Authorities are searching for a two-year-old girl who has been missing after her father drove his pickup truck into the Walnut River in Leon, Kansas. Police went to perform a welfare check on the toddler and found she was in the truck with her father, Chris Johnson.
Johnson appeared drunk and refused to allow officers to talk to his daughter. As they approached his truck, he drove into the woods.
"They felt he was under the influence of alcohol, he was being peaceful, communicating and talking to them and the child was fine at the time," Butler County Sheriff Kelly Herzet said. "When they told him they were going to have to take the child, he started the pickup and drove off."
As he was driving, his truck went over a 30-foot embankment and crashed into the river below. It took officers nearly three hours to reach Johnson's truck and pull him from the water. He was pronounced dead, but they could not find any traces of his daughter. They believe she escaped through the back window, which had been broken out.
Emergency crews have been scouring the area in a desperate attempt to locate the young girl.
"It's tragic for this community of Leon for the fact they know the mother, they know the father," Herzet said. "The mother grew up in this town. And they had this child together. It's a sad day in Butler County and in Leon today."
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