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Nancy Grace
Stain of Child`s Outline in Casey Anthony`s Car Trunk; Pregnant 12- year-old and Sister Missing
Aired September 29, 2009 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HLN ANCHOR: Breaking news tonight in the search for a 2-year- old Florida girl: six months of searching culminate when skeletal remains found in the heavily wooded area 15 houses from the Anthony home confirmed to be little Caylee.
A utility meter reader stumbles on a tiny human skeleton, including a skull covered in light-colored hair. The killer duct taping and placing a heart- shaped sticker directly over the mouth and then triple-bagging little Caylee like she`s trash.
Bombshell tonight, as we go to air, wading through over 1,000 police documents released in just the last hours, we confirm high-tech FBI testing reveals the outline, a stain. It`s the silhouette of a little child. A child curled up in the fetal position, discovered in tot mom`s car trunk.
Air samples already confirm human decomposition in that trunk. But now a virtual picture: a picture of little Caylee dead in her own mother`s car.
And tonight another bombshell: duct tape wrapped around Caylee`s skull matching duct tape in the Anthony home, determined to be extremely rare, torpedo to the prosecution. Was all the testing on the duct tape, the tape wrapped around Caylee`s skull, ruined at the FBI lab? We learn a female lab tech`s DNA ends up on that tape, the tape on Caylee`s skull.
We also discover the defense`s so-called wish list. A list of people the defense P.I. was to investigate as potential scapegoats, someone else to point the finger at in court. Hundreds of e-mails surfacing between grandmother, Cindy and the Anthonys` private eye, secretly compiling charts to dig up dirt on key people connected to the case.
And in a stunning twist, months after Caylee`s memorial, grandmother Cindy still wants the PIs to search for a living Caylee, insisting this photo of a little girl being investigated as a possible Caylee sighting in Puerto Rico.
And tonight a key witness emerges, possibly the last person to see Caylee alive outside the family, placing her at a local Wal-Mart with tot mom Casey Anthony.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You`re talking about a 3-year-old little girl. I need to find her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don`t know what your involvement is, sweetheart. You`re not telling me where she`s at.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Because I don`t [BLEEP] know where she`s at. Are you kidding me?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was a bag of pizza for, what, 12 days in the back of the car full of maggots. It stunk so bad.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My husband`s a deputy sheriff years ago, and the first thing he thought was human decomposition. I`m a nurse. I thought human decomposition.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Maybe someone put a body in the car after it was towed to the tow yard.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She is not a murderer.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There is no evidence that Casey has ever done any harm to her child.
CASEY ANTHONY, CAYLEE ANTHONY`S MOTHER: I as a mom, I know in my gut there`s a feeling as a parent; you know certain things about your child. You can feel that connection. And I still have that feeling, that presence. I know that she`s alive.
GEORGE ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S FATHER: I got within three feet of my daughter`s car and the worst odor that you could possibly smell in this world. And I`ve smelled that odor before. It smelled like a decomposed body.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight police on high alert for two little sisters, just 12 and 11 years old; the 12-year-old nearly nine months pregnant. The little girls, allegedly taken on the run by their stepfather. Why?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: North Carolina police are still looking for a 12-year- old girl who is nearly nine months pregnant. She is due. She disappeared from her Morrisville home along with her younger sister and adoptive dad.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Matthew Hess left his estranged wife a note saying that he was taking Kiera (ph) to Lakeshore middle. She became suspicious when Kiera didn`t make it to her doctor`s appointment.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police say he may have abducted them.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I`m told the 12-year-old Kiera intended to keep the baby. She may have already delivered. Investigators say inside this home where she lived with her father there are plenty of baby supplies and equipments.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police are worried that 12-year-old Kiera, due to deliver a baby any day now, isn`t getting the medical attention she needs.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Please drop them off. I just want the girls. Ok?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Time may be running out for Kiera`s baby.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us.
As we go to air, wading through over 1,000 police documents released in just the last hours, we confirm high-tech FBI testing reveals the outline, a stain; it`s the silhouette of a little child. A child curled up in the fetal position, discovered in her own mother -- tot mom`s trunk.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You said their remains, from what?
G. ANTHONY: How dare you say that about my granddaughter? How dare you? How dare you.
C. ANTHONY: They hold all of their information from me yet at the same time they`re twisting stuff. They`ve already said they`re going to pin this on me if they don`t find Caylee.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I believe that there`s something that day. I just know in my own gut and I think I (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That was an overpowering smell of the dead.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no odor in the car when it was towed down to the towing company. No odor.
G. ANTHONY: Maybe my daughter ran over something.
C. ANTHONY: Air samples don`t mean anything.
CINDY ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S MOTHER: If we continue to, you know, look at evidence that hasn`t been verified, you guys are going to put Caylee in a coffin because eventually something`s going to happen her if we don`t find her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They found hair samples in the trunk of the car that are similar in length and color to that of Caylee.
G. ANTHONY: The person who was in the back of my granddaughter`s car is not my granddaughter.
You don`t forget that odor no matter what it is. You never ever forget.
CINDY ANTHONY: There`s something wrong. I found my daughter`s car today and it smells like there`s been a dead body in the damn car.
G. ANTHONY: The stain that was in the trunk of my daughter`s car, when she got home and I mean, I opened up the trunk, we had the windows rolled down, the sunroof open. Instantaneously that gets in your house, just like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out to Kathi Belich joining us from WFTV there in Orlando. Kathi, what can you tell me about the results of these high-tech FBI tests?
KATHI BELICH, REPORTER, CNN AFFILIATE WFTV: Well, if you`re referring to one of the FBI investigators noticed and then another agreed that the mysterious stain that was in the trunk of Casey`s car actually took on the shape of a child in the fetal position and they said they could actually distinguish the back area from the bottom area from the leg area. And they did further testing on that.
They were trying to get that video enhanced so that you could print it up and see it rather than just look at it on a computer screen.
GRACE: To Ellie Jostad, our producer on the story, joining us from L.A. tonight. Ellie, what can you tell me?
ELLIE JOSTAD, PRODUCER, NANCY GRACE: Well, Nancy, we also found out more about the hair that was found in the trunk; one of the FBI investigators writing that this hair is consistent with the dead body. She also says that it matches hair on a hair brush they knew was used -- used to comb Caylee`s hair. She also points out that the hair does not match Casey Anthony.
Now, in some other news...
GRACE: All right, well right, stop right there, Ellie. Hold on.
So the hair found in the trunk we know is from a dead body because the hair -- Norm, see if you can pull up that shot we have depicting a death ring on a hair. A dark-color ring comes -- appears on a hair near the follicle, near the root, postmortem. So this hair had that death ring on it.
JOSTAD: Right.
GRACE: We can also tell from either nuclear or mitochondrial DNA that it belonged to either tot mom Casey Anthony or her daughter, Caylee. Then it was ruled out. Tot mom`s ruled out because the hair wasn`t treated with dye or bleach. This only leaves little Caylee.
Now what are you telling me about the hair?
JOSTAD: Well, Nancy, now we`re saying that this is a less sophisticated test. It`s not DNA. This is a microscopic test that indicates the hair matches the hair on the hair brush and it does not match samples of Casey Anthony`s hair.
GRACE: So bottom line, this is the baby`s hair. This is Caylee`s hair.
JOSTAD: Right.
GRACE: I want to go back to the silhouette. The silhouette found on the trunk -- tot mom`s trunk lining. What can you tell me about that? I mean, I already know that the hair belongs to Caylee. I already know that.
JOSTAD: Well, Nancy, there is e-mails in between -- going back and forth between FBI colleagues. One of them says a very interesting photo exists which you have, there`s a large stain. If you look closely at this photo, there appears to be an outline or a silhouette of a child in the fetal position.
Now, this FBI investigator asking a colleague what can they do, can they enhance the photo, can they send the trunk liner to the body farm for further testing? Can they figure out what made that stain?
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. To Beverly in New York. Hi, Beverly.
BEVERLY, NEW YORK (via telephone): Hi, Nancy. I`m sorry, but you already answered my question. I wanted to know if the hair had ever been positively identified.
GRACE: Well, let`s just run back through that.
Nikki Pierce, WDBO Radio. Nikki, I know that they did either nuclear, which is from the root of the hair, or mitochondrial DNA testing on the hair.
Now, am I correct? Was it determined it was either Caylee`s or Casey`s?
NIKKI PIERCE, WDBO RADIO: It was determined that it was either Casey`s or Caylee`s. But we can see now from these new documents that in appearance it does not match Casey`s. It looks like it came from the hair brush that Cindy had given them, grandmother Cindy had given them earlier when FBI investigators requested a brush and she said that Casey and Caylee used that brush together. And that piece of hair does not match Casey`s.
GRACE: Unleash the lawyers. Susan Moss, New York; Bill Schaefer, Orlando; Raymond Giudice, Atlanta; Daniel Horowitz, famed attorney out of San Francisco.
Ray Giudice, this is a virtual snapshot of little Caylee lying there dead or dying in the fetal position in tot mom`s car trunk. What more does the jury need Ray? Give it your best shot, friend.
RAYMOND GIUDICE, ATLANTA LAWER: Well, I`ll read to you the second e-mail that your reporter lashed out from the FBI that says, "We cannot draw any conclusions at as to what caused this image, it is too speculative." When the prosecutions FBI expert on the stand is saying, too speculative, that`s a defense lawyers dream.
GRACE: Ok, to Sue Moss, you know I don`t think a jury, when they see what the FBI has, when you look at silhouette, I don`t need an FBI lab tech to tell me what I`m seeing. If I see a silhouette of a child in a fetal position and that silhouette is found in the trunk of the mother`s car, do you even have to make a closing argument?
SUSAN MOSS, NEW YORK LAWYER: Absolutely, this stain can explain who is to blame. Don`t look at this of evidence alone. Look at it in total with all of the other evidence. The smell of death in the car, the fact that that hair was found in the car which is a hair of death which shows in fact that somebody who had that hair has died.
When you look at this in its entirety that`s when you see how powerful it really it is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CINDY ANTHONY: There was no odor in the car when it was towed down to the towing company, no odor. I saw it rotten whatever it was.
Nothing is decomposing in there. Maybe someone put a body in the car after it was towed to the tow yard. Hair samples don`t mean anything.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They are saying that -- they`re saying that in the trunk of the car...
CINDY ANTHONY: There was a bag of pizza for what -- 12 days in the back of the car, full of maggots, it stunk so bad. You know how hot it`s been. That smell was terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: To Tracy Sargent -- she`s here with her detection dog Cinco. They`re both from Homeland Security. Tracy, do cadaver dogs actually alert on food ever?
TRACY SARGENT, HOMELAND SECURITY: No, ma`am, they do not. That`s one of the training things we do with these dogs, that any distraction we might find out there, they are trained off of that. They are only to alert to human remains scent.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANTHONY: There`s something wrong. They found my daughter`s car today, and it smells like there`s been a dead body in the damn car.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The crime scene investigators are working on the car, trying to determine where the smell is coming from. They also found a stain inside the trunk of the car that came up under black light that`s questionable and we need to process.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It started around that time when two dead squirrels crawled up under the hood of the car, you know, and they died in there.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 911. What`s your emergency?
ANTHONY: I called a little bit ago, the deputy sheriff. I found out my granddaughter has been taken. She has been missing for a month. Her mother finally admitted that she`s been missing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ok.
ANTHONY: Get someone here now.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What is the address that you`re calling from?
ANTHONY: We`re talking about a 3-year-old little girl. My daughter finally admitted that the babysitter stole her.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACY: Straight out to the calls, everyone.
In case you are just joining us, tonight we learned technicians at the FBI lab have identified a silhouette. It`s a stain. It is a silhouette of a child`s tiny body curled up in the fetal position in tot-mom`s trunk. A virtual picture of little Caylee as she lay dying. Unleash the lawyers: Susan Moss, Bill Schaefer, Raymond Giudice, Daniel Horowitz.
Bill Schaefer, you`re there on the scene joining us from Orlando. What do you make of it?
BILL SCHAEFER, ATTORNEY: It`s very damning. It`s another very strong piece of circumstantial evidence. The problem with the defense is that every time they pop one of these chains there seems to be another piece of evidence to take its place and reinforce it.
And this evidence is consistent with what was found in the trunk, indicating that this is where little Caylee`s body was. And the other thing is her body in that car, alive or dead, in the trunk, that is significant. That child should not have been in the trunk in any respect.
GRACE: Daniel Horowitz, you`ve tried so many murder cases as a defense attorney. Give me your best shot to defend against this.
DANIEL HOROWITZ, ATTORNEY: I don`t think the forensic evidence is that strong. If the jury also believes she`s guilty, then they`ll give a lot of credence to it. But really it`s like an ink blot test. One person`s curled-up body in a fetal position could be another person`s pizza that just rotted in the trunk.
The science of the hair and the ring of death is very dramatic, but there`s not much background or backup for it. So bottom line is this is dramatic evidence but it`s not really persuasive evidence all by itself.
GRACE: Good stab at it, Horowitz. I thought that either you or Giudice (ph) would try to compare it to those magic eye photos where you have to squint your eyes to really see the picture. But apparently, people at the FBI can very clearly make out the silhouette of a child in the fetal position.
Celia in Alabama. Hi, Celia.
CELIA, ALABAMA (via telephone): Hi. How are you doing tonight?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?
CELIA: Why is it the courts won`t require the rest of the family members to undergo a polygraph test if for no other reason for credibility in court?
GRACE: I`ll tell you in a nutshell. You cannot force anyone to undergo a polygraph test, especially if it goes against their self-interests.
In this case also -- well, in every case, Celia in Alabama, polygraphs are not admissible in court unless both parties, defense and state, agree up front before trial that regardless of the outcome it`s going to come into evidence.
And believe me both sides in this case are not going to agree on anything.
To Brenda in West Virginia. Hi, Brenda.
BRENDA, WEST VIRGINIA (via telephone): Yes.
GRACE: Hi, dear. What`s your question?
BRENDA: Hi, Nancy. Yes, I have one quick question and one quick comment. Can you tell me if this precious little baby has been either cremated or buried yet? And...
GRACE: Ok. What do we know about that, Kathi Belich, WFTV?
KATHI BELICH, WFTV: From what I remember, the family had Caylee`s body cremated and it is somewhere that they are not divulging.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was an overpowering smell. I`ll admit that.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: At first glance you thought this may be the smell of a body, or decomposition?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s a possibility, yes. I mean, maybe my daughter ran over something.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I arrived, go through the garage door like I typically do...
I just went oh, [BLEEP]. Like I just -- I couldn`t even describe it. I`m just worried that the police are not following up Caylee as a missing person and they`re trying to build a case against my sister like for a homicide.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who took her? And then Casey goes, "the nanny did. She was kidnapped."
I believe everything that my sister tells me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Straight out to Kathi Belich, joining us from WFTV.
Regarding this stain, I understand that the Anthony family`s response is it is an old stain, that the car had gone through a lot of people.
BELICH: I don`t know a whole lot about that. I do know that their attorney, Brad Conway, plans to make some sort of a public statement tomorrow in reaction to all of this. We did ask him to speak today, but I guess he hadn`t seen all the discovery.
GRACE: Ellie Jostad (ph), what do you know? And also, what can you tell me about the FBI allegedly destroying the duct tape evidence, the duct tape found wrapped around Caylee`s head?
ELLIE JOSTAD, PRODUCER, "NANCY GRACE": Right, Nancy. Well, about the stain, yes, the Anthony family has tried to explain this away, saying it was there before Caylee ever went missing.
About the duct tape, two big problems with the duct tape that we just learned about today. Number one, they found some unknown female DNA on that tape. They couldn`t figure out who it was from. Not from Caylee, not from Casey Anthony. They eventually went and -- it looks like they tested female FBI agents, other female technicians involved in processing the tape. They were able to determine that the DNA on the tape matched one of the technicians.
The other problem with the tape -- there was that heart-shaped residue that we`ve heard about on the non-adhesive side of the tape. Apparently, only one technician observed that. No photo that we know of was ever taken of that heart shape. And the tape itself was destroyed -- or the marking on it, rather, was destroyed during the testing process. So the jury`s not going to be able to see what that image looked like.
GRACE: Ok. There you have the defense on a silver platter. To you, Daniel Horowitz, getting an FBI lab tech`s DNA on this crucial evidence, the tape wrapped around the child`s head, is a torpedo to the state.
HOROWITZ: It shows sloppy work, Nancy. I could see innocent ways that it could happen. You probably are dissolving the things on the tape in acid - - or it`s not acid -- but alcohol, and extracting. And DNA can fall on it.
But that missing heart, the evidence that may be manufactured, that`s of tremendous concern. That could be fatal to the forensics in this case.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CASEY ANTHONY, MOTHER OF CAYLEE ANTHONY: Can someone let me -- come on!
GEORGE ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S FATHER: That same odor, that`s something you`ll never forget.
CINDY ANTHONY, CASEY ANTHONY`S MOTHER: There`s something wrong. I found my daughter`s car today and it smells like there`s been a dead body in the damn car.
CASEY ANTHONY: My entire life has been taken from me. Everything has been taken from me.
G. ANTHONY: I believe something was placed in the back of that trunk. I don`t want to believe it was my granddaughter.
CASEY ANTHONY: I`m going to hang up and just walk away right now. Let me speak for a second. Dad, I let everybody talk.
G. ANTHONY: I don`t want to believe it`s any other kind of -- any other thing. That`s all I`m trying to believe. Deep inside my heart I feel it`s not.
CASEY ANTHONY: I can`t even swallow right now. It hurts.
G. ANTHONY: I opened up the trunk. I was glad because there was -- my daughter or my granddaughter weren`t there. I`m thankful for that. But there was a trash bag. I don`t know what size gallon. It`s a kitchen type trash bag. It was white in color, almost semi-white. It was almost transparent. Inside of it I could see a pizza box. I couldn`t make out what pizza it was. But there was pizza full of maggots and all kind of stuff. And odor. It was very, very, very strong.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Straight back to Nikki Pierce, WDBO. Nikki, what can you tell me about Cindy Anthony wanting investigators to investigate a recent photo of a little girl taken in Puerto Rico? A living Caylee, she believes.
NIKKI PIERCE, REPORTER, WDBO RADIO: Nancy, we just learned today that Cindy wrote an e-mail in July to her attorney, Brad Conway, showing him a picture and saying I believe this could be a live, older Caylee. She was in Puerto Rico with somebody named Zenaida.
So that had been forwarded on to Dominic Casey perhaps for an investigation. And we received that today. It seems to lead one to conclude that Cindy is still looking for a live child.
GRACE: What do you make of it, Ellie Jostad?
ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER, COVERING STORY: Well, Nancy, there`s other interesting e-mails between the family and their investigator Dominic Casey. Apparently, they were trying to dig up some kind of connection between Richard Grund, the father of Jesse Grund and ex-fiancee of Casey Anthony, trying to connect his father to Roy Kronk, the guy who found the remains.
They also -- looks like the investigator was trying to find other people, persons -- he didn`t call them persons of interest. I believe he called them characters of interest. Other people that they were trying to investigate, do background checks on it. That was all released in those documents today.
GRACE: I want to go out now to Leonard Padilla, bounty hunter, included in many of the Anthony family private investigator notes, as you recall. He first bailed tot mom out. Then came off the bail. He`s joining us via Skype from Sacramento, California where he is a bounty hunter.
Leonard, thank you for being with us. What do you make of all this especially the silhouette in the car that looks like a child in the fetal position and this recent photo that Cindy Anthony is having private investigators investigate that it`s a living Caylee in Puerto Rico?
LEONARD PADILLA, BOUNTY HUNTER, INCLUDED IN ANTHONY FAMILY P.I. NOTES: Well, if you were to believe Cindy thinks that you have to do away with all of the forensics and all of the studies that were done at the body farm and the FBI lab in Quantico.
As far as the stain or the indentation in the trunk of a child in the fetal position, that first came up the very first night that we met with George and Cindy. They said there was a stain in the car that the cops are alluding to being something -- decomposition, but it was there when we bought the car for Lee years ago.
However, the -- it doesn`t necessarily have to be a stain. It could be an indentation in the napping of the carpet in the trunk of the car. And therefore, there might not be any DNA. It may just be the body did an indentation like a footprint in your carpeting at home. So it doesn`t have to have DNA like a lot of people are speculating.
GRACE: Out to the lines, Melissa in California. Hi, Melissa.
MELISSA, CALLER FROM CALIFORNIA: Hi, Nancy. We love you. My 6-year-old loves watching along with me.
GRACE: Thank you. Thank you for watching. And thank you for calling in. What`s your question, dear?
MELISSA: I wanted to know, do you think that maybe Casey tried to clean up the stain by using something that contained chloroform and that`s why it was found in the trunk and that would explain her Web searches, to see what chloroform is used for?
GRACE: To Dr. Patricia Saunders, clinical psychologist joining us from New York. You know, Dr. Saunders, you`ve seen it all. Now, I understand Melissa`s thinking. But we also have in those computer searches conducted by tot mom searches for household items used as weapons, neck breaking, all sorts of sinister and nefarious-sounding Google searches.
PATRICIA SAUNDERS, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST: I don`t think there`s any way out for Casey Anthony really that even if she used chloroform to clean up the body there was a body there and there`s pretty much overwhelming circumstantial evidence.
The whole family engages in -- let`s call it creative reality. They see things, interpret them any way they want to. Casey just flat out lies.
GRACE: To Dr. Marty Makary, physician and professor of public health joining us from Johns Hopkins. He`s in Washington, D.C. tonight.
Dr. Makary, can you imagine -- I mean, you deal with children all the time. Any circumstance that a child should be lying in a car trunk?
DR. MARTY MAKARY, PHYSICIAN, PROF. OF PUBLIC HEALTH, JOHNS HOPKINS: Not at all. And you know, a hair cell and a stain may sound trivial, but it is a treasure trove of forensic medical evidence. You can tell not only the color and the treatment down to the shampoo or conditioner used that day but the root describes whether or not it`s been pulled, naturally fell out, or sloughed off from blood flow being cut off from someone`s death.
Same with the stain. There`s mold, fungus, and moisture that builds up without DNA that can outline any body, given the pressure of a person in that position.
GRACE: Explain.
MAKARY: Well, a person in that position is going to have an indentation simply from the pressure, and moisture will form an outline. That moisture will then be co-infected or, as we say, colonized with bacteria and fungus that will form a periphery or rim around that silhouette. And that`s what investigators can look at without any DNA evidence and make a pretty strong conclusion that that was a body.
GRACE: Well, Doctor, you have just very beautifully demonstrated why you are the M.D. and I`m just the J.D. It makes perfect sense when you say it that way.
To John Lucich, former criminal investigator, president of High Tech Crime Network, joining us from New York.
John Lucich, the stain, the silhouette of the child in the fetal position is not -- that we know of now. They`re not telling us what the moisture is. But they`re not saying it`s DNA. How do you think they first noticed, I mean, what test were they conducting on it?
JOHN LUCICH, FORMER CRIMINAL INVESTIGATOR, PRESIDENT OF HIGH TECH CRIME NETWORK: Well, they saw the image. I think that`s what brought their -- everyone saw the stain right off, but only they saw the image. I think what they`re going to have to do here -- digital imaging forensics is a very complex science, but they can.
GRACE: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Digital what?
LUCICH: Digital imaging forensics.
GRACE: OK.
LUCICH: They can actually take a photograph and digitize it, bring it into a computer, and they can do things with computers. They can do the color balancing, they can illuminate dark areas, and see clear shadows. They can refocus if the image was off and they can actually increase the resolution.
In one case that I read about they had a fingerprint against a plaid background. They were able to smooth out that plaid background just to be able to recognize the fingerprint and compare it to something and the case got solved.
So digital imaging forensics is something that`s been out there for a while, and I think it`s going to be key in solving this stain problem.
GRACE: Well, hold on just a moment. Let`s go to the defense lawyers and Susan Moss on this.
To Raymond Giudice, digital imaging forensics. Yes, they can do it. They can also paint a portrait of the "Last Supper" on the side of that car. But that doesn`t mean it`s going to come into evidence.
RAY GIUDICE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: That`s right.
GRACE: Just wait. Try to go down the middle of the road, Giudice, all right?
GIUDICE: I will.
GRACE: Do you believe that digital imaging forensics that Lucich has just told us about would come in at trial? I think it might.
GIUDICE: I do not as based on what I hear now, which is I`m looking at the e-mail from the FBI that says.
GRACE: Yes-no, please.
GIUDICE: We can`t tell whether this outline was caused by blood, fluid, or decomposition. They can`t tell.
GRACE: Can you.
GIUDICE: They can`t tell.
GRACE: Can you answer, yes or no.
GIUDICE: I did answer.
GRACE: You know what, never mind.
GIUDICE: No, it`s not coming in. I`m telling you now.
GRACE: What about it, Horowitz? Yes-no?
DANIEL HOROWITZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: It`s not coming in. It`s like Michael Jackson`s ghost that we saw on CNN. You can see lots of weird things when you play with digital photography.
GRACE: So I guess that`s a no from you.
HOROWITZ: That`s a no.
GRACE: What about it, Sheaffer?
BILL SHEAFFER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY, WFTV LEGAL ANALYST: No. Prejudicial impact outweighs the probative value. Too speculative.
GRACE: Susan Moss, throw me a bone here.
SUSAN MOSS, FAMILY LAW ATTORNEY & CHILD ADVOCATE: They will try and it might fly. I think it might very well come in. If they can show that this is a generally accepted way of doing this type of method, I have a feeling it`s going to pass both Albert and the Frye tests.
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CINDY ANTHONY: There was a bag of pizza for, what, 12 days in the back of the car full of maggots it stunk so bad. You know how hot it`s been. That smell was terrible.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Sierra and Keara are believed to be in the company of their adoptive father Matthew Hess.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Hess apparently left his estranged wife a short note saying he was taking one of the girls to school. Police say he may have abducted them. The pregnant girl is in immediate need of medical attention.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Apparently, there were some other complications with her pregnancy. And we don`t know if he realizes that. If he realizes that she needs medical attention.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Investigators suspect the girls may have been taken to Tennessee.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They`re going to have to surface at some point in time. They`re going to need food. Keara is going to go into labor. They`re obviously going to need baby supplies. So I feel at this point, yes, that we`re going to find them, that they`re going to be hopefully OK.
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GRACE: Straight out to Adam Hicks, reporter with News Talk Radio 1200 WXIT.
Adam hicks, you`ve got a 12-year-old and an 11-year-old little girl, sisters. The 12-year-old is about nine months pregnant. And the stepfather, now adoptive father, takes off with both of them?
ADAM HICKS, REPORTER, NEWS TALK RADIO 1200 WXIT (via phone): That`s right, Nancy. Now, Keara, she`s the 12-year-old who`s nine months pregnant, she was actually due to give birth to the child over the weekend. And the mother, Janet, she works night shift. She said the last time she saw the children was about 9:00 Wednesday night before she went in to work.
She got off work about 4:00 that morning and she got up at 8:00 later on in the day to -- 8:00 a.m., and she found a note from her husband, Matthew Hess, saying that he had taken the girls to the store to pick up some supplies before school.
GRACE: Some supplies. OK. Tell me, how long have they been married? Nine months?
HICKS: No. The two have been married -- this is Janet Hess and Matthew Hess have been married about 10 years. And the two -- Keara Hess and Sierra Hess are both adopted.
GRACE: OK. Adam Hicks, give me that timeline one more time.
HICKS: All right. Jeanette Hess, she works the night shift. And so she went in to work at 9:00 on Wednesday night. Before she went in to work she saw the two girls at home and safe. She got off work at 4:00 that morning and then she ended up waking up for Thursday, at 8:00 a.m. on Thursday, and that`s when she found the note from her husband saying that he had taken the girls to the store to pick up some supplies before school.
GRACE: OK. Joining me right now, Lieutenant Julie Gibson, from the Iredell County Sheriff`s Office.
Lieutenant, thank you for being with us. Lieutenant, do we know who the father of the baby, the 12-year-old the carrying is?
JULIE GIBSON, IREDELL COUNTY SHERIFF`S OFFICE, ON THE CASE (via phone): We do not know who the father of her child is.
GRACE: Had there been any tensions or arguments between the stepfather and the mother?
GIBSON: No. We`ve talked to the mother about that quite a bit. Prior to her going to work that night everything was fine. She had no indication that`s there were any problems at all.
GRACE: So you`ve got a 12-year-old little girl that`s nine months pregnant, and the parents can`t get the identity of the father out of the child?
GIBSON: That was investigated by another agency. They moved to our county in July of this year. So as far as that investigation, we were not involved in that.
GRACE: Well, do you believe that would have some bearing on what`s going on here?
GIBSON: You know there`s a lot of questions that we`d like to ask once we locate them. But our primary focus is just finding them, getting the recovery, making sure Keara`s safe.
GRACE: OK. Understood. Lieutenant Julie Gibson joining us from Mooresville, North Carolina.
To Clark Goldband, our producer on the story. Apparently, this 12-year- old`s life is in danger. A 12-year-old little girl nine months pregnant on the run with her stepfather and her 11-year-old little sister. Go ahead, Clark.
CLARK GOLDBAND, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER, COVERING STORY: And law enforcement is concerned, Nancy, that these two may be in extreme danger because the 12-year-old girl who`s pregnant has missed an important medical appointment that she was supposed to attend. Also the mom.
GRACE: Well, forget the medical appointment. The baby`s due, Clark Goldband. The baby was due this past weekend.
GOLDBAND: And the mom has also spoken out in the press saying that in fact it is so important that this procedure was to take place. Mom has also said she`s asked the 12-year-old girl who the dad is and she`s responded that it`s a, quote, "young person," according to published reports.
GRACE: OK. Do we have any idea? Out to Adam Hicks, WXIT. The motivation of the stepfather for take the children away?
HICKS: No, Nancy, we haven`t heard any kind of motivation from any of the authorities or any of the published reports for that matter.
GRACE: Everyone, the tip line, 704-878-3100. This is a case that is baffling everyone. Take a look at this vehicle. A green `93 Ford explorer. Back right passenger window broken, covered with Plexiglas and duct tape. You can`t miss that.
Tag number Y, yellow, T, Texas, E 8014. Please look at this vehicle. Again, tip line, 704-878-3100.
To Dr. Marty Makary, what tests could be so crucial this late in the pregnancy?
MAKARY: Maybe a test for diabetes. But quite honestly, the big concern here is that in a 12-year-old that pelvis is narrow, the labor is for sure going to be protracted, long, and drawn out. The person`s going to be at risk for dehydration, malnutrition, bleeding and infection. So there`s a high risk here.
GRACE: You know, Dr. Makary, you kind of glossed over the risks associated with delivering. If he is on the run with these children, it`s very likely he`s not going to take them to a hospital. He may have her deliver this baby in some sleazy motel room.
MAKARY: All the more reason.
GRACE: I mean a lot can go wrong in pregnancy. I was at one of the best hospitals in the world for pregnancies and deliveries, and the three of us nearly died .
MAKARY: Child birth was the number one killer of women before modern obstetrical care. Without good care she may very well bleed to death during the labor.
GRACE: To Patricia in Maryland, hi, Patricia.
PATRICIA, CALLER FROM MARYLAND: Hi, Nancy. How are you?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?
PATRICIA: First I want to say your book is excellent.
GRACE: Well, thank you for buying "Eleventh Victim."
PATRICIA: And my next question is has there ever been any at all whatsoever domestic violence in the home?
GRACE: What do we know, Adam Hicks?
HICKS: Well, we have heard reports from an interview with the next-door neighbor that there is maybe a possibility of some mental abuse from the father, the stepfather of the family, but no physical abuse, no reports of that.
GRACE: Mental abuse on whom, Adam Hicks? Mental abuse on whom?
HICKS: Now we`ve heard that from the stepfather Matthew Hess, that we have heard from the neighbor that he may have been saying some negative things about his wife, Jeanette Hess.
GRACE: OK, so.
HICKS: That`s about some of the reports that we have from.
GRACE: If this is, you know, talking to a neighbor about your wife, I don`t think that.
HICKS: No, no. Talking to the children about his wife.
GRACE: Oh. Talking to the two stepdaughters about their mother. OK, Dr. Patricia Saunders, that puts everything in a whole new life.
SAUNDERS: Yes, it does. One possible scenario is that he abducted these girls to punish the mother, to deprive her of a potential grandchild that looked like it was planned. The girls were packed up, they went. Or maybe she wanted to turn the baby over to the state and he said no way, that the girl wanted to keep the baby and he was going to go with that.
GRACE: Everyone, we are going to break. We are taking your calls live. But a special happy birthday to Arizona friend Ginger Gebbert. She`s fighting and winning the battle against stage 4 breast cancer.
With Breast Cancer Awareness Month around the corner she wants you to know you don`t have to stop living after a cancer diagnosis. Her attitude and faith is an inspiration to others, especially those battling cancer. Her therapy, rescuing stray dogs and spending time with her two puppies, Badge and Bear.
Happy birthday, Ginger, and stay strong.
And tonight, a special congratulations to Liberty United Methodist Church in Macon, Georgia. Hearing the call to serve others. They are building a beautiful playground, redesigning, painting, and kicking off their very first parents` morning out to serve their community. Love in action.
Break a leg, Liberty United Methodist Church, and God bless the little children coming your way.
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UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: She is pregnant and needs a medical procedure to protect her child.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There are some things we`ve been told from her physician that make us very concerned that the baby needs medical attention right away.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Sierra and Keara are believed to be in the company of their adoptive father, Matthew Hess.
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GRACE: Joining me right now, special guest from Mooresville, North Carolina, Annette Regula, the next-door neighbor of the family.
Miss Regula, thank you for being with us. Are you surprised the stepfather has allegedly taken of with this little girl and her little sister?
ANNETTE REGULA, NEXT DOOR NEIGHBOR OF HESS FAMILY, CLOSE FRIEND OF MISSING GIRL`S MOTHER: No, I`m not surprised at all.
GRACE: Why?
REGULA: There`s -- he`s had a relationship with those two older girls that didn`t seem normal to me. He always talked negative about their mother, which I couldn`t understand. She didn`t deserve to -- her children being turned against her.
GRACE: In what way? What would he say about the mother? He would be saying this to the little girl?
REGULA: Yes. That she wasn`t any good, that -- they didn`t like their mother. They talked very poorly to her. They even used profanity, cussed at her, and he would never, ever correct them.
GRACE: With me is Annette Regula, the next-door neighbor of this family. What is the mother`s response to the children being taken, hijacked by the stepfather?
REGULA: She`s very upset. She wants her girls back. She knows that the oldest one needs to have her baby, she knows that she needs to have.
GRACE: Understood.
REGULA: . immediate medical attention.
GRACE: With me is Annette Regula, the next-door neighbor there. All I know is that the two girls are missing. Tip line, 704-878-3100.
Let`s stop and remember Army Private First Class Chad Marsh, 20, Wichita, Kansas, killed Iraq. Enlisted as a student, buried next to his father, who he lost at just 5. Never met a stranger, had a big heart. Dreamed of being a cop back home. Leaves behind mom, Janet, sisters Lori and Renee, brother Jerry.
Chad Marsh, American hero.
Thanks to our guest, but especially you for being with us. I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And until then, good night, friends.
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