Missing Twitter hoax teen who posted a fake plea for help online FOUND safe after two-day search
A missing New Jersey teenager who falsely tweeted that someone was in her house was found unharmed and has been reunited with her family.
Clark Police Chief Alan Scherb said state troopers spotted 16-year-old Kara Alongi walking along the New Jersey Turnpike near Interchange 1 in Carneys Point around 4.30pm Tuesday.
She was taken to a hospital for evaluation and returned home early Wednesday.
Alongi gained hundreds of followers after asking people on Twitter to call 911 Sunday. However, the evidence has pointed toward the teen being an apparent runaway.
Surveillance video showed her at the Rahway train station purchasing a ticket to New York City on Sunday after the tweet was sent.
The police chief says detectives are trying to determine the girl's whereabouts over the past two days.
The high school student posted a misspelled message to her Twitter page around 6.20pm Sunday night that gave the impression that she was in a panic, stating: 'There is someone in my hour ecall 911'.
Her Twitter followers did not call the authorities, but her parents did once they returned to the family home in Clark, New Jersey, and realized that the girl was missing.
But the teenager has now been spotted on CCTV holding a backpack and a large purse while waiting for a train at the NJ Transit station in Rahway.
The 16-year-old's lone tweet that appeared to be a desperate plea for help went viral with hundreds of Twitter messages posted hoping for a her safe return.
Clark police confirmed Sunday night that the girl's initial tweet was a hoax and there were no signs of foul play in Alongi's home.
At the time of her disappearance, her family were watching her younger brother's sporting event.
Police brought a canine unit to the home and, according to their press release, the dogs 'tracked Kara's scent from the back door of the house, through a neighbor's yard and then to the sidewalk and around the corner back onto her block where the scent goes cold.'
After initially believing the Tweet, police became suspicious because there were no signs of foul play or abduction.
The biggest sign, however, that something was amiss came from phone records that showed someone in the Alongi's home called a local taxi company and ordered a pick up at their address right around the time that Kara posted the intruder claim to Twitter.
'The investigation quickly revealed a number of inconsistencies in the teen's statement,' the police statement reveals.
The local Patch site reports that police got in touch with the taxi driver who picked up the request, and the man identified Kara as the girl he drove to the nearby Rahway train station.
The train station serves the Northeast Corridor line and the North Jersey Coast line, both of which have their northern-most stop in Manhattan.
'Kara might feel that she will be in trouble if she comes home after this scare and causing a panic. At this point all everyone cares about is seeing her safe and at her house where she belongs,' the police statement concluded.
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