Another $25,000 reward offered in Smart case

Elizabeth Smart

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (CNN) -- Authorities announced Wednesday that an additional $25,000 reward is being offered for information leading to missing 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart or resulting in the arrest and conviction of her abductor.

"There are some who very well may have information about this crime, and they may not know there is a significant reward," Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson said.

"We certainly wish that people were motivated by something other than that, but rewards can be very effective."

The reward, provided by the FBI and Salt Lake City Police Department, is in addition to an already announced $250,000 reward for Elizabeth's safe return.

The teen-ager was abducted at gunpoint early June 5 from her bedroom while her parents and four brothers slept. Her younger sister witnessed the kidnapping, police said.

EXTRA INFORMATION Images of Elizabeth Smart  • Missing children facts     Suspect description White male 30 to 40 years old 5 feet 8 inches tall to 5 feet 10 Medium build Dark hair Dark hair on arms and backs of hands Source: Salt Lake City police Elizabeth Smart information Web site: ElizabethSmart.com Tip lines: 800-932-0190 or 801-799-3000

The latest reward comes as investigators have been looking at Richard Ricci, 48, a handyman with a 30-year criminal record who once worked in the Smarts' 6,600-square-foot home in Salt Lake City's upscale Federal Heights neighborhood.

Ricci has not been named a suspect in the disappearance, but he is a primary focus in the probe, a law enforcement source said.

In a statement released by his attorney, Ricci denied any involvement in the Smart kidnapping and extended his concerns to the girl's family.

The girl's father, Ed Smart, appealed to the public to "keep your eyes open for Elizabeth" over the Fourth of July holiday. Booths are to be set up in Salt Lake City to get the word out during the holiday celebrations.

"My wife and I still strongly feel she is out there, that she is alive," Smart said. "I would make a plea again to this abductor to please let Elizabeth go. We really want her home."

Ricci is in Utah State Prison in Draper on an unrelated parole violation. His attorney, David Smith, said the arrest was for drinking alcohol, which violated a condition of his parole.

Smith said his client has been cooperative with authorities, undergoing 26 hours of questioning, taking a lie detector test, consenting to searches of his mobile home and vehicles and giving a blood sample.

Ricci's wife, Angela, maintains her husband was at home in bed with her at the time Elizabeth disappeared.

The FBI returned to Ricci's mobile home Tuesday to search it and a shed out back. Investigators were there for more than two hours, and witnesses said they carried several bags of material from the home.