as a homicide investigation, Sheneman said. No arrests have been made, but hundreds of people have been questioned.

Police returned to the mobile home park Monday night to search a residence and cordoned off nearby Clover Road Baptist Church, Sheneman said. He declined to discuss the reason.

Sandra’s father does not live in the area, but drove in after she went missing, Sheneman said. Police questioned him when he came to the department of his own volition.

Residents said they feared that the perpetrator could strike again. The girl was known throughout the mobile home park, where residents said she had a smile for everybody.

“She was a sweet little thing. Loved everybody,” said neighbor Bernice Koth.

The staff and students at Melville S. Jacobson Elementary School, where Sandra was a second-grader, were dealing with the news as best they could, said Jessica Cardoza, a spokeswoman for the Tracy Unified School District.

“Sandra was a very well-known and very well-loved member of the Jacobson school family,” Cardoza said. “She was happy and full of life each day.”

The district dispatched psychologists and counselors to all its schools to help people deal with their grief, she said. Letters also were sent to parents offering tips on how to discuss the death with their children and how to keep them safe.

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alexandra.zavis@latimes.com