Depressing news from Quebec, but not surprising. The search for missing nine-year-old Cedrika Provencher of Trois-Rivieres has shifted to a search for a man who approached young women in the area:

Investigators in central Quebec are scaling back the intensive search for 9-year-old Cedrika Provencher and are instead focusing on tracking down a man in his mid-30s who approached several young women in the area where the child disappeared.

Police now believe Provencher may have been taken by the man, who apparently asked her to help look for a missing black dog – a search the girl cheerfully mentioned to a neighbour shortly before she vanished.

The balance of opinion now is that Cedrika was deliberately targeted and abducted:

Though she has now been missing more than 72 hours, the girl's family remains hopeful she'll be found.

"The hope is still there, that's for sure," Martin Provencher, the child's father, told reporters in Trois-Rivières, roughly 140 kilometres east of Montreal.

He also acknowledged the family is growing increasingly certain that Cedrika was abducted, and issued a public plea for her safe return.

"All I would say is to please bring her back ... all I want is my daughter back. That's all, that's all," said Provencher, the strain of the ordeal etched on his face.

Another girl in the area reported that she was approached by a man who invited her to go swimming:

She described him as a man in his mid-30s with short dark brown hair, standing about 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighing 150 pounds.

Police said they are investigating several leads and soon hope to pull together a description of the suspect.

Kidnapping is one theory, acknowledged Const. Pierre Rivard of the Surete du Quebec provincial police.

Police have also started looking into registered sex offenders who might be living in the area.

You know that if this turns out to be an abduction, and a known sex offender in the area turns out to be responsible, Canadians both in Quebec and across the country are going to be asking some harsh questions about how we manage the release of sex offenders into the community. The John Howard Society, which advocates for prisoners, reports some disturbing facts about child molesters:

One research project looked at 61 previous studies of sexual recidivism using a 4-5 year follow up period. This research on sex offenders found that 13.4% recidivated with a sexual offence, 12.2% recidivated with a non-sexual, violent offence and 36.6% recidivated with any other offence.

A long term follow-up study of child molesters in Canada found that 42% were reconvicted of sexual or violent crime during the 15-30 year follow-up period.

In addition, the long-term follow-up study (15-30 years) of child molesters showed that the average recidivism rate for this group of offenders is actually lower than the average recidivism rate for non-sexual offenders (61% versus 83.2% respectively for any new conviction).

If the topic was not so terrible, the last sentence would almost be funny in the way it tries to spin 61% recidivism as something impressive.