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Mother and officials hoping to find answers in teens death!
By Deborah Knapp
KENS 5 Eyewitness News
At this hour, emails are circulating around the country from a San Antonio mother on
a mission. She is searching for her daughter's killer. Emily Garcia was found murdered 10 years ago, but her mother and police
feel this cold case can be cracked with just one call.
If you have any information on Emily Garcias death, please call the
Comal County Sheriff's Department at (830) 620-3400.
It was a February day in 1993 when Sheila Smith-Ramirez put her daughter on a city
bus for some medical tests after the teen and her family learned she was pregnant. I never heard from Emily again. As the
mother searched for her daughter, a body was found in Comal County, but no one made the connection between the murdered 15-year-old
and the one listed as Jane Doe.
On the one-year anniversary of Emilys death, a television report aired a picture of a
tattoo on Jane Doe's hand. Smith recognized the tattoo and took her daughters fingerprint card to the Comal County Sheriff's
Office.
For the past 10 years, police have had this case, but they haven't found the killer.
All this time Emily's mother has lived in agony. I can't get on with my life, she said. You can't have peace, you can't concentrate.
I just haven't' been able to function. Last month Smith moved in with her sister and now they work the computer looking for
leads. They've contacted a lot of Texas and out-of-state police agencies and parents of murdered children, "to see if other
mothers have similar cases", Smith said. Smith sister Theresa Yeary added: Maybe after all these years the guilt alone that
they haven't talked or something will bring us some answers. Two weeks ago Smith received Emily's autopsy report containing
this picture. It confirmed the teen was strangled and sexually assaulted. After reading the brutal details of her daughters
death, Smith is more determined than ever to finding Emily's killer. She feels she is not alone on this mission. She feels
Emily's presence. I feel she's the one pushing this right now. I really feel she's helping us with this. At the Comal County
Sheriff's Office, the file on this case sits on the corner of Sgt. Tommy Ward's desk. This is where it's been every day since
he took over the case eight years ago. He thinks the time is right for a break.
Somebody knows who did this. Somebody knows Emily Garcia. Someone has some info on the
person who killed her, he said. Ward is hoping for that one call, but he does have something more. He has a DNA sample.
When Emily was killed, the technology was not there to analyze it, Ward said. He
recently resubmitted the evidence. We got some DNA results back. However, right now those results are not far enough advanced.
It will catch up. Technology is improving every single day especially. In this forensic work. One day I'll put someone in
jail for killing Emily Garcia.
Police also are investigating a possible connection to another unsolved child murder.
Eleven-year-old Heidi Seeman was murdered two-and-a-half years before Emily. Both girls were last seen in north San Antonio.
Their bodies were found within five miles of each other in Comal and Hays counties. There are some other similarities that
police are keeping confidential.
If you have any information on Emily Garcia or her death, please call the Comal County
Sheriff's Department at (830) 620-3400. | 
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