RENO (AP) - Reno police asked for the public's assistance Friday as they seek clues into the disappearance of a teenage girl who went for a bike ride and never returned.
"It appears foul play is involved in the disappearance of Karamjit Kaur," police Lt. Mike Whan said.
Kaur, 16, came to Nevada eight months ago from East India. On Wednesday, she told her family she was hot and left her house around 6:30 p.m. to ride the family's bike. She had no possessions with her.
When she didn't return within a half hour, the family started looking for her and then called police.
The girl was dressed in a short-sleeve T-shirt, bright blue cotton pajama bottoms, and black flip-flops.
Officers searched through the night Wednesday with dogs and helicopters. They went door-to-door talking to neighbors and contacted registered sex offenders in the area.
"We still have no investigative leads," Whan said.
Kaur's red and silver mountain bike was found Thursday afternoon about a quarter mile away at a skateboard park.
"She had just been learning to ride the bike for the past month, so she normally only rode it in front of the house," Whan said.
He said authorities do not believe she ran away.
"She's never done that before and the family says it is not in her character," Whan said. "She has only been in the country eight months and it is not part of their culture. She normally doesn't leave the house unless she's with her brother or one of her sisters."
Whan said it's unknown whether Kaur left the bike at the park, or if someone else found it elsewhere and then left it there. There was no sign the bike had been damaged by a car.
But he said knowing how the bike got there, and where it was when Kaur was last with it, is key to their investigation.
"If we knew where the bike had been left when she left it, we would be concentrating our search in that area instead," he said.
Kaur is described as 5-foot-7, 140 pounds, with long black hair, brown eyes, and a scar on her forehead.