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Hampton Roads search and rescue team assists in search for Hannah Graham

Posted at 12:21 AM, Sep 26, 2014
and last updated 2014-09-26 00:21:36-04

A handful of Hampton Roads volunteers are assisting in the search for Hannah. The Tidewater Search and Rescue team combed the city and woods of Charlottesville last weekend.

Theresa Crossland was one of the 11 TSAR team members who drove up to help.

"In an urban environment there`s no shortage of clues,” she says. “There were literally hundreds of clues that were found."

Vicky Banta is also part of that group. She first hunted for evidence around UVA.

"It was really kind of sad to see the college students in the dorms know that some of these may be her friends and people that care deeply about her,” she says. "Hoping maybe to find a cell phone or an item that would be linked to her, but we didn`t," she says.

She then searched along the twisting two-lane Highway 20.

"One item was a hat, another was a coat,” Banta says, talking about the items she found. “You can usually tell if it`s been there any length of time so it`s probably not related to this search. It had some age to it, things like that."

With a suspect now in custody, search and rescue volunteers hope their clues will lead to answers.

"I believe she will be found. The question is when and by who," Crossland says.

"It`s a college student, I have a college student now and it really hits home,” Banta says. “Like the parents said, this is their worst nightmare and none of us would ever want to experience this."