Exclusive: Diena Thompson, Mother of Murdered Somer Thompson, Recalls Daughter
Person of interest in child's murder named, mom wants death for the killer.
Feb. 12, 2010 — -- Diena Thompson, mother of murdered 7-year-old Somer Thompson, said her little girl "loved to dance."
"She was so clutzy," Thompson tells ABC News Chief Law and Justice Correspondent Chris Cuomo, co-anchor of "20/20," in an exclusive interview airing tonight on "Nightline."
"I mean, she could not walk and chew bubble gum at the same time," Thompson said. "But she loved to dance. She wanted to be a ballerina."
The emotional interview took place just days before police named a former neighbor of the Thompsons as a person of interest in the girl's death on Thursday. Jarred Harrell, 24, was arrested on 29 unrelated charges of possession of child pornography.
"We are also naming Harrell a person of interest in connection with the abduction and murder of Somer Thompson," Florida's Clay County Sheriff Rick Beseler said Thursday.
Harrell lived on the street near where Somer was last seen Oct. 19, 2009. He was under surveillance for some time, police said.
Neighbors described Harrell as antisocial and withdrawn, and said they saw Somer occasionally stop to pet a little white dog near his former home.
After his arrest Thursday, authorities searched the new home of Harrell's family, particularly a shed.
The term "person of interest" has no legal ramifications and police have not named Harrell as a suspect. The $1 million bond set for Harrell likely was because of the number of counts filed.
The day Somer disappeared, she was walking to her Jacksonville, Fla., home from school with her older sister Abby and twin brother Samuel. She was last seen in front of a vacant house on a block she walked every day.
Despite a statewide search, Diena Thompson knew that day that she would never see her daughter again.
"I can't explain it, but I just knew that she was gone," she said.
Investigators sorted through more than 225 tons of garbage until they found Somers' lifeless body at a landfill some 50 miles away across the state line in Georgia.
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