'We cry for her:' Volunteers shed light on search for missing Tampa mom that led them to body
TAMPA - One day after a body believed to be that of a missing Tampa mother was found in Hillsborough County, volunteers are sharing their emotional thoughts on the sad end to the search.
Tampa police believe the body of Sylvia Pagan was found Wednesday in Wimauma.
"Yesterday was the fight to find her," Billy Lane, co-founder of the nonprofit search group We Are the Essentials, said. "Today is the day we cry for her. Mourn for her family."
Pagan and her 9-year-old daughter were reported missing on Sunday. Police believed the two disappeared with Pagan’s boyfriend, Jovanni Caceres Steffani.
An AMBER Alert was issued around 1 a.m. Monday, but it was canceled about an hour and a half later. Tampa police say Pagan’s daughter was found with Steffani in a hotel room in Suwannee County.
Police say the little girl was safely removed from the hotel room. They say deputies in Suwannee County tried to talk to Steffani for about an hour, but he shot himself in the head.
Investigators say Steffani was the only person of interest in Pagan’s disappearance.
The search for Pagan intensified over the last couple of days. The group We Are the Essentials says Pagan’s family reached out to them for additional help in the search for her.
"On Tuesday evening, we were contacted by the family again, and they had told us that they were out conducting their own search," Lane said. "Well, at that point, we realized we had to get boots on the ground and involved, because we did not want the family to have a tragic find."
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Lane says they joined the search for Pagan on Wednesday.
"They had three areas of concern," Lane said. "One was his home. Number two was an area where they located a shirt. And number three was a location where an RV was stored at."
Lane says their crew went to the area in Wimauma where that RV was stored and neighbored a densely wooded area.
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"Fifteen minutes of being on scene, we were able to locate the remains," Lane said.
Lane says they called in law enforcement when they believed they had discovered Pagan’s body.
On Wednesday night, Tampa police confirmed that the body believed to be Pagan was found in Wimauma.
"That area is an area (where) we were looking," Chief Lee Bercaw said. "It’s a two-mile square area, so it’s a very large area. We had cadaver dogs, we had bloodhounds out there, we even had our air service with our infrared camera out there, and no, we did not see Sylvia out there at that time."
Chief Bercaw says they got a call from Hillsborough County deputies that someone else had found Pagan’s body.
Lane says this isn’t the outcome anyone had hoped for, and that their goal is to bring every missing person home to their loved ones.
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"This is about Sylvia and her family, about her children, about their grieving process and how we all need to just pray for them," Lane said.
Tampa police are still investigating, and say more information will be released when it’s available.
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