Authorities search river for missing student

GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- National Guardsmen lowered cameras through river ice and scoured abandoned buildings and roads in North Dakota and neighboring Minnesota on Friday in a search for Dru Sjodin, the college student apparently kidnapped from a mall parking lot. The search was suspended at nightfall after covering nearly 400 square miles. The operation was to resume today. Sjodin, 22, of Pequot Lakes, Minn., was last heard from Nov. 22 as she spoke to her boyfriend by cell phone after leaving her job at a Victoria's Secret in Grand Forks. Prosecutors have charged Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., 50, a convicted rapist released from prison earlier this year, with kidnapping Sjodin. He has said he is innocent, and is jailed on $5 million bail.

Police have said DNA tests showed Sjodin's blood was in Rodriguez's car, and a knife found in his trunk matched a sheath found near Sjodin's car.

The National Guard was called in to search Friday when temperatures that fell to minus 10 made it dangerous for volunteers.

Guardsmen wearing life jackets and insulated clothes drilled holes through a foot of ice on the river, then lowered cameras to see the bottom. Vavra said the water was murky and visibility was only a couple of feet.

About 300 people -- sheriff's deputies, State Patrol officers and the National Guard from North Dakota and Minnesota -- also searched roads, ditches and abandoned buildings. They hoped to cover 800 square miles by Sunday night.

Sheriff Dan Hill said Sjodin is probably dead, but her boyfriend, Chris Lang, said Friday that the family still has hope.

"She's not here yet, so we keep pressing on, and have strong faith that she's out there, so we will find her," he said on NBC's "Today" show.