The Alabama lady who went missing after stopping to aid a stranded toddler on a busy highway was discovered alive Saturday night.
Carlethia “Carlee” Nichole Russell, 25, returned to her house in Hoover, Ala., before 10:45 p.m., according to the Hoover Police Department.
Russell, a nursing student, was reportedly dropped off at the apartment and “appeared to be in shock.”
According to authorities, she was taken to a nearby hospital for evaluation.
Hoover is about 10 miles south of Birmingham, Alabama’s third-largest city.
Hoover police verified to The Post that more information will be released as the investigation into Russell’s whereabouts during the two-day missing continues.
Russell went missing on Thursday night after going to aid a lost toddler on I-459, according to law authorities.
At roughly 9:30 p.m., she was reported on the phone with 911 before speaking with her sister-in-law for 6 minutes until a “scream” was heard on Russell’s end of the line before becoming silent.
Officers arrived just minutes later and found Russell’s running car, cell phone, and purse.
Police were unable to find any sign of her or the child she reported.
“In the process at some point she got out of the car and my daughter-in-law could hear her asking the child if they were OK,” Talitha Russell, Carlee’s mother, told the outlet.
NEW VIDEO outside the neighborhood where Hoover Police say missing woman Carlee Russell showed up to her home around 10:45 Saturday night https://t.co/tUZtq1ZwOt pic.twitter.com/qx9TVbGGyY
— Jonathan Hardison (@WBRC6Hardison) July 16, 2023
“The child did not respond, or at least she did not hear her respond, he or she respond. And then she heard our daughter Carlee scream and from there on all we could hear was noise… background noise in her phone which we later found out was noise from the interstate.”
WBRC discovered a traffic camera video from Interstate 459 at mile marker 11.7, which appears to show Russell’s automobile pulling over before she vanished.
Russell had just ended her shift at Birmingham’s The Woodhouse Day Spa and was on her way to get supper for herself and her mother when she noticed the toddler.Russell guessed the youngster was roughly 3 or 4 years old, according to Talitha.
According to Lt. Daniel Lowe of the Hoover Police Department, one witness reported seeing a gray vehicle parked near the scene and a “light-complexioned male” standing outside Russell’s automobile.
