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Carlee Russell Bought Snacks at Target Before Disappearing, Seen Walking Home Alone in Security Footage: Cops
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Authorities in Alabama have scheduled a news conference Wednesday afternoon to discuss the Carlee Russell case, but in the meantime they provided some new details about their investigation in the 25-year-old nursing student’s 49-hour disappearance last week.

Russell called 911 Thursday night at about 9:30 p.m. to report seeing a toddler walking alone along Interstate 459, as CrimeOnline reported. Minutes after the 911 call, she reported the same information to a family member, saying she was topping to see if she could help.

Traffic camera footage showed Russell’s car, hazard lights blinking, slow to a stop near mile marker 11. The family member reported hearing Russell ask, “Are you OK,” but heard no response, and then Russell screamed. She was not heard from again until late Saturday night, when she knocked on her parents’ front door in Hoover.

In a statement released Tuesday night, Hoover Police said that surveillance video in the neighborhood showed Russell “walking down the sidewalk alone prior to her arrival at her residence.” Medic were sent to the home, where Russell lived with her parents, for an “unresponsive but breathing” person, which police said was information relayed by the person calling 911.

“When first responders arrived on the scene, they found Ms. Russell conscious and speaking and she was transported in that condition,” police said. “Whem was later treated and released from a local hospital.”

Police said they have spoken only briefly with Russell on the night she returned home and “are waiting for her to be made available to obtain a more detailed statement.”

The investigation has determined, however, that after Russell stopped to pick up dinner on her way home from work the night she disappeared, she also stopped at a Target store and bought snack items.

“These items were not located in the vehicle or with her cell phone and wig at the scene of her disappearance,” investigators said.

And as they have said since the disappearance, police still have no evidence of a toddler walking along the highway. No other calls to 911 reported a toddler, “despite numerous vehicles passing through that area as depicted by the traffic camera surveillance video.”

Police said there were also “numerous evidentiary items” they were still evaluating and said that they would release more information at Wednesday’s news conference.

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[Featured image: Carlee Russell/Hoover Police Department]