Return to Transcripts main page

Nancy Grace

Missouri Woman Assaulted by Female Stranger; Police Searching for Perpetrator and Missing Baby Girl

Aired September 18, 2006 - 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: A newborn baby girl kidnapped from her Missouri home, the mom attacked, left for dead by a female attacker. Repeat, female attacker. Miraculously, the mom survives. And tonight, police release this sketch of the suspect. Tonight, only 10 days old, baby Abigale in danger.
And also tonight, back to Florida and the ongoing search for Trenton Duckett. His mom says she tucked him into bed, goes to the next room for a movie. Just two hours later, Trenton gone, the bedroom screen slashed. And then mom, Melinda Duckett, commits suicide. Tonight, new clues, a possible timeline, and divers searching local lakes.

But first tonight: a Missouri mom left for dead, her newborn baby girl kidnapped.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The most important thing to us right now is getting Abigale back safely.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jim (ph) was in agony. This is horrible! We just want her to come home. My daughter is torn apart. The whole family is torn apart. It just hurts!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Good evening everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us tonight. Two (ph) of the heartland. A Missouri mom wants her daughter back after she survived a slash to the throat, multiple stabbings. Left locked in her home, she makes her way to a neighbor`s home to report this beautiful baby, just 10 years (SIC) old, gone. And tonight, we learn it`s a female suspect.

To the reporter with the "St. Louis Dispatch," (SIC) Aisha Sultan. Welcome. Thank you for being with us, Ms. Sultan. What happened?

AISHA SULTAN, "ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH": Apparently, this woman stopped in a car in front of Stephanie Ochsenbine`s house, knocked at the door, asked if she could use the phone. Stephanie let her in. When she tried to make a long distance call, it didn`t go through. She then asked to use the bathroom.

When she was in the bathroom, she was able to lock Stephanie in there, stabbed her, slashed her throat. She had some stab wounds to the arm. She passed out -- the mother did -- and the kidnapper told her, I`m going to take your daughter, and she took off with the baby, at that time 7 days old.

GRACE: Now -- Aisha Sultan with us from "The Dispatch." Aisha, you stated that she had been slashed in the throat. It`s my understanding police have recovered a knife somewhere around the home. Describe.

SULTAN: They have discovered a knife. They said that she had been attacked by a filet knife, and they said that they were waiting on DNA or an evidence report to see if there`s any sort of evidence that can be recovered from that knife.

GRACE: So I take it, then, by a cursory look with the naked eye, that had blood on it?

SULTAN: They don`t know. Or at least, they have not revealed that to any of us.

GRACE: Take a listen to what police had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s a black scarf. It`s a little bit unique. The first photo we have is basically of the location where it was found -- not the exact location, but I mean, it`s on the ground in a wooded area. The other one is a picture of it spread out. It`s got fringe on each end of the scarf. You know, (INAUDIBLE) we`re hoping that somebody that may have seen it before would give us a call.

The victim said that she saw a dark-colored scarf. We recovered the dark-colored scarf in the area. As far as -- the reason it was found Saturday was during an extensive search that we located it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Many of us on the staff didn`t know exactly what a filet knife is. Well, this is a filet knife. It`s a nasty little piece of work. And apparently, that is what may have been used on this mom. Now her 10-day- old baby girl gone.

Back to our reporter from "The Dispatch," Aisha Sultan. Aisha, question. In the front yard, did they have notification, like, you know, sometimes there are balloons, there`s a sign or a stork?

SULTAN: There was. There was a metal sign that said, Welcome home, Abby, and some balloons. And so that might have been a sign that there was a baby there if someone was looking for it.

GRACE: Now, where did you tell me, Aisha Sultan, that this filet knife was found on the property?

SULTAN: They haven`t released that information.

GRACE: OK. And where was the scarf found on the property, do we know?

SULTAN: In the woods. In the woods near the crime scene.

GRACE: Interesting. I wonder if it was the woods leading to the road or the woods behind the home. That would suggest to me which way the perpetrator went.

SULTAN: They haven`t said. I know they`ve been searching the woods surrounding that area quite extensively.

GRACE: Let`s go out to our G-men joining us tonight, all three former and respected FBI agents, Mike Brooks, Don Clark and Steve Rogers (ph). OK, Mike Brooks, give me your best shot.

MIKE BROOKS, FORMER FBI, FORMER D.C. POLICE: Well, we got -- you just saw in that picture, we got the FBI evidence response team who was there on the scene processing, so we know that there are the best that`s available processing that crime scene. And with that knife, there`s always a possibility, if she was slashed, there was either -- there was also the victim`s DNA...

GRACE: Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute right there! Mike Brooks, I heard what you said, "if she was slashed." Now, typically, we always look at the parents as perpetrators.

BROOKS: Sure.

GRACE: But I see no possibility from what I`m hearing tonight that this is a self-inflicted wound. She was slashed. And if you`ll notice, Mike, with self-inflicted wounds, it`s somewhere right on the arm or the chest...

BROOKS: Sure.

GRACE: ... or the leg. It`s never where the person could actually die from their self-inflicted wound. So I see no possibility of the mom self-inflicting a wound. She was slashed!

BROOKS: She was slashed. And there`s a possibility that there`s going to be her DNA and possibly the perpetrators DNA because a lot of times, Nancy, when you have a slashing like that, you`re holding somebody as they`re trying to get away from you, you sometimes cut yourself. So that`s going to be important, to see if there`s more than one DNA -- any more than one person`s DNA on that knife. That scarf is a big piece of evidence because there`s possibly DNA on that scarf, just...

GRACE: Or hair.

BROOKS: Hairs, fibers, those kind of things. And I guarantee you, the FBI evidence response team -- I used to be a member of that particular team out of the Washington field office -- and they went through that house with a fine-toothed comb, most likely vacuumed that house for any kind of hairs and fiber evidence that they can compare once they do get a suspect in this particular case.

And when you look at the -- the -- you know, the composite here, it almost looks like it`s a man. So was it really a woman? Well, the victim could best tell, and she said it was a woman. But there`s always that possibility it could also have been a man, especially from the facial structure...

GRACE: Right.

BROOKS: ... those type things. So that`s something else to take into consideration, Nancy.

GRACE: To defense attorney Raymond Giudice. Why is the FBI in on this? Why isn`t the local police handling it?

RAY GIUDICE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Nancy, not to offend local authorities here, but in rural America, the FBI is going to be clearly the people who call in to secure a crime scene. I don`t know how many cases we`ve seen -- of course, the JonBenet case -- where the -- hours after the incident occurred and is reported is where the critical problems rise up, either in the defense of the case or in the inability to solve the case. As Mr. Brooks just said, this FBI unit`s the best in the country.

GRACE: Back to Aisha Sultan with "The St. Louis Dispatch." Aisha, again, thank you for being with us. Give me her best description of the perpetrator. This is extremely rare, to have a female perpetrator, violent crime, female on female, stranger on stranger, very unusual.

SULTAN: Stephanie described her as about 5-8, 200 pounds, dark curly hair. She was last seen wearing a dark cap over her head. And she was even described as having light facial -- like a female mustache, like facial hair.

GRACE: Bluejean shorts, gray or brown T-shirt.

Let`s go back to the G-men, Mike Brooks, Don Clark, Steve Rogers. To you, Don Clark. I had the same thought that Mike Brooks had at the get-go. You`ve got somebody that could be 5-8 and 200 pounds, some slight female facial hair. Could it be a man? But now that I see that the perp was wearing shorts and a T-shirt, certainly, the victim can make out the legs or the bust of a woman. What do you think?

DON CLARK, FORMER HEAD OF FBI HOUSTON OFFICE: Well, I got to believe that the victim in this case probably has a pretty good idea of the sex of the person. It could possibly be a little bit of deception there, but by and large, with that type of dress, she would probably know the type of person that attacked her.

But the key here is, is that, what did she really see, Nancy? And this is what the investigators have to sit down with, and not just sit down with her. They`ve got to have diagrams. They`ve got to have photographs. They`ve got to pick out particular parts of this person -- the mouth, the nose, the eyes -- and really try to match it up to make sure that they can put together a pretty good composite because, generally speaking, people don`t really know what they see just by asking them. Fat to one means skinny to another. So they don`t really know. So the bottom line is, get all these components together, talk to this witness again and again and again to be able to really complete a very good composite.

GRACE: That`s a really good point, Don Clark. Back to Aisha Sultan with "The Dispatch." Aisha, what condition is she in? Is the mom in a shape where she can actually undergo more police interrogation?

SULTAN: She`s been helping the police with the composite. They said that she wasn`t completely satisfied with the composite they released, but they felt she couldn`t work on it anymore. But she has not made a personal plea yet to the media. The grandmother has. And the police said today that she is just in too much emotional distress to be able to do something like that.

GRACE: And out to our G-men again. To Steve Roger, also from the former FBI task force. Steve, when you draw these composites, very often - - and I`ve had this on the stand, actually, in front of a jury, where the victim says, Well, that composite isn`t exactly right. I couldn`t explain what I meant about the nose or I couldn`t explain the eyes. Now there are computer programs that can reevaluate and reconfigure a composite sketch. But just because the mom isn`t happy with the sketch does not mean it is not roughly accurate.

STEVE ROGERS, FORMER FBI: Well, that`s absolutely right. And you`re not going to having everything precise when it comes to a composite. But with the technology we have today, it`s going to be darn close to what that person looks like.

One of the things the police are going to be looking into -- the FBI, that is -- is was it stranger to stranger? Is this someone who could have known the victims, who could have known the movement of the victims? And I`ll bet your bottom dollar, Nancy, what they`re going to look into to see if there was suspicious activity reported in the area of that home prior to and leading up to the abduction.

GRACE: Well put. Back out to Aisha Sultan with "The Dispatch." Aisha, tell me about the area. I keep hearing rural. How many people live there? How far away is it from a big city? And important, are there any factories, any plants, any industry, anything there where maybe the mom or the dad worked where someone would know there was a new baby?

SULTAN: This -- Lonedell, the area near where it happened, is about 45 miles south of St. Louis. It is a rural area that the house -- the street, it`s off of a rural highway, Highway 47, heavily wooded on both sides. The homes are pretty far apart. And it was a modest home, and some of the homes there have mobile homes on the property. And there really isn`t...

GRACE: Mobile homes on the property?

SULTAN: There -- on some of the -- in some of the neighboring houses, there are. They`re gravel roads leading off the main highway. And there`s very little overhead lighting. Some residents in the area told me that it is not uncommon for strangers to stop and ask to use the phone because they`ve had car trouble and they can`t get a signal or reception on their cell phone. And people there leave their doors unlocked. They don`t think twice about letting a stranger come in and use their phone, if they`re saying that they`ve got some car trouble.

GRACE: Well, Aisha, actually, that`s the way a lot of us grew up, but those days are long, long gone.

To Caryn Stark, psychotherapist. Think about this, though, Caryn Stark. Jessie Lunsford was from Homosassa, Florida. That`s not near a big interstate, not near a big metropolitan area. It was someone that observed her, according to police, it was catty-corner from her home, watching her. You`ve got Dylan and Shasta Groene in Kutenai County, a very rural area. In that case, it was a complete stranger that was actually stalking the home with night-vision goggles. I mean, what mom can protect herself from that, for Pete`s sake, Caryn?

CARYN STARK, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: Well, I guess you`re right, Nancy. You really have to be on the lookout, at this point. And I think it was a big mistake, although harmless, but -- it`s a big mistake to have a sign out that says that, you know, welcome home to this baby. It sort of is saying, Welcome, kidnappers, because you`re giving out...

GRACE: Caryn, Caryn...

STARK: ... too much of a clue.

GRACE: ... Caryn...

STARK: Yes, Nancy?

GRACE: You do hear yourself. What does it mean to America that in a rural area, you can`t put, Welcome home, baby Abby, that you`re advertising for a kidnapper or some...

STARK: Well, you know, I hate to...

GRACE: ... freak to come into your home?

STARK: I hate, Nancy, to be the messenger here of bad news, but these days, I think you have to be very cautious. And there`s a good chance that somebody was watching that house because they saw a sign like that.

GRACE: To Lawrence Kobilinsky, forensic scientist. I have hope. I have hope, because of that scarf, that maybe there`s hair in it. If you look at hair, Koby (ph), can you tell if it`s male or female?

LARRY KOBILINSKY, FORENSIC SCIENTIST: Well, actually, you can, providing there`s a root because in that root, there`s cellular material, and the finding of a Y chromosome through something called quinicrine (ph) staining will reveal if it`s a male or not.

(CROSSTALK)

GRACE: Repeat! What kind of staining?

KOBILINSKY: It`s called quinicrine staining. It`s not commonly used, but it can be used. I think we have to remember that there is evidence here. We have a bloody knife. We have the scarf. But DNA is not going to help if this person is not on the database, if there are no fingerprint records of this person. So I think here, a show like this one will alert the public, and maybe the public will contribute by, you know, telling us about sightings.

GRACE: Look at this -- that composite again, everybody. It also looks like she`s got peach fuzz on the chin and about the face.

Let`s go to the lines. Lorrie in New York. Hi, Lorrie.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy.

GRACE: What`s your question, dear?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don`t hear much about the father, but to me, this -- somebody stalking is one thing, but to know she`s alone in a rural area, it just seems very odd to me that someone would just out of the, you know, blue -- could it be a person that was hired to do this? I hate to say it, but...

GRACE: You mean -- now, how are you connecting the father up to that, Lorrie?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, not necessarily even the father, a jealous individual close to the family.

GRACE: Right. Right. You know, it`s interesting to me, Lorrie, that in almost every case I prosecuted, the perpetrator had been -- knew the victim, not necessarily the reverse, but as you`re pointing out, had been observing them, watching them. How would she know, A, a baby was there? You`ve got the poster in the front yard. B, the husband was gone.

Aisha, hasn`t the husband been ruled out? Wasn`t he at work?

SULTAN: They are saying the husband was at work. But I think they are keeping all the possibilities open. That`s what they`re saying. So although they don`t suspect the parents...

GRACE: This was a woman. This was a woman.

SULTAN: Right.

GRACE: I mean, she tried to use the phone, she walked in, she had conversation with this individual. If she says it`s a woman, it`s a woman. And plus, there was another kid in the home. If the dad wanted to get rid of a kid, why pick on the little baby? I mean, I don`t see the dad involvement right now that Lorrie is insinuating. But Lorrie`s right, police always look at the parents first.

We`ll all be right back with this late-developing story out of Missouri. We are taking your calls. And we`re not just a bunch of legal heads. We have investigators and reporters on this case to answer your calls. We are live in Missouri tonight.

Very quickly, to tonight`s "Case Alert." No bond for a South Carolina man accused of kidnapping and assaulting a 14-year-old girl. Miraculously, the girl found alive in an underground bunker. She had been held there for 10 days. Thirty-six-year-old Vinson Filyaw (ph) allegedly abducted the girl from a school bus stop. He`s now accused of assault and kidnap and assaulting another 12-year-old girl. The latest 14-year-old victim rescued by sending her mom a text message using her alleged captor`s phone while he slept.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He has, of course, got a criminal sexual conduct in the second degree with a minor from the November case. From this case, he`s looking at kidnapping charges, possession of an incendiary explosive device, two counts of that. He`s also looking at impersonating a police officer, as well as criminal sexual conduct in the first degree.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The aunt of 21-year-old murder victim Carolyn McGrew Simpson (ph) can only hear her niece now through old videos. Her family says Simpson (ph), six months pregnant, was found Friday shot to death, with her abdomen cut open in a farmer`s field in Oklahoma. Her fetus was missing.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And I ran to the car (INAUDIBLE) to the door. And then they sped off (INAUDIBLE) I chased them. And I`m just saying, (INAUDIBLE) my baby, but they couldn`t hear me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) I`m going, No, it has to be somebody else with that name, you know? And then I heard Skidmore (ph), Missouri, and I looked up, and I`m going, Oh, my God, it`s her. It`s her! It`s not possible. It`s her!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: The recent phenomena of women stealing children from other ladies and inflicting physical harm on the natural mom seems to be growing. At one point, it was practically unheard of. But now out of the heartland in Missouri, another example. Tonight, the search for 10-day-old baby Abigale goes on. Miraculously, her mother surviving a slash to the throat. That`s the good news. But tonight, where is baby Abby?

With us by phone, a very special guest, Dr. Andy Zupan. He is the pediatrician on call the day baby Abby was born. Doctor, thank you for being with us. Does baby Abby have any identifying marks?

DR. ANDY ZUPAN, TREATED MOM AND BABY ON DAY OF BIRTH: (INAUDIBLE) baby Abby was a very healthy baby in the nursery. She did have a mark on her forehead, right between the eyes, that is somewhat identifying, although it can be seen in other babies.

GRACE: What do you mean, it can be seen in other babies? Do you mean it`s going to disappear?

ZUPAN: It usually does within several years, disappeared to a vast extent, yes.

GRACE: What is it?

ZUPAN: It`s called amebus flamius (ph).

GRACE: A what?

ZUPAN: Amebus flamius.

GRACE: And what is that?

ZUPAN: Essentially, a salmon patch.

GRACE: And you believe within a couple of years, it will go away. But for the next three or four weeks, will it still be existent on her forehead?

ZUPAN: Certainly.

GRACE: Have you been asked by police to help, Dr. Zupan?

ZUPAN: You know, I`ve been asked only to the extent of, you know, being involved in a press conference. And I`ve offered to be as helpful as I can be, but not any other direct requests.

GRACE: Doctor, was baby Abby healthy in every other way?

ZUPAN: Yes, ma`am.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The most important thing to us right now is getting Abigale back safely. And you know, the person that did this knows that they`ve done wrong, and we`re hoping that they`ll realize that and return Abby and get her back to her family.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: OK, let`s unchain the lawyers. Joining me tonight, Ray Giudice and Penny Douglas Furr. What jumps out at you, Ray?

GIUDICE: Well, Nancy, what concerns me is you`ve got a description of a 5-foot-5 to 5-foot-8 200-pound woman who`s in possession of a 5-year-old -- day-old baby who`s probably crying her fool head off. That -- someone should know something. That -- she`s got to go to a CVS. She`s got to get milk for that baby. Somebody`s going to point that out.

GRACE: Agree or disagree, Penny?

PENNY DOUGLAS FURR, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I agree with that, Nancy. And I think the good news in this type case is that, generally, if somebody wants to take the baby, they don`t want to hurt the baby. So hopefully, the baby will be OK because, generally, they keep the baby and keep it alive.

GRACE: Out to Marc Klaas, president of Beyondmissing. His daughter went missing herself. Marc, what jumps out at you?

MARC KLAAS, BEYONDMISSING.COM: In 2002, 217 cases of women stealing other people`s babies for themselves. Most of those were resolved quickly.

GRACE: So you think, in this case, Marc, it is a female perpetrator? And why are they resolved quickly?

KLAAS: Well, they`re resolved quickly because, number one, people see them hanging around emergency rooms. They`re women that all of a sudden have babies that shouldn`t have babies. Or there are other things that stand out from their disturbed minds.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Members of the Leesburg police department, Florida Department of law enforcement, and FBI continue to work tirelessly in their efforts to find little Trenton and bring him home. These are dedicated personnel who will not stop until Trenton is found.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you only have an idea of who might baby-sit or who might have watched Trenton, we`re still encouraging you. Even if you have no direct information about that specific time, if you know who she may have utilized to watch him, give us a call.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Tonight, breaking developments in the missing person case of 2-year-old Florida boy Trenton Duckett. Tonight, we learned that there may be witnesses that spotted Melinda Duckett without the child.

Straight out to Court TV`s Jean Casarez, Jean, what`s the latest?

JEAN CASAREZ, COURT TV: ... August 27th, which is the day of the alleged abduction. Police are saying that there were two possible sightings of Melinda. The first one is 8:00 in the morning that someone believed they saw Melinda at a Leesburg business and that she was familiar by sight. They didn`t know her personally, but she was at her car, and her little baby was not in the vehicle at all.

Then, again, number two, at 3:00 in the afternoon on Sunday, she was allegedly going from her car to her apartment, once again, the little baby, this witness said who saw her, was nowhere in sight. So what the police are asking is anyone who was taking care of baby Trenton that day, morning and afternoon, to please call the authorities.

GRACE: Let me get this straight, Jean Casarez. The mom, who unfortunately has at this juncture committed suicide, 8:00 a.m. at a Leesburg, Florida, business, 8:00 a.m. on Sunday?

CASAREZ: That is correct, yes.

GRACE: Without Trenton?

CASAREZ: Correct.

GRACE: All right, 3:00 p.m. the mom is spotted walking into her apartment from her car?

CASAREZ: That`s right.

GRACE: No Trenton.

CASAREZ: And no baby.

GRACE: OK. Take a listen to what Melinda Duckett told us as to her whereabouts -- Liz?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GRACE: Melinda, where had you been with him that day?

MELINDA DUCKETT, LATE MOTHER OF TRENTON DUCKETT: All we had basically been out is driving around. There is something about a convenience store. I don`t know where that came into play because whenever I go out somewhere, you know, I always have gas. I`m not shorthanded with anything. And I`m always prepared for it all.

GRACE: So where had you been that day?

MELINDA DUCKETT: We had been all through Lake County and up into Orange.

GRACE: Doing what?

MELINDA DUCKETT: Basically just shopping, going around driving.

GRACE: Shopping where?

MELINDA DUCKETT: Well, we didn`t go anywhere specific.

GRACE: Well, I, mean if you went shopping you had to go into a store. What store did you go into on Sunday?

MELINDA DUCKETT: We went throughout the county.

GRACE: Any store? I`m thinking of video cameras, Melinda. I mean, maybe they have a picture of someone.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRACE: Let`s go out to our G-men. To Mike Brooks first, we`ve got a very conflicting time line right now, Mike. We`ve got the mom telling her lawyer before her suicide that she was driving through Ocala National Forest with a diaper bag, a baby, and a shotgun that she got on an odyssey because she got confused and disoriented, didn`t know where she was. All right, one story at the shooting range in the forest.

Second story, to me, shopping throughout the day at unspecified locations. Now we`ve got two witnesses coming forward, placing her somewhere altogether different, impossible in that time frame, Mike.

BROOKS: I`m telling you, you know, the stories, they just keep getting on and on and on. And none of them have been -- we don`t know what the truth is. That`s the whole thing.

And, you know, and she on an eight-hour odyssey going through the park? I mean, she probably would have run out of gas in eight hours, Nancy. The stories just do not make any sense. And then we`ve got, you know, the two witnesses that were with her the night they were watching movies. It`s just -- the stories just keep getting bigger.

GRACE: Oh, oh, oh, which reminds me -- to the viewers and to our G- men and panel, here`s the latest regarding the two witnesses -- I guess you would call them -- that were there that Sunday evening watching videos. Here is what we have learned from our sources here at Headline News.

Number one, one of the guys and a third person were invited over the day before the baby goes missing. On Saturday -- I believe Saturday afternoon -- the mom, Melinda Duckett, calls and asks two people to come watch a movie at 7:00 on Sunday. One of them backs out. And at the last minute on Sunday, she calls another gentleman.

Both of these guys have now been cleared; both of them state they never saw Trenton Duckett in the home. So what does that say -- out to you, Don Clark -- the fact that the day before, on Saturday, the mom is arranging this movie event? It was a movie rental, to my understanding. Somebody had to go get that movie rental, as well, Don Clark.

CLARK: You`re exactly right. And, you know, Mike`s right, too. These stories just keeps getting bigger and bigger. But the reality here is what we have to deal with or what the investigators have to deal with now is figure out, how can they use all of the information or even misinformation that may have come from Melinda or other people and try to connect the dots, if you will, to try to really develop a line as to where she was?

They have got to really find somebody out there who knows -- if somebody saw her at 8:00 in the morning, then that person has to be dealt with. If somebody saw her at 3:00 in the morning, they`ve got to figure out Nancy, going to all of these people. They`ve also got to go back to the grandparents, they`ve got to talk to them, because they`ve got to get some idea of the mental state of this person as to what she might do and where she would usually go.

GRACE: I like it. I like it, Don Clark.

And a very important issue to me, Steve Rogers -- all of our G-men tonight, former and well-respected FBI agents when they left the feds -- to Steve Rogers, I`m very interested in something that Don Clark just said, demeanor. Demeanor. We saw it in Melinda Duckett`s demeanor here on the show, under some tough questioning, which I, of course, have been attacked for, but what was her demeanor that evening when she had two guys watching a movie?

ROGERS: Well, Nancy, let me just share this with you, that don has hit the nail right on the head. The demeanor wasn`t like a hysterical mother. It wasn`t like someone who was very upset. And perhaps this is politically incorrect to say, but, Don, you hit the nail on the head.

Those dots that are going to be connected may lead right back to the center of gravity: right back to home. And so, Nancy, you know what? They could attack you all they want. The fact of the matter is, is that you were probably able to do something that the investigators didn`t have the opportunity to do, and that was to really show some demeanor here. And she did. And any law enforcement officer who saw that program that night, you know what? Those dots are leading right back to the center of gravity.

GRACE: Well, you know, what`s interesting -- back to you, Steve Rogers -- is I asked Captain Rockefeller on the show on live TV, was he -- unlike myself, I couldn`t get her to establish a time line -- was he able to do that? And he told me they had interrogated her for some time and could not get a time line.

I got another factor to through in there. Let`s unchain the lawyers again. Ray Giudice and Penny Douglass Furr with us. Another thing we`ve learned -- but we can`t confirm it yet -- is that she was blogging, she was online writing around 1:00 p.m. that day. Only problem with that, we don`t know if it was Pacific or Eastern time the blog was set to. So either 1:30 or 4:30 Sunday afternoon, she`s blogging.

So, long story short, 8:00 a.m. spotted at a Leesburg business, no Trenton; 3:00 spotted, no Trenton; 1:30 or 4:30, online, blogging. Out to you, Ray Giudice. Interpret.

GIUDICE: Well, Nancy, first of all, inconsistent statements are a defense lawyer`s nightmare. Good investigators, like the gentlemen on this show, they will go over that statement with -- time and time again, looking for subtle nuances. And so often it`s the small changes, the small inconsistencies that get a defendant hung up in front of a judge and a jury.

Lastly, the blog and the Internet is just becoming an absolute problem for all of us defense lawyers. There`s an Internet trail.

GRACE: That`s the problem for you defense attorneys; it`s a great aid for prosecution.

GIUDICE: Absolutely.

GRACE: And out to Penny, have you ever noticed, Penny, maybe one of your clients or maybe one of my lying witnesses sometimes on stand, they`ll take a little piece of the truth and then, right at the critical moment, like, "I turned my head and I didn`t see who shot the gun," it kind of gets fuzzy right there?

So if we can piece together what the mom was saying, what do we come up with? We don`t know where she was. She could have been 100 miles away from that Ocala National Forest.

PENNY DOUGLASS FURR, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, those blogs are very interesting, Nancy, because one of the things she said in those blogs was that, when she met someone, that the man sometimes had a problem with the fact that there was a child involved. And this woman had just gone through a very nasty divorce and custody battle, so she had to be in a very frazzled state of mind anyway.

And apparently, she had a mental -- I`m sorry, she had a mental condition anyway. She had threatened suicide before, I understand. So a divorce would put tremendous stress on her, also.

GRACE: Yes, stress, yes, but I don`t know how that would affect her time line. To Marc Klaas, weigh in, Marc.

MARC KLAAS, FOUNDER OF BEYOND MISSING: Well, you know, a couple of weeks ago, we said we hoped this isn`t Susan Smith, but it`s increasingly looking like it could be. Nothing that this woman said had any credence whatsoever; everything`s been shot down. I just hope that she didn`t take this horrible secret to the grave without leaving some kind of a clue that will bring us to the little boy, whether he`s dead or alive.

(NEWSBREAK)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... just a ball of joy, I mean, full of energy and loved to play and loved having fun. And he loved to be around other kids and family members and so -- if you`d turn your back for one second, you were chasing him down, because he was in high gear, running.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Welcome back. The search for 2-year-old Trenton Duckett is still ongoing.

Out to Jean Casarez. Jean, where did they search today? And what can you tell me about divers getting involved?

CASAREZ: Well, the dive teams are getting involved now, Follows Lake (ph) in the Ocala National Forest and near that area. One of the search dogs, the cadaver dogs, had sniffed close to that lake, so they believed it was important to go there.

But, Nancy, it is very slow-going. Twenty divers had been working on the water area, but it is so swampy, and they cannot see at all, so they have to do everything by feel. And, Nancy, we`re in Florida right here, and there are alligators in that lake. They haven`t come across any, but one reason to be so guarded is that you just don`t know what you`re going to come to until you come to it. So they have to be very careful for their own precaution.

At the same time, helicopters are surrounding that lake from the air to see if there are any alligators that would get in the way of those divers. But they are continuing those dive teams, but at this point no sighting of Trenton.

GRACE: It is my understanding, Jean, and some late news that we got, they`ve actually encountered either a croc or an alligator in that neck of the woods. I would guess an alligator.

CASAREZ: Yes.

GRACE: So these dive teams, you`re saying 20 divers.

Out to Mike Brooks, you and I are both divers, sometimes in those conditions, in a lake condition, you can`t see a foot away from your face.

BROOKS: Absolutely, not, Nancy. Having been a police diver up in D.C. in the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers, I can tell you that sometimes the visibility is two feet or less. But you see also the weeds in here. You also have that to contend with. And the divers are getting caught up in that long grass in the pond, very, very treacherous. Ad it`s very tough going in that kind of conditions, and I definitely wouldn`t want to be one of those divers. But they`re used to those conditions, and they`re going to do the best that they can with what they have to work with.

GRACE: To Don Clark, and a cadaver dog can actually sniff a cadaver, a dead body, underwater.

CLARK: Yes, they can. Those dogs are really good, Nancy. We`ve had the opportunity, unfortunately, to use those when I was on board down here in Texas, looking for kids and bodies and so forth. And they are very good.

But, Nancy, here`s the point here, too, is that these things are really manpower-intensive. And that notwithstanding, you`ve got to have the people to get out there and do it, so you`ve really got to try to pinpoint places as best you can, based on information and investigation that you`re bringing in, because that`s a huge area down there. And they`ve got to respond to the area.

I suspect that they`re probably doing that. But after awhile, it`s going to have to just almost depend on leads from the public to go into an area and be that intensive.

GRACE: To the lines, to Maria in New Jersey, hi, Maria.

CALLER: Hi.

GRACE: What`s your question, dear?

CALLER: Yes. Is it possible that she sold her kid?

GRACE: You know, that`s a really good question. That was one of the first questions put out there, and I think part of the reason it`s questionable, it`s possible, is because nobody has been turned up.

And it`s so hard for us, Caryn Stark, psychotherapist, to accept that a family member could hurt a child. So we naturally look for alternatives, Caryn Stark.

STARK: Yes, Nancy, that may be true, but take a look at this woman. She obviously has a propensity towards violence. It`s very unusual to find someone, a female who will kill herself using a shotgun. That`s not usually what women do. And so she seems capable of anything. And I wouldn`t be surprised if, against what you`re saying, this is somebody who could harm her own child.

GRACE: And out to Marc Klaas, president of Beyond Missing, you can find that at BeyondMissing.com -- his own daughter, Polly, went missing. She had been abducted from her home, molested and murdered. And the first thing Klaas did was insist on a polygraph, insist his home and car be searched, so police could then rule him out and look for the real perpetrator, whom they found.

Marc Klaas, the diving, the dogs, we have to do that. But as a trial lawyer, I want to go back to the statements, because that`s what I understand. You`ve got a witness spotting her 8:00 a.m. in this car -- it`s a 2000 silver Mitsubishi Eclipse, as I recall. Let`s show that picture, Liz, so the viewers can see it.

8:00 a.m. in Leesburg, Florida, I don`t know what she was doing out and about without the baby at 8:00 a.m., Leesburg, Florida. 3:00 p.m., this is a person that actually had a cursory relationship with her. 3:00 p.m. she`s spotted her apartment, no baby. In between, we think she may have been blogging. So where does it leave her? That`s what we know.

KLAAS: Well, what we have to do is continue to circulate the pictures of Melinda, the baby, and the vehicle, and encourage people who might have seen her during that time, between 4:00 Saturday and 6:00 or 7:00 on Sunday, to come forward with that information so they can continue to close in on those time lines, and hopefully that will lead them to little Trenton. It`s a big world; he`s a little baby.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, we`re wanting anybody that saw Melinda and/or her car and/or Trenton to continue to give us a call. These happen to be two possible sightings that did come in as a result of our pleas for help, and we`re just providing these to see if perhaps we can get some more information.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: We at NANCY GRACE want very much in our way to help solve unsolved homicides, find missing people: 4-month-old Julisa Gomez Diaz, Cairo, Georgia, missing since Sunday. Suspect: 30-year-old Oscar Lopez, driving a green Toyota Camry, Florida plates.

If you have info, please help us. Call Cairo, Georgia, police, 229- 378-3096.

Let`s go straight back to the Trenton Duckett story, still trying our best to help locate the missing boy. To Mike Brooks, two questions: One, what should they be doing with this vehicle? It`s still in police compound. And, two, if this is mixed with salty Everglade water, what does that mean if the child is in the water?

BROOKS: Well, number one, Nancy, if the child`s in the water, in salty water like that, he does not stand much of a chance whatsoever.

GRACE: OK.

BROOKS: And getting to the car, now, the FDLE, The Florida Department of Law Enforcement, still has custody of this car. It`s locked up because it`s still evidence. This car could just be full of evidence, Nancy.

If they do find out that maybe she was in that area for sure, there should be dirt, and grass, and other things that are up inside the car from the area she was at that they can do soil comparisons with. If she actually went off-road over towards this lake or somewhere else to try to get rid of something, or even to go shooting where she said she was supposed to be going, it could hold a lot of evidence.

Also, inside there`s a lot of fingerprint evidence. I guarantee that the FDLE used some superglue, and that`s the best way to get fingerprints and keep it. There`s still a piece of evidence.

GRACE: The translation: superglue, when heated, catches all the fingerprints and markings on the inside of the vehicle.

Very quickly, Marc Klaas with Beyond Missing, the dad had a car wash to raise money for the missing person fund. I think he raised about $1,600. You were there, Marc Klaas.

KLAAS: Well, you know what? You have to keep these searches going, particularly if you`re using volunteer searches. And it becomes an incredibly difficult thing to do over time; you have to be able to feed people, and you have to be able to give them water.

GRACE: Marc Klaas, a survivor himself. Please help us find Trenton Duckett.

Tonight, we stop to remember Army National Guard Sergeant Joshua Ford, just 20, Pender, Nebraska. A contagious smile, attention-grabbing hairstyles, and a zest for life. He loved Texas Hold `Em and gave Iraqi children his own water. He leaves behind a family and a fiancee, Michelle. Joshua Ford, American hero.

Thank you for being with us. Our biggest thank you, as always, to you for that. Nancy Grace signing off. See you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. Until then, good night, friend.

END