Police say parents are not answering vital questions

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Donjeta said:
I don't know. Are they able to detect an odor if the body was inside an airtight plastic container of some sort and it wasn't in the car for very long?
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I am not sure what scientific research says, but it would seem to me that unless it was a vacuum sealed container, the dogs could hit.

However, even if they couldn't that leaves some big questions. What happened to the container? It would float if there was air in it, so surely it would have been found by now. Unless there was a lot more than 30lb. in it. But if there was, what would a diabolical person put in the box that would not be traceable to them? Scott Peterson used concrete, but with only 4 hours, DB had no time for that.

Maybe she threw the container out and just dumped the baby? But where? Something large enough to hold a 30-lb baby would be large enough to catch the attention of searchers or LE. Unless she drove way further than just the river. Which would be risky because the longer she was away from home, the more likely she is to get caught, since she didn't know when JI would be home.

It just doesn't work easily. Not to say it couldn't be done, but it would require so much luck and forethought that it seems unlikely.
 
Karmaa said:
Please note that I was referring to SKY's mother as being accused of having mental issues, not Debbie! So far as I know, there is nothing to indicate that DEBBIE has serious mental issues. Also nothing to indicate that she has any criminal history. Sky's mom has a history of leaving a baby in a parked car.

One more note: schemata refers to "normal for that individual". Not "normal in general". So, we don't compare me to Jeffrey Dahmer, for instance. But to compare Ted Bundy to Jeffrey Dahmer might be more applicable. And even then, there are so many factors to consider that it can't be said that Bundy did THIS, so Dahmer would too. What you can say is "people LIKE Bundy often do this... so the chance is greater that Dahmer did as well.

So, it all hinges in this case on how you see Debbie. If you see her as a wild party animal, you will form a different opinion of her. If you see her as a young, middle class mother you will have a different opinion of her. My point is that there is no reason to think of her as a wild party animal. If there was, it might push my thoughts in a different direction
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I know you were referring to Sky's mother, in the context of comparing her to DB. I continued the thought. I don't know if she has serious mental issues but if she had I wouldn't think of it in terms of an accusation.

I think people might sometimes find themselves doing things that are not normal for that individual when faced with situations that are not normal for that individual. Killing babies is not that common that a normal person would have a set pattern of customary behaviors in that situation. Maybe some kind of crisis response schemata or a general "I'm in trouble, how do I cover my ***" pattern would apply but I don't have enough information to say what anybody's behavioral patterns are in this case.

I don't necessarily see "wild party animal" and "young middle class mother" as mutually exclusive but IMO one does not have to be a wild party animal to do something to one's children. There are examples of both. DB did say that she drinks alcohol two or three times per week and depending on the amounts consumed it might indicate a problem even if it's in the context of a middle class home.
 
Donjeta said:
I know you were referring to Sky's mother, in the context of comparing her to DB. I continued the thought. I don't know if she has serious mental issues but if she had I wouldn't think of it in terms of an accusation.

I think people might sometimes find themselves doing things that are not normal for that individual when faced with situations that are not normal for that individual. Killing babies is not that common that a normal person would have a set pattern of customary behaviors in that situation. Maybe some kind of crisis response schemata or a general "I'm in trouble, how do I cover my ***" pattern would apply but I don't have enough information to say what anybody's behavioral patterns are in this case.

I don't necessarily see "wild party animal" and "young middle class mother" as mutually exclusive but IMO one does not have to be a wild party animal to do something to one's children. There are examples of both. DB did say that she drinks alcohol two or three times per week and depending on the amounts consumed it might indicate a problem even if it's in the context of a middle class home.
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You are absolutely correct in everything you are saying! (As far as Sky's mom - some people never reference the original post, so I wanted to be sure we didn't get someone jumping in thinking that we were talking about DB ;) )

Anyway, you are right, and the last sentence seems to be indicative of the issues where most reasonable people are hung up on in this case. How do we interpret things, especially when we have so little information? Do we immediately assume that she is an alcoholic (not saying that YOU do), or do we say "eh, some people do that - it's not necessarily a red flag". If later down the road we hear that she has a history of drunk driving, or people reporting that she was out dancing and partying recently, the people who believe the "it's not a red flag" thing will probably revise their opinion of it. But some just as reasonable people will think the complete opposite. Maybe because in their own experience, people who drink a few times a week ARE dangerous or irresponsible people.

No matter what, it's just important that we each keep an open mind, and frankly, I think you do - even if you are more off the fence than me, lol!
 
Donjeta said:
The family has a car, she has a computer and could have access to email or skype, the phone may have had internet access, as a mom she is probably used to carrying the baby, we don't have any idea what if anything was found on her shoes, shoes can be cleaned, thrown away, mud on shoes can be explained away in an innocent fashion, there may be paved bridges and dry paths via which one can access the river that don't destroy your shoes.

I am not sold on her guilt as a 100 % thing but none of the reasons presented so far that she couldn't have done it seem convincing to me.
I am keeping my options open but I am certainly not going to be convinced that DB is too feeble and immobile to have had the physical strength or not smart enough to have hidden a ten month old baby. It's not reasonable doubt to me. It just seems like grasping at straws to prove her innocent.

She might be but this does not prove anything to me because I don't believe her to be as helpless and clueless as all that.


It's a few minutes drive to the river:
Chouteau Bridge, Kansas City, MO to N Lister Ave, Kansas City, MO - Google Maps
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Please help me with the sentence that I bolded. Are you saying that DB needs to prove to you that she's innocent of harming BL? In other words she's guilty until proven innocent? TIA.
 
Detective Klimpt said:
Refer me to the distance from the house to the river. I know it was stated somewhere on here early on. Your logic and mine are very different. I suppose it has to do with whether or not we think DB is responsible.

BL was around 30 pounds and DB does not look all that 'fit' to me. Carrying 30 pounds of dead weight to the river while in a panic and afraid of getting caught raises some serious reasonable doubt to me. I don't know what the river bank in Kansas City looks like or if there is a bridge or something where someone could stand and toss a baby, but I don't think so from what I've read. If DB was down near the water, she would have evidence on her shoes (mud/sand?) and likely other tell-tale signs of being near the water.

Also, DB acting alone means leaving the boys alone for a while and assumes that during the time she was gone, neither boy woke up and noticed her gone.

Nope, I'm not buying into this theory at all. I could believe a theory where DB did something and had another person put the body in the river (or somewhere), but in order for me to believe that, I would need to know how she contacted her assistant. Everybody that believes DB did it, cannot come up with how she contacted her assistant. No working phone, and even she had a phone that did work, LE has probably looked at incoming calls to the phones of all connected people and POI's.

I am very much in agreement with what poster KARMAA wrote, and posted similarly on a recent thread.

One thing Wild Bill said early on is "tell me how she did it". I have yet to hear a believable theory of how she did it.
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If I might add ,she was more then likely sloppy drunk, making it hard to believe she could commit the crime without leaving a trail of evidence and hiding the body from LE and the FBI.
 
RANCH said:
Please help me with the sentence that I bolded. Are you saying that DB needs to prove to you that she's innocent of harming BL? In other words she's guilty until proven innocent? TIA.
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Of course no one needs to prove anything to me, I am not the jury. Please read the thread. I was responding to a number of posts that implied I must be convinced that she is guilty and that it was impossible for her to have done anything for reasons a), b), c) etc. The reasons a), b), and c) did not prove her innocence to me in the context of this discussion, and the reference to not being sold on her guilt was my response to the assumption that I must think she's guilty. That's all.

Detective Klimpt posted:
Your logic and mine are very different. I suppose it has to do with whether or not we think DB is responsible.
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I do not necessarily think she is responsible but some of the logic trying to prove she couldn't have done it nevertheless makes no sense to me.
 
Karmaa said:
I just noticed - I said 3 hours. I MEANT 4 hours. I don't know why the 3 and the 4 have to be so close together on my keyboard!:dunno: lol.

Anyway, that's why I said it was not impossible. BUT, think about yourself and the people you know closely, maybe a mother or sister or your best friend.

First: what would you do if there was an accident? Call 911 or someone FAST, right? I believe MOST people would. Maybe not someone with a history of child abuse and CPS visits and stuff, but I see DB as being a basically "normal" person in this regard.

Second: just suppose that you flipped out and (God forbid) threw the baby against the wall or something. How long do you think it would take you to pull yourself together to even THINK about covering it up? (Again, someone with a history of impulse problems might be faster due to experience at making really bad choices and covering up, but we are talking about a relatively "normal" person.)

I am real close to getting my psychology doc, so I know that there are some really whacko people out there, and that you can NEVER predict what anyone is capable of doing. But there are things called "schemas", that tell us if people are LIKELY to do certain things, based on things they have done in the past.

What that means is that people with a history of having impulse issues are more likely to have experienced punishment or attention for those problems. If DB had a history of child neglect or abuse, that would be a tally in the probably guilty column. But she doesn't. And aside from some rumors of behavioral stuff as a young person, there is nothing else to indicate it. (O/T but when you compare this to the OCD mom of Sky, in Washington - you can see what I am talking about. She had been accused of having mental issues, she had been accused of threatening to kill her children - true? or not?, and she has a mental illness. I would NOT use the same "schema" parameters on her as I would for DB.)

None of that is PROOF, of course. It is just one more piece of the puzzle.
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Wouldn't the fact that she has successfully raised on child to the age of 5 iirc factor into that also?
 
Respectfully snipped by me:

Karmaa said:
No matter what, it's just important that we each keep an open mind, and frankly, I think you do - even if you are more off the fence than me, lol!
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Yes! I have been on a standing grand jury before, and I have to say that given the information we in the general public know I would be unable in good conscience to vote for a true bill to indict on this evidence. This is not to say that LE doesn't have much, much more, but I cannot in fairness decide on the guilt or innocence of Lisa's parents until more of the pieces of evidence are known. That's why, despite having fallen off a time or two, I am still on this lonely fence. And it's also why, when a poster makes a good point I will acknowledge it whether it fits in with my personal leanings or not.

Also, as much as I want Lisa to be found (safe!), I am extremely uncomfortable with the idea of her parents (or any parents) to be stripped of their constitutional rights to counsel, to remain silent, to not self-incriminate, etc. Not because I am in favor of guilty parents getting away with something, but because those rights were hard-won and are in there for a reason, and to start lifting them in certain cases is a very slippery & treacherous slope.

JMO!
 
Minette said:
Respectfully snipped by me:



Yes! I have been on a standing grand jury before, and I have to say that given the information we in the general public know I would be unable in good conscience to vote for a true bill to indict on this evidence. This is not to say that LE doesn't have much, much more, but I cannot in fairness decide on the guilt or innocence of Lisa's parents until more of the pieces of evidence are known. That's why, despite having fallen off a time or two, I am still on this lonely fence. And it's also why, when a poster makes a good point I will acknowledge it whether it fits in with my personal leanings or not.

Also, as much as I want Lisa to be found (safe!), I am extremely uncomfortable with the idea of her parents (or any parents) to be stripped of their constitutional rights to counsel, to remain silent, to not self-incriminate, etc. Not because I am in favor of guilty parents getting away with something, but because those rights were hard-won and are in there for a reason, and to start lifting them in certain cases is a very slippery & treacherous slope.

JMO!
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A jolly good post. That is what it is basically all about for me. Although I still think it is extremely unlikely that Debbie had anything to do with this.
 
Thank you, Sabot. I should clarify that the grand jury, of course, would not be called on to determine guilt or innocence, just to a) determine that a crime had been committed (and which crime(s) it was, and b) if there exists enough evidence to believe that a given person or persons committed the crime(s). If both of those are yes, the grand jury returns a true bill. Otherwise, a not true bill is returned, although the prosecutor can bring it again if there is new evidence (that was true at least in the jurisdiction in which I served.)

As I said, in this case I wouldn't have enough evidence to vote to return a true bill, much less to convict. (What specific crime(s) was/were committed and by whom??)
 
Minette said:
Thank you, Sabot. I should clarify that the grand jury, of course, would not be called on to determine guilt or innocence, just to a) determine that a crime had been committed (and which crime(s) it was, and b) if there exists enough evidence to believe that a given person or persons committed the crime(s). If both of those are yes, the grand jury returns a true bill. Otherwise, a not true bill is returned, although the prosecutor can bring it again if there is new evidence (that was true at least in the jurisdiction in which I served.)

As I said, in this case I wouldn't have enough evidence to vote to return a true bill, much less to convict. (What specific crime(s) was/were committed and by whom??)
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I totally agree. Once we know WHAT crime was committed, we will at least have something to work with. But at this point, we only know that somehow Baby Lisa was not in her crib at 3:30 am that morning.

We don't know WHAT was done, much less WHO did it, HOW they did it, WHEN they did it, or WHY they did it. We are barely comfortable with WHERE it was done - at least in general. But that could prove to be wrong too!

We need way more than this to charge, convict or really even just to accuse someone!
 
Minette said:
Thank you, Sabot. I should clarify that the grand jury, of course, would not be called on to determine guilt or innocence, just to a) determine that a crime had been committed (and which crime(s) it was, and b) if there exists enough evidence to believe that a given person or persons committed the crime(s). If both of those are yes, the grand jury returns a true bill. Otherwise, a not true bill is returned, although the prosecutor can bring it again if there is new evidence (that was true at least in the jurisdiction in which I served.)

As I said, in this case I wouldn't have enough evidence to vote to return a true bill, much less to convict. (What specific crime(s) was/were committed and by whom??)
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I must admit that I don't know much about Grand Juries, but they sound a bit like The British Crown Prosecution Service who decide if there is a case to answer to for one or more persons. And as things stand at the moment, this Case wouldn't go to Court against anybody, not even Jersey, who we all no doubt, would love to blame.
But I do think that someone had been watching that house. And from what little I have been able to learn, Baby Snatchers target someone and then just wait for an opportune moment.
 
wow..hadn't been around this board much, lately. Looks like DB and JI have done a good job drumming up support! Not hard to do with media attorneys and large law firms. But, kind of sad, too. Where is the support for baby Lisa? Oh! That's right....local LE and the FBI are her support. Bless them for not giving up on her. For tirelessly searching...
 
I am by no means a legal expert, just speaking based on my own experiences! But what happens in general is that the grand jury is overseen by the prosecutor (the DA) and only addresses felonies, not misdemeanors. The prosecutor presents evidence and the and can summon witnesses and compel them to testify. A judge is not present, nor are any defense attorneys. During my service, we were allowed to question witnesses directly. We ruled on everything from murder to rape to drug offenses. Hearsay can be admitted if it is supported by other evidence. The grand jury determines whether the evidence meets the standard of 'probable cause,' not 'beyond a reasonable doubt'--that is left to the trial jury to determine. So in general, the grand jury acts under the direction of the prosecution and is held to a lower standard of proof than a trial jury. Even so, there has to be some hard evidence, or a preponderance of circumstantial evidence of what happened and who did it.
 
Amster said:
wow..hadn't been around this board much, lately. Looks like DB and JI have done a good job drumming up support! Not hard to do with media attorneys and large law firms. But, kind of sad, too. Where is the support for baby Lisa? Oh! That's right....local LE and the FBI are her support. Bless them for not giving up on her. For tirelessly searching...
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LE seem to be searching for A Dead Body. I am rather hoping for A Live One.
 
I don't 'support' DB & JI--I support the truth. And the truth is, I don't know exactly what happened, or who did it. When and if LE does, I expect them to bring charges. I support that, too.
 
Minette said:
I don't 'support' DB & JI--I support the truth. And the truth is, I don't know exactly what happened, or who did it. When and if LE does, I expect them to bring charges. I support that, too.
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And to bring charges against the CORRECT person, no matter who that turns out to be.
 
Minette said:
I am by no means a legal expert, just speaking based on my own experiences! But what happens in general is that the grand jury is overseen by the prosecutor (the DA) and only addresses felonies, not misdemeanors. The prosecutor presents evidence and the and can summon witnesses and compel them to testify. A judge is not present, nor are any defense attorneys. During my service, we were allowed to question witnesses directly. We ruled on everything from murder to rape to drug offenses. Hearsay can be admitted if it is supported by other evidence. The grand jury determines whether the evidence meets the standard of 'probable cause,' not 'beyond a reasonable doubt'--that is left to the trial jury to determine. So in general, the grand jury acts under the direction of the prosecution and is held to a lower standard of proof than a trial jury. Even so, there has to be some hard evidence, or a preponderance of circumstantial evidence of what happened and who did it.
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Thanks. That sounds reasonable, and not much different to UK.
France has a similar system to America. one is Inquisitorial and the other is
Adversarial, although for the life of me I can never remember which one is what.
However, both France and UK have convicted innocent people in recent years, not to mention before hand, and some of whom were Executed. Which ever way you look at it, both of these systems rely on evidence supplied by LE.
 
I think everyone on this forum cares deeply about finding Baby Lisa. Many of us hope desperately that she will be found alive. We can differ about what we think happened, and who might or might not be involved, but I hope we can all agree that finding Lisa is the most important thing.
 
And to get back OT: Can the parents just for pete's sake, for LISA's sake, go and answer the police's questions? Until they do, speaking of innocence till proven guilty, what they currently are proving to me only of course, is how they are obstructing a LE investigation TO retrieve THEIR own baby!

The freaking mind boggles.
They have really convinced me of their level of care and concern. Really and truly.

I guess another cold case.
And relying on Karma somehow down the line.

sigh.
 
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