PORTERDALE, Ga. — Police have yet to share why a search at a Newton County property was carried out in connection with Morgan Bauer’s case, but her mother Sherri Keenan said she’s made peace with the unthinkable.
No one has heard from Morgan since she went missing seven years ago -- back in 2016. Police believed Bauer went missing in late February of that year.
“I believe Morgan, if she were still here, she would have reached out. Even if she didn’t want to talk to me, she would have reached out to her grandma," Keenan said.
Morgan's mom said the last time she saw her baby girl, she gave her something to keep her safe.
“We didn’t really talk, I gave her a penny though. I told her to put the penny in her pocket and to keep it with her to keep her safe," Keenan said. "She was with a friend but I don’t know who he was. They walked off and that was the last time I ever saw her."
Morgan had just moved to metro Atlanta two weeks before she vanished -- leaving nothing but unanswered questions in her absence.
Porterdale Police provided photos of the search Thursday:
But Keenan hopes Thursday’s search will bring closure and healing.
“To the family that lives in that house, to the parents of the people who live in that house, that I’m so sorry and they must love their child as much as I love mine," Keenan said.
Several agencies including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Peoria, Illinois, police and the Newton County Coroners' Office were called in.
Porterdale Police Chief Jason Cripps is being cautious about sharing details but said this case is important and he needed resources and people to make headway.
Keenan said the FBI has been involved from the start.
“We’ve had someone that’s been helping us with the FBI since day 1. She’s on the ground there since day one and I know she's on the ground floor," Keenan explained.
More on Morgan Bauer's case
Police believed Bauer went missing on Feb. 25, 2016, but in an 11Alive News exclusive, investigators found a discrepancy that could shift that timeline.
Police discovered the teen last posted on social media on Feb. 26, 2016. That's a day after they initially thought she vanished, so that could change the entire course of the investigation.
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Bauer is described as having her ears gauged and her lip pierced twice. Her family also said she has several tattoos: a sun-moon near her right shoulder inside a Celtic design, an anchor with the words "whatever you love can be taken away, so live like it's your dying day" on her left wrist, a blue and orange jellyfish on arm from her inner wrist to elbow, and a black tree and flowers on the back of her neck.
Keenan said a $10,000 reward is being offered in her daughter's case. Bauer's family has set up an anonymous tip line at 1-855-MORGANB.
She had moved to the Atlanta area from Aberdeen, South Dakota just about two weeks before she went missing seven years ago.
"There isn't a lot of information out there," Morgan's mother Sherri Keenan told 11Alive in 2019. "Morgan is a cold case, but an active cold case with the Atlanta Police Department."
In February 2016, Bauer moved from her small South Dakota hometown to Atlanta and took a job as a dancer in a Gainesville club.
Two weeks later, she disappeared.
“On the 25th into that night, she was dancing at Top of Gainesville," Keenan recalled. "She left and we know she left with some people. They stated they dropped her off at a Citgo gas station in Covington, Georgia."
Bauer’s Instagram is private, but Keenan said a friend of her daughter's recently sent her a screenshot of Bauer’s last post.
It shows it was posted on February 26.
That could mean police have been looking in the wrong places, based on an incorrect timeline.
The video posted to Bauer's Instagram appears to show her in a park with a man walking behind her.
Atlanta Police declined 11Alive's requests for interviews and have not revealed if they know who that person is, or where the video was taken.