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Girl auided nearlv-b fa therTYLER (AP) — Gene McRoy is tormented by the disappearance of his daughter, the beacon who guided him through 10 years of approaching blindness.Someone cut a hole in the screen door of McRoy’s home west of Tyler, slipped quietly into the house and stole into the night with 11-year-old Trisha McRoy.Sheriff J.B. Smith said authorities are stymied by the disapperance of the girl early Saturday morning. Bloodhounds lost the scent along the Neches River and investigators have few clues and no suspects.“She really helped take care of her daddy, and I don’t know what will become of him without her. He is just going to explode.”For three days her father has knownlittle and feared the worst about the daughter who helped him endure the disease that is slowly stealing his sight.“She really helped take care of her daddy, and I don’t know what will become of him without her He is just going to explode,” said neighbor Chester Owen.McRoy and his wife, Jan. have made an impassioned plea for the return of their daughter. He said he would offer a reward for her safe return, but he has no money. Instead, the couple and their twoyounger children — 5-year-old Travis and 9-year-old Carrie — keep a hopeful vigil outside their small white frame house.“She was always right there by my side like another hand helping me,” said McRoy. “At night I can’t see at all, and she would help me feed the farm animals. She would lead me through the house, pour my coffee, just whatever she could.”Failing vision forced McRoy, 36, a hard-working, broad-shouldered man, to quit his trade as a bricklayer. The disease, retinitis pigmentosa, has taken 90 percent of his sight. Both he and his wife now work for The Lighthouse for the Blind in Tyler.When I first found out about it ithe disease i, I tell you I thought I would kill myself, but Trisha made all the difference for me.... I love all three of my children, but I'll always hold a certain spot for her,” said McRoy.“She was just the opposite of most kids that age. When she came home, she always put her books up and hung up her coat, and instead of going right to the television set, she would often go to her room and read. She loved to read. 1 think her favorite books were on history, and she loved to read the Bible, said McRoy.While he stood outside with friends and family who had gathered at the house Monday, McRov could control hisw *emotions. But when he entered his missing daughter’s room, he leaned against her bed and wept, managing only a few words:“Just bring her back to me.
Newspaper Details
New Braunfels Herald Zeitung
New Braunfels, Texas, US
Tue, Jul 07, 1981
Page 10
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
USA 06 Jan 2019
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