Missing Morgan Hill Teen Deemed 'At-Risk'

MORGAN HILL, CA — Morgan Hill Police need your help finding 18-year-old Desirae Akins-Qualls, missing since Thursday, May 4. Police say Akins-Qualls left home and walked to the bus stop on Monterey Road at Vineyard Boulevard on Thursday, May 4. She was supposed to get on a VTA bus to San Jose, but police say she never got there, and hasn't been seen or heard from since.

The bus stop is one block away from a Safeway store on Tennant Avenue, one of two Safeway stores where Antolin Garcia-Torres, 26, was convicted on Tuesday of attempting to kidnap three women as they climbed into their cars in 2009. Garcia-Torres was also convicted of the 2012 kidnap and murder of 15-year-old Sierra LaMar as she walked to her school bus stop, about 7 miles away off of Old Monterey Road in the nearby community of Perry.

"We're not making any assertion that there's any connection or any real similarities at this point," Morgan Hill police Sgt. Carson Thomas said of the two cases, noting that Akins-Qualls has run away from home before, but has always called home within a day or two.

She was last seen wearing an unknown colored top with black and white leggings. She is 5-feet, 5-inches, 225 pounds, with long brown hair and hazel eyes. She has a history of depression, but she had not made any suicidal threats and did not appear upset when she left home, according to police. Police say she could be in San Jose at this time.

Anyone with information regarding this case can contact Detective Greg Dini at 669-253-4965, or the anonymous tip line 408-947-7867.

Bay City News contributed to this story / Image via Morgan Hill Police