“Cruel” vandals have ripped down posters for a missing 14-year-old Jewish girl who vanished more than a week ago in Toronto.
Flyers containing details about the disappearance of Esther, known as “Esti,” were stuck on lampposts and telephone poles with thick tape across the city before being callously yanked off, CBC reported.
The bungling yobs even left behind evidence by not even fully removing the posters, pictures shared on Reddit show.
Toronto police spokesperson Nadine Ramadan told CBC it’s not “necessarily a criminal offense” to remove posters, but it has sparked outrage.
The teen’s family’s lawyer, Maureen Leshem, described the act as “disturbing and cruel,” adding: “When a family is desperately trying to find their child, this kind of behaviour should concern every person in our city.”
Leshem fears the vandalism may be influenced by antisemitism before warning it impacts the search effort.
“Whether or not that is the intent, the impact is the same: It interferes with efforts to spread awareness and could ultimately hinder the search for Esti,” she said.
Esti has been missing for more than 10 days after she was last seen at a location around two miles south of Earl Bales Park in North York, Toronto, just after midnight May 16.
She was last seen wearing a turquoise sweater with words on the front, gray sweatpants, and no shoes.
Cops revealed the teen is on the autism spectrum, heightening concern.
Esti’s worried mom, Shira, told Global News her daughter is “very, very smart,” while her dad, Joseph, said “if you just had a conversation with her, you’d have no clue that she was on the spectrum.”
“You’d think she was just a genius and very articulate. You might think she’s a 25-year-old and not that she’s 14 years old,” he added.
“That’s really how it affects her. It just makes her smarter and she thinks 10 steps ahead of everybody else.”
Toronto cops issued a Level 1 search — which is the organization’s highest level of operation.
This means authorities can deploy their canine, mounted, and marine units.
Volunteers from New York are assisting Shomrim, a Jewish civilian patrol group, with the search for the missing teen, City News reported.
“We started off in Earl Bales Park where she was originally last seen and we’ve been expanding that bubble ever since. So we’ve covered this entire community, we’ve been downtown, we’ve been as far as Scarborough, Mississauga, we’ve been literally everywhere in the city,” Shomrim supervisor Stuart Sugar said.
A QR code has been created for the public to submit video or photos of Esti to the authorities.
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