After first saying they were not looking to determine if a body found Sunday was that of a North Carolina woman missing from Portsmouth, the Scioto County Sheriff’s Office is now saying that is their first priority.

Nichole Alloway, 20, had, according to her grandmother, Diane Dille, come to Portsmouth to meet a man she met on the Internet.

After Alloway was seen on a surveillance camera picking up money at Western Union in the Portsmouth Kroger Store, she apparently vanished.

Scioto County Sheriff Marty V. Donini said his office had received a call at approximately 5 p.m. Sunday from a married couple that had come across the skeletal remains of what appears to be a white female in the Otway area of Little Bear Creek.

In the original conversation with the sheriff’s office the question, “Are you looking into this as possibly being Nichole Alloway?” The Portsmouth Daily Times was told, “no.”

Now it turns out, according to one detective, to have been the original focus of the investigation.

“I can tell you that for sure,” Scioto County Sheriff’s Detective Denver Triggs told the Times. “We are trying to identify a body. She’s the only girl that we know is missing. And we know she is not from here, but she is listed as missing from here. That’s automatic protocol, anybody we have missing, we automatically call and get their dental records or DNA, and send that up to BCI&I (Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation) to be compared to her DNA. Or in the case of dental, you’d send that to Montgomery County, where a forensic dentist would compare it.”

Scioto County Coroner Dr. Terry Johnson ordered the remains to be sent to the Montgomery County Forensic Center.

“They will compare hers, and there will be surrounding agencies who will call us and ask us what we’ve found, if they have someone missing,” Triggs said. “They will be wondering if that is their missing person. With that information they can send dental records as well, especially if our first instinct would be incorrect. If it would turn out that it wouldn’t be that young lady from the North Carolina area, then we would have to identify who it is, and that’s when we would check missing records from other counties, and/or states surrounding us.”

Despite rumors about the remains, Triggs said details, such as conditions surrounding how the body was found, are not released to the public, because only the killer would know that kind of detail.

Meanwhile, Scioto County Sheriff Marty V. Donini said anyone with information on this case may contact Detective Matt Spencer at (740) 354-7566. All calls will be kept confidential.

FRANK LEWIS may be reached at (740) 353-3101, ext. 232.