Sad News--Call to Parents of Missing Child was a Hoax



Indianapolis Star--Woman charged with Shannon hoax: "It was a cruel hoax, police said today, that renewed a Boone County family's hope that a daughter missing for 17 years was about to come home.

A Kansas woman is charged with identity deception and false reporting, police said at a press conference this afternoon. Donna Walker, 35, Topeka, is not in custody and police asked for help in locating her.

Walker used the telephone and e-mails to make the family of Shannon Sherrill think that she may have been the missing girl, police said

Shannon was 6 when she disappeared Oct. 5, 1986 outside her mother's trailer home in Thorntown.

Without warning, Dorothy Sherrill received a call Saturday from a woman saying she may be her daughter, said Indiana State Police spokesman First Sgt. David Bursten. The girl would be 22 years old.

Bursten said the investigation determined it was Walker actually making the contacts, but they don't know why she did it."