LA - Mickey Shunick, 21, Lafayette; 19 May 2012 - #22

[Zuckerschnecke]

Hi all,

Couldn't sleep, so I let my mind wonder a bit....about the bike dump. Hope I can make sense here with what I am trying to say....as it's way past my bedtime! Here goes:

So somehow our perp ended up with a body (alive or not) and a bike in a vehicle. One would think that you would not want to transport the body very far, because if you got pulled over for any reason or someone noticed...your in deep trouble. However, one might be more comfortable transporting the bike a little further say to Whiskey Bay. If you have the bike in your vehicle and you get pulled over or someone sees the bike in your vehicle PRIOR to MS getting reported missing or anyone knowing anything about a missing bike.....it does not look out of the ordinary. You have a bike in your vehicle....so do a lot of people. No real threat of getting caught immediately, if this is done before she is reported missing. But driving further than you absolutely have to with a live victim or even a body is different. I would think it'd be "safer" (for the perp) to leave MS closer to her abduction or accident site rather than further out where the bike was found.

Now on the other hand, we all know that many criminals just don't think logically, especially in a panic. I don't know how many cases I have seen where someone could have taken a much easier route to rid of evidence and would likely have had a much better chance of getting away with the crime then what they actually ended up doing.

With that said...what do we have here? Do we have a planner who felt comfortable driving MS around (alive or not) or do we have someone who panicked and tried to get rid her quickly? Either way, the person had to feel comfortable enough with driving the bike to WB. That could be that they had traveled that route a hundred times before and felt ok about getting there and dumping it without being seen or that they needed a "safe" place to dump it quickly were it wouldn't be found right away to buy more time or many other things I am not thinking of.

I just almost think she is somewhere closer. If it was me, I wouldn't want to drive too far with a live victim and/or a body. Though again....it's hard to figure out what a potential abductor/panicked person/drunk person may do. Food for thought, I guess.

Did that make sense? Lol....

That's what I said a while back....that I don't think they transported her far, alive or otherwise. The bike is an easier alibi. I think she is very close to where the last camera shots are. JMO All these threads have been going in circles so I've been mainly lurking. It's a tough case. I am hope with the search team coming back, they have a lead or know something. I am sure they do.

 

[cluciano63]

It is possible that if LE has a suspect or a POI, that would provide them with new areas requiring TES's help to search. Once they have a person to focus on, they would have more ideas of where that person might frequent, etc...hope so.

 

[kemo]

Been researching abductions of bicyclists, after someone posted of a case in Hawaii. With the exception of quite a few child abductions while riding bikes. I could not find any prior abduction cases of adult bicyclist in the Continental United States.
Could Mickey Schunick's abduction be attributed to a gang-initiation ritual?

In 1991, on the Big Island in Hawaii, Dana Ireland, 23, was deliberatly run down by a moterist and taken in his car to another site where she was raped and left for dead. The damaged bicycle was left at the scene.The perp was never found.

In 1988, Tara Calico was last seen riding her bicycle on a rural road near Belen New Mexico. Neither she nor the bicycle was seen again. A motorist came forward and said that he had been stuck behind a very slow moving Old Pick- Up that he thought was following a girl on a bicycle on the same road that Tara was believed to have been riding on. The perp was never found.

There have been at least a few other cases where women on bicycles have "disappeared" but I am not certain that they involved sexual assault.

This is not a common "MO" but it is not unprecidented.

 

[katie78]

I agree that it isn't a window decal. I personally believe that it is just a distorted reflection of whatever is across from it (the construction sign, maybe?)

the only other thing that I could almost believe it being is a sunshade for a carseat.

I see the dog face - but it looks like a cartoon. I have a mastiff so I am used to the giant head lol, but the proportions are all wrong. JMO

If it is a decal, perhaps it could be a tiger head? As in LSU Tigers? That could be what people are saying looks like an over-large dog head.

 

[tlzzdavis]

Decals, Rumors, DWTIQ's, Routes...happy to see that my Taco Tuesday did not require me to miss new information

OFF TOPIC:
Must add...all cleaned the carpets in my house all by myself! About 3200SF! And in dusty Arizona...YUCK!

AND...ISABEL CELIS CASE: Sheriff Made A HUGE Announcement Today! If you follow the case I would check it out! Also is an example of why we need to keep the hope alive!

 

[cluciano63]

In 1991, on the Big Island in Hawaii, Dana Ireland, 23, was deliberatly run down by a moterist and taken in his car to another site where she was raped and left for dead. The damaged bicycle was left at the scene.The perp was never found.

In 1988, Tara Calico was last seen riding her bicycle on a rural road near Belen New Mexico. Neither she nor the bicycle was seen again. A motorist came forward and said that he had been stuck behind a very slow moving Old Pick- Up that he thought was following a girl on a bicycle on the same road that Tara was believed to have been riding on. The perp was never found.

There have been at least a few other cases where women on bicycles have "disappeared" but I am not certain that they involved sexual assault.

This is not a common "MO" but it is not unprecidented.

Actually at least two people were convicted in Dana's case...she was taken by a group of young men. Also her bike was found crushed at the scene...that was how it was known she had been taken elsewhere.

http://karisable.com/crdanai.htm

Tara was indeed never found...all kinds of rumors and stories, I had just moved to NM when she went missing, and it comes up from time to time...but no real evidence. LE has said they have possible POI's, or a POI, but nothing they can bring to court.

 

[chicken fried]

I just compared the jpegs from chicken and the ones released. Can only state what I see. I do not see the white letters to the side which tends to make me believe that there was work done subsequent to those stills that were released.

ETA chickens link to jpegs

Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - LA LA LA - Mickey Shunick, 21, Lafayette; 19 May 2012 - #22

Dang; step out for awhile and I'm 13 pages behind.

The "ONLY" lettering is there, absolutely, in the Mickey pic. It straddles the asphalt/cement border. Look at it again. Don't you see it? What you're not accounting for is that the right end of the picture is quite stretched. I'm headstrong and make mistakes and sometimes get snippy with other posters, but I'm having a hard time adjusting to the fact that my personal visit to the site and photos and statements about the flawless asphalt are still being questioned, after a three-day effort on this subject, when a cursory examination of the "Mickey" photo reveals the lettering in the identical spot as it is now. I took the initiative to drive up there and get these photos and then carefully examine them compared to the Mickey photo.... Last request... will someone without bias please compare the notch in the asphalt/concrete border closest to the curb in my photo and Mickey's photo? That's a unique, haphazard application of asphalt. I wish that it were possible to hear the word, "Uncle," at some point. It's one thing to question me about things you can't see... but the photos are right there for comparison because I drove up there to try to end this highly improbable idea on Websleuths that the LPD actually released to the world a photo of Mickey Shunick getting squashed and then overlaid the evidence and the fresh turn-lane markings with fresh asphalt and then repainted the turn-lane markings to cover it up.

I've shown the perfect asphalt, the correct contours, and provided photographic evidence that the turn-lane markings on 6/3/12 match the ones on 5/19/12, and that the same asphalt upon which Mickey was supposedly run over on May 19, 2012, is the asphalt that was there on June 3, 2012.

I don't know what more I can do? The police are our fellow townsmen and neighbors. Do y'all think that they're really that corrupt to call out the streets department to dump asphalt over the scene where a young woman was run down by a truck, covering the brand-new lane markings and redoing them? That would be a breathtaking cover-up.

I've done all I can do. Probably more effort than I should have done, but I thought I could prove things and eliminate this horrific idea of what would be a criminal cover-up, by being on scene with my personal camera and letting people carefully examine the photos.

 

[tlzzdavis]

Off to bed...too many tacos, drinks and WTs!

We are about 20 miles from I10 here in AZ and I still look for the DWTIQ!

My husband says I am nuts...told him "It is either this or shopping. you pick." He said "sleuth away my love." Ha!

 

[JennyDent]

New here, hi everyone!

I have been reading most of the threads on Mickey and have been trying to keep track but it's been a holiday here so forgive me if it's already been said (which I'm sure it had been). I think that Mickey was just an unfortunate victim of a sick opportunist that happened to be out that late at night and saw her riding alone and bumped and grabbed her for whatever awful reason and then put her bike where it was found, away from where she is to throw the trail off some and possibly make people wrongly assume she was put in the water to keep people focusing there.

Or it could of course be a hit and run and someone panicked after. I tend to go against this theory some just because I feel there would be more evidence of a hit and run happening.

Edited to add: What ever became of the girl that said she took a ride fom a man in a white truck that sad he went looking for pretty girls or something along those lines? I assume if it was validated they surely would have released a composite sketch of him by now. Again, sorry if it's been answered.

Either way I have a lot of respect for what everyone is doing here and for playing even a small role in helping to locate and bring Mickey back to her family!

 

[chicken fried]

Thanks for updating with the link. I agree that I don't see the "ONLY" lettering in the one where Mickey is riding. HOWEVER, the line of the asphalt against the pavement looks exactly the same. Including the wave.

It's there. It's stretched. It's there 100% and easily visible.

This is what I've been trying to point out about the camera, folks, it's HEAVILY distorted!

 

[chicken fried]

MOO --- I do not think that either the "bump" or the "snatch" occurred at this intersection.

agreed

 

[chicken fried]

Still...a lot of work went into it and it's yet to be completely disproven.

Everything's on the table till the case reaches its conclusion.


I'm not saying I think that's what happened.

I don't know

You don't know

Nobody knows.

I agree - it was a genius iddea, and seeing it would have horrified me, too, as I would have thought my great idea (it was great) had cracked the case.

My main two problems are:

1. She had to have been passed out lying in the road, and the camera just happened to catch the brief time before passing out and being run over.. Thats the only way, with the laws of physics, that that's her under the truck.

2. I'm not sure people are taking me seriously when I say the asphalt is flawless, without one single scratch or discoloration in that entire area. No blood was spilled there. No metal hit the ground and was pushed even 6 inches, with any downward force. What an amazing coincidence that we had a perfectly blank canvas. I so thankful for that, because viewing it with my own eyes, I know that no one got run over there. Just imagine had it been gouged and pitted... could we ever lay the theory to rest?

 

[chicken fried]

You're not alone in having developed these habits during the DTL days. I did too, as well as configuring my keyless entry on my car to only open the drivers door, locking my doors immediately when inside my house and car, always having my keys out, never being alone in a secluded place (night or day), etc., the list goes on and on. But I am glad I'm not the only one it stuck with. We need to keep these habits all the time, whether a crime spree is going on or not. I'm a firm believer of living your life alert and aware, but not in fear, in believing in the goodness of people but protecting yourself from those few bad eggs who take, advantage of that belief. Keep up your good habits!

Reading all the stories here from women and their precautions and fear has really opened my eyes to something I never gave much thought to.

I really have never thought how vulnerable a woman can feel alone in an isolatedor spooky place. As a guy, I've been lots of places myself, including taking off on a one month trip around the West, sleeping in the forest when the motels were full, being out on mountains in the dark by myself..... Sure, some places I have had protection ready, especially near big cities or way out in the desert when you have a small chance of meeting someone, but a bigger chance that somone may be off, and no help available.

That has been a kind of mental freedom I have taken for granted my whole life. What struck me is that men have the ability to act "tough," using a gruff voice and acting like someone not to be messed with... and men pick up on those signals. Although I'm not a really big guy, I know how to play gruff redneck and it is an effective first line of defense.

It has finally struck me how women don't have that go-to defense ... how men will automatically see woman as weaker.

Eye-opener. All you ladies who are scared should consider getting your concealed-carry license to make up that gap. Just think before you shoot, though!! Most decent men aren't a danger to a woman, even in an isolated place. It's that one perp out of 1,000 that women need to guard against, and I am gaining a better appreciation of that.

 

[chicken fried]

I apologize in advance if you've answered this. I'm struggling to stay afloat through all the posts. ---> I have to work sometimes or they'll take my truck and laptop (and paycheck) away..

Which camera is being referred to here:

But back to you, Chief Craft. What about other businesses or residences that she would have gone past on her bike on the drive home? Do they have surveillance video? Because my sources are telling me there was a surveillance video where somebody goes by on a bicycle. You can`t tell if it`s a man or a woman. Do we know what time that was?

CRAFT: No, we don`t know what time it was, and the video is such a poor quality because a lot of these cameras are actually located inside of businesses for the purpose of videoing inside the business, and so they might catch something on the outside but...

GRACE: Well, Chief, what I don`t understand why we don`t know what time it was because, I mean, the fact that somebody is going by on a bike at, say, 1:45 when she`s missing at 2:00 could have establish that she had made it that far, Chief Craft.



CRAFT: Well, in that particular video, though, the time was noted to be off in the business. So we can get it down to about within an hour, but that`s about the best we can do on that.


source: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1205/24/ng.01.html

I'm thinking that this may be 224 - and if so, it changes everything. Changes the location. I seem to remember a blurry pic shown once, early on. This sure is worth running down.

A.C.I - did 224 have an indoor camera in either of the two buildings, (#1 or #2) on first or second floor? 224 came up early and was being tossed around, but disappeared.

 

[Mr. Noatak]

My opinions only, no facts here:

Good friend, I looked at your most recent posts about the white truck image, but cannot post until late at night and suddenly, we have a new thread which took me awhile to find!

With your more recent posts, I can appreciate that you have faithfully studied the surveillance images. Yes, there are several ways to interpret what is seen through the windows of the white truck. And another thing, for all we know, this is simply a random and unrelated vehicle with a man and wife and maybe a pet. I cannot deny this. If we evaluated the white truck image with a bias that this vehicle is related to the crime- then we would naturally assume that there can only be a lone male driver. But it might be a family going to the store or whatever. I do think that the police are a little suspicious that they could establish the identity of the other two vehicles in question so quickly, but not this particular one.

I will take a try at enhancing the interior of the white truck. I don't think that zooming is effective when the pixel quality is sooooo bad. Sharpening will make the quality worse. What I will try to do is examine each pixel in the cab of the truck and see if anything can be gained with a pixel by pixel enhancement. This involves "selecting" pixels of identical color and playing with their tone, contrast, and brightness to see what 'develops'.

I DO believe (as you do) that the driver is visible, but I fear that the driver is only represented by only a few pixels.

My opinions only, no facts here:

On review of recent posts by fellow poster slowlybutshelly, I told slowlybutshelly that I would evaluate individual pixels in the image (of the cab) of the white truck that is following the bicycle.

A pixel-by-pixel evaluation of an image is marginally better than a whole-image enhancement. It still requires personal judgment and biases.

This will not be the same as my original work, posted as an attachment earlier. Only the cab interior and side mirror of the truck has been enhanced in this version. I looked at the reported 'dog image' in the rear window and determine (accounting for superficial magnification in the distorted original) that the dog's face is too large (but otherwise very life-like!). I conclude that the dog image is a result of the diffraction of back-lighting through the rear window as viewed through the right-rear side window. I have to admit though that in the original pic, this dog resembles the one I have now!

The front passenger possibility is concluded by me to be the result of the contrast between a dark external side-mirror AND the seat and head-rest. This creates the effect of a dark face and a light covering on the face. Can anyone else but me see that the interior coverings look blue or green? This is a very subjective factor in such low-light, but I am just curious. However, on the subject of a possible front seat passenger, I am not as confident as with the back seat dog situation, so I defer to slowlybutshelly to evaluate my post concerning my opinion about the passenger.

I still see a driver with a light-colored clothing top, possible leaning forward over the wheel. Possibly bulky, certainly not petite.

 

[chicken fried]

Many will be happy to know that I just used both UV light and luminol (to make damn sure) on a particular stretch of roadway and there was NO BLOOD. Mickey was not under the truck in that picture. Problem solved. Debate over.

Kissing you on both cheeks, and I'm a dude....

:woohoo:

 

[Mahouston69]

This is what makes me go in circles and mistrust what we have and don't have. I am not local but it is very concerning.
http://theadvocate.com/news/3023320-123/officers-allege-police-misdeeds

I am not verified and not sure if I should be before I say my opinion from that standpoint. I have been working with photoshop professionally for 14 years I also work with lighting and photography so I know a shadow, corrupted pixels etc.

I am NOT saying others don't or that the police don't. I am just saying when you see certain things over and over again, you get a feel right away for faces, inanimate objects and the like..
Having said that, I am fairly certain that the roadway was done (kinda hap hazardly) before she went missing and would not be surprised if they hadn't really scoped this area out much at all. I think they have her on camera further down the road. Not terribly far, but further down. MOO

 

[chicken fried]

I know this is under extreme circumstances, but i would be so insanely embarrassed if LE or anyone broke into my fb or emails. I wouldn't want anyone to see the things i write about to my friends and stuff.
Again, i know this is probably the last thing i would need to worry about at this point, if i was missing this long.
But still, i would hate it.
I hope i made sense....
Can they do that btw?

With a search warrant, yes Facebook would let them in.

Those are the perils of the social-media generation. I truly don't understand how people trust their private thoughts, photos, etc., to a company that has had them sign an agreement that that stuff is kept for LIFE!!

Maybe the problem is that there is just too much communication these days; I might call it a communication addiction. Ray Bradbury wrote an amazing short story in 1954 or so that predicted cell phones and Facebook... Still gives me the chills - it's like he hopped in a time-machine, forwarded to 2012, took a look around, and went back and wrote it. It's in an amazing collection of his called "The Sound of Thunder." Pick it up..the writing is exquisite.

 

[chicken fried]

Hi all,

Couldn't sleep, so I let my mind wonder a bit....about the bike dump. Hope I can make sense here with what I am trying to say....as it's way past my bedtime! Here goes:

So somehow our perp ended up with a body (alive or not) and a bike in a vehicle. One would think that you would not want to transport the body very far, because if you got pulled over for any reason or someone noticed...your in deep trouble. However, one might be more comfortable transporting the bike a little further say to Whiskey Bay. If you have the bike in your vehicle and you get pulled over or someone sees the bike in your vehicle PRIOR to MS getting reported missing or anyone knowing anything about a missing bike.....it does not look out of the ordinary. You have a bike in your vehicle....so do a lot of people. No real threat of getting caught immediately, if this is done before she is reported missing. But driving further than you absolutely have to with a live victim or even a body is different. I would think it'd be "safer" (for the perp) to leave MS closer to her abduction or accident site rather than further out where the bike was found.

Now on the other hand, we all know that many criminals just don't think logically, especially in a panic. I don't know how many cases I have seen where someone could have taken a much easier route to rid of evidence and would likely have had a much better chance of getting away with the crime then what they actually ended up doing.

With that said...what do we have here? Do we have a planner who felt comfortable driving MS around (alive or not) or do we have someone who panicked and tried to get rid her quickly? Either way, the person had to feel comfortable enough with driving the bike to WB. That could be that they had traveled that route a hundred times before and felt ok about getting there and dumping it without being seen or that they needed a "safe" place to dump it quickly were it wouldn't be found right away to buy more time or many other things I am not thinking of.

I just almost think she is somewhere closer. If it was me, I wouldn't want to drive too far with a live victim and/or a body. Though again....it's hard to figure out what a potential abductor/panicked person/drunk person may do. Food for thought, I guess.

Did that make sense? Lol....

Well, just my two cents, there are a lot of people who know the waterways. Myself, heck yes the boat would have been the first option...... boats slide under the radar and if I kept my head, it would not have been difficult at all.

 

[laura83]

It's there. It's stretched. It's there 100% and easily visible.

This is what I've been trying to point out about the camera, folks, it's HEAVILY distorted!

I can see the ONLY lettering. If you look at the daytime pic you can see the asphalt is straighter over that part, and in the night time pic it looks wavey... this is where the lettering is, it just looks like the way the asphalt is laid rather than ONLY. Everything else is so blurry the chances of being able to literally read the word ONLY are slim to none.

When someone goes to that much effort, it's a bit harsh to then not believe it, even with the pictures.

Good work Chicken! You can also see the gutter that looks like the black on the back of the truck, and the curb with bumpy grass that looks like an open door in the night time pic :tyou: