Missing 12-year-old twin girls found safe

Rickhia and Nicolette McClam, the 12-year-old twin girls who went missing Tuesday, have been found safe, their father told Local 10 News.

The girls were found at the home of a family friend in Florida, he told the station.

Police said they believed the two girls left their home in Coral Springs Tuesday instead of boarding the bus to Forest Glen Middle School, departing with packed clothing, their iPods, and nearly $100 they had received for birthdays and holidays. They also left a note on their father’s bed, which suggested they were “running away due to unrealistic standards from their father,” an officer wrote in a police report.

Their father Rickey McClam did not discover the two sixth-graders were missing until he returned home from work Tuesday afternoon. Police had suspected their biological mother, who lives in New York, might have been involved. She visited the girls and their father the prior weekend and argued with McClam Sunday, they said.

On Thursday, their father had begged for his daughters to return home.

“I want y’all to be safe and I want you home with me,” he said tearfully at a press conference.“Please come home. I need you to come home.”

This story was originally published June 9, 2017 at 8:43 AM with the headline "Missing 12-year-old twin girls found safe."