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Nancy Grace
Cases of Three Missing Women Detailed
Aired December 14, 2005 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight, as many of us prepare to be with family and friends for Christmas, Hanukkah, not everyone so lucky. Please help us bring three missing women home. Three separate cases, one common thread: Their disappearance is still a mystery, their family desperate for answers. Tonight, 26-year-old Sueann Ray disappears from a local Wal-Mart, or was her SUV staged in that giant parking lot to throw off police? Then a doctor who devoted her life to children, pediatrician and mother Dr. Zehra Attari (ph), vanishes into thin air a month ago, leaving her own medical clinic. And Summer Shipp, missing a year, Independence, Missouri.
Where are these three ladies? Tonight we ask for your help.
Good evening, everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us tonight. Tonight, it`s been one long year since Summer Shipp disappeared, Independence, Missouri. This wife and mother vanished while doing door-to-door surveys, her car found in the same neighborhood she was working. A year later, the mystery only deepens. And also tonight, a mom- turned-doctor leaves her office, Oakland, California, disappears, leaving her family on a desperate search. No sign of Dr. Zehra Attari or her car.
But first tonight, 26-year-old mom Sueann Ray vanishes from a Georgia mall four months ago, still no real leads in the case, her husband still not named by police as a suspect.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
QUINTON RAY, SUEANN`S ESTRANGED HUSBAND: One of the few that still do believe she`s still alive, but as the days pass on, I don`t know. We wasn`t together, you know, a lot. She had her own living, her own life and doing her own stuff. I don`t know what went on.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I want to go straight out to a reporter with "The Atlanta Journal Constitution." He`s been on the case from the beginning, Don Plummer. Don, bring us up to date, friend.
DON PLUMMER, "ATLANTA JOURNAL CONSTITUTION": Well, it`s been 110 days since Sueann disappeared. The questions surrounding her disappearance are still nagging both police and her family. What was she doing at her estranged husband`s house? What did he do afterwards? And what is his status? Is he a suspect, is he not a suspect?
GRACE: You know, Don, before you go one more word, let`s catch the viewers up to date. For those of you that are just joining us on the Sueann Ray missing person story, this is a beautiful young mother. Her disappearance has baffled local police, obviously. They still don`t have any real leads, are not naming anyone as a suspect. Don, take it from the top.
PLUMMER: Well, Sueann evidently found out on August 26 that her husband, who she was separated from, had taken their daughter from school. This was not part of their plan. She went to his home north of Atlanta. He said she went up there to have some work done on her car. However, just the prior week, she had had her car serviced. So perhaps that`s true, perhaps it isn`t. He says that she left there about 7:00 or 7:30. There`s some question about when her car actually showed up again at this Wal-Mart parking lot in Canton, George.
And there are also some questions about a rash of telephone calls between her estranged husband and his family that occurred right after the time that he says that she went to pick up her daughter.
GRACE: Well, Don Plummer, what`s so unusual is she had primary custody of the little girl. How old is the girl?
PLUMMER: She`s 6 now.
GRACE: OK. This husband was not supposed to go to the school and just take the little girl out of school, and that had never happened before, is my understanding. Suddenly, he does it that day, of all days, takes the little girl to his parents` house, and then, coincidentally, after just having her car serviced, she then takes her car over to his car business, which is right behind his house.
Now, that`s a very odd set of circumstances. She`s furious with him about taking the little girl without her permission.
PLUMMER: Yes. Quinton Ray, her estranged husband, said that they worked out that issue while he was with her. He said that they were, in fact, arguing at first but that they settled their issue. She decided to go and pick up her daughter, and that`s the last that he saw of her.
GRACE: Take a listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SGT. DAN KING, WOODSTOCK POLICE: She was up getting her car worked on by her husband at his automobile shop in Jasper. That was the last place that she was seen.
SANDY CHASM, MISSING WOMAN`S SISTER: The van was found at the Wal- Mart parking lot, backed in perfectly straight, and she can`t back anything up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I want to go out now to a special guest joining us. Sueann Ray`s father is named Danny Jenkins. Every road seems to lead to nowhere in the search for his girl. Danny, what`s the latest on your end?
DANNY JENKINS, MISSING WOMAN`S FATHER: Well, they don`t tell me a whole lot, Nancy. They`re pretty -- you know, the GBI`s pretty mum. They don`t say nothing and...
GRACE: After you appeared on the show last time, Danny, did you hear from them at all?
JENKINS: No, ma`am. I didn`t hear from them. No.
GRACE: What can you tell me about this video, this video from the Wal-Mart parking lot? It seems to me, Danny, that if we could get the video from the parking lot and see did she really leave her car there -- and Elizabeth (ph), if you could show me the spot -- yes, all the way at the end of this vast Wal-Mart parking lot, she parks her car all the way at the end, backs in. I`m not buying it. What about that video, Danny?
JENKINS: Well, if we could get NASA to maybe take a look at it, enhance it, and -- you know, of course, I don`t know that the GBI would release it. But if NASA could get involved in this, maybe we would have the answers that we`re looking for.
GRACE: I`m going to go to Atlanta prosecutor Eleanor Dixon. Eleanor, you and I have both had to have audiotapes, such as wiretaps, answering machine messages, you name it, enhanced. A lot of times, Eleanor -- you were with me when I tried this case at a bank robbery and then murder, the ATM photo. A lot of times, you`ve got to get video or audio enhanced. Now, is it possible for NASA to enhance it further than the GBI could?
ELEANOR DIXON, PROSECUTOR: I don`t really know because I`ve never personally had NASA enhance anything. But usually, what happens if the GBI can`t do it, we go to the FBI, and they have other ways that they can enhance photographs and videos, as well. So that might be an avenue to explore.
GRACE: Eleanor, have you had ever to bring in NASA to enhance?
DIXON: No, I`ve never brought in NASA to enhance anything.
GRACE: I haven`t, either, but I have brought in the FBI to enhance.
I`m going to go now straight out to a special guest joining us by phone, Dr. David Hathaway. He is a NASA scientist. Dr. Hathaway, thank you for being with us on the show. As many of us approach Christmas and Hanukkah, plan to be with our families, not so for Sueann Ray. What could NASA do to enhance this video?
DAVID HATHAWAY, NASA SCIENTIST: We`ve developed a process -- in fact, originally, we developed a process with the FBI and the GBI for the Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta back in `96. And it`s a process that allows you to get cleaner images out of video. And again, we`ve helped the FBI in about a half dozen cases now. We`ve personally worked probably four or five dozen cases for law enforcement across the U.S. using this technology.
GRACE: Could you describe in laymen`s terms, so even us lawyers can understand it, how do you enhance it even further than, for instance, the GBI could? What do you do to it?
HATHAWAY: It`s a process where we try to add images together to get rid of the video noise, the little speckly stuff you see when you do a freeze-frame on a video. But in order to add images together, they have to match. And so we`ve developed a mathematical process that looks at the images and figures out how you have to transform one image to another to make the pieces match so that you can add them together, get rid of the noise, and then you can do image enhancement things that people are more familiar with.
GRACE: You know, as I recall, didn`t you do that on the Carlie Brucia, the Florida case?
HATHAWAY: We worked on the Carlie Brucia case down in Sarasota, Florida. That was digital video, so it was -- it had its own kind of artifacts or video noise that made it difficult. Worked on that one. Worked on the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping out of Salt Lake, Katie Poeir (ph) up in Minnesota, and helped with a 9-year-old girl who was attacked in a West Virginia Target store back in July of 2003.
GRACE: You know, I`m just listening to what you`re saying -- everyone, with us is NASA scientist Dr. David Hathaway -- I bet you never thought when you went to NASA that you would be called upon, NASA would be called upon, to help solve missing people cases of little girls and ladies missing out of parking lots and Wal-Marts. It`s -- did you ever imagine that? Did you ever envision that, Dr. Hathaway?
HATHAWAY: Not at all. Again, we got started when the FBI came to NASA in `96 asking for help with all the video they had from the Olympic Park bombing, and that got us started. Once we developed the technique, word of mouth spread, and so we`ve been called in on a lot. It`s...
GRACE: How much does NASA charge for something like that?
HATHAWAY: There`s no charge. This is all paid for with your tax dollars.
GRACE: Whoa! Hold on! Would you repeat that?
HATHAWAY: This is...
GRACE: That`s the first time I`ve heard a taxpayer didn`t have to pay for something!
HATHAWAY: No. No. You already did.
GRACE: Whew! Cha-ching! OK, who -- and I don`t mean to put you on the spot, Dr. David Hathaway, everyone, NASA scientist with us tonight -- there`s a revolutionary new method that NASA has employed on a very limited number of missing persons cases. He named out Carlie Brucia, Elizabeth Smart, several other cases, trying to enhance video so that it can be discernible to a juror`s eye.
How would Danny Jenkins contact NASA, Doctor? Who would he contact?
HATHAWAY: He can contact me. Again, it usually has to be through law enforcement. Unfortunately, the way things work, we can`t help individuals.
GRACE: I understand.
HATHAWAY: But if GBI or the police involved in the case contacted me, we would make arrangements to give them assistance.
GRACE: To Danny Jenkins, Sueann Ray`s father, who is with us tonight, who seems to be the driving force behind the investigation into his daughter`s disappearance -- Danny, we`ll set that up for you after the show.
To Don Plummer, reporter with "Atlanta Journal-Constitution" -- do you get the sense they have been able to get anything off that video? I mean, listen, isn`t it correct that Sueann Ray went to the Wal-Mart earlier that day, and she was supposed to take her little girl that evening around 7:00 PM to, like, a cheerleader tryout or dance recital tryout or something like that? There`s no way she would have turned back to go to Wal-Mart and not pick up her girl. Why was her car parked there, Don?
PLUMMER: Well, that`s probably the $64 question in this whole case because if there is a video, they may have seen at least the car coming at a certain time. It would give them some kind of timeframe to work on. Obviously, the police have not told me or any other media this. The other thing that they might have is they may have interior video. It would be likely that if anybody parked that car, they might have been able to follow them into the store, if they went inside there.
They did do arches of the area. They did search both Quinton Ray`s home and also his parents` home. In both cases, though, they have sealed the evidence that they may have gained. We don`t know whether or not they`ve been successful in finding any links in those cell phone calls or whether they`ve been able to identify where those cell phone calls were made.
GRACE: Right. Right. Very quickly, to defense attorney Jason Oshins. Even if they can get the interior of the Wal-Mart, Jason, they can rule out when she was and wasn`t there. I mean, why go to the Wal-Mart if you don`t go in?
JASON OSHINS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, clearly, it would look as if someone planted the car there, as you just discussed, in trying to thwart law enforcement from finding out what truly happened, just put them off on the side and have them spinning tracks in a different direction from where it really is.
GRACE: And when we get back, Jason Oshins and Fred Perry (ph), Jr., will explain how the defense will then attack that video.
Quickly, to tonight`s "Case Alert." Tonight, we ask for your help. Help us bring home 19-year-old Brianna Maitland (ph), last seen Franklin, Vermont, March 2004, car recovered the next day. No sign of Brianna. If you have info, call 802-524-2121. Also missing tonight, Claudia Peres (ph), just 15 years old, Wildwood, Florida, disappeared October 5. We want them home for the holidays. If you have info on Claudia Peres, 352-793- 2621.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: According to police, Sueann`s estranged husband, Quinton Ray, may have been the last person to see her.
SGT. DAN KING, WOODSTOCK POLICE: She was up getting her car worked on by her husband at his automobile shop in Jasper. That was the last place that she was seen.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sueann`s maroon minivan, which looks very similar to this one pictured here, was later found parked in this parking space at the Canton Wal-Mart. Her sister, Sandy, says just the way it was parked is suspicious.
SANDY CHASM, SUEANN RAY`S SISTER: The van was found at the Wal-Mart parking lot backed in perfectly straight, and she can`t back anything up.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Welcome back, everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us. We are talking about a missing person case out of Georgia, Sueann Ray.
Back to Don Plummer, "Atlanta Journal-Constitution." So what have police done, what has the GBI done, since we last spoke, to find Sueann Ray?
PLUMMER: Well, we know that they did a search of Quinton Ray`s parents` property. They said that was a consent search, so there is no search warrant application and there`s no need for them to file with court any information about what they got. We know they`re doing other things. One of the things they may be doing is looking at these cell phone records to find out if Sueann`s cell phone was used after she disappeared, and so where...
GRACE: Well, that takes about 30 minutes. You can call Bell South on the phone and advise them that you`re with the GBI and get that information. They can send it over within a couple of days. It`s been four months, Don! Four months.
PLUMMER: Right. And obviously, they are doing something. One of the problems is the police have stopped talking about what they`re doing. Initially, there was a flurry of activity in October, when the family gathered up a $105,000 reward. There was additional activity. In the last two months, we`ve heard very little from police. The Woodstock police, the original police agency, has bowed out of the case. The state bureau of investigations is now handling the case, and they refuse to say what they`re doing.
GRACE: Also, on this matter, Vito Colucci, private investigator, what does the location of the car suggest to you?
VITO COLUCCI, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR: Well, somebody knows that she shops there all the time. Who could that be? The husband, OK? If it is the husband, he makes a tactical mistake, OK, not remembering that she can`t back her car in. In Georgia, there`s no front license plates, so they back it up against the barrier, against a wall.
Also, one thing that`s jumping out to me, Nancy, this guy, Quinton Ray, is going through bankruptcy right now, OK? Is he entitled -- I think maybe her father would know this. Is he entitled to any life insurance money on this case? And also, he just gets arrested for threatening an individual that he says is having an affair with his wife. We need to bring that guy in, see if that is true. I`m sure the guy will `fess that up now, if that`s true or not. So you got a lot of investigation to do. You just got to be trained enough to do this, Nancy.
GRACE: Everybody, quick break. We`ll all be right back on the Sueann Ray case. Then we take you to two other missing persons cases. We ask for your help tonight.
To tonight`s "Trial Tracking." Thirty-seven-year-old Lisa Lynette Clark (ph), now pregnant -- yes, pregnant! -- speaks out about her 15-year- old husband.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LISA CLARK, FACING CHILD MOLESTATION CHARGES: If anything, he took advantage of me because he knew how old he was. He knew what he was doing. And now I`m being, you know, burned at the stake because what I feel like, it`s like a witch hunt, like I`m being crucified because I fell in love with someone.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Falling in love with an underaged boy. OK. The 15-year-old groom -- dare I say the word? -- now on probation on burglary charges. Clark herself faces charges of child molestation.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHASM: I just basically just keep hope that she is alive, and that little bit of hope`s what keeps me going. You know, it keeps me from breaking down every day. I mean, it just -- it keeps me strong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We`re talking about 26-year-old mother Sueann Ray, now missing for months. What`s the stall in the investigation? Her father leading the investigation, the reward money up to $106,000. Can anybody hear me, $106,000. Tip line, toll-free, 800-597-TIPS.
Can you imagine, as you head into Hanukkah or Christmas, sit down at the table with your family, this is all you have of your girl, a missing button and a flier you can go outside and post on a tree? Look at this. Mr. Jenkins, her father, sent this to us. Got that shot? This is what he has of his daughter, a flier and a button.
I want to go straight back out to Danny Jenkins, Sueann Ray`s father. Danny, as you head into Christmas season, what are your thoughts on this case?
JENKINS: It`s rough, Nancy. It`s -- no dad or no one should go through Christmas not knowing where their little girl is.
GRACE: Have you been in touch with your son-in-law, Quinton Ray?
JENKINS: Yes. He calls me -- he calls me a lot.
GRACE: I`m sorry. I couldn`t hear you. Repeat?
JENKINS: Yes, ma`am. He calls me. I talk to him.
GRACE: And?
JENKINS: Well, you know, some things I can`t talk about, but he does talk to me and I do...
GRACE: OK, wait a minute! You`ve come on the show begging for help from the public, and you`re telling me you can`t talk about it. Did I just hear that?
JENKINS: Well, yes and no, Nancy. He swears he didn`t do nothing with her. He swears he didn`t kill her. He swears he`ll take a polygraph. I talked to his attorney and I told his attorney that I would pay for the polygraph. And he don`t take a polygraph.
GRACE: I want to reiterate that Quinton Ray is not a suspect in this case. He has not been named a suspect. Police have not named him a suspect.
But to Dr. Edward Doherty (ph), psychologist. Danny Jenkins, her father, probably feels this way because the son-in-law was the last one she was seen with, and very often, husbands and boyfriends are the perpetrators.
EDWARD DOHERTY, FORENSIC PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, I think that`s very common. We know that the first suspect is usually the spouse. The other problem with this case, I think, is, you know, 110 days that we`re all feeling how bad it is that she`s missing, and we can see how Danny Jenkins is handling it. I wonder how this little girl is handling it. She hasn`t seen her mother. Mothers don`t abandon their kids. They are there...
GRACE: Where is her daughter, Danny?
JENKINS: With her godmother.
GRACE: With her godmother. Go ahead, Dr. Doherty.
DOHERTY: I think Quinton -- I would really like to know, as a forensic psychologist, more about his personality, his history, does he have any particular personality disorders which would warrant further investigation? And I`m sure the Georgia Bureau of Investigation is doing that right now.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Dr. Ali, did anything unusual happen at all in the days preceding your mom`s disappearance?
RUBY ALI, DAUGHTER OF MISSING DOCTOR: No. It was very happy days. It was the month of Ramadan. We were fasting that month. We were celebrating. I had just gotten married two months prior to my mom`s disappearance.
My mom was in really happy spirits. We were doing really well as a family, so nothing unusual, no fights, nothing. She hadn`t even disappeared for an hour. She`s never -- we know exactly what she does all of the time. She knows exactly what all of us family members do all the time, as well.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Can you imagine your mom leaving work -- this Dr. Zehra Attari left her clinic and then no trace, not a car accident, not her pocketbook found strewn in a parking lot, not a ransom phone call. Nothing, no car, no pocketbook, no mom.
Welcome back. I`m Nancy Grace. Thank you for being with us, especially at this time of the year. Let`s try to solve missing persons cases.
I want to go straight out to Susan McDonough, reporter with the "Oakland Tribune." Welcome, Susan. What can you tell us about the doctor`s case?
SUSAN MCDONOUGH, REPORTER, "OAKLAND TRIBUNE": Well, I talked to police yesterday. And they say at this point there`s still not many leads in her case. They have checked the estuary that divides Oakland from Alameda, where she was supposedly headed, repeatedly. And they`ve canvassed her route.
They`ve purposely gone in the wrong direction looking for ideas of where she might have wound up. And, at this point, they say they still have very little information and very few leads.
GRACE: When you say they checked the estuary, Susan McDonough, did they actually dive the estuary?
MCDONOUGH: No, they haven`t dived the estuary. And...
GRACE: Well, how could they have checked it, then, if they didn`t dive it? What, did they just look out there?
MCDONOUGH: Well, they actually used sonar equipment. I think to try to find -- you know, it`s a big estuary. And I think they`re trying to find locations where she might have gone into the water.
And they have patrolled the estuary. They`ve looked with sonar. They`ve looked by helicopter. And they`ve never identified any spot where she could have gone in. So they say, you know, diving at this point would be fruitless when they don`t know where to dive.
GRACE: That`s actually a very good point, Susan. The sonar they use, Vito Colucci -- everybody, Vito Colucci, a private investigate, Colucci Investigations -- remember they used that in the search for Laci Peterson. It is called side-scan sonar.
And you can really pick up sometimes the smallest of items on the bottom of the waterway. Can`t really tell what it is, but how would you compare that sonar usage to actual divers?
COLUCCI: It`s good, Nancy. It`s not the best. You need the divers to go down there. But, you know, what`s interesting to me -- everybody is making a point about this diving down here and everything else.
I just hope they`ve gone through the whole process of talking to every patient, every former patient, everybody that`s come through that office. This lady leaves the same way every day. All you`ve got to do is watch her a day or two if you want to do something to this woman.
So, you know, let`s keep all the options open on this, Nancy, rather than just putting her in this water.
GRACE: Well, actually, I don`t think the water is a very good alternative for search, Vito Colucci, because an earlier reporter told me it would be very difficult to get her car -- I guess there`s some type of a ramp dividing the roadway from the estuary. But he said it would be very difficult for her to get into the estuary anyway. So to me, that doesn`t sound like a viable possibility, Vito.
COLUCCI: Yes, I always get worried when you keep hearing, let`s say, the police lock in on a certain theory. You`ve got to keep all options open. Also, she`s of the Muslim race. This could be a hate crime. You hate to say that, but it`s happening all over our country. So that could be.
GRACE: Hey, Vito, take a look at this. Here you`ve got the car and the plate, 4MUH-810, 4MUH-810, which brings me to another issue. Back to you, Vito, how easy would it be to just switch out the name plates? You know, we saw the same thing in the Taylor Behl case.
COLUCCI: Oh, definitely. Definitely. If somebody did something to this young lady, they`ve taken the car. The plates are changed. This looks like this was pretty much planned out. This looks like more of a professional job, whoever was involved in this.
GRACE: Susan McDonough, agree or disagree, because typically in a missing person case you do have a last-seen location, you have a general idea what may have happened. This is bizarre. She walked out of her clinic, boom, vanished.
MCDONOUGH: Right, yes. I believe police are baffled by the case. They say that, you know, they`ve talked to her patients, they have talked to her family, they`ve talked to people along the route. And no one has seen her. No one has -- there`s no sign of her. And no sign of the car, and no sign of foul play.
GRACE: Joining us now, a special guest out of Sacramento, California, the daughter of Dr. Attari, Dr. Ruby Ali.
Doctor, thank you for being with us.
ALI: Thank you for inviting me.
GRACE: Doctor, where was your mom headed?
ALI: She was going to Alameda. She had a doctor`s meeting at 6:00 p.m. -- between 6:00 and 6:30 p.m. -- and she never made it.
GRACE: So this was not just her regular route from work to home?
ALI: No. This was a special route because she had a meeting that day.
GRACE: How far away is that?
ALI: It`s about five miles away.
GRACE: Did you become a doctor because of your mom?
ALI: Of course, yes. She was my role model. Whenever I had a tough time in medical school, I used to think, "Well, if my mom can be a doctor, then definitely I could get through it, too."
GRACE: Dr. Ruby Ali is with us. She is the daughter of a missing doctor, her mother, Dr. Attari.
Dr. Ali, just this morning, my mom had been up visiting. And I stood out in the street waving as she drove away, you know, like I would never see her again, you`d think. And I`m just imaging how you must feel right now. When was the last time you talked to your mom?
ALI: I talked to my mom Sunday night. And she asked me how my life was going and how -- because I had just gotten married. So she was asking about my married life and if I was happy. I told her I was really, really happy. And she`s like, "Well, I`m really happy for you. I`m so happy that you`re happy."
That was my last conversation. And I was at work. I was in the hospital. And I remember I had to rush off to go do other work. And I was, like, "Mom, OK, I`ll talk to you later." And that later never came.
GRACE: Ruby, has your family hired a private investigator?
ALI: Yes, they did.
GRACE: Why did you feel the need to do that?
ALI: Because we have no leads. We have no information. And we need as many resources as possible to look for my mom.
GRACE: I am very disappointed in the sense that Dr. Attari`s case has not been more publicized. And, tonight, we are reaching out for your help.
Elizabeth, if you could show the photo and the car tag, there`s a $20,000 reward for information leading to the discovery of what has become with Zehra Attari. She is a mother and doctor who devoted her life to curing and treating children. The tip line: 510-777-3333.
We`ll be right back with her daughter, Dr. Ruby Ali.
We at NANCY GRACE want very much to help solve unsolved homicides, find missing people. Take a look at 29-year-old Mary Mount, disappeared from Fort Myers, Florida, January 2004. If you have info on Mary Mount, please call the Carole Sund Carrington Foundation, toll-free, 888-813-8389. Please help us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TASSADUQ ATTARI, MISSING WOMAN`S HUSBAND: I was worried on Monday, when her phone would not answer, like right then and there on Monday. She gives me a call all the time if she leaves.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A woman who devoted her life to curing ailing children is missing, mother and pediatrician Dr. Zehra Attari.
Very quickly out to defense attorney Fred Perri, Jr. In this case, normally the first suspect is husband/boyfriend. Not so here. Husband has an alibi.
FRED PERRI, JR., DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Yes, it`s interesting that this case is much different than the SueAnn Ray case, in that it appears that the police have looked at her estranged husband from the beginning. With respect to the doctor`s case, he apparently has no involvement. And the police are quite comfortable with that aspect of it.
GRACE: I think you`re right about that. For once, I`m agreeing with a defense lawyer.
To Jason Oshins, the other thing here is, Jason, very rarely do you see the whole case just up in smoke, no sign of the car, nothing. Now, does carjack-murder, carjack-kidnapping, does that fit into a possible scenario?
JASON OSHINS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Listen, Nancy, at this time, as Fred said, she`s just disappeared straight out. They`re searching any place anywhere for any idea of what might have happened.
GRACE: I know that, Jason. I`m asking you, as a veteran defense attorney, what do you make of the missing car?
OSHINS: Well, I think that`s interesting, the fact that the car has just completely vanished. I mean, it gives police pause to think maybe she self-directed her disappearance. That`s one theory that I`m sure that they`re working with to rule out, besides foul play.
GRACE: Oh, man, you are so talking like a lawyer. "She self-directed her own disappearance." You mean she took a powder?
OSHINS: She took off. You know, maybe she had...
GRACE: I don`t buy it. Uh-uh. Uh-uh.
OSHINS: That`s something, Nancy, that you cannot just rule, considering that there`s absolutely no evidence whatsoever. As opposed to the SueAnn Ray case, where you see the vehicle.
GRACE: OK, you know what? Very quickly to Dr. Ruby Ali, her daughter. Response?
ALI: There is absolutely no way my mom would have left, none, zero. There`s no way. My parents have an extremely good relationship. They`ve been married for 29 years. They don`t have -- they rarely ever fight.
And if my mom even decided to disappear, she would have let me or my sister know and she didn`t. And it`s extremely out of my mom`s character. If you know the Indian culture -- we belong to the Indian culture -- women don`t leave their husbands like this.
And, plus, on top of that, my mom is a doctor so she would not just leave her practice. And if she was really unhappy with something like a marriage or something, she would get a divorce. It`s not like she would -- you know, she wouldn`t just disappear. She`s not...
GRACE: Ruby, Ruby, tell me about your mom`s practice. What part of town was it in? What type of clientele?
ALI: She works in Oakland. So she works with low-income families, mostly Hispanic families.
GRACE: So here is a woman -- everyone, I`m going to Dr. Edward Dougherty, psychologist -- she could have made a ton of money in private practice. Instead, she`s devoting herself to underprivileged patients, children.
Doctor, is it possible for patients to take out some type of revenge on their doctor? But, in this case, wouldn`t that be preposterous, since she treated children?
DOUGHERTY, PSYCHOLOGIST: I agree with you, Nancy. I think it`s preposterous. What`s so perplexing about this case is you have a 55-year- old woman married 30 years who every morning has tea with her husband, who`s dedicated to her patients, with her children.
Who doesn`t love their pediatrician, the person that takes care of our most precious things in life, our children? It`s the last person you hate. The only thing that I could think of, any kind of a scenario, if, God forbid, a child had died in her practice or something had happened, and the patient`s parents had blamed her. I don`t know if that`s in here. I think you have to investigate and look at all the different patients.
GRACE: Dr. Dougherty, I`m shocked at you that you would spin such a story. I`m prosecuting you. You`re getting straight probation. Before we..
(LAUGHTER)
I`m going to give you a chance to redeem yourself, Dr. Dougherty.
DOUGHERTY: You`ve had me on probation for a couple of weeks, Nancy.
GRACE: Yes, I have.
(LAUGHTER)
I`m going to quickly go back to Ruby, Dr. Ruby Ali. Dr. Ali, final thoughts?
ALI: I know, 100 percent, my mom would never leave. And I think she`s been kidnapped. And the police and the public, they need to find her kidnapper and we need to find out what happened.
GRACE: And very quickly, Elizabeth, if you could please put up the reward, 510-777-3333.
And to her daughter, a doctor like her mom, our prayers are with you, and we will continue to help in the search for Dr. Zehra Attari.
We are switching gears quickly, everyone. I want to remind you about the Summer Shipp case. We haven`t given up on that story. Let`s go straight out to Kendrick Blackwood, staff writer with "The Pitch." Bring us up-to-date.
KENDRICK BLACKWOOD, STAFF WRITER, "THE PITCH": I talked to the prosecutors this morning. They assure me it`s still a very active investigation. They do get regular tips about what might have happened to her.
GRACE: If you could bring our viewers up-to-date on her disappearance, quickly.
BLACKWOOD: It`s kind of that classic-but-horrible mystery. On December 8th of 2004, she was going door to door in a kind of an eclectic neighborhood of Independence, Missouri.
GRACE: Eclectic? What does that mean?
BLACKWOOD: Oh, doesn`t have curbs or sidewalks. It`s quite hilly, quite a lot of trees, and sort of -- some ramshackle houses, some quite nice houses.
GRACE: OK.
BLACKWOOD: And she...
GRACE: Door to door doing what?
BLACKWOOD: She did door-to-door surveys. She would be the kind of pestering woman at the grocery store who would ask if you have a moment to fill out a form.
GRACE: That doesn`t pester me.
BLACKWOOD: She enjoyed the work. She loved meeting people. She was kind of this effervescent personality. And suddenly, nobody had heard from her. They discover her car a couple days later in this neighborhood and, you know, cold coffee on the dashboard, purse in the trunk, no clue as to what might have happened.
GRACE: Eleanor Dixon is a veteran prosecutor. Eleanor, I know that you`ve been working on a case where your realtor was out showing a home in a pretty nice neighborhood but not a lot of people were around. What do the facts in this case say to you, Eleanor?
ELEANOR DIXON, PROSECUTOR: I`d say that -- well, unfortunately, she put herself in a position where she might meet somebody who could harm her, and possibly that did happen in this case.
I would certainly, of course, canvas all of the people she talked to, or certainly in that eclectic neighborhood that was mentioned, to see exactly who she visited and what happened. And the scary thing is, is she`s out there, she`s conducting surveys in an area where perhaps it`s very easy for somebody to go missing.
GRACE: And an area she`s not familiar with. To her daughter, Brandy Shipp -- this is Summer Shipp`s daughter -- Brandy, what do you make of it?
BRANDY SHIPP, DAUGHTER OF MISSING WOMAN: Well, at this point, there is one person of interest. And he was the last person seen with my mother on that day. And since then, we found out that he has a very, very extensive criminal record.
And, although we do want to find out what happened to my mother that day, and I`ll never give up trying to find out what happened to her, at the same time, this person shouldn`t be on the street. He`s a danger to society.
GRACE: We`re going to be right back with Summer Shipp`s daughter, Brandy, in just one moment.
But very quickly, to tonight`s "All-Points Bulletin." FBI and law enforcement on the lookout for Daniel Min Suh, wanted in connection with the `99 murder of 16-year-old Antonio Barron.
Suh, 24, 6 feet, 130 pounds, black hair, brown eyes. If you have information on Suh, please call the FBI, 404-679-9000.
Local news next for some of you. But we`ll all be right back. And remember, coverage of a university professor`s murder trial, 3:00 to 5:00 Eastern, Court TV.
Please stay with us, everyone, as we remember tonight Corporal Jonathan Blair, just 21, an American hero.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SHIPP: We as a community need to find the person responsible for this heinous act and bring them to justice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Where is Summer Shipp? Straight out to Detective Mike Johann with Independence Police Department. Detective, what can you tell us?
DETECTIVE MIKE JOHANN, INDEPENDENCE, MISSOURI, POLICE: Well, she was canvassing the neighborhood. And we were able to determine the last person that she was seen with at a residence, and this is a person of interest. However, this person is not very cooperative and has refused to talk to us.
GRACE: Now, wasn`t someone arrested and then released?
JOHANN: Well, this person was arrested on some unrelated city charges.
GRACE: Is it true you went to his door and he ran out the back door?
JOHANN: He went out the back door. He was arrested on some city charges.
GRACE: I would say that`s suspicious. When I see a cop, I behave. I don`t take off running or try to dash out the back door.
JOHANN: No, you`re right. That`s very suspicious behavior. Like I said, he didn`t cooperate and would not talk with us.
GRACE: Man, you`re not kidding.
Eleanor Dixon, don`t you love it when a suspect or a defendant literally runs out the back door? I`ve had one jump out a window before. Juries love that.
DIXON: Oh, and then you can argue to the jury, you know, if he`s so innocent, why didn`t he stay there and talk to police? I love to argue flight as a consciousness of guilt. That sort of goes to that argument, I think. You`re not going to run if you haven`t done anything.
GRACE: Brandy Shipp, where should police go next? And what are your thoughts as you head into Christmas?
SHIPP: Well, I really think it`s a matter of time. I think something will happen. This person of interest we`re speaking of, he`s a federal parolee. His parole should be violated. We found several, several reasons why it should be violated and why it should be revoked and why he should be pulled from the streets.
And hopefully, possibly that will lead us somewhere. And also, just keeping up the national media and keeping her story out in the public eye, which is what I`m trying to do.
And I`m devoted and dedicated to keeping her story out , because I think -- I know someone knows something. And I`m just pleading for them to come forward.
GRACE: Brandy, Brandy, we are, too. We are, too. Everyone, tip line: 816-474-TIPS. Reward up to $100,000. Thank you to Brandy.
But I want to thank all of my guests tonight. And our biggest thank you tonight and every night to you for being with us, inviting us into your homes.
Coming up, headlines from all around. I`m Nancy Grace, signing off for tonight. See you here tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp. Until then, good night, friend.
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