TBI focused on previous ‘areas of interest’ in search for Summer Wells

Posted: Feb 28, 2022 / 01:27 PM EST

Updated: Mar 1, 2022 / 10:04 AM EST

HAWKINS COUNTY, Tenn. (WJHL) — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) combed through thickets in Hawkins County on Monday during a planned search for missing 6-year-old Summer Moon-Utah Wells.

TBI spokesperson Leslie Earhart confirmed that crews will also return to the area on Tuesday.

“Teams will be back in Hawkins County today, although I don’t know for how long,” Earhart stated in an email to News Channel 11.

TBI agents and Hawkins County deputies conduct a small-scale, planned search for missing 6-year-old Summer Wells, focusing on areas previously identified as “areas of interests,” according to a tweet from the TBI. (PHOTOS: TBI)

The TBI tweeted Monday that the agency focused on “previously identified areas of interest.” The small-scale search acted as one of many efforts to bring Summer home. Hawkins County Sheriff Ronnie Lawson revealed that the search involved 35 officers with the TBI and sheriff’s office.

Summer disappeared from her Beech Creek home on June 15, 2021; February marked over eight months since she was last seen.

***Tennessee AMBER Alert – Summer Wells (Photos: Tennessee Bureau of Investigation)***

The case garnered national attention after numerous searches involving rescue teams and professionals from across the country yielded to no developments. In a December 2021 release, the TBI said there was a “very real possibility” that Summer wandered off.

The only piece of information released in the case was the TBI’s search for a red or maroon truck, which the TBI stressed could have been driven by a “potential witness.”

Summer’s mother, Candus Bly, spoke with News Channel 11 during an exclusive interview late last June — marking her first on-camera plea for Summer’s safe return.

Bly told News Channel 11 that Summer was last seen as she helped family members plant flowers in a garden.

“Me and my mother and [Summer] were planting flowers, and we went in after we got done washing our hands, and she got a piece of candy from grandma,” Bly said in the June 28, 2021 interview. “And [Summer] wanted to go back over and see her brothers, and I said, ‘OK,’ and I walked her all the way over to the porch, and I watched her walking into the kitchen where the boys were watching TV. I told the boys, I said, ‘Watch Summer; I’ll be back.’ And within two minutes, I came back, and I asked the boys where their sister was, and they said, ‘She went downstairs, Mom, to play with her toys in the playroom.’ I said, ‘OK.’ And I yelled downstairs for her a couple times, and I didn’t get no answer, which was unusual because usually she always answers me. And so, I went down there to check, and she was nowhere in sight.”

The TBI AMBER Alert reports Summer’s appearance as follows: