La’Niyah Clark taught other people sign language.
"She had so much patience for people, more than you could ever, ever know. She was an amazing kid. She was so smart,” Sabrina Smith, her grandmother, said of the teen, who was hearing-impaired.
"Lala made an impression on every person that she saw, every person that she met loved Lala because of her spirit," adoptive mother Ameerah Woods said. "She had all the energy in the world, and she was smart and beautiful and well loved, and her spirit was contagious. We want you to know that.”
The young woman who touched other people through her kindness was the inspiration for a somber and often tense gathering outside Wilkes-Barre Police Department headquarters on Wednesday.
La’Niyah, 15, went missing Jan. 17 in Wilkes-Barre. A body matching her description was found in South Wilkes-Barre on Saturday.
Relatives and friends at the gathering organized by Smith alleged city police didn't act quickly enough to find the missing teen, and they question why an Amber Alert wasn't issued for La’Niyah.
Wilkes-Barre Police Chief Michael Boyle and a city spokesperson did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The department published a missing person post to Facebook on Jan. 23, and Boyle sent out a media release on Feb. 10 asking for the public's help in finding La’Niyah.
While officials have not publicly confirmed the remains found Saturday off Thayer Street were La’Niyah, relatives said police told them they were. A search warrant filed in the case said the remains had "physical attributes" consistent with La’Niyah.
Luzerne County District Attorney Sanguedolce said Tuesday that investigators believe the remains found Saturday in South Wilkes-Barre are related to La’Niyah’s case, but couldn't say how.
He also said that an autopsy was performed Tuesday morning, but no affirmative cause or manner of death had yet been ruled, and the remains had not been fully identified.
Reached Wednesday afternoon, Sanguedolce said there were no updates.
Luzerne County Coroner Dion Fernandes on Wednesday said he could not comment on the autopsy.
Family: No answers coming 'until arrests are made'
About 50 people gathered outside WBPD on Wednesday morning. Some carried flowers, others held posters with La’Niyah's picture, and one man chanted "justice for Lala" from a megaphone.
Woods told reporters Wednesday that Wilkes-Barre Police called the family to the station Tuesday to tell them that they found the body of their adopted daughter.
“And that they said they can't (give) as much details right now until arrests are made,” Woods said.
There were tense moments between Smith and La’Niyah’s friends and adoptive family Wednesday.
"Her biological grandmother has the right to grieve, but her adoptive family does as well. This fighting and bickering has got to stop. We all came together and did everything we can to find her,” Candice Lowe, a family friend, said.
What all agreed on: WB police failed La'Niyah
Woods and La'Niyah's adoptive father, Antoine Clark, reported the teen missing on Saturday, Jan. 17.
"On Monday morning, I called here and asked if there was a detective on the case. There was no detective assigned to the case yet. I didn't get in touch with a detective until Thursday. She went missing on a Saturday. Why do I not hear from anyone until Thursday?” Woods said.
She said the detective she finally heard from told her he had been out sick all week.
"Again, it was no urgency from the police department, because they labeled her as a runaway. It doesn't matter if she was a runaway or someone took her, there should have been some kind of urgency," Woods said. "She's a minor. She was deaf, and she should have been, if they couldn't do an Amber Alert, they should have labeled her missing and endangered immediately.”
Woods said there were multiple factors that suggested La'Niyah was not a runaway. She said the teen's clothes were laid out for school and that she had written a note to give to a friend.
Smith said police obtained a DNA sample from La’Niyah’s mother in Illinois.
Search warrant request gives insight into discovery
A Wilkes-Barre Police Department search warrant request was filed by Det. James Conmy seeking to search the area where La’Niyah was found.
On Saturday, police responded to 55 Thayer St. for the report of a dead body, according to the court document.
They discovered the remains of a naked female beside a garage, owned by Clark, behind a gold Chevy Cobalt. "It appeared to have been there for some time," the affidavit in the request states.
Police were called by Luis Perez. He told officers he rented part of the structure from Clark, who he said uses the rest of the building.
The affidavit said that there were suspected signs of trauma to the body, including that she appeared purple by her face, back and arms, "which may be bruising."
“Two areas that appear to be cuts, has a rope-like item around the right wrist, and a pair of scissors was viewed near the body,” the affidavit signed by Conmy says.
Perez told detectives that he was at the garage between Feb. 13 and 16 and there was nothing suspicious there at the time, the affidavit adds.
The affidavit says “the physical attributes of the deceased body are consistent with a female, L.C., reported missing to this department on Jan. 17, 2026.”
"L.C. was reported missing by Clark, and he was one of the last people who saw L.C. prior to her going missing," the affidavit states.
The garage is just blocks away from where La’Niyah lived, relatives said.
'Lala was sweet. She loved animals.'
Woods unzipped her white Philadelphia Eagles sweatshirt outside the front door of the police station. Tattooed on her arm is a date 3/17/2020 — the day the family adopted La’Niyah.
"She had been with us for so long, and we understood how Lala ticked, how Lala worked, and to put her back in the system, wouldn't have been fair to her, and we loved her," she said.
Woods learned how to sign “Hi, my name is Ameerah” before La’Niyah joined the family. She said the 15-year-old called her mom from day one.
Woods said she always helped with chores.
“Lala was sweet. She loved animals, she loved other kids. She loved, you know, to take care and (be) like, almost like a parent to little kids. She just adored them. She was goofy, like, very goofy, and quick-witted,” she said.
Smith said her granddaughter had so much patience for people.
"More than you could ever, ever know. She was an amazing kid. She was so smart," she said.
'She had a family that loved her'
Smith said that La’Niyah should have never been in foster care.
"She had a family that loved her. She was my baby. She was my granddaughter, but she was like my baby. I had years of proof that she was a part of our life, and they never should have took her away from us,” she said.
Smith said Luzerne County Children, Youth and Families took La’Niyah from her mother in 2020, but that she spent time with different foster families over the years.
“As per state regulations, Luzerne County Office of Children, Youth and Families cannot comment on individual cases,“ Luzerne County Spokesperson Colleen Connolly said.
"She had prior history of running away, which doesn't matter, because that was in the past, and this was the here and now," Woods said.
Carmen Tinson is La’Niyah’s adoptive grandmother. She said that her family asked for a Protection From Abuse (PFA) order against a female biological relative in October. She claims the relative had La’Niyah in a home with a pedophile.
Investigators on Tuesday surrounded a four-unit apartment building on New Alexander Street, about a half mile from where the body was found.
Sanguedolce on Tuesday told reporters that "parties at this address have been related back to La’Niyah Clark," and that law enforcement searched the apartment building’s lower left unit for three or four hours Tuesday afternoon.
Many people from the apartment building are being questioned, Sanguedolce said Tuesday, but declined to say whether anyone who lived there was a suspect.
A search of registered Megan's Law Offenders showed an individual with a history of rape and sexual assault living at that address.
"So when she went missing again in January, our concerns are, why aren't we looking actively at the person that there's a PFA on," Woods said. "They were 'oh we can't really find her. She's not willing to talk.' There was just not enough pressure.”
Woods said that her sister, Sameerah, told the police three weeks ago that La’Niyah could have been with the biological relative at her address.
Woods said Clark is her ex-husband and they still live around the corner from each other.
"The kids go back and forth to our houses,” Woods said.
She said Clark thought that La’Niyah left his house around 11 or 11:30 a.m. on Jan. 17 to come to Woods’ house or go to the store. By dinnertime, the family was searching for her.
Woods maintains the Wilkes-Barre Police Department lacked the same sense of urgency.
"I believe they had it made up in their minds before any words were spoken," Woods said. "And they not only delayed assigning a detective, at one point when we were reaching out, they said they don't work weekends.”
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WVIA News' Sarah Scinto and Roger DuPuis contributed to this report.
