UPDATED, 10:20am Thursday, September 18: Charlottesville police say videos of missing UVA student Hannah Graham on the Downtown Mall early Saturday morning have pointed them to a man who said he followed the 18-year-old and then saw her talking to another man.
The first video, taken at 1:06am from Sal’s Pizza at 221 E. Main St., shows a white male walking into the frame, looking over his shoulder, and stepping into a doorway as Graham strides past. He then steps out of the doorway and follows her out of the frame.
In the second video, taken at 1:08am from Tuel Jewelers—a block east at 319 E. Main St.—shows Graham walking with the same man behind her.
The man in the videos has since come forward to police, and told them he followed Graham because she looked to be “somewhat physically distressed” and he “wanted to make sure she got safely to wherever she was going.” He said as he was following her, he saw a black male approach her and put his arm around her.
“Ms. Graham and this black male started speaking and it appeared to the witness that the black male was either known to Ms. Graham or was trying to help her,” according to the most recent press release from police. “The witness then walked away and he said that Ms. Graham and the black male were still standing and talking when he left. The black male is not shown in either of these videos.”
In the days after that have followed Graham’s disappearance, many UVA students said that they are afraid for their safety, even in broad daylight, as they follow the case closely.
“We agreed to buddy up when walking home,” said Meredith Lawrence, a 19-year-old second-year. “We have started carpooling to the library because we do not feel safe anymore.”
Many said they are hyper-aware of their surroundings, particularly in off-Grounds student housing, which most students transition to after moving out of their first-year dorms.
Fourth-year Allison Lank said it bothers her that there’s no lock or door code on the outside of her University Circle apartment complex. Still, that’s familiar territory. Further afield, it’s a different story altogether.
“Directly around my apartment building, I feel safe but if I were walking alone towards Preston and McGrady’s, where Hannah was last seen, I would not feel quite as safe.”
The original story was posted at 5:30pm Wednesday, September 17: Five days after UVA student Hannah Graham disappeared after a night out with friends near the Corner, the search for the missing 18-year-old is intensifying as police have interviewed at least 50 people and are poring over surveillance videos taken from various downtown businesses seeking more clues.
“The investigation is aggressive and will continue to be,” said Charlottesville Police Chief Tim Longo at an afternoon press conference, as he described the use of bloodhounds and the flood of tips—now more than 100—that have come in through a dedicated line. He said his department is receiving investigative support from the FBI and Virginia State Police in the widening search, which is now headquartered at the Albemarle County Office Building. Longo urged property owners in Charlottesville and Albemarle County to search their own land for signs of the teen, who was last seen on surveillance footage in the early morning hours of Saturday, September 13 as she walked along Preston Avenue and the Downtown Mall.
One video obtained by police shows a woman identified as Graham walking unsteadily west on Preston and circling the patio in front of McGrady’s restaurant around 12:45am. She briefly approaches the front door, then turns back to Preston and heads east toward downtown. Ten minutes later, video shot from the Shell gas station east of the restaurant shows the same woman running briefly, then returning to a walk and continuing east, where she was captured again on surveillance by cameras at The Crossings, a single resident occupancy building at the corner of Fourth Street.
Longo said despite investigators’ initial alarm over her running, police believe that she was not being chased.
Sometime around 1am, Longo said, an eyewitness placed her at the Second Street Mall crossing, and additional surveillance video confirms that she then headed east up the Mall.
What she was doing or where she was going remains unclear, Longo said, describing accounts of the earlier part of the evening as uneventful. He said Graham had dinner with friends at a Corner restaurant, then left on her own and headed to two separate house parties at off campus student residences, where police say, she drank alcohol that may have impaired her judgment.
Graham, who lived in a Corner-area apartment with three others, was reported missing on Sunday afternoon after her friends and family realized no one had spoken to her since late Friday night. Longo speculated that her studious nature led friends to believe she was at the library studying or otherwise engaged in a school activity.
The case has drawn comparisons to the 2009 disappearance and murder of Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington, who vanished after leaving a Metallica concert at UVA’s John Paul Jones Arena in October and being denied reentry. Her remains were found by a farmer checking fences in late January 2010 on Anchorage Farm in Albemarle County, and the case has been linked through DNA to a 2005 rape in Fairfax. In addition to requesting that area property owners search their land, particularly vacant or wooded lots, for any sign of Graham, Longo reminded that anyone who discovers anything that could be evidence in the case should not touch it but should instead call police immediately.
In a written statement, Graham’s parents, John and Susan Graham, expressed gratitude for support from the community and law enforcement and pleaded for anyone with information about their daughter’s whereabouts to alert police.
“Like you, we will not rest until we find her and she comes home,” they wrote.
Charlottesville Police have set up a tip line for the case at 295-3851.
Nicolette Gendron and Graelyn Brashear contributed to the reporting of this story.