By By GREG KATSKI
Community Editor
The search continues for a Beaufort County man and his 11-year-old daughter after he allegedly abducted her from a Virginia hospital Sunday afternoon.
Lemuel Cartwright, a Bath resident, removed his daughter, Alexis, from Cumberland Hospital in New Kent County, Va., about 3 p.m. without the permission of the hospital or the Beaufort County Department of Social Services. Following the abduction, a felony warrant was issued for the elder Cartwright.
The younger Cartwright is in the legal custody of the Beaufort County Department of Social Services. She was placed at the hospital because of certain medical needs related to her being an insulin-dependent diabetic patient.
Laurel Miller, supervisor of foster care and adoptions at the Beaufort County Department of Social Services, said she could not divulge why the younger Cartwright was put in foster care because of privacy laws.
“We just want her to be able to get the medical care (she needs),” Miller said. “We’ll do anything to help in that respect.”
As an insulin-dependent diabetic, the younger Cartwright requires medications twice a day.
The Cartwrights are believed to be traveling in a 1993 Dodge Ram 1500, blue in color and bearing North Carolina license plate XYZ-8450. It is believed that the elder Cartwright is traveling to Bath, according to a release from the New Kent County Sheriff’s Office.
The New Kent County Sheriff’s Office has been in contact with the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office, Virginia State Police, North Carolina Highway Patrol and the National Center for Missing &Exploited Children, said Chief Deputy Joe McLaughlin.
“We’re not limiting the scope of the investigation,” he said.
McLaughlin said the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office has been particularly helpful in the investigation.
“The Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office has been a great resource. They’ve done a lot of leg work,” he said.
McLaughlin said investigators have talked to immediate relatives of the Cartwrights, including Alexis’ mother, whose name was not released.
“We have talked to several relatives,” he said. “They want to hold any information to themselves and not be inundated with unnecessary traffic from the media.”
On Tuesday afternoon, at the request of the Daily News, Miller contacted the younger Cartwright’s mother at the family’s home in Bath. According to Miller, she declined to comment on the alleged abduction.
The younger Cartwright is described as a 5-foot, 3-inches tall, 135-pound, white girl with sandy-colored hair and blue eyes. The elder Cartwright is a 6-foot, 7-inches tall, 200-pound, white man with brown hair and brown eyes.
Anyone who has seen Cartwright or his vehicle is asked to contact the New Kent County Sheriff’s Office at 804-966-9500 or a local law-enforcement agency immediately.