Young Girl Last Seen Running After An Ice Cream Truck

Equilla Lynn Hodrick was an 8-year-old African-American girl from the Bronx, New York City. She lived with her mother, Terona, who was 8-months pregnant. The two were very close and would pray together every night.

On August 12, 1985, Terona and Equilla sat on the porch of their Briggs Avenue home. It was around 6:30 PM when a couple of Terona’s friends walked by the house. As they talked, Equilla heard the Mr. Softee ice cream truck as it was parking at the end of the block, on the corner of Briggs Avenue and 194th Street. She asked her mother for some coins, but she said no. Equilla decided to run to the truck anyway.

Terona, being pregnant, was unable to run after her. But she wasn’t too worried as Equilla was always quick to return home.

Sometime after, Terona’s niece told her she had seen Equilla playing video games at the arcade down the road. When the young girl failed to return home later that evening, Terona called the police.

Equilla was last seen running towards the ice cream truck. The sighting at the arcade was never confirmed.

Led by Detective Frankie McDonald, the NYPD conducted an extensive search for the young girl. They spoke to the ice cream truck driver, but they did not recall seeing Equilla that day.

Bloodhounds traced Equilla’s scent to a large hole in a fence on Webster Avenue, near the Metro-North train tracks. McDonald asked the Metro-North for permission to search the railroad, but they refused to stop the trains, not wanting to inconvenience their commuters. After several hours, they agreed to slow down the trains so that authorities could conduct their searches in a safer manner.

Equilla’s disappearance in itself did not make the news. What did become a news story was McDonald’s interference with the trains. A reporter demanded to know why he had made such a decision, to which he replied,

“Nobody made that decision. We made the decision to search for a missing child. What is your story? That an eight-year-old girl is missing? Or that a few assholes from Westchester came home to a cold dinner? I don’t have anything more to say to you.”

After searching the tracks for three hours and speaking to several homeless people living in the enclaves, no clues as to Equilla’s whereabouts were found.

McDonald spent the following two years focused on finding Equilla, chasing every lead he could get. Terona has praised him for his hard work. The two became close, and she even named her son after him. When he told Terona he was retiring in 1987, she responded with, “Well, that’s the end of it.”

In a 2001 interview with the NY Press, Terona remained hopeful that her daughter was still alive,

“I still be praying that she will come home. I know in my heart that she is alive because I can feel her. You know how it is with a mother and her child. You can feel them. She’s out there. I know she’s not underground. Not my baby.”

McDonald wasn’t so optimistic,

“I hate to upset the mother but I don’t think she is alive. Equilla was very savvy for an eight-year-old. She knew her phone number. She was smart and street-smart. She would have reached out for the mother.”

Terona says she moved to Manhattan as she couldn’t deal with the “bad memories.”

The case has been reopened by a cold cases unit at the New York City Police Department. Unfortunately, it remains unsolved.

Equilla Lynn Hodrick has been missing for 37 years. If alive, she is now 45 years old.