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Nancy Grace
Shaniya Seen on Surveillance Video, New Suspect Arrested
Aired November 13, 2009 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAT LALAMA, GUEST HOST: Breaking news tonight in the case of 5-year- old North Carolina girl Shaniya Davis, little Shaniya reported missing from the sofa of her own home.
Major developments tonight. Is there a break in the case? Little Shaniya spotted on surveillance video in the arms of a man at a hotel 40 miles away, the sighting at 6:11 AM, just 40 minutes before Mommy reports Shaniya missing. The surveillance video leads investigators to make a new arrest. After a tipster claims seeing Mommy`s boyfriend driving away with the little girl, we now learn charges have been dropped against the boyfriend. Cops say 29-year-old Mario McNeill confessed to kidnapping the little girl, but there`s still no sign of Shaniya tonight. Where is she?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police in North Carolina say a man has admitted to kidnapping a 5-year-old girl, but we still do not know where Shaniya Davis is.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The 5-year-old vanished from her home in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Someone was arrested yesterday, but now that guy`s out of jail, charges dropped. But an ex-con`s behind bars. There he is, Mario McNeill.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were able to gain some information from additional tips and interviews we conducted overnight. We were able to go pick Mr. McNeill up at a location that was disclosed to us. Again, we found him there. We brought him in. He was questioned continuously through the night. He was arrested, charged with first degree kidnapping for Shaniya Davis.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You`re charged on November the 10th of 2009 with first degree kidnapping (INAUDIBLE) unlawfully (INAUDIBLE) kidnap Shaniya Davis, a person under the age of 16.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Shaniya was spotted with Mario Andrette McNeill just an hour after she disappeared back on Tuesday. She was seen with him in a hotel about 40 miles away from her home. Police used surveillance video from the hotel to confirm their identities.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And what we do know from investigators is that they were only at that hotel for about an hour around 6:11 AM just this past Tuesday morning.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police are going to have to see if there is any relationship between Coe, McNeill and the mom. What had happened prior to this? Why was this child targeted?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The weak link is obviously the mother. What exactly are these conflicting stories of hers? None of this stuff makes sense.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I just ask that they let her go, bring her home safe. And I miss her and love her very much!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: And breaking news tonight out of Oregon in the disappearance of a young satellite TV saleswoman, Jayme Sue Austin, the mother of two apparently vanishing from the shower, signs in the bathroom of a struggle. Breaking tonight. The search for 31-year-old Jayme comes to a tragic end, her body found buried in a gravesite. In the last hours, an arrest goes down, the murder suspect Jayme`s own brother-in-law.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shocking developments in the search for missing mother of two Jayme Sue Austin. Police believe they`ve located Jayme`s body buried in a grave and have arrested her own brother-in-law in connection with her murder.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Someone had been in my bathroom. The sheriff`s office, because of what the bathroom looked like, they`ve listed it as suspicious, you know, as a crime.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jayme`s mom reveals many potential clues left behind in her bathroom, including a wet rug and freshly vacuumed floor, the throw rug folded on the counter. Perhaps most disturbing, a necklace Jayme really liked found broken inside the vacuum.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Whoever vacuumed up that sopping wet carpet in the bathroom felt there was no rush.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s someone she knew, someone close to home, someone who would know even her mother`s habits.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police charging 45-year-old Patrick Lee Horett (ph) late last night. Days of intense search by air, land, sea and tracker dogs culminate with bad news.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: Good evening. I`m Pat Lalama, in for Nancy Grace. Breaking news. Is there a break in the case of missing 5-year-old North Carolina girl, Shaniya Davis? Little Shaniya spotted on surveillance video in the arms of a man at a hotel just 40 miles away.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have made another arrest in the Davis kidnapping case. We have arrested Mario Andrette McNeill. We have apprehended him now. We`ve been able to charge him with first degree kidnapping. He admitted he did take Ms. Davis.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just in, new arrest in the kidnapping of 5-year- old Shaniya Davis. Cops say a convicted felon admits he took the little girl from her home. He`s behind bars, but there`s no sign of little Shaniya.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She was spotted with this man, Mario Andrette McNeill, just an hour after she disappeared Tuesday. Shaniya was seen with him in a hotel about 40 miles from home. Police used surveillance video, this surveillance video from the hotel, to confirm their identities.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police say McNeill checked into the hotel in Sanford with little Shaniya just after 6:11 AM Tuesday. Police say a tip led them to the Sanford hotel, but by the time police arrived, McNeill and the little girl was gone.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now with McNeill`s arrest, kidnapping charges have been dropped against the man police arrested Wednesday. Police are still looking for Shaniya. Her father says he just wants his little girl back home safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Shaniya, are you listening? It`s Daddy. I miss you so much, honey. I`m waiting for you. I`m not going to give up, and you don`t give up, either, honey!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: Astonishing images of this little girl in that man`s arms, but perhaps a little bit of hope that she is alive. It gives us something to believe in.
Gurnal Scott, reporter WPTF radio, what is this man telling cops?
GURNAL SCOTT, WPTF RADIO (via telephone): Right now, absolutely nothing. They have him in custody. They`ve been questioning him, as you have heard. When they took him into custody, they questioned him all night. But he has not given up the location of little Shaniya. And police are frantically trying to search to find this little girl, who looked in the pictures, as we all seen them, that she was in reasonably good health and was being taken care of. But now they don`t know where she is. She has apparently been handed off again.
LALAMA: So you`re -- oh, OK. Well, that`s a very good point. Is she handed off? Did he indicate he gave her to someone else? Do we have any knowledge that that, in fact, happened?
SCOTT: If that has been told to police, they are not sharing that with us in the media, that -- maybe to protect their investigation. But what we know at this point, we have no idea where the whereabouts of this little child is, if she has been handed off to someone else who may be involved. That is the big question here right now.
LALAMA: It`s just extraordinary to look into the eyes of that child, grainy as it may be, and just ask yourself what is going through her pretty little head. Marlaina Schiavo, NANCY GRACE producer -- motive. I mean, in order to even start constructing what we think might be a motive, we have to look at the scenario. We believe this man to be the ex-boyfriend of the mother`s sister, do I have that right?
MARLAINA SCHIAVO, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: That`s right. But we`re only getting that from one -- actually, you know what? We`re actually getting that from two sources because we spoke to Shaniya`s half-brother today, and he said that that`s the relationship. And also, we also spoke to Clarence Coe, the man who was falsely arrested yesterday, and he also said that that is the ex-boyfriend of the mother`s sister, the sister that they were living with in that trailer.
LALAMA: All right. So we have the mother, the sister and Shaniya. Are there any other children in this scenario?
SCHIAVO: Well, when the reports originally came out, we heard that there was a 7-year-old also in the home. And then there was one report that said there was an infant. Police will not talk about the children in the home. They`ve been very tight-lipped about a lot of the details of this investigation, and much of which was -- you know, was the people who were actually in the home.
LALAMA: OK. Sheryl McCollum, crime analyst, director of cold case squad, Pine Lake PD. We`ve got the trailer. We`ve got the hotel. What are police going to be focusing on?
SHERYL MCCOLLUM, CRIME ANALYST: They`re going to focus on the direction he was traveling. So if he did drop that child off with somebody else, it`s past that hotel. He drove 40 miles with her, Pat. He went in that same direction to drop her off.
LALAMA: It`s just absolutely frightening to imagine, Gloria Allred, family law attorney and victims` rights advocate. The person in question here does not -- I mean, he has a criminal history, but nothing sex-crime- related, nothing child-related. What concerns you tonight?
GLORIA ALLRED, VICTIMS` RIGHTS ATTORNEY: Well, it concerns me that he had this little -- little sweet little girl, and there doesn`t appear to be an allegation that he had her with consent. So what did he do with her? Is she OK? In whose hands or arms is she right now? And what is he telling law enforcement, if anything?
LALAMA: Are you concerned about the other Chicago, child or children, who may be in that environment?
ALLRED: I am, and it may also be that this little girl knew him, if, in fact, he was the ex-boyfriend of the mother`s sister, and maybe -- who knows what he even told her. And I am concerned about the others, although the other little children appear to be safe at this time.
LALAMA: All right, now I want to go to Lillian Glass, psychologist and body language expert, author of "I Know What You`re Thinking." You know, when you look at those images, I`d like to believe she`s not scared out of her mind, OK? Tell me what you`re thinking when you look at those images.
LILLIAN GLASS, PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, it`s very interesting because she does look like she knows him. She does look comfortable. But there`s something that is a giveaway that doesn`t look comfortable. And you could later on in the pictures that she does cross her legs. Her knees are together. So my question is, is she sexually molested? What has happened to her? What is been done with this girl, or what has been done with her?
LALAMA: And Dr. Jake Deutsch, that -- doctor of emergency medicine -- the question -- we`re all hoping and praying that there has been no harm. I mean, kidnapping, bad enough, putting the fear of God into this child, but you know, any physical harm. If and when she`s found, what will we look for so that we know?
DR. JAKE DEUTSCH, DOCTOR OF EMERGENCY MEDICINE: Well, the doctors are going to have to do an overall assessment to look at her medical condition, look for any signs of trauma, bruising, head injury, just general wellbeing. But in order to determine if there is any sort of rape crime, they`re going to have to do a rape kit. And that`s an investigation where they`re going to collect evidence, secretions, body fluids, hair samples in order to really seal the case and understand what the extent of the trauma was.
LALAMA: Doug Burns and Bradford Cohen, both defense attorneys, this man apparently has confessed to kidnapping. And you know, if he wants to make a good deal for himself, he`d better tell where that child is, correct?
(CROSSTALK)
DOUG BURNS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I`m sorry, Brad.
BRADFORD COHEN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: That`s one thing that it could happen. I mean, what`s unusual here is the timeline and that she saw the baby at 5:30, he gets to the hotel at 6:11. I`m very concerned with what the mom knows in terms of how this all occurred, how he got into the trailer, how he grabbed the child. I mean, there`s a lot of things that they`re going to have to look at here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We`re still conducting interviews on following up on leads this morning.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is she alive?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I can`t speak to if she`s alive or not. Again, we`re hoping we find her alive.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, we have not found Shaniya yet.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Investigators say Mario McNeill`s time on the run with 5-year-old Shaniya Davis ended here in this Cumberland County courtroom. Investigators say the little girl was not with him when he was taken into custody, but he admitted to kidnapping her. Judge David Hastee (ph) laid out the trouble McNeill now faces.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You`re charged on November the 10th of 2009 with first degree kidnapping. It`s alleged you did unlawfully, willfully and feloniously kidnap Shaniya Davis, a person under the age of 16.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Investigators still have not been able to locate the 5-year-old who was kidnapped from her home Tuesday morning. Investigators are now reinterviewing residents at that mobile home park. McNeill`s arrest cleared the way for Clarence Coe to go free in connection with Shaniya`s disappearance. Coe was initially charged with first degree kidnapping.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are dropping the charges against Mr. Coe. That`s correct.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As for McNeill, investigators got a line on him after releasing these pictures of surveillance video from a Sanford hotel that show McNeill with little Shaniya. WRAL has confirmed this is the Comfort Suites in Sanford, where police say McNeill initially took Shaniya. His attorney says after police contacted McNeill`s family, he turned himself in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama, in for Nancy Grace. Extraordinary breaking news. You saw those images, and they at least give us some hope that she was alive Tuesday, she`s alive today.
Gurnal Scott, reporter, WPTF radio, we need to talk about this timeline because there are some questions being brought up, as you`ve heard from one of our lawyers. Mom says she put the child on the sofa at 5:30 AM. Take it from there.
SCOTT: That is the case. And it`s also said that the last time she saw her was at 5:30. Then she made the call to police at close to 7:00 o`clock in the morning. Now, you have to add into that the neighbor who said around 3:00 in the morning, she heard a ruckus around her trailer. So between that and the last time she saw the child and the time that the police were called to report the child missing, there`s a little bit of time in there that police are trying to hammer down and find out exactly if all the -- if there is a lot of truth in what`s being said here.
LALAMA: All right, defense attorney Doug Burns -- so if the child is put down at 5:30 and the surveillance tape shows 6:11, that doesn`t give him a lot of time to get from the trailer to the hotel?
BURNS: No...
(CROSSTALK)
LALAMA: Go ahead.
BURNS: I agree with Bradley, actually, that the time chronology is definitely a little bit odd. I also find it very odd, Pat, working off your original point, and I think you`re right, that a confession usually would go hand in hand with information about the whereabouts of the child. So for the report to come in, OK, he`s confessed to kidnapping, he`s confessed to taking her, but we don`t know where the girl is, strikes me as unbelievably puzzling.
LALAMA: Marlaina Schiavo, NANCY GRACE producer, any clue of a motive? I mean, we`ve got two sisters living together. We`ve got one boyfriend who is no longer considered a suspect, was charged, but not a suspect. And another boyfriend who now confesses to kidnapping. I mean, it seems very - - everybody`s a little interconnected here.
SCHIAVO: I mean, they are interconnected, but as far as a motive goes, I mean, we would actually have to have somebody admit to what is going on here. I mean, all right, so he says he -- he confessed that he kidnapped her. Obviously, we have this video. But by the same time, I mean, we don`t have any information from the mother. We have no information because the father doesn`t know anything. And we certainly aren`t hearing about those other adults in the home. So no one`s actually giving up the information, so it`s hard to determine why this happened.
LALAMA: I want to take some calls from our viewers. Regina from Tennessee, good evening. And what`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi. Yes. Thank you for taking my call. Because of the timeline, I am very worried, and I`m wondering if the mother or any other of the adults in this have taken a polygraph?
LALAMA: Sheryl McCollum, crime analyst, what would be the scenario there? Do you drag them in, ask them to take a test?
MCCOLLUM: Definitely. Everybody in that trailer should be taking a polygraph. No question.
LALAMA: But it doesn`t seem at this point that we have any indication they have. Tina in Illinois, your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. Why hasn`t the mom stepped up, and you know, asked, you know, Where`s my child, and all this? You haven`t heard nothing from her.
LALAMA: Lillian Glass, psychologist, is the mother probably thinking, It`s best if I just stay out of the limelight right now, or would we expect her, as a mother, to plead for the safe return of her daughter?
GLASS: Well, you would expect any mother to be just frantic and to plea for her daughter to come back. And this is such a beautiful little girl. And it`s very disconcerting what`s going on. And just the mother`s silence speaks volumes.
LALAMA: Gloria Allred, I just have to ask you -- a suspect comes in, says, yes, I kidnapped her, but I don`t know where she is. I mean, what are your thoughts?
ALLRED: Well, I -- it`s very bizarre. And I might add, Pat, too, that, yes, it`s interesting that the mother has not come forward. And one has to ask why is she not coming forward? Ordinarily, law enforcement would want her to come forward. Is she afraid herself that she might say something that might implicate herself, even if she`s innocent? I don`t know. We`ll have to wait and see.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We were finding out that DSS (ph) was no stranger to this household. There have been custody issues that they have dealt with in this household from time to time. There at some point had been drugs found in this house. So they`re not saying that this is involved in this case, per se, but if you`re a police officer and you`re doing this investigation, you have to keep that in mind.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We`re receiving new leads all the time. And again, since that footage was aired last night, we`ve received a lot of phone calls. Every single phone call has to be followed up on. So again, we continue to follow up on all leads and tips that we have.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: Extraordinary breaking news. You saw the images of little Shaniya Davis being held by a man who admits that he kidnapped her but won`t talk about where she might be, who she might be with or what fate has -- she`s dealing with at this point.
You know, I do have to talk about Clarence Coe because he`s the mother`s boyfriend who`s been completely cleared. And Doug Burns, he`s not a happy man tonight. We spoke to him. He feels he`s really been treated unfairly. And I`m sure you, as a defense attorney, feel the same way.
BURNS: Well, no. I mean, obviously, anybody who`s arrested and then immediately freed, of course, is going to be extremely upset. But you know, as Gloria Allred`s been saying, I mean, this is a bizarre family circle here of all kinds of interrelated actors. And you know, it`s very, very hard -- it was very, very hard to determine who`s doing what. But of course he`s upset, and we`ll see what happens, you know, in terms of any claim he might make.
LALAMA: Lillian Glass, did I hear you say or tell someone earlier that it`s possible he could -- well, maybe he could use this as a defense, that he was trying to protect the child, take the child out of a horrific existence?
GLASS: That`s a possibility, too. And when you look at the pictures initially, you see her hair is pulled back. She looks very, very well kept. But you see in this picture, the hair is disheveled. It`s very wild. And you wonder, you know, was the mother tending to her? Were the family members taking care of her? And that speaks volumes, especially when you look at how well kept she was ahead of time.
LALAMA: Gloria Allred, are you inclined to believe that this man was trying to help her out?
ALLRED: N-O! I have no belief in that because, look, if she was in some sort of abusive situation -- and we don`t have any information that would support that theory -- but if she were, then the right thing to do would have been to call child protective services, not to engage in some sort of act of self-help, taking her away and not providing any information to any of her relatives about where she was.
LALAMA: Sheryl McCollum, crime analyst, we were, you know, hashing this out today in the newsroom. I mean, what`s the motive of taking a child for an hour to a hotel and then Lord knows what next? I mean...
MCCOLLUM: Pat, there`s three motives for kidnapping a child. One is for ransom, one is to harm her, and one is to assault her and then turn her loose. So that would be like revenge. We`re down to two here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: DSS was no stronger to this household. There have been custody issues that they have dealt with in this household from time to time. There at some point have been drugs found in this house.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: A North Carolina man admits to kidnapping five-year-old Shaniya Davis. But why is the little girl still missing?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have made another arrest in the Davis kidnapping case. We have arrested Mario Andretti McNeill.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cops say McNeill admits kidnapping the little girl. And there is shocking new surveillance footage. Police say that`s McNeill carrying little Shaniya to a hotel room. So he`s in jail, but Shaniya is still missing. Is she still alive?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She looks relaxed like she`s waiting for the elevator to come. She`s in his arms. It`s not like fighting him or anything of that nature.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The key piece of evidence or the key clue in this may come from that girl in that video. I am wondering who is in the elevator. If you get footage of that, that might give us something to look at.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They are looking at the stories to try and make it fit together so they can actually find out what happened to the little girl.
GRACE: With McNeill`s arrest, kidnapping charges have been dropped against the man police arrested on Wednesday. But police take a good look at Shaniya here, but her father says he just wants his little girl home safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I miss you so much and I`m waiting for you. I`m not going to give up and you don`t give up, either, honey.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
PAT LALAMA, CNN HN HOST: I`m Pat Lalama in for Nancy Grace. And as you see, extraordinary surveillance footage we are just now looking at tonight. This girl, at least as of Tuesday, was alive, and with any luck and hope she still is. Gurnal Scott, reporter of WPTF radio, tell me about this suspect. I know he`s got a criminal history, but nothing related to children or sex crimes that I know of.
GURNAL SCOTT, REPORTER, WPTF RADIO: From what we understand, no. He`s been arrested for fleeing police, assault on a female, many drug arrests. But as far as any kind of harm to children, that we have not seen in his record and we are given no indication that he has a history of that.
LALAMA: Was he recently released from prison?
SCOTT: no. That was Mr. Coe, who was released from prison as recently in August, in his case after a charge he was in jail on. But as far as Mr. McNeill not recently in jail that we know of.
LALAMA: Marlaina Shiva, what`s next for this person? Arraignment I understand and he`s going to plead not guilty?
MARLAINA SCHIAVO, "NANCY GRACE PRODUCER," COVERING STORY: He was arraigned today. He put in a plea of not guilty. He is being held right now on $100,000 bond, the same, exact situation that Clarence Coe was facing yesterday.
LALAMA: But Bradford Cohen, if he`s saying he admitted to kidnapping, but he`s going to plead not guilty, are you going to argue or would you argue about the alleged confession?
BRADFORD COHEN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Of course. I would always argue about a confession.
LALAMA: Dumb question, huh?
COHEN: You have to see if it was voluntary, how the confessions was made, when the confession was made, if they read him his Miranda rights. There are so many issues surrounding a confession, first of all. That`s number one.
Number two is that you don`t know the circumstances surrounding the kidnapping. I`m a bloodhound. I`m going to go out after this and smell out what`s going on.
These cops need to get the mom in and start questioning her. She`s nowhere to be found. It`s very suspicious what`s going on. I think it`s a smart thing for him to plead not guilty at this point. Let`s see where the chips fall.
LALAMA: Gloria Allred, I`m curious about the argument, banging noise that the neighbor heard at 3:00 in the morning. Do you think there`s a correlation?
GLORIA ALLRED, FAMILY LAW ATTORNEY: It may be. But, also, one wonders why was the little girl on the couch, and was the door to the trailer open, was it locked or unlocked? Why is the mother not saying anything, by the way?
Maybe she`s so emotionally upset that she can`t say anything. And another issue that hasn`t been addressed, if there have been drugs in the past, is this little girl being taken and held hostage in order to pay off a drug debt, suggesting that perhaps until that debt is paid she doesn`t come back. But we don`t know.
LALAMA: Good point. Good point.
I want to take some calls, but I have to ask this one question of Gurnal. Do we know who was in the house in the hours leading up to the kidnapping? Were the boyfriends hanging around? Was it just the sisters? Who was there that night?
SCOTT: From what we understand, the mother was there, the sister was there, Mr. Coe, the boyfriend was there, and there were either two or three other small children in the house including young Shaniya. So there were I believe as many as six people were in the trailer at the time this happened.
LALAMA: Interesting. Marlaina you want to add something?
SCHIAVO: Just one thing. It was actually the sister`s boyfriend that was in the house. Mr. Coe was at home at his stepmom`s house that night.
LALAMA: So, in other words, the suspect, now, was in the house, but not Mr. Coe?
SCHIAVO: No, I`m sorry. The suspect now is the ex-boyfriend of the sister. The sister`s current boyfriend was allegedly in the home and then of course the man who was falsely arrested, Mr. Coe, was not in the house at all that day.
LALAMA: All right, got you.
Casey, I think you have been waiting quite a long time from Florida. Are you with me, Casey?
CASEY, CALLER: Yes, ma`am.
LALAMA: Question?
CASEY: They have surveillance of her going into the hotel. Is there any of her coming out with him or somebody else?
LALAMA: A very good question. Gurnal, any other video? I understand he was only there for an hour, so somebody must have some understanding of when and how he left.
SCOTT: You would think they would. The only surveillance video and pictures we that we have seen and we have been privy to are the ones when they were checking into the hotel. And if there was surveillance of them coming out, police are keeping that close to the vest and we have not seen that yet.
LALAMA: I want to take Claire from Indiana. Your question, Claire?
CLAIRE, CALLER: Yes. I`m wondering has anybody noticed his body language as he`s carrying the child into the elevator. He just seems, he reminded me of a Cheshire cat.
LALAMA: Interesting. Let`s ask Lillian Glass. We asked about the child, but we didn`t ask about him.
LILLIAN GLASS: That is a very good -- he does. He looks very confident, like he knows he has a purpose and he knows what he`s doing, and that`s an excellent observation because you really do see that.
But the thing that concerns me is just the fact of how her legs are positioned. That just really bothers me.
LALAMA: Dr. Jake Deutsche is a doctor of emergency medicine. Does anything strike you in looking at this child?
DR. JAKE DEUTSCHE, M.D., DOCTOR OF EMERGENCY MEDICINE: It hasn`t been a long time, so severe dehydration or malnourishment doesn`t really concern me. But I agree, the wellbeing of this child is of the utmost importance, and really getting to the bottom of what happened to her is very, very important for the medical field.
LALAMA: Absolutely. Sue in Minnesota, let me take a question from you.
SUE: Yes. To confirm the mother`s story, is in the picture, in the surveillance video, is she wearing the same clothes the mother said she was wearing when the mother last saw her?
LALAMA: Marlaina, tell me about that, the clothing in the surveillance tape. I believe the mother said she has a blue t-shirt on and pink panties.
SCHIAVO: Yes, that`s correct. That`s all she was wearing when the mother last saw her.
But again, Pat, you have to remember we are not clear on the details about what the mother is saying.
LALAMA: So we don`t know for sure that that`s exactly what she had on.
SCHIAVO: That`s what I`m saying.
LALAMA: Cheryl MacCallum, as a crime analyst and investigator, what do you do next?
MACCALLUM: They are going to look at his cell phone, see if there were pings that shows the movements in the directions he was going and how long he was in certain places to try to determine again the location of this child.
And hopefully, if he has dropped her with anyone else, the best thing they can do is drop her in a safe place. Drop her off -- hospital, police department, somewhere.
LALAMA: That`s a very good point. Gloria Allred, as a child advocate and activist, what would you implore anyone who knows anything to do tonight for this child?
ALLRED: Well, absolutely, to even call anonymously to law enforcement if they are afraid themselves of being implicated, and disclose the whereabouts of this child, or even if anyone has a suspicion but is not sure and things they may have seen a child that resembles this child to call law enforcement and give that tip, because I have every reason to believe the law enforcement will follow up on each and every tip.
LALAMA: And Brad Cohen, if you were defending this person, what would you be doing with him tonight?
COHEN: Obviously, telling him to keep his mouth shut. But besides that, look at the sloppy police work that`s going on...
LALAMA: Why is it sloppy?
COHEN: Because they arrested a man too early, that`s why. They should have investigated their case. They should have built their case, get more witness statements. The mom is nowhere to be found. The sister is nowhere to be found.
LALAMA: Isn`t time of the essence with a missing child?
COHEN: Absolutely, so you need to start taking statements from people who know what happened.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: What did you hear around 3:00 a.m.?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It didn`t sound like there was someone trying to get in my house. I heard noise outside of the house.
GRACE: What kind of noise?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It sounded like a struggle, but I know it wasn`t anybody per se fighting, but it sounded like banging on my side of the house.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Breaking news. Police say they found a grave believed to contain the remains of missing mother of two Jayme Sue Austin. And Jayme`s own brother-in-law Patrick Lee has been arrested and charged with her murder.
GRACE: New inside details emerge about the bathroom where Jayme is believed to have taken a shower. That bathroom was soaking wet and someone had vacuumed.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Someone has taken a shower. The carpet was wet clear out to the counter on the other side of the room. It was quite wet, yes.
GRACE: What happened?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Officers immediately sealed off the scene and continued to process the area for evidence.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama in for Nancy Grace. Yet another breaking news story tonight in a very, very strange case. Leslie Lotto, this guy, the brother-in-law leads cops to her body?
LESLIE LOTTO, REPORTER, BICOASTAL MEDIA (via telephone): Yes. What I`m told from the D.A. is on Monday, apparently Mr. Horace went along with search crews looking for wherever Ms. Austin might have disappeared to.
And on Monday night, they questioned him. And he appeared to be acting strangely. They questioned him, again, on Tuesday night, and further thought he was acting stranger. So they questioned him yesterday, and he led them to the grave.
LALAMA: So I can assume he confessed to killing her?
LOTTO: They are not saying that he confessed. I guess there are ethical reasons for that. The D.A. says it`s against the bar rules for him to say that. But it sure seems like that.
LALAMA: All right, Clark Goldband from "NANCY GRACE", one of our great producers here, we have to set the scene here. This is an interesting scenario. We have three houses. We have our victim. We have got her sister and her husband who live in the middle, and her mother on the other side, correct?
CLARK GOLDBAND, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Yes, pat.
LALAMA: OK, so remind the viewers what happened. She took a show at her mother`s house. Meanwhile, her brother-in-law is home that day in the middle. Take it from there.
GOLDBAND: It all started about 9:00 a.m. Monday morning when the victims show wasn`t working. She didn`t have any water. So she called her mom at her mom`s and said I need to shower at your house. Mom said no problem.
What happens is Jayme goes over to the mom`s house about 9:30, car found in the drive way. Jayme never shows up to her job. She even called her job up that morning to tell them I`m going to be late. I don`t have water in my house.
So mom gets worried, and low and behold, Jayme is gone, car still in the drive way, shower soaking wet, and Jayme`s prized necklace that she always treasured and took care of was inside the vacuum.
LALAMA: OK. Now, obviously, we need to look for a motive here. Cheryl MacCallum, crime analyst, what is this, the case of an obsessive brother-in-law who had the hots for his sister-in-law?
MACCALLUM: Absolutely. He`s a stalker. He`s living next door to her. Absolutely, no question.
LALAMA: And Leslie, do we have any reason to believe she could have been having a relationship with him? What do we know?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We don`t know. The sheriff is pretty hush-hush about any type motive. I guess they are trying to seal the case up for, you know, he will be arraigned on Monday. Maybe we will hr more on the weekend. There`s going to be an autopsy tomorrow. We don`t even know at this point how she was killed.
LALAMA: I`m going to take a caller. Hi, Sheba, what`s your question?
SHEBA, CALLER: Hey, darling. My question is, it`s really odd to have one house in the middle of a block without water. Could somebody have turned her water off, this brother-in-law, like?
LALAMA: Well, I guess that`s always a possibility. Gloria Allred, I`ll throw that one at you. If he`s obsessed, we don`t know that, but if he is, could he have turned her water off?
ALLRED: I guess that`s possible. It`s also possible that the bill wasn`t paid, and that is why the water was turned off.
But there are many reasons why it may not have been working, but the fact that that necklace appears broken and that was a prize necklace of hers, it does appear that there was an act of violence against her and she probably didn`t leave with any kind of consent that she gave. It was against her will.
LALAMA: Doug Burns or Bradford Cohen, we`ll go with Doug, first. We have another seemingly confession here, we don`t know for sure. He led police to the body, it doesn`t look good if you are the lawyer, right?
DOUG BURNS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I don`t mean to be cute, but conceivably he could have known what happened to her and then have led them to the body, but that`s very unlikely, Pat.
But again, the police are playing it very, very close to the vest, as they should. But you`re right, if you lead somebody to a body, that`s not a good sign.
COHEN: I agree with Doug, it`s not a good sign. But again, if that confession was not valid and it gets thrown out, any fruits of that confession also get thrown out. Now, where the body was or if there`s semen or fluids on the body, that will also get thrown out.
So you need to take a look at that confession. When was he read Miranda is the question.
LALAMA: Lillian Glass, what does it smell like to you? Obsessed brother-in-law?
GLASS: Yes, it does, very much so.
LALAMA: And by the way, he`s still married to the sister. They live in that house and they have children there. And one other thing I have to add is she had been cell phone stalked. I know that`s not really a word, but is it likely he is the one that was hacking into her cell phone?
GLASS: It`s a good possibility. And the fact that behavioral changes noted, that people noticed that he did have a strange behavior. And perhaps the guilt consumed him and he had to let it out once and for all.
LALAMA: Very quickly, Dr. Deutsche, what are they looking for on the body?
DEUTSCHE: The smoking gun, any DNA evidence, blood, tissue, fibers that may lead to the person who killed her. And also cause of death. How was she killed? What were the circumstances of her death?
A mother of two, ladies and gentlemen, another horror story.
And now, tonight`s CNN heroes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEWEL, SINGER/SONGWRITER: Hi, I`m Jewel. Two years ago I had the honor of serving on the blue ribbon panel that helped select the top ten CNN heroes of 2007.
As founder of Project Clean Water which works to improve the quality of life for millions of people by helping to provide clean water around the world, I`m thrilled to help CNN introduce one of this year`s top ten honorees.
Now, more than ever, the world needs heroes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I live on the street.
JORGE MUNOZ, CNN HERO: When you`re hungry, you`re hungry. That`s it. Four years ago, I see those guys standing there like they`re desperate. They need to eat.
My name is Jorge Munoz, and every night I bring food to the hungry in Queens, New York. I`m born in Columbia. I`m a school bus driver. When I come back around 5:15, my second job starts.
It`s a family project seven days a week. I go to the same corners every night around 9:30. They`re waiting for me. I help anyone who needs to eat, just line up.
The best part is when you see their smile. I want them to eat every night. For me it`s easy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very good. Tired, but good.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LALAMA: And now a look back at the stories making headlines this week.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Where is little Shaniya Davis? Police in Fayetteville, North Carolina, say the five-year-old girl reported misses is in extreme danger. At 5:30 in the morning, mom says she put little Shaniya on the couch and noticed her missing an hour or so later.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She did report her missing about an hour after she said she found Shaniya was gone.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three people were in the home, Shaniya`s brother, a mother, and a person they identify possibly as a boyfriend.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mother of two Jayme Sue Austin was running late for work after her water stopped working. She called her mom asking to use her mom`s shower just a few houses down. Jayme was never heard from again.
GRACE: Cindy is with us tonight, the mother of Jayme Sue. Was there anything out of place in that bathroom? Was everything in place in your home?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything was in place in my home, but not in the bathroom. And, you know, the sheriff`s office has asked me not to disclose any of the information about it. But because of what the bathroom looked like, they`ve listed it as suspicious, you know, as a crime.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 911, what`s your emergency?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My name is Quinn Gray and I was kidnapped and I`m not sure where I am right now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s standing by his wife. He believes she was kidnapped, and then because of her mental disorder, bipolar disorder, that she bonded with the suspect and began to participate in this plot to extort $50,000 from Reid Gray.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Were you trying to get money from your husband?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Of course not. If I wanted $50,000, all I would do is take it out of the bank account.
GRACE: So at some point either at get-go or somewhere between the beginning and end, the boy toy, 25-year-old lover, starts taping mommy, 37- year-old Quinn Gray during their sex sessions, while they are discussing the fake kidnap plot, discussing blowing the head off of her husband, the father of her two little children.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LALAMA: Cody Stanley, 21, Texas. On a second tour of duty, he also served in Afghanistan. Awarded the Purple Heart, Combat Action Ribbon and National Defense Service Medal. He loved growing up on the family ranch, hunting, fishing, and four wheeling. He leaves behind parents Wendy and Bob, brother and best friend, Cade. Cody Stanley, an American hero.
Thank you to all of our guests and for you at home for being with us. Thank you, Nancy, for letting me sit tonight. See you tomorrow night at 8:00 sharp eastern. And until then, goodnight, everybody.
END
