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Nancy Grace

Sex Video May Contain Clue to Trenton Duckett`s Fate

Aired November 16, 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, we are live from team Trenton headquarters, Leesburg, Florida. Stunning developments suggest a 2-year- old Florida boy, Trenton Duckett, could be alive. New details emerge tonight in a parent`s worst nightmare, a 2-year-old boy tucked into his crib, mom in the next room with a video. Then she says the window screen slashed, the baby gone. Almost immediately, police name mom, Melinda Duckett, the prime suspect.
Just hours ago, we learn a new witness, a retired nurse, places Melinda Duckett and baby Trenton at an Ocala convenience store early on the morning Trenton reported gone. And a second newly discovered witness passes a poly with no hint of deception, giving hope baby Trenton is alive. Tonight, exclusive video, interviews and more on the renewed search for baby Trenton.

And tonight, to North Carolina, a championship cheerleader found murdered in her Raleigh home, her 2-year-old little girl unharmed there at the murder scene. Tonight, a search for answers.

But first, live at team Trenton headquarters.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have a witness.

She believed she saw Melinda.

We believe that it was possible during this time that she may have left that Wendy`s and actually met someone to hand Trenton off to another person to take. Team members of this parallel investigation are prepared to say that little Trenton is alive.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If you have him, please return him home!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Good evening, everybody. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us tonight, live at team Trenton headquarters here in Leesburg, Florida, hoping to reinvigorate the search for baby Trenton.

First, out to Marilyn Aciego, reporter with "The Daily Commercial." What`s the latest?

MARILYN ACIEGO, "DAILY COMMERCIAL": Hi, Nancy. The latest is they`ve had a witness step forward who says that she saw Melinda and Trenton both come through the drive-through at Wendy`s at a small town called Belleview, which is about 20 miles north of Leesburg. And not only did she -- did Melinda come through the drive-through with Trenton, about 20 minutes later, she came back through the drive-through by herself.

GRACE: In addition to learning about the Wendy`s witness -- we found out about that yesterday -- a new witness has emerged in just the past few hours. Joining us here at team Trenton headquarters is private investigator P.A. Turner. Thank you for being with us, Mr. Turner. What can you tell us regarding the new witness at the convenience store?

P.A. TURNER, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR, SUNSHINE STATE INVESTIGATIONS: We were contacted and notified that a potential witness had come forth. A member of my staff had contacted this lady. She`s 81 years of age. She`s a retired nurse specializing in psychotherapy. She is -- told us that she had seen Melinda at a convenience store in Ocala, Florida, about 12 miles north of Belleview, on the morning of the 27th, that she did have Trenton with her, and that they were inside this convenience store. The child was running around while she was waiting in line behind Melinda, who was making purchases at the store of some very strange items.

GRACE: Now, let me get this straight. This is on August the 27th. That`s a Sunday. Trenton reported missing later on that evening. About what time was this?

TURNER: She bases it -- she had been at the Wal-Mart across the street from the convenience store at 8:33. She showed us a receipt. She walks -- she does not drive. She walked across the street, went into the Quick King (ph) to purchase some potato chips to watch the tennis match.

GRACE: And she observed Melinda Duckett in line, 8:30 AM, Ocala, getting something in line. And the baby was with her.

TURNER: Yes.

GRACE: OK. Let`s go out to Major Chris Blair. That is the Marion County sheriff. Major Blair, thank you so much for being with us. How would this fit into your timeline?

MAJ. CHRIS BLAIR, MARION COUNTY SHERIFF`S OFFICE: I believe what I heard was around 8:30, if that`s correct. I believe they got her in Leesburg at the ATM machine at 8:49 that morning.

GRACE: And would that be possible?

BLAIR: Probably not probable. I think we`d certainly have to look at it and certainly visit those stores to see if we can obtain any video footage.

GRACE: Tonight, tips are coming in at 1-877-TRENT-65. Let`s go out to Jean Casarez, Court TV news correspondent. Jean, what can you tell us?

JEAN CASAREZ, COURT TV: When we look at the timeline -- and this comes from the cell phone tower records. And we`ve known this timeline for quite a while. They have said that around 8:00 o`clock in the morning, that she was probably around at a business in the Leesburg area. And then at 10:49, that was when she was at this ATM, still in lake county, still in Leesburg. And then that`s when she drifted into Marion County. And that fits with the Wendy witness that came forward yesterday in Marion County, saying that she was at a Wendy`s around 11:15 to 11:30, and then on to a mall at 12:08, according to the cell phone records.

GRACE: We`ve heard a lot about a newly emerged witness, a witness that has allegedly passed a polygraph, which means so much to law enforcement, this witness placing Trenton Duckett and his mom at a local Wendy`s. Now, that could fit in the timeline with the new witness, the Ocala witness, placing them at a convenience store early that morning.

But let`s take a listen to what the Wendy`s witness has to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But for sure, she called him Trenton, and you guys discussed the name Trenton?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I thought it was -- you know, I (INAUDIBLE) I thought she said Denton and she said Trenton, because I moved my ear and I heard the "T." (INAUDIBLE) Oh, that`s nice.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would just like to ask whoever has Trenton, or knows where he`s at, to please return him. He`s 2 years old. He doesn`t deserve this. He`s done nothing wrong through any of this and he deserves to be back home with his dad.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Also tonight, disturbing developments regarding alleged pornography. Back to private investigator P.A. Turner, who has been working on the case. Mr. Turner, that came to our attention in New York several weeks ago, but we did not see any reason to report on it. We couldn`t really confirm it, other than a few candid shots that we had. And I frankly did not see a connection to any alleged pornography on Melinda Duckett`s part to the disappearance of the baby. Therefore, we did not bring it forward.

But now, apparently, a video has emerged that Trenton may actually be in the room when the pornography was shot.

TURNER: That`s correct.

GRACE: What can you tell us about that?

TURNER: We were made aware of the potential of the video, that we had received that information, that it existed, and were working in the process to obtain that clandestinely because we didn`t want to alert the company producing that video to anyone in Florida. In the meantime, the news media locally in Orlando contacted our office and asked if we were aware of the video, and I informed them that we did know it. Our interest was merely to gain intelligence for other persons that may have been present in the room.

We didn`t know if it was singular, if it was Melinda alone, or if there were other people. Before we could obtain a copy of the video, we were provided with certain information about that by the local media. We told them -- that they asked us if we intended to bring it forward. We said, no, we were just utilizing that as an informational gathering method to identify associates of Melinda. We were subsequently informed that in one segment of the video, a baby is heard crying in the background. Not visible, but only audio.

GRACE: Have you seen the video?

TURNER: No, I have not.

GRACE: Josh, have you seen the video?

JOSH DUCKETT, MISSING BOY`S FATHER: No.

GRACE: How did you learn about the video?

DUCKETT: It was sent, a link to us on the Internet, and it actually popped up with the photo that had Trenton in it.

GRACE: So you haven`t seen any portion of it?

DUCKETT: No.

GRACE: Have you seen a still of it?

DUCKETT: I`ve seen the still that had Trenton in the background.

GRACE: What did you see? I don`t want to go into any description of sex on the air...

(CROSSTALK)

DUCKETT: ... and there`s a picture of her with a guy holding -- and she was reaching over her shoulder, holding a bottle for Trenton.

GRACE: Could you make out that it was Trenton`s face?

DUCKETT: Yes.

GRACE: Are you sure it was Trenton?

DUCKETT: Almost 100 percent.

GRACE: From your knowledge, did anything look doctored about the picture?

DUCKETT: Not at all.

GRACE: OK. This is a brand-new and disturbing wrinkle in the search for Trenton Duckett. Let`s unleash the lawyers. Joining us tonight, Joe Lawless, Alan Ripka and Penny Douglass Furr. Out to you, Joe Lawless. This is a very disturbing development in the case. What, if anything, could it have to do with the disappearance of Trenton?

JOE LAWLESS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, Nancy, if she was involved in something like this, if she was aware that there was a picture floating around with her son, it`s possible she might have started to see the handwriting on the wall in terms of her ability to maintain custody of Trenton in the long run. She might have seen it as the beginning of the end.

And if you look at the suicide notes that she left, they were positive about Trenton -- you know, Trenton`s future but not her own. And it`s entirely possible that she may have been thinking, Well, I may not have him in my life in the future, but if I can`t have him in my life, no one else in my life is going to have him. And to me, it makes the possibility -- and again, it`s only a possibility -- but the possibility that she passed him off a lot more plausible than before.

GRACE: What about it, Alan Ripka?

ALAN RIPKA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, you know, Nancy, this is the type of people she may have been associated with. Certainly, people that are willing to take a video of her while she has her baby son and she`s attempting to feed her baby son is probably an unsavory group. And you never know what goes on behind the scenes with these people. She could have befriended many of these people. And God forbid this is the type of group that she gave her baby to in order to keep him away him away from her ex-husband.

GRACE: Out to Penny Douglass Furr, a child custody expert. Penny, if DFAC had known about his alleged activities, should they have taken the baby away?

PENNY DOUGLASS FURR, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Nancy, I believe they definitely should have taken the baby away. I know in the very beginning of this case, law enforcement was asking where she got all of her cash, and I think that`s now becoming clear, now that we find out she was making pornographic videos, because I`m sure there were other...

GRACE: Allegedly. Allegedly. Allegedly making pornographic videos. I haven`t seen it myself, Penny. I have only seen a couple of still shots early on in the investigation that, in my opinion, had no bearing on the disappearance of Trenton Duckett until now I`ve learned this tonight.

FURR: Well, if she was making those videos, Nancy, that could be where her cash was coming from, number one. And number two, it could have something to do with the disappearance of Trenton because of the people that are involved in this business. And obviously, they knew she had a child if he was in that video. So this could have a huge impact.

GRACE: Right. To Josh. Right now, we`re showing you a shot of an abandoned home. The family is answering every single lead that it gets here at team Trenton, where we`re broadcasting live tonight. It got a lead to go to this abandoned home, and interestingly, there in the home -- Trenton had a favorite type of bouncy ball, and he collected them. They`re tiny little balls. I believe you get them out of the bubble gum machine, the candy machines at stores. He would collect them. And one of the bouncy balls was found in good condition at this location. It`s just sent the family into a tailspin.

Back to the alleged pornography. To you, Josh. Did you tell the DFAC, department of family and children services, about the alleged porn?

DUCKETT: Yes.

GRACE: And what did they say?

DUCKETT: They said to me that just because she was making pornographic videos and pictures didn`t make her a bad mother. Their words were exactly that they have prostitutes that are good mothers.

GRACE: Let`s go out to the lines. Kathy in Florida. Hi, Kathy.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi. Good evening, Nancy. My question is to Josh. Would he know if Melinda had any relatives outside of this country?

GRACE: What about it?

DUCKETT: No, not to my knowledge.

GRACE: Well, you bring up a very interesting point, Kathy. I know where you`re going. Could the baby be stashed with a relative police haven`t encountered yet? As a matter of fact, Josh, you spoke with one of her good friends out of state last night. What did she tell you?

DUCKETT: She felt very strongly that Melinda had actually stashed Trenton with somebody. She had no idea anybody who possibly would be involved in it. But she has the same feelings that we do all along. She feels that Trenton`s alive and he`s well, it`s just a matter of finding him.

GRACE: Do you believe, Josh, that the police approached her about the alleged porn?

DUCKETT: I think they approached her, but they didn`t check into it as much as they should have.

GRACE: Out to Mike Brooks, former D.C. cop and former fed with the FBI terrorism task force. Mike, it just gets curiouser and curiouser. Sometimes I feel like I am in "Alice in Wonderland," that everything`s turned upside-down. We came down to follow along with leads and refocus attention on missing Trenton Duckett only to find out additions in the timeline and now alleged pornography, with the baby -- according to people that have seen the video, seen the picture, with the baby in the background.

MIKE BROOKS, FORMER D.C. POLICE, SERVED ON FBI TERRORISM TASK FORCE: I`ll tell you, Nancy, it does. Every time -- it seems like every turn, there`s something new in this case, and It just gets weirder and weirder by the minute. You know, they need to go back and take a look and see if they can identify who is in these alleged videos. And you know, have these people been interviewed? That`s in Marion County. That`s the Leesburg police, the FDLE and the FBI have to figure out, see what they can do to take these pictures, enhance them to see what kind of information and good intelligence they can glean from these. These could be very important in this case on people who may not have been interviewed as of yet.

GRACE: Well, with us tonight, the source, Major Chris Blair at the Marion County sheriff`s office. As you know, this isn`t just a single jurisdiction investigation. There is the FDLE, the FBI, the Marion County sheriff, the Lake County sheriff, the Leesburg sheriff. To you, Major Blair. Were you aware of the alleged porn? Have those people been questioned or even identified?

BLAIR: No, ma`am. I had heard word of it, but I`m not totally aware of what it consisted of.

GRACE: Would you consider speaking to them? I mean, it may even be difficult to identify who they are, but would you consider that an important person to speak to?

BLAIR: Well, I think that all avenues need to be checked, and I`m sure that that`s probably going to be in the hands of the Leesburg Police Department. We`re running a parallel investigation with them, and I`m sure that they will go down that avenue.

GRACE: The tip line, as you all know, is 1-877-TRENT-65. Behind me, volunteers working the lines here at team Trenton headquarters. Won`t you help us find baby Trenton Duckett?

Very quickly, to tonight`s "Case Alert." A routine preliminary hearing in an Ohio courtroom gets out of control when a family of three murder victims attacked the murder suspect, 24-year-old Jason Howard (ph), handcuffed there in court, Howard accused of killing a Columbus woman, her 10-year-old daughter and two younger sons.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: What store did you go to, Wal-Mart, J.C. Penney`s, what?

MELINDA DUCKETT, LATE MOTHER OF MISSING BOY: I`m not going to get into any specifics.

GRACE: Why?

MELINDA DUCKETT: Because I`m not dealing with the media very well.

GRACE: Well, can you remember where you were that day?

MELINDA DUCKETT: I can remember perfectly well where I went that day, just like I`ve spoken with the FBI with it. But as far as anything else goes, we haven`t had very good...

GRACE: Well, don`t you think it would be a great idea, for instance, if you were at a local J.C. Penney`s or Sears Roebuck, to tell the viewers right now, This is where we were? Did you see anything? Did you notice anything? Here`s your child`s picture. Here`s my picture. Help me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Welcome back. We are live at team Trenton headquarters here at Leesburg, Florida, hoping to reinvigorate the search for a missing 2- year-old baby boy. He went missing on August 27. Just recently, new eyewitness testimony has emerged. These are new and exclusive shots of baby Trenton. Take a look.

Here at team Trenton headquarters is Trenton`s dad. Josh is with me, along with private investigator P.A. Turner, the family itself has employed.

There`s been a lot of confusion regarding the cut in the screen, the cut in the screen, through which Melinda Duckett said an intruder took the baby. Now we learn that contrary to earlier reports given to us by police, the window was cut three separate places, across the bottom, as you see, nearly 30 inches, and on either side. However -- to you, Josh -- we had also been told by Melinda herself the baby was sleeping directly under the window. That`s not true. Explain.

DUCKETT: The bed didn`t go directly under the window, it actually ran against the wall that connected to the window.

GRACE: When you saw that, is there any way that someone could have reached in and gotten the baby?

DUCKETT: No.

GRACE: Even with the screen cut like that?

DUCKETT: Not to my knowledge. And not to what I`ve seen.

GRACE: This is what Major Rockefeller (ph) had to say about the cut in the screen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I wanted to go ahead and, you know, clarify on the air about the issue with the window screen. I want to set the record straight. It is a U-shaped cut 10 inches high and it goes 32 inches across. We`ve always said that it is possible that somebody could have reached through the window. I do know that we`ve always said it`s possible, it`s just not probable.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: I was on assignment November 9. Our show aired a story that night on the divorce dispute between pop star Britney Spears, Kevin Federline. During the segment, we erroneously featured video of a Hollywood deejay, deejay Amo (ph), mistakenly implying he was Kevin Federline. We apologize for that error.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... but very disturbing items that are in it, the very serious threats that are in it. They were very troubling to investigators to begin with. The fact that she was able to write those words and used it as part of even this investigation for a reason to claim that somebody else had taken Trenton out -- all I can say is that was one of the big factors in us looking (INAUDIBLE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: The search for Trenton becoming blurred with jurisdictional disputes, and now alleged pornography with the child in the room. Straight out to Marc Klaas, president of Beyondmissing. What`s your take on the search efforts so far and these new developments?

MARC KLAAS, BEYONDMISSING.COM: Well, there`s a couple of things I`d like to say. First I`d like to make mention of this cut in the window. We had always been led to believe it was one 10-inch cut, which unfairly pointed the finger at Melinda and nobody else, and now we`re finding out that that`s totally different. And I think law enforcement should have pointed that out long, long ago instead of letting us believe something that wasn`t true.

Secondly, I`m very disturbed by this idea that Josh and his family are taking in leads and they are personally following up on those leads. You don`t put amateurs into a situation like this. All leads that come into his hotline or to anybody else`s hotline should go immediately to law enforcement, and they should be allowed to investigate them. Otherwise, you could get yourself in serious trouble. You can compromise the crime scene. You could even get yourself in serious injury.

And then thirdly, I think that this Wendy`s is key to -- could quite possibly be key to this whole case. And I think what they need to do is create a perimeter around Wendy`s, maybe one or two miles, and then start searching all the residences within that perimeter.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If there is a captor and they have little Trenton in their custody, but they`re not sure how to get him returned, we want to encourage you to drop him off at a public place. Just drop him off somewhere to where we can bring him back home.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There`s many theories that surround this case, many, many theories, and I don`t think any one of us have the correct answer. And I think that our main focus is to put every effort out there to find Trenton.

911 OPERATOR: Hi. What is Trenton wearing, honey?

MELINDA DUCKETT, LATE MOTHER OF TRENTON DUCKETT: I don`t know. He was ready for bed.

911 OPERATOR: You don`t know what you dressed him in before he went to bed?

M. DUCKETT: He might have had his shoes off and his shirt off -- no shoes. I know who friggin` did it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: We are here broadcasting live from Team Trenton Headquarters in Leesburg, Florida, trying to reinvigorate the search for this 2-year-old missing boy. Stunning new developments suggesting the child could actually still be alive.

Out to Court TV`s Jean Casarez. There`s also now a third alleged sighting at Wendy`s?

JEAN CASAREZ, COURT TV: That`s right. The woman that worked at the Wendy`s drive-thru believes -- and she passed a polygraph test on this -- that her belief was legitimate, that there was a third visit by Melinda on that Sunday, August 27th, maybe around 4:00 in the afternoon or so, but yet cell phone tower records place her back in Lake County. And investigators believe she was at home. They also have a record that she was on the Internet e-mailing at that point in time.

GRACE: To Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst joining us out of the L.A. jurisdiction, what of it, Bethany? I once had an 84-year-old judge that would tell the jury, "It is your duty to try to make all the witnesses speak the truth, impugning perjury to no one." Is there a way that this Wendy`s employee -- she`s passed a polygraph -- can be telling the truth that she did see Melinda Duckett and the child once that day, Melinda Duckett alone 20 minutes later, a third sighting there at Wendy`s? Explain to me.

BETHANY MARSHALL, PSYCHOANALYST: I can see the first two times. The third, as Jean Casarez pointed out, doesn`t seem so credible, because there`s other records she was somewhere else. You know, what really negative impacts a person`s ability to reliably remember events is if they`re trying to remember something that was traumatic.

So if she was witnessing a homicide, a burglary, a rape, then the trauma would kind of scramble her memory, so to speak. But this is a teller who`s in a small town of less than 4,000 people watching people go through a drive-thru, and someone goes through twice. That`s a rare event.

And it`s not traumatic to see a young mother come through a drive-thru with a small child, so I can see no reason why she would not remember accurately, other than if she was pulling a John Mark Karr and trying to insert herself into this crime in some way, but that doesn`t seem likely.

GRACE: Well, what`s so interesting -- out to you, Mike Brooks -- we`ve dealt with a lot of witnesses before and polygraph issues. She actually had a conversation that sounds very believable with Melinda Duckett, saying through the headset at the drive-thru, what`s your baby`s name? And she thought Melinda said Denton. Melinda corrected her to say, "Trenton."

I recall the first time I saw an entire arm from wrist to shoulder entirely tattooed. It was a medical examiner there in Atlanta, I might add a very well-known medical examiner, that tattooed his whole arm.

Long story short, she remembers this unique tattoo that Melinda Duckett had on her arm. Those are facts to me that give -- detailed facts that we look for when assessing whether a statement is true or not.

MIKE BROOKS, FORMER D.C. POLICE: You`re absolutely right, Nancy. And, you know, her saying a third time, well, you know, OK. Number one, the investigators went out and they talked to her. They established apparently, you know, her mental status at the time and everything else, and what she was doing, her reliability to show up for work on time. They talked to her employer, her coworkers.

And, you know, they have enough credible information. They think she`s credible enough, Nancy, that they`ve gone ahead and came out and said that, from this information, they believe Trenton is alive. You know now, keep in mind -- and you know this, too -- polygraphs are a great investigative tool, but they`re not infallible. And it all depends sometimes on the state of the mind of the person taking it.

GRACE: Oh, please, you want to tell me some 60-year-old granny working at Wendy`s can beat a polygraph? I don`t believe that; that lady did not go into this polygraph trying to beat the polygraph, Mike Brooks.

BROOKS: I didn`t say that, Nancy. That`s not what I said.

GRACE: That`s ridiculous.

BROOKS: That`s not what I said.

GRACE: That`s where you were going.

BROOKS: Not necessarily. I`m just saying they`re not infallible. They`re only as good as the operator who is conducting the polygraph examination, period.

GRACE: Oh, so you`re suggesting -- let`s go out to the lawyers on this. He`s actually right on that. I do not believe that this lady employee at a Wendy`s beat a polygraph. However, there is a way -- let`s go to the lawyers, Alan Ripka, Joe Lawless, Penny Douglass Furr, to you, Joe Lawless, if the question is posed in a way that the witness answers truthfully but you still don`t get what you want, such as, "Do you believe you saw Melinda Duckett?"

JOE LAWLESS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Sure. The polygraph measures bodily responses to questions. And if a witness believes that what they`re saying is true, they`ll register a truthful response. It doesn`t tell the actual truth or falsity of the statement. It tells how the person feels about what they`re saying, if they`re reacting to the question. And if they believe it`s true, the machine will register a non-deceptive response, not a truth or a lie, but a degree of response. So she might not have been trying to beat it...

GRACE: Alan Ripka, the question may have been off. Right, got you. To you, Alan Ripka, have you ever agreed to introduce polygraph into a trial? The only way to do it is stipulate to it up front, both parties agree to it, not knowing how it`s going to turn out.

ALAN RIPKA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Of course not, Nancy. I`ve never agreed to that. First of all, it`s unreliable. Also, in this particular case, someone can be under the mistaken belief and thus be telling the truth. But I`ll tell you something: She didn`t report this for 30 days after the happening, Nancy. And I think there`s something to be said for that, if she`s so reliable.

GRACE: And to you, Penny Douglass Furr, the emotions during a custody battle. You`re the child custody expert. Have you ever seen parents leverage the child one against the other? In this case, there are allegations Melinda Duckett would call Josh Duckett and then make the baby cry on purpose in the background to try to get something she wanted.

PENNY DOUGLASS FURR, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: First of all, Nancy, it`s not at all unusual to have emotions running high in any custody battle. But when you have emotions running high and you have a mentally unstable parent, it can very easily get out of hand. And this case is an example of how easily one can manipulate the system. She wrote a letter pretending that it was from Josh, and that`s what she used to get a restraining order against Josh.

GRACE: Out to a very special guest joining us tonight, in addition to Marc Klaas, president of Beyond Missing, Mark Lunsford. As you know, this is the father of Jesse Lunsford and now a tireless crusader for victims` rights. What`s your advice at this juncture, Mark?

MARK LUNSFORD, DAUGHTER JESSICA ABDUCTED AND MURDERED: Well, you know, I`m listening to everything. And, you know, I have to agree with Marc Klaas. I mean, I`ve learned a lot from Marc Klaas.

And also, you know, this thing with the screen, you know, at first they said it was 10 inches, and now it`s bigger. I mean, they`re confusing people; they`re not telling everybody everything.

I know they can`t give all of the information out, but now we`ve got Marion County involved. They`re doing another investigation, so everybody`s getting involved. Law enforcement should work together. People should be aware that, you know, turn your tips over to law enforcement, because you could jeopardize, you know, Trenton`s safety. You could jeopardizes evidence pointing towards where Trenton might be.

But, better yet, why do us families have to put these organizations like Team Trenton or Jesse`s foundation or Klaas Kids to do all this work? Why isn`t the government doing more? I mean, you know, this is getting really out of hand.

GRACE: Out to Marilyn Aciego with the "Daily Commercial," we have seen, Marilyn, an intense effort on behalf of the family to find the baby. What are police doing to find the baby?

MARILYN ACIEGO, REPORTER, "DAILY COMMERCIAL": Leesburg still has their command center set up, Nancy. They have had the command center set up since Melinda reported Trenton missing. And now we know, too, that Marion County has been working on this at least since September 27th.

GRACE: To you, Josh, as we head to break, what are your thoughts about what you hope to gain tomorrow in the search?

JOSH DUCKETT, FATHER OF TRENTON DUCKETT: My hopes are that more people will come forward with any kind of information that they have and that each one can be followed up on and help in the search for Trenton.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(NEWSBREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LINDA FISHER, MOTHER OF MICHELLE YOUNG: I have great faith in the police that they will help find the person who is responsible for taking our Michelle away from us. She`s a wife, a sister, a granddaughter, and, most importantly, the mother of my only granddaughter, Cassidy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Welcome back. A championship cheerleader-turned-mom found dead in her own home. Out to Court TV`s Jean Casarez, what`s the latest?

CASAREZ: Still a very active crime scene, especially at the home where her body was found, because obviously they have collected evidence. They are testing evidence. But they still have it as that crime scene, because once they get results, they may want to test other things.

Remember, Nancy, Michelle Young was found in the bedroom. She was dead. There was blood all over. Her little 2-year-old had gotten in the blood, and there were bloody footprints all over the home from the 2-year- old. There was also blood found in the bed, so they`ve got to distinguish what is transferred blood from that little 2-year-old and what was blood emulating from the crime scene itself.

GRACE: This is what Michelle`s mom had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FISHER: My name is Linda Fisher, and Michelle Young is my daughter. We are shaken and heartbroken over the tragic loss of Michelle. She is a wife, a sister, a granddaughter, and, most importantly, the mother of my only granddaughter, Cassidy. I`m asking for anyone who has seen or heard anything, as trivial as you might thing it is, anything to please come forward and help find the person who murdered our daughter, my daughter.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: The death scene: bloody. And to add insult to injury, the 2- year-old baby girl there on the scene at her mom`s body. In fact, the child`s bloody footprints found in the home.

To Jean Casarez, what do we know police are doing to investigate?

CASAREZ: Well, one thing we know right off the bat, her husband, Jason Young, was on business and with his parents about 300 miles away, so they got a non-testimonial identification order from the judge that allowed him to get his DNA, his fingerprints. He didn`t have to say anything. He was not interrogated.

Obviously, they`ve been testing that. But it`s going to be difficult, because of course his DNA and his fingerprints are going to be in that home. But they`re trying to find now if they can find that suspect, that person of interest. They say that there is no one that is a person of interest. There is no forced entry to the home. They do not believe it was a random murder.

GRACE: Take a listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DISPATCHER: All right, what`s the problem? Tell me exactly what happened.

MEREDITH FISHER, FOUND SISTER`S BODY: I think my sister`s dead.

DISPATCHER: OK, tell me what happened, ma`am.

FISHER: I have no idea. Oh, my God.

DISPATCHER: All right, stay on the phone with me, please. What`s your name?

FISHER: Meredith Fisher.

DISPATCHER: Meredith.

FISHER: And this is the Young address. Oh, my God.

DISPATCHER: Meredith, listen to me, please.

FISHER: Yes.

DISPATCHER: Are you with the patient now?

FISHER: Yes (INAUDIBLE) with her daughter.

DISPATCHER: OK, how old`s the patient?

FISHER: And there`s blood everywhere. She`s 28, 29.

DISPATCHER: Twenty-eight?

FISHER: Should I try to move her?

DISPATCHER: Listen to me, ma`am.

FISHER: Yes.

DISPATCHER: I`m going to tell you what to do but you need to calm down so you can help her. You said there is blood everywhere?

FISHER: Yes.

DISPATCHER: Is she conscious?

FISHER: No, I don`t think so. Should I try to help her?

DISPATCHER: Listen to me, ma`am.

FISHER: I`m listening.

DISPATCHER: Is she breathing?

FISHER: I don`t think so.

DISPATCHER: Have you checked?

FISHER: Michelle? She`s cold.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Out to Mike Brooks, former cop and former fed with the FBI, Mike, apparently the husband`s out of town on business, but he`s also with his family, and he calls the natural sister of the victim, his wife, and says, "A fax is coming to the home. Can you go pick it up?" What was the fax?

BROOKS: That is the mystery. No one knows what this mysterious fax is, Nancy. You know, and, number one, why would he call the sister to go over and get the fax at the house? It`s just very odd to me. You know, what is the relationship between Jason and his sister? That`s one of the things that law enforcement needs to look at.

You know, and apparently there was something in this fax -- we heard originally something in this fax that he did not want his wife to see. What was it that he didn`t want her to see? That`s the other question.

Now, there`s a lot of other questions, too. You know, they said they`re looking. Apparently the police have narrowed the time that they`re asking people if they saw any suspicious activity, any vehicles at all around this very quiet, very affluent neighborhood, because we know that she had someone with her up until 10:30 that evening.

But they`re asking for anyone who saw anything suspicious from midnight to 6:00 a.m. to come forward, because they need their help. Now, so apparently they`ve narrowed it down to just -- this happened between midnight and 6:00 a.m., probably from what they were able to glean from the scene and also, you know, time of death and those kinds of things, Nancy. But there`s a lot of questions that still remain unanswered.

GRACE: To you, Bethany Marshall, psychoanalyst joining us out of L.A., so often we seed homicide during pregnancy. In fact, we learned during the Laci Peterson case that it`s the number-one cause of death amongst pregnant women is homicide, according to the "New England Journal of Medicine." Why?

MARSHALL: Well, I think there`s two reasons. One is if the father is unprepared to take on the burden of fatherhood, he will kill the wife. I mean, in some cases, if he`s homicidal.

But the other thing is sometimes these really primitive, mentally disturbed dads, they actually feel jealous of the unborn baby, because the mother will be very maternally preoccupied and connected to the baby, and the dad will get jealous and envious and then strike out at the mother.

GRACE: The father of the unborn child not a suspect in this case.

Let`s go out to the lawyers joining us, Joe Lawless and Alan Ripka. You know, it`s Trial 101, forcing someone to give non-testimonial evidence. What I mean by that is, for instance, a judge signing an order for a voice impression, a fingerprint, a shoeprint, a handwriting comparison, DNA. What about it, Alan Ripka? Is it allowed?

RIPKA: It sure is, Nancy. What it is, it`s less intrusive, and you need more oftentimes to get a search warrant or to ask someone to take blood from them. And as a result not wanting to be as intrusive but wanting to get information quickly, you ask for this non-testimonial evidence. And generally a judge will sign off on it.

GRACE: Agree or disagree, Joe Lawless?

LAWLESS: Absolutely agree. It happens all the time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GRACE: Tonight, we are live from Leesburg, Florida, in a parent`s worst nightmare. Two-year-old Florida boy Trenton Duckett vanishes. His mom in the next room watching a video with hope that he is still alive. Tonight, renewed efforts in the search for baby Trenton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Where were you? Why aren`t you telling us where you were that day? You were the last person to be seen with him.

MELINDA DUCKETT, LATE MOTHER OF TRENTON DUCKETT: And we`ve already gone out and distributed the flyers...

GRACE: Why? Why aren`t you telling us and giving us a clear picture of where you were before your son was kidnapped?

Ms. Duckett, you`re not telling us for a reason. What is the reason? You refuse to give even the simplest facts of where you were with your son before you went missing. It is day 12.

M. DUCKETT: It`s all media. It`s not just here. It`s all media, period.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have a witness. She believed that she saw Melinda. She remembers seeing little Trenton in the vehicle, and she asked about his name. She had an earpiece in her ear, and she said, "It was Denton?" And Melinda corrected her. We believe that it was possible during this time that she may have left that Wendy`s and actually met someone to hand Trenton off to another person to take.

Team members of this parallel investigation by the Marion County Sheriff`s Office, along with the Leesburg Police Department, Lake County Sheriff`s Office, the Federal Bureau of Investigations, and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are prepared to say that little Trenton is alive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Tonight, we remember Army Private First Class Kenny Stanton, Jr., just 20, Hemet, California, killed, Iraq. Enlisting straight from high school, Stanton loved poetry, wanted to be an English teacher. Active in the youth ministry at his local church, the oldest of four children, he leaves behind a large and loving family. Kenny Stanton, Jr., American hero.

Thank you to our guests, but especially to you for inviting us into your homes. NANCY GRACE signing off for tonight here at Team Trenton Headquarters. See you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And until then, good night, friend.

END