Edmonton girl, 13, who went missing June 24 found safe in Oregon Saturday

A teenage girl from Edmonton, who was first reported missing over a week ago, was found safe in the state of Oregon Saturday, police say.

A man, 41, from Oregon has been arrested. The Edmonton Police Service will be charging him with child luring under the Criminal Code of Canada, though more charges may be laid as the investigation progresses, including charges from other police agencies, said Insp. Brent Dahlseide, of the EPS' major crimes branch, during a news conference Saturday morning.

"This was an intensive investigation right from the beginning," Dahlseide said.

"This is a happy ending to an investigation that was exhaustive and intensive; a very heavy week for family and friends, as well, not knowing where [the child] was."

Edmonton police partnered with multiple police agencies, including the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, Gladstone Police (Oregon), Oregon City Police and the FBI.

Dahlseide described the investigation as unique in that EPS does not often have to coordinate with police forces outside the province, let alone across international borders.

The 13-year-old girl rode the bus to school on June 24, but was reported missing after her family learned she did not attend class and did not come home that afternoon.

Family and friends pushed to find her, or any information regarding her whereabouts, in the days since by searching the neighbourhood, forming a Facebook group and posting to social media, handing out pamphlets and putting the child's name and face on billboards.

The girl was listed as missing in the Canadian Police Information Centre, a national database shared among Canadian law enforcement, and the Child Search Network, a nation-wide app created by the Missing Children Society of Canada, Dahlseide said.

Police did not issue an Amber Alert, however.

According to the Alberta government website, police can only activate an Amber Alert if four criteria are met:

Initially, police did not have evidence that suggested the teenager was with someone else, said Staff Sgt. James Vanderland, of EPS' historical crimes section, in a news release Saturday.

Eventually, Edmonton police gathered enough information to start drafting an Amber Alert. But then they learned the girl was out of the country, which made it no longer feasible because she was out of the jurisdiction.

Once police were notified that the man had crossed the border, Edmonton police started coordinating with U.S. law enforcement in case the man returned to Oregon, Dahlseide said. The man lived near Portland, Ore., but Dahlseide was unsure of his citizenship status.