The FBI has joined the search for a missing Texas mother and her newborn daughter, police said.
Heidi Broussard, 33, was last seen with her daughter, Margot Carey, on Thursday as she dropped off her 6-year-old son at an elementary school. Investigators believe the pair returned to their apartment complex in Austin before vanishing, Detective Brad Herries told reporters Tuesday.
The FBI’s Child Abduction Rapid Deployment team has joined the search for Broussard and her daughter, who is now 3 weeks old. But Herries said the development isn’t an indication of what detectives believe may have happened to the pair.
Herries declined to comment when asked if Broussard’s boyfriend, Shane Carey, is being considered a person of interest in the case, saying investigators are considering any possibility ranging from foul play to Broussard having left the area by choice.
“To be perfectly honest with you, this case is unique in that we don’t have a person of interest right now,” Herries told reporters. “We’re exploring every avenue that we have and every possibility … Anything is possible at this time.
“Our assumption is that they’re alive and the sooner we can find them, the better.”
Carey, meanwhile, told KXAN that he last heard from Broussard early Thursday after she dropped her son off at school.
“He needs his mom. I need his mom,” Carey told the station. “We need the baby back, we just had a sister.”
Carey later told NBC News that Broussard wouldn’t have left without taking her ID and Margot’s diaper bag, which were both left behind.
“If she left, everything is here,” he said. “And she would tell her friend if she left, so that’s scaring me more.”