Ore. boy's disappearance now a criminal case
 | This undated photo provided by the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office shows Kyron Horman. Investigators have limited the search for the missing 7-year-old Portland boy to the city's metro area, despite tips from as far away as Washington state, a sheriff's spokesman said Tuesday, June 8, 2010. (AP Photo/Multnomah County Sheriff's Office) |
PORTLAND, Ore.—Ten days after a 7-year-old Portland boy disappeared, Multnomah County Sheriff Dan Staton fought back tears while announcing the search has been reclassified as a criminal investigation.
Staton announced the reclassification -- along with a $25,000 reward for information that leads to Kyron -- at a crowded news conference Sunday. But he offered no explanation for the change.
"(The investigation) is not going to stop," Staton said. "I will address those types of issues once we've located Kyron."
It's not the only detail about Kyron's disappearance that remains a mystery, as school officials and law enforcement try to keep a clamp on information they say could compromise the investigation.
What is known is that Kyron saw his stepmother, Terri Moulton Horman, in the hallway of rural Skyline Elementary School on the morning of June 4. It was minutes after he had presented his second-grade science fair project, a diorama on red-eyed tree frogs.
Hours passed. Kyron's school bus arrived at his home that afternoon, but he