Authorities say a sex offender convicted in Habersham County is now the subject of an Amber Alert out of Tennessee.
Police are searching for 41-year-old Benjamin “Ben” Shook in connection to the disappearance of 14-year-old Hayleigh Wilson.
She was last seen with Shook on Tuesday in surveillance footage from a Wal-Mart in Marion, North Carolina. The girl’s been missing from her home in Surgoinsville, Tennessee since Monday night.
Tennessee authorities say Shook was found guilty of child molestation in a case from Habersham County and aggravated child molestation in a case from Stephens County. Shook was in prison from 2004 to 2014 but failed to register as a sex offender in Georgia when he got out last year. Instead, he moved to Tennessee.
The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation says Shook has multiple tattoos, and drives a maroon Ford Explorer Sport Trac with a Tennessee license plate “D6020D.”
If you have any information on either Wilson or Shook, contact the Surgoinsville, Tennessee Police Department at 423-272-7121 or the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation at 1-800-TBI-FIND.
