LE Statements

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From Nancy Grace transcripts:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1001/07/ng.01.html

Jan 7, 2010

GRACE: Well, you know, I`ve never heard of it happening every day. But, all right, if that`s what the Mommy scenario is, fine. I`m hearing in my ear we are just being joined by a very special guest. It is Sergeant Steven Carbajal — Carbajal He`s the public information officer with the Tempe Police Department. We`re very grateful to have you with us, Sergeant. Thank you for being with us. We`re just hearing as we go to air tonight that this Arizona couple who were hoping they could be an adoptive parent — adoptive parents, couple, are now persons of interest. What happened, Sergeant?

SGT. STEVEN CARBAJAL, TEMPE POLICE DEPARTMENT (via telephone): Well, let me say this, Nancy, right off the bat. You mentioned they were hopeful to be adoptive parents. Logan McQueary is…

GRACE: I know.

CARBAJAL: … the biological father… … of Gabriel Johnson…

GRACE: I`ve read your statement earlier.

CARBAJAL: … and he`s the custodial…

GRACE: We — I know that. I know that.

CARBAJAL: OK.

GRACE: We all know that.

CARBAJAL: My point was this, was that the Smiths were never eligible to be adoptive parents because that was not something that Logan McQueary had consented to or was going to consent to. So I want to make that right up front.

GRACE: Sir, that is a given. We`ve seen the father all over TV for hours, begging for the return of his son. He never consented to an adoption. That`s part of the reason many people believe this mom took off. That`s all said and done. What I`m trying to find out is this recent development in the case as to why this couple, who did — and I am correct — did believe that they could be adoptive parents — they wanted to be adoptive parents. Whether they were right or wrong, that`s what they thought was going to happen. Why have they been named persons of interest? Do you believe they know where Gabriel may be?

CARBAJAL: That`s what our investigators are — we have some good indications at this point with our investigation that Tammi and Jack Smith do know more information than they have provided to us that could possibly lead us to Gabriel.

GRACE: Sergeant — everyone, with me from the Tempe Police Department, Sergeant Steven Carbajal. Sergeant, I know there`s very little that you can share with us because this is an ongoing investigation. And I understand that. We all understand that. All we want is baby Gabriel back. Do you have reason to believe, Sergeant, that this baby is alive?

CARBAJAL: Our investigators have had indications that Gabriel is alive. We are hopeful that that is the case, and we are continuing our investigation as such.

GRACE: Are the Smiths being cooperative with you?

CARBAJAL: They have spoken to investigators. But again, as we stated earlier in a media release — and I`ll say it again now — that we do not feel that they are providing us all the information that they have about Gabriel and his location and condition.

GRACE: Sergeant, can you tell us what leads you to believe that?

CARBAJAL: I cannot get into that.

CARBAJAL: Just like you said, there`s not a whole lot that we can say. Our investigators are working furiously right now as these leads are developing. Minute by minute, it seems like we`re getting new developments and new leads to follow up on. And a message that we want to get out, as well, if anybody has Gabriel, we encourage them to come forward. If you want to drop him off at a safe place, a hospital, a fire station, anything, please do so. All we want is Gabriel back.

GRACE: Sergeant, do you believe that it`s possibly true that Mommy just gives the baby away to some couple she meets in the park?

CARBAJAL: Well, we are trying to determine that still at this point. We have not been able to confirm that. On one hand, we hear that that went down and the child was given away to a couple, unknown couple, at a park. We balance that with statements made by Elizabeth that she killed Gabriel. Which story is true? Our investigators are trying to get to the bottom of that right now.

GRACE: Sergeant, is it true that in one of her motel rooms, she left behind baby clothes, a high chair and other belongings of baby Gabriel`s?

CARBAJAL: We cannot get into, again, Nancy, unfortunately… … those details at this time — at this time. We`re not prepared to get into that. Again, we have some good information. We know, again, that Elizabeth and Gabriel were in San Antonio from at least the 22nd to the 27th. We know kind of what hotels they were staying at. That information is out there. Really, the main focus now — we have the vehicle, like you mentioned in your rundown. It was a great recap, a great timeline. We have Elizabeth. We have the car. We now have persons of interest. The next point of interest is to find Gabriel.

GRACE: OK, I know you`ve got go — everybody, with us, Sergeant Steven Carbajal, and they are under the gun. They are working around the clock there at the Tempe Police Department, trying to find this baby, along with other police stations cooperating with them, including the FBI.
Very quickly, Sergeant, what can we do for you, other than this tip line?

CARBAJAL: Well, if you see something out of the ordinary, a neighbor, a friend, relative buying new baby items that didn`t have a baby before, anything suspicious, report that to local law enforcement. Let us investigate that because it just might be that phone call that breaks this case wide open.

GRACE: And Sergeant, we believe the last time the baby was spotted was December 26th. Is it the 26th or the 27th.

CARBAJAL: The last indication that we have is the 26th, not the 27th.
 
One word of caution that I think you guys already know.
Be extremely careful about reports like "LE says" or "LE is reported as saying" or "investigators say" or any statements that are not direct quotes from LE personnel. If it is general info it is not as critical as if it is specific very important case information.

Journalists take extreme liberties with actual LE statements and mold them into much more sensational and often just flat out untrue statements. There is a lot of sloppy journalism where the reporter is not clear on case facts and just report something close to what they may have heard 2 officers talking about over a cup of coffee LOL. that has led us on plenty of wild goose chases in the past.

So unless the article says :
Dudley Doright from xx PD said "XXXXXX"
I would try and find a direct quote from an LE spokespersson.
Of course Pressers are the best source of info , right from the horse's mouth and usually the lead investigator.
 
BeanE said:
For ease in Googling for LE statements, here's my collection of LE names:

Tempe PD Sgt. Steve Carbajal

Tempe PD Lt. Mike Horn

Tempe PD Cmdr. Kim Hale

SAPD Chief William McManus

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio

SAPD Spokesperson Sandy Gutierrez
Click to expand...
This right here is the list of names that you want to get your direct quotes from.
This thread could be extremely valuable in the future, but it will only be as strong as the accuracy of the info on it.
I strongly recommend you limit this thread to direct quotes from these people or any that are directly involved in the case.
 
Prof said:
I think it might be useful to have all the LE statements in one place, so we may actually point to it?

As JBean suggests, let’s try to only include direct quotations from LE officials involved, and avoid reporters’ paraphrasing of LE statements?
I thought I'd start it off with the reports of LE statements from this article dated January 29, 2010

http://www.abc15.com/content/news/so...ZWBC0ifjg.cspx

Snips:

"The tips are not coming in at the volume they were a week ago," said Tempe Lt. Mike Horn.

"It is a very real possibility that Elizabeth killed Gabriel," Horn said. "We are holding out hope that he's alive, but we have to look at every aspect and investigate everything."

"There's one thing we've learned in this investigation and that is that anything is possible," said Carbajal
Click to expand...

Thanks for making that change, Prof. It will definitely make this thread a more useful and valuable resource.
 
SAPD Chief William "Bill" McManus
Video with clips from news conference Feb 9, 2009

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MuZI_4sRpM[/ame]

Partial transcription by me:

"We do remain hopeful that baby Gabriel is alive. We are, however, conducting both a missing persons investigation as well as a homicide investigation.

Homicide investigators believe that aspects surrounding the disappearance of baby Gabriel involve elements of a possible homicide."

More McManus statements regarding specifics of search at 1:23 in the video.
 
Chief McManus interviewed by Nancy Grace Feb 9:

Video: [ame]http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/crime/2010/02/09/ng.baby.landfill.cnn[/ame]
 
Steve Carbajal, Tempe PD

- "Jack Smith is no longer a person of interest," Carbajal said. "Tammi Smith was arrested for the [above charges]... . Unless there's some new information we're unaware of, nothing will change on that front."

- "We've been building this case and we've been working with several agencies, including the County Attorney that's going to be prosecuting this case later on down the road," said Sgt. Steven Carbajal of the Tempe Police Department. "We feel that we obviously had probable cause for the arrest. All the information we had led us to this arrest."

- "Our main goal is to find Gabriel," Carbajal said. "We're going to assist San Antonio with what we can ... ."

http://www.azfamily.com/news/local/...-of-missing-Tempe-baby-arrested-83362862.html

From video included with article. Transcription by me:

"We don't have any indication that leads us to believe that Tammi knows where Gabriel is."
 
SAPD Chief Bill McManus on Nancy Grace on Feb 9

GRACE: Chief, I know this has been a very, very difficult decision to make because it`s our understanding -- I do not want to compromise your investigation in any way -- that you have received a fair amount of evidence that baby Gabriel could be alive. And then to suddenly -- well, not really suddenly, but to start the momentous effort of digging through this landfill must have been somewhat of a disappointment.

MCMANUS: Well, we`re following up on leads from the missing person investigation. But at the same time, when we learned that -- you know, what the baby`s mother had transmitted to the father, we immediately secured that landfill and the area where it was calculated that the debris was dumped that was put in that dumpster.

Logistically, it took us a much shorter time to actually put this search together, this dig together. Normally, they take, you know, anywhere from two, three, four months to put together. We rushed this. We were hampered by the rains. We finally got our first chance to dig today.

But the -- you know, I didn`t want the question to come up, Chief, if this is a missing person investigation, why are you digging in the landfill? So from a technical perspective, we went ahead, and you know, we made a homicide report and we`re just following up on it. It still remains a parallel investigation, both missing person, and of course, the dig is going to, you know, point toward the homicide investigation.

GRACE: With us tonight, a very special guest, and we are taking your calls live. With us, the chief of the San Antonio Police Department, Chief Bill McManus. Chief, we now know more of the details of what 23-year-old Elizabeth Johnson said to the biological father, the bio father.

Chief, the details that she gave the father are much, much more chilling than, I smothered the baby, I hid him in the diaper bag and I threw him in the trash. It says, "You can spend the rest of your pathetic life wondering about" baby Gabriel. "I`m already boarding a plane out of the country. When I`m safe, I`ll e-mail you the exact location of dead Gabriel`s little blue body, if the garbage don`t come first."

You know, Chief, you`re probably a lot more diplomatic than me, but she can rot in hell for this e-mail alone, to say dead Gabriel`s "little blue body"! Is that the correct wording, Chief, of the text message she sent the baby`s father?

MCMANUS: Well, I`ll tell you, Nancy, I don`t want to get into the details of the investigation, whether you have them correct or not. But I will tell you that the communication that transpired back and forth -- or back to the father, was pretty tragic.

GRACE: Oh! And of course, Chief, as we all know in law enforcement, it only gets in the way. It impedes the investigation. Now, chief, a lot of people want to know what took you so long to start the dig because you had this evidence back in December. I know you`ve got an explanation, including how long it took to get the dig together. Please explain to the viewers.

MCMANUS: We continue to follow up on leads on the missing person investigation. The -- securing the landfill -- by securing the landfill, nothing was going in there, nothing was going out of there. So you know, time was really not that critical in terms of having to search the landfill. Nothing was going to be lost.

If we were -- if we believed that it was going to be lost, then we would have been in there, you know, as soon as we could have. And actually, today was as soon as we could have. But nothing was lost over those -- over that time period, from the time we discovered it until the time we actually went in.

http://archives.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1002/09/ng.01.html
 
Tempe PD Cdr Kim Hale - Jan. 17, 2010 12:00 AM

- "If the child is in good hands, and that's a big if, then the child will still be around," said Tempe police Cmdr. Kim Hale. "But the longer we go, it doesn't help us as far as trying to recover him, wherever the child is, whether that is in a home, or the child has been taken across the border to Mexico, or if he's in the bottom of a landfill."

- "Time is not on our side when it comes to the recovery of this child," Hale said. "The recovery chances grow much more dim as time goes on."

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/2010/01/17/20100117missingbaby0117.html
 
San Antonio Police Department Press Release Feb 9, 2010
http://www.sanantonio.gov/sapd/pdf/Adv_020910b.pdf
CONTACT: Sandy Gutierrez DATE: February 9, 2010 RELEASE NO: 122
Media Advisory
SAPD Holds News Conference in Missing Baby Gabriel Case
On Tuesday, February 9th, San Antonio Police Chief William McManus held a news conference to discuss the latest developments in the case of missing baby, Gabriel Johnson. Below are the points he discussed:
• 8-month-old Baby Gabriel has been missing since December 26th when he was last seen here in San Antonio.
• In cooperation with the Tempe Police Department and the local FBI office, the San Antonio Police Department opened a missing person’s investigation into the disappearance of Gabriel (1-9-10).
• We remain hopeful that baby Gabriel is alive.
• We are conducting both a missing person’s investigation, as well as a homicide investigation.
• Homicide investigators believe that aspects surrounding the disappearance of baby Gabriel involve elements of a possible homicide.
• During the course of the investigation, we have received and followed up on several leads.
• One of those leads has led us to this landfill (Tessman Road Landfill).
• Landfill personnel have pinpointed an exact location where the search will begin.
• Today, we have begun the excavation process.
• This operation will be two-fold:
- Phase I – we will begin by removing 45 feet of debris. This excavation process will take a MINIMUM of 6 days to accomplish.
- Phase II – the “search operation” begins. Once we have removed debris and have reached our target area, we will begin the arduous task of sifting through layers in search of possible evidence.
• This phase will be a long and repetitive cycle.
• Search teams will be looking for anything of evidentiary value.
• Debris will be thoroughly examined by search teams as well as cadaver dogs.
• Debris with no evidentiary value will be disposed of.
• Tentative hours for this operation will be 7:30 am to 6 pm, Monday through Friday.
• As the need arises, information will be disseminated.

We continue to urge anyone with information on this case, to call 1-800-THE-LOST (843-5678).
 
Good Morning America Interview with Steve Carbajal, Tempe PD
from January 7th

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/search-baby-gabriel-infant-alive-cops/story?id=9499798

Steve Carbajal in reply to a question of what charges someone might face if they are found to have Gabriel --transcribed here

"we've had some questions about what charges someone might face if they have Gabriel--those are issues we are not too concerned about right now --we want Gabriel returned safely -- so if somebody has Gabriel if you can turn him into a fire department, a hospital, some safe place, that's all we are asking for and that's all Logan is asking for the safe return of his son"
 
Today Show Jan 19 interview with Lt Horn

[ame="http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4700943&postcount=40"]Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - AZ-Gabriel Johnson, 8 months News Media and Updated Information ONLY. No Discussion.[/ame]

Includes statements regarding LE's concerns about Gabe based on the hotel pictures - his lethargy etc.
 
Two statements from Carbajal in this video from the day of Tammi's arrest:

1:38 "As um Elizabeth left Arizona, um we believe that um Tammi was basically working with her, in order to um um, in order to um um provide a place for her potentially to go and some just, some help along the way."

2:10 "We have no further information from her that would lead us to any information of where Gabriel may be."


http://www.kpho.com/video/22416124/index.html
 
So... it looks like she actually did get charged with custodial interference. Or am I misunderstanding those documents?
 
One statement from Carbajal at 2:55 in this video from the day of Tammi's arrest:

"There were times when Tammi would reach out to Elizabeth, saying "Hey, you gotta come back." But that was after basically all the other attempts to get Logan to sign over custody um all these different things that she was trying to to eventually have Logan out of the picture."

http://www.azcentral.com/video/64594055001
 
chell said:
So... it looks like she actually did get charged with custodial interference. Or am I misunderstanding those documents?
Click to expand...

She was arrested for forgery, conspiracy to commit custodial interference, and custodial interference. A few days later, the prosecutor dropped custodial interference, and charged her with forgery and conspiracy.
 
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