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Nancy Grace

Two Bodies Found in Oklahoma Maybe Be Child and Her Kidnapper

Aired March 29, 2010 - 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 missing 7-year-old Aja Johnson. Police say a car belonging to kidnapping and murder suspect Lester Hobbs may have been found, and there are reports two bodies are inside. Hobbs is accused of killing little Aja`s mother, his estranged wife, before kidnapping the little girl back in January. The vehicle was found near Lake Thunderbird, Norman, Oklahoma. Tonight, we want justice!

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As a parent, as a father, if anybody out there could help me, please help me get my little girl back!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Breaking news out of Norman, Oklahoma.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I never thought that he would go that far.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... the case of 7-year-old Aja Johnson. She went missing back in January.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s just something that`s just happened.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just moments ago, cops say a vehicle belonging to kidnapping and murder suspect Lester Hobbs may have been found.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... within the last hour, hour-and-a-half...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hobbs is accused of killing little Aja`s mom, Tonya (ph) Hobbs, his estranged wife.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He`s had a violent past.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... and bludgeoning her, killing her in a brutal fashion.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... including charges for resisting arrest, assault and battery with a deadly, dangerous weapon, and violating a protective order.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Police aren`t saying if today`s discovery is the little girl, but they confirm two bodies were found.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s believed to be driving a white two-door `92 Toyota Paseo.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One body was reportedly found inside the vehicle.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They`re confirming the plate that was found on the car.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The other body was found nearby.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Once investigators got the tip that the car was out there, of course, they went out there right away.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The vehicle was found near Lake Thunderbird.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Lester was not supposed to be around that child. Obviously, Aja has been missing ever since. The last time we knew that she was with Lester, Lester Hobbs, was when her mother was murdered.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: Good evening. I`m Pat Lalama, sitting in for Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. Breaking news tonight in the case of missing 7-year-old Aja Johnson. Police say a car belonging to kidnapping and murder suspect Lester Hobbs may have been found. There are reports two bodies are inside.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Breaking news tonight. A medical examiner is being called to the scene of an abandoned vehicle in Norman, Oklahoma, believed to be involved in the case of missing 7-year-old Aja Johnson and her slain mother, Tonya Hobbs. An Amber Alert was issued for 7-year-old Aja Johnson in late January after her mother, Tonya Hobbs, was found dead inside an RV camper. The just located vehicle is said to match the description of the vehicle driven by Tonya Hobbs`s estranged husband Lester Hobbs, who`s wanted in connection with the murder of his wife and the kidnapping of Aja Johnson.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LALAMA: Let me repeat, this story developing as we speak. Dave Lanning, reporter, KOKC Newstalk, what do you know?

DAVE LANNING, KOKC NEWSTALK (via telephone): Well, the latest is that the vehicle was discovered 2:45 this afternoon Central Time, and about an hour and 15 minutes ago, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation confirmed that it was the vehicle they`d been looking for, of Lester Hobbs.

Now, originally, or earlier today, Jessica Brown of the OSBI had told "The Daily Oklahoman" that there were bodies found. At the press conference about an hour and 15 minutes ago, she would not confirm that. At this point in time, the only confirmations we have is that they have found the vehicle near Lake Thunderbird, which is about an hour-and-a-half to two hours from where the slayings took place near Lawton, Oklahoma.

LALAMA: Dave, stay with me a second. Now, this was called in by a tipster? Do I have that correct?

LANNING: Well, they say tipster, but it was actually somebody walking through the area and did call the Norman Police Department. I`m not sure whether it was a hunter or actually the land owner, who may have just been out wandering on his property. The vehicle`s about a couple hundred yards from a fairly busy rural highway, so it`s not that far out in a rural area. It`s just in some woods that`s overgrown out there and was not visible from the street.

LALAMA: But Dave, what I`m wondering -- first of all, give those of us outside of your state a sense of, you know, where -- what kind of terrain are we talking about? What exactly is this area, and how close is it to where the child was first taken?

LANNING: All right. The child that was first taken in Lawton, which is in southwest Oklahoma, Comanche County. The discovery was in Norman. That`s home of the University of Oklahoma, about 10 miles south of Oklahoma City. The discovery was a few miles southeast of Norman, kind of hilly area, a lot of brush, scrub brush and so forth, some kind of brushy trees and stuff. The vehicle was found kind of next to a series of some brushy trees 100, 150 yards from state highway 9, which is a fairly busy state highway through that Norman area.

LALAMA: Dave, does that lead you to believe that this car, then, was recently placed there? Because it`s obviously an area where someone would have come across it prior to this.

LANNING: Well, no. One description we had from a helicopter pilot in the area, it looked like the vehicle had been there for quite some time, actually.

LALAMA: Really?

LANNING: You know, I mentioned that it was fairly close to the highway, but where the car was, this particular piece of property gets very little traffic. Nobody notices it. And it`s very rare that somebody actually goes through that area.

LALAMA: OK. And what are police saying as of -- you said there was a presser. What are they saying?

LANNING: At that point in time, the only thing we got -- because this thing lasted about 45 seconds -- was the confirmation that the vehicle did belong to Lester Hobbs. They would not confirm that bodies had been found. The U.S. Marshals office probably is on scene now. The State Bureau of Investigation was on scene at the time of the press conference. So they`re doing their crime scene investigation as we speak, and we`re expecting another press conference anytime now, we thought maybe even by 6:30, which was about 35 minutes ago, but that has not happened yet.

LALAMA: OK. We`re trying to clear through all the facts of this case. It`s something that happened starting back in January.

Ellie Jostad, Nancy Grace producer -- I`m sorry, I`m getting something in my ear about a presser. Here we go.

QUESTION: Someone would not have been able to see it from the road?

JESSICA BROWN, OK STATE BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION: It doesn`t sound like someone would have been able to see it. I so know a deer blind was out there. So you can imagine that it was a secluded area where there is a lot of wildlife.

QUESTION: But it`s not the impression of your investigators that that car and the bodies had been there since late January.

BROWN: We have an idea they haven`t been there the entire time, but pretty close to much of the time that we`ve been searching for him, the girl, and the car.

QUESTION: To your knowledge, had authorities ever searched this area before?

BROWN: I don`t know. All right, thank you very much. Appreciate it.

QUESTION: Thank you, Jessica -- Jessica Brown, OSBI.

QUESTION: Can you tell us when the last time -- was there a last (INAUDIBLE)

(CROSSTALK)

LALAMA: Jessica Brown, PIO, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.

QUESTION: Ellie Jostad, Nancy Grace producer, it sounds to me like she`s confirming there were bodies found. Do we know that for a fact?

ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: We don`t know that for a fact right now because we didn`t have that up at the beginning of the presser. It did, however, sound like she did confirm that. And it sounds also, as we mentioned earlier, that the car had been there for possibly most of the time that Aja and Lester Hobbs were missing.

LALAMA: All right. Now, Ellie, I`m going to give you the responsibility of walking us through this story from the beginning, something that occurred in January. Tell us the players. Tell us what we know.

JOSTAD: OK. Well, Lester Hobbs was living with his sister and his estranged wife, Tonya Hobbs, and her two daughters came to see him back in January. On January 23rd, Hobbs, Tonya, the mother and the two girls had dinner with the rest of the family. Hobbs, Tonya, the mother and Aja Johnson went back to Hobbs`s trailer. The next morning, the vehicle is gone, no response inside the trailer. Finally, Hobbs`s relatives went inside. They found Tonya Hobbs, the mother, dead. Hobbs and little Aja were missing. And that`s how this all got started.

LALAMA: All right. Now, the mother was murdered.

JOSTAD: Yes.

LALAMA: And blunt force trauma. They think she was bludgeoned with a hammer? Is that correct?

JOSTAD: That`s correct. And actually, Tonya Hobbs had once sought a protective order against her estranged husband, and in that order she told the court that he had once threatened to beat her daughters with a hammer.

LALAMA: All right. Yet we do know for a fact that she was with him hours before her murder and they were holding hands in a Wal-Mart?

JOSTAD: Well, yes. And although she did file the request for a protective order, apparently she never got it. She and Hobbs both did not show up for that hearing, so the protective order was never issued.

LALAMA: All right. You are -- I`m sorry, Ellie. Were you finished?

JOSTAD: Yes.

LALAMA: OK. Thank you.

QUESTION: You`re looking at surveillance from the Wal-Mart hours before the mother was bludgeoned to death and then he allegedly took off with Aja.

QUESTION: We`re already getting lots of callers, people highly interested in this case. I`m going to start with Mike. Good evening, Mike in West Virginia.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, ma`am, thank you. I want to start off -- I have a comment for Nancy. I just want her to know there`s a lot of fathers that really -- and daddies -- well, actually, daddies, that really she is our hero, as well. And I love the way she loves her children and the respect she has for her mother.

LALAMA: That she does. Yes, she does.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I also want to say, we`re just going to have to do something else to stop this madness. I mean, like in other countries, we`re going to have to make these crimes a lot more punishable, a lot more harsh. There`s going to have to be something done. It`s just too much. And from what I`m understanding, as well, you know, people can go in Blockbuster and it takes them forever to pick out a movie, but they`re leaving their children with too many people. And that`s all I have to say.

LALAMA: Mike, you are so right. And bless you for your call. Thank you very much.

Scott Haines, sheriff`s officer, Santa Rosa -- sorry, we don`t have Scott yet. But Eleanor Odom, prosecutor, let me ask you. What is the most important thing right now for investigators at that scene in order to preserve this crime scene and make no mistakes?

ELEANOR ODOM, PROSECUTOR: Well, I think the most important thing they need to do -- of course, they`ve got it sealed off -- and to collect any piece of evidence that they can in that car. That means any fiber evidence, any hairs, any DNA, anything that would help tell them what happened to the people who were allegedly in the car.

LALAMA: Peter Odom, defense attorney, this guy`s got a record a mile long. Are you going to argue that we`re rushing to judgment?

PETER ODOM, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Right now, I think it`s important, yes, just to step back and let the evidence take us where it will. I mean, it - - I`ve got to tell you, though, it seems to speak for itself.

LALAMA: Jessica Brown, PIO, public information officer, with Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, are you confirming that those are bodies at the scene now?

BROWN: Yes. We do have two bodies, one of an adult male and one of a young person. We cannot positively identify them at this point in time. That will be done with fingerprints and dental records. But I can tell you we have no reason to believe those bodies are anybody else`s except those of the victim, Aja, and Lester Hobbs.

LALAMA: Jessica, does it surprise you that it`s so close to home, since this first transpired in January?

LALAMA: No, we`re not surprised at all because even though we got hundreds of leads of people who thought they had recognized either the car or Aja or Lester Hobbs, we could never positively identify any of those leads coming in. So we always had the idea maybe he didn`t get far.

BROWN: Where do you think he`s been all this time? Do you think they`ve been there for quite some time?

BROWN: We do believe that they have been there for quite some time, not necessarily right after Lester killed his estranged wife, Tonya, but sometime very close to that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Breaking news tonight. Authorities are investigating two bodies found near an abandoned car in Norman, Oklahoma. The vehicle, authorities say, matches the description of a car believed to be driven by Lester Hobbs, who`s wanted in connection with the kidnapping of 7-year-old Aja Johnson and the beating death of Aja`s mother, Tonya Hobbs. Lester Hobbs allegedly snatched Aja in late January and hasn`t been seen since.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama, sitting in for Nancy Grace. As you just heard, this story is developing as we speak, some very disturbing developments.

QUESTION: Jessica Brown, PIO, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, thank you so much. I know you`re busy and you`re taking time to speak with us. But we`re very curious. Lester had a huge record, did he not?

BROWN: He did, a violent record upon that.

LALAMA: Can you tell us about it?

BROWN: I don`t have anything in front of me because I`m out here at the scene, but I believe it was assault and battery, domestic violence. And he was possibly going back to prison for several warrants that were out for him.

LALAMA: Did he not have a court date that was upcoming?

BROWN: He did. He had one. It was supposed to be that Monday prior to, basically, the killing of his estranged wife and the kidnapping of his -- of Aja, actually.

LALAMA: All right. Now, as we speak -- and if he is one of the bodies, it`s rather a moot point in terms of, you know, prosecuting. But he was charged with murder and kidnapping. Tell us what were the charges prior to you finding these bodies.

BROWN: Well, the charges were just that, the murder of Tonya Hobbs and the kidnapping of her 7-year-old daughter, Aja. We were hoping to find, of course, both alive. What we`re doing now with the investigation, we`re trying to figure out if anybody may have been aiding him from his escape from the long arm of the law, basically. And if so, we want to prosecute them. We have no indication at this point in time anyone did that.

LALAMA: Well, that`s what I was just about to ask you. You don`t have a reason to believe that there`s an accomplice in any way.

BROWN: Not at this point in time, no.

LALAMA: So now, I suspect that you have been investigating the property where he lived prior to all of this. I mean, you`ve been keeping your eyes like a hawk on where you thought his whereabouts may be.

BROWN: We`ve been searching most of Oklahoma, where his relatives lived, where he has any friends, which he did not have many. Any area that he may frequent, we were going there and knocking on doors and really investigating different areas. And he had lived in Norman for several years. I don`t have a timeline on when that happened, but it doesn`t surprise us that we found him here in Norman.

LALAMA: Jessica, I know it`s hard to say at this point, but motive. Give me a motive. Do you have a clue?

BROWN: I don`t know a motive. Possibly he was going back to prison and he didn`t want to go. And I don`t know if there was an argument that ensued that caused him to strike out at his estranged wife and then take her daughter. It`s possible that her daughter actually witnessed that murder. We`ll never know, of course. So it`s really a mystery at this point in time as to why this happened.

LALAMA: Oh, such a heartbreaking mystery, as well. And let me ask you this -- is there not another stepchild? In other words, the deceased mother, she had another daughter, correct?

BROWN: Yes, she did.

LALAMA: And do you know if that child is safe and sound?

BROWN: Yes. She is.

LALAMA: And well, obviously, you don`t want to tell us her whereabouts, but is she going to be able to help you with this investigation at all?

BROWN: She did help us some at the very beginning, but I don`t think that her help could go beyond what she did at the very beginning for us.

LALAMA: She`s 13 years old?

BROWN: I don`t know how old she is, older than Aja.

LALAMA: OK. Is it true -- we`ve heard that Lester did not like the young child. Do you have any reason to believe that he had it out for this little child?

BROWN: Well, in court records, it certainly stated that he had made threats against the child, so that`s why we certainly were very concerned about her safety and tried to get information out to the public as quickly as possible. But we were always a step behind due to the fact that the murder, we believe, happened on Saturday. It wasn`t discovered until Sunday, perhaps 24 hours later. So he got quite a jump on law enforcement.

LALAMA: But you don`t know why he may have targeted this poor young child in particular.

BROWN: Not in particular. She was there at the time, and she was easy prey.

LALAMA: But not the older one. He left the older one alone.

BROWN: The older one was not in the camper at the time when this happened.

LALAMA: I see. So perhaps he was trying to protect himself by allegedly abducting the 7-year-old, Aja.

BROWN: Well, he was very selfish, so that`s certainly an idea.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is indeed the vehicle Lester Hobbs disappeared in, and this is what everyone has been talking about the last few minutes. The vehicles from the state medical examiner`s office have arrived here on the scene.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: We have found two bodies. We have not positively identified those due to the rate of decomposition. Of course, the medical examiner is out there. They will determine the positive ID on Hobbs with fingerprints and on Aja Johnson possibly with dental records. We have no reason to believe it is not those two people.

The car was found earlier today. A call was made in to the Norman Police Department, Norman PD, as well as OSBI, and the U.S. Marshals Service has been out there and looked at the car. It is confirmed it is the car Lester Hobbs used in kidnapping Aja Johnson, the daughter of his estranged wife, whom he killed, we believe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama, sitting in for Nancy Grace. Breaking as we speak, the case of 7-year-old Aja Johnson.

Back to Jessica Brown, who`s kind enough to stay with us for a couple more minutes, PIO, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. How long before you`ll absolutely identify the bodies?

BROWN: This is a guess because that`s another agency, but I would say several days. My understanding is that we should get good fingerprints off of the adult body, and we do have dental records of Aja Johnson coming. So it will just be a matter of the medical examiner being able to take the time to do the autopsy on both of those bodies.

LALAMA: Are you able to give us details about the positioning of the bodies inside the car, outside the car, anything more detailed?

BROWN: I don`t have confirmation on any of that. My understanding is that his body was inside the car and hers was not. But that`s as much information as I have for you that I can confirm.

LALAMA: And can you give us a sense of the level of decomposition at this point?

BROWN: A high rate of decomposition, that`s why it`s to difficult to make a positive identification, but not a high enough rate to degrade the fingerprints we think we can get from him.

LALAMA: So you`re pretty convinced that it`s them and that they`ve been there for a while.

BROWN: We have no reason to believe otherwise, since they are either in or near the vehicle that we know that he was driving after he murdered Aja`s mother and kidnapped her. So we believe that they have been out there for quite some time. Now, have they been out there for this entire time? We don`t know. We have reason to believe perhaps not the entire time but much of the time.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Breaking news tonight. A 7-year-old Oklahoma girl, Aja Johnson, has been missing for two months. An Amber alert was issued for Aja in late January after her mother, Tonya Hobbs, was found beaten to death inside an RV camper.

The medical examiner said Tonya Hobbs died of blunt force trauma injuries to her head, neck, and abdomen. The manner of death -- homicide. Authorities charged Tonya Hobbs` estranged husband, Lester Hobbs, with her murder and the kidnapping of Aja.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We do have two bodies, one of an adult male and one of a young person. We cannot positively identify them at this point in time. That will be done with fingerprints and dental records. But I can tell you we have no reason to believe those bodies are anybody else`s except those of the victim, Aja, and Lester Hobbs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAT LALAMA, GUEST HOST: I`m Pat Lalama sitting in for Nancy Grace.

Horribly disturbing facts of the case surrounding Aja Johnson. More than likely her and her stepdad, Lester Hobbs.

I want to go back to Ellie Jostad before we get to the rest of the panel who`s been waiting so patiently -- I know -- but we`re trying to get these facts out before we dissect it.

Nancy Grace producer Ellie Jostad. What do we know of his criminal record? It`s pretty violent, pretty extensive?

ELLIE JOSTAD, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER, COVERING STORY: That`s right, Pat. Actually, Lester Hobbs was on probation at the time of Tonya Hobbs`s murder and little Aja`s abduction.

He was sentenced to 10 years. He served about five of it on a domestic battery and an assault and battery. He`s also got charges he pled guilty to like eluding an officer, resisting arrest.

He`s got a host of DUI and other offenses like that. He`s violated protective orders in the past. And just this past -- I`m sorry, rather February, he was charged with a DWI. And that was the hearing that was coming up when he took off.

LALAMA: You know, Jessica Brown, PIO, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation -- again, thank you for your time. The mother had had a restraining order on him, but was he -- in other words, should they had not been together at that point, according to the law, when the mother died?

Am I confusing you? You want me to restate that?

(CROSSTALK)

JESSICA BROWN, PUBLIC INFORMATION DIRECTOR, OKLAHOMA STATE BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION: I would hate to give my opinion on that. But certainly there was domestic violence in that relationship.

LALAMA: Yes, it certainly seems so.

Let`s go to our callers, who`ve also been waiting. Kathy in Illinois.

Good evening, Kathy. Your question?

KATHY, CALLER FROM ILLINOIS: Good evening, Pat. It`s nice to see you on.

LALAMA: Thank you. Thank you.

KATHY: I have two quick questions. One, has the father been contacted? And was he -- the whole two months that this has been going on, has he been kept informed?

And can they tell what -- how they died? How they were murdered. The young girl or who`s ever in the car.

LALAMA: OK. Well, let`s go to Jessica. Very quickly. Do we know? We don`t know cause of death at this point, correct?

BROWN: We do not.

LALAMA: OK. Dave Lanning, reporter, KOKC News Talk, the father -- there is a father, a biological father of Aja. Where has he been through all of this? And has he been informed?

DAVE LANNING, REPORTER, KOKC NEWS TALK: The father lives in south Oklahoma City. In fact, he spent most of the day -- at least since this afternoon -- in contact with state and local authorities. Waiting to find out any information about this.

I know some reporters have visited with him a little bit here this afternoon. But he has not actually had any kind of a full-fledged media event. They have talked to him in the past and expect that we`ll see some comments from him before the evening`s over.

LALAMA: Jeff Gardere, psychologist and author of "The Love Prescription," it`s an age-old story of women continuing -- I don`t want to pass judgment on this family in any way, but women and their problems breaking away from violent men.

Can you talk to us about that?

JEFF GARDERE, PSYCHOLOGIST, AUTHOR OF "LOVE PRESCRIPTION": Yes, we see that these women always seem to somehow come back to these violent men. The reason is they have self-esteem issues, they have dependent personalities, they don`t feel that they can do better.

They come from situations of domestic violence. And I think this was a classic case where this woman should not have been -- Tonya should not have been with Lester Hobbs but felt that she had to go back because this is the guy she felt who loved her, perhaps the only person she felt who loved her.

It was a very dangerous situation. And now we think her daughter is dead because of it.

LALAMA: Alan Ripka, defense attorney, can you blame the law for not keeping up with this guy?

ALAN RIPKA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, you know, if the law`s going to follow every single person when there`s a domestic violence complaint, there`s not going to be enough people to go around in law enforcement.

I`ll tell you this, though. When they found these two people, when they found Lester and Aja, unless they know it`s a murder-suicide you cannot count out someone else killing both of them and being involved in the original murder of Tonya.

LALAMA: Eleanor Odom, what`s the likelihood this is anybody but Lester?

ELEANOR ODOM, PROSECUTOR: I think that`s slim. Although that`s a creative argument by defense counsel. What`s so sad about these cases, though, Pat, is that even if a woman or man has a temporary protective order oftentimes if the violent partner wants to do harm a piece of paper won`t stop them. And that`s the frightening thing about these types of cases.

LALAMA: Dave Lanning, back to you. Let me ask you about the community. This must be just upending the people in your community.

LANNING: Well, you know what? For one thing I think they`re very, very glad that it`s over. It has been torturous. And this is the last thing anybody ever wants to see, not just in Oklahoma but anyplace in the United States, the planet, where have you.

It`s a terrible and tragic ending to this story. But you know, there is a closure a little bit, particularly for the father. He did mention that today, that he wanted anything -- what he wanted more than anything was closure on the situation and just know about his daughter.

And he did get that today. So there is a little bit of closure here in Oklahoma for this case.

LALAMA: And I want to go to Angela in California. Are you with us, Angela?

ANGELA, CALLER FROM CALIFORNIA: Yes, I am.

LALAMA: Hello. Your question?

ANGELA: Yes. Basically, I wanted to know what can we do as citizens to make Washington, D.C. stand up and listen? Does it take a march? What does it take? I mean I`ve called congressmen. I`ve called everybody like that.

I mean, I`m a victim. I was -- in my 40s of rape in my own home. And I`m 60 now. And I just -- I`ve just been seeing and seeing and seeing all this happening and I don`t know what to do.

LALAMA: Well, Peter Odom, you`re a defense attorney, and I know you often take on cases that are unpopular with the public. But as a community, what can we do? The young lady asks a very, very important question.

PETER ODOM, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: She asks probably the key question in this case. How is it that something like this can happen really under our noses? Because this began really in public with a domestic violence relationship.

Pat, one question that you asked earlier was about motive. And what we see, of course, I am a former domestic violence prosecutor. What we see time and time again is that domestic violence perpetrators will use children to get at the actual target of their domestic violence needs -- of their violence.

And that appears to be what happened in this case. And also, he seemed to have chosen to target one child over another child, something else that you see time and time again in domestic violence cases.

What can we do to stop it as a community? Keep our ears open, keep our eyes open. Call the police when we see things that are concerned --

LALAMA: Get involved. Get involved, right? I mean as tough as it might be.

P. ODOM: Get involved. And talk to our children.

LALAMA: And, you know, I want to ask Jessica Brown again from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. This poor little child, my understanding is that she suffered from bipolar syndrome and also attention deficit. Is that true? And that he particularly picked on her for that reason?

BROWN: I don`t have confirmed that information. I have heard her biological father talking about that. I don`t know if he targeted the child for that. But certainly she was easy prey for him since she was only 7 years old. The other child was quite a bit older.

LALAMA: Dave Lanning, do you know anything about those syndromes this child may have suffered?

LANNING: Just what I have also heard from the father, that she did -- was taking medication for being bipolar as well as the attention deficit syndrome. The accusations that Hobbs perhaps attacked her particularly trying to work on those two syndromes, I don`t have any idea either.

LALAMA: And Jeff Gardere, can you give us some insight into how children with those kinds of problems may be targeted by angry, violent authorities and adults in their lives?

GARDERE: Absolutely, Pat. What we know, kids who do have ADHD or bipolar, if they`re just a little bit different, when you have a very violent individual in that home, they are very bothered by that kind of behavior.

Anything that will set them off or get them irritated. And they will target that child. So kids with these sorts of disorders, learning problems and so on, they become at risk. So I think that`s what happened here.

LALAMA: Unbelievable. And through no fault of their own. Through no fault of their own.

GARDERE: Exactly.

LALAMA: Do we have time for a call? Liz, can you hear me? All right. Let`s take a call from Lonita in Oklahoma.

Good evening, Lonita.

LONITA, CALLER FROM OKLAHOMA: Hello. How are you?

LALAMA: I`m well, thank you. Your question?

LONITA: Now the reason he targeted that child was because it was not his. The first child, the older child was supposed to have been his.

LALAMA: Well, I don`t know --

(CROSSTALK)

LALAMA: I`m wondering about that. Let`s ask Ellie Jostad, NANCY GRACE producer. Was the older child his child?

JOSTAD: I`m not sure about that, Pat. I was under the impression that both children were from a previous relationship.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Norman Police tell us that they received that call around 2:46 this afternoon from someone saying that a car matching the description of the one that Lester Hobbs and Aja Johnson disappeared in more than two months ago was found here near Lake Thunderbird.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Breaking news tonight. A medical examiner is being called to the scene of an abandoned vehicle in Norman, Oklahoma believed to be involved in the case of missing 7-year-old Aja Johnson and her slain mother, Tonya Hobbs.

An Amber alert was issued for 7-year-old Aja Johnson in late January after her mother, Tonya Hobbs, was found dead inside an RV camper. The just-located vehicle is said to match the description of the vehicle driven by Tonya Hobbs`s estranged husband, Lester Hobbs, who`s wanted in connection with the murder of his wife and the kidnapping of Aja Johnson.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Even though we`ve got hundreds of leads of people who thought they had recognized either the car or Aja or Lester Hobbs, we could never positively identify any of those leads coming in, so we always had the idea maybe he didn`t get far.

We do believe that they have been there for quite some time, not necessarily right after Lester killed his estranged wife, Tonya, but sometime very close to that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think deep down we all knew and it`s better that Aja`s with Jesus and didn`t have to endure anything from Lester other than -- than what she did. You just take comfort in the fact that that baby`s with Jesus. And we`ll miss her. That she`s with him and she`s comforted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama sitting in for Nancy Grace. Devastating, heartbreak, and developing as we speak, the case of 7-year-old Aja Johnson. Presumably and allegedly -- let`s state that for the record -- abducted and murdered by Lester Hobbs, a man with a long and violent history.

Eleanor Odom, prosecutor. Here`s a guy with a huge history. Here`s people taking out restraining orders here and there. And yet we know the bottom line. You know, your hands are tied as a prosecutor when in fact the parties don`t live up to their own claims.

Again, I don`t want to blame the mother for all the horrible things that have happened. But my understanding is she took out a restraining order on this guy and then didn`t show up for the hearing, then chose to be with him afterwards, and only bad can happen in those cases. Am I right?

E. ODOM: You`re so right, Pat. And unfortunately, we see it time in again where -- and it`s usually the women -- don`t show up for hearings and allow the perpetrator back into their home and in their lives, and this cycle of violence is just so devastating, as we`ve said before.

But you know what, it`s in his nature. He was not going to change.

LALAMA: And Peter Odom, defense attorney, you know, your hands are tied in a way as a defense attorney if in fact the parties you`re opposing are not doing anything to continue their complaints, to keep them going.

I mean I`m sort of asking you to speak on the other side of the aisle. But you know what I`m saying. If you were representing this guy Lester, all you`d have to do is say hey, you know what? The wife wanted him back.

P. ODOM: Right. And that`s often the case. Where the person that initially takes out a restraining order, you know, the domestic violence perpetrator, will start with the hearts and flowers, they`ll get back together, and you know, defense attorneys are able to walk into court and say, well, they are back together. And judges are often very accepting of that argument.

LALAMA: But Jeff Gardere, why, why, why, why? Judges know, it is so easy for vulnerable women to fall into the trap of saying OK, honey, I know you`re not going to beat the crap out of me one more time. Right?

GARDERE: Well, yes, what we normally see here, the judges are thinking with their minds. They have to do this legally. They see the people back together, as your previous guest has said, and they have to go with that.

But in their hearts they know that these women drop these orders, don`t show up to court, only because it`s part of that cycle of violence, the dependent personalities, these guys are apologizing a million times over, and the women fall for it every time.

Because they come from cycles of domestic violence. Because they have these self-esteem issues. They`re hoodwinked.

LALAMA: Yes, it`s almost like an alcohol addiction, isn`t it?

GARDERE: Absolutely. And talking about alcohol, one of the things we know about this guy Lester Hobbs is that he was an alcoholic. All these DUIs, DWIs, and so on, I think that also contributed to his violence and picking on this young girl.

LALAMA: Right.

GARDERE: Who allegedly was beaten by him in August -- several months ago.

LALAMA: And Alan Ripka, it explains that split-second rage in a way, doesn`t it? That I`m holding hands with my wife at the Wal-Mart just a few hours earlier and boom, she`s dead?

RIPKA: Yes. And that goes directly to this. And I have to say, regardless of what Tonya would have done, had she shown up for the hearing, had she taken up orders of protection against this guy, based upon his conduct, the way he killed her, there was nothing that was going to stop him.

She couldn`t lock any door that would have changed things here. So I don`t think we ought to be blaming her at all.

LALAMA: No, no. And there is no blame here. I just want to try to dissect the dynamic of what makes women in particular do this.

Dr. Marty Makary -- excuse me. Did I get that right, sir?

DR. MARTY MAKARY, PHYSICIAN, PROF. OF PUBLIC HEALTH, JOHNS HOPKINS: Yes, Makary, right.

LALAMA: Yes. Forgive me. You are a physician and professor of public health at Johns Hopkins. I know I`ve spoken to you before. And thank you for joining us. Cause of death, how important is that going to be to this case?

MAKARY: Well, that`ll be --

LALAMA: And cause of death and time of death. Cause of death and time of death.

MAKARY: There could be a very strong correlation in the method or mechanism of death. You know, we know that Tonya Hobbs was 37, and according to the state medical examiner she died from blunt force trauma.

That could have been, who knows, a fist, hammer, pot, pan. You know, there are certain common patterns. And when two people have similar types of burn injuries or hammer injuries or, you know, injuries from a golf club, then it`s much easier to connect them. This girl was 7 years old, not seen for two months. Really anything`s possible.

LALAMA: And in terms of forensic clues in that car, what will investigators need to find?

MAKARY: Well, definitely they`re going to look at air samples. If there could have been a two-month window, there could be a potential for a long decomposition with significant decay and bacteria. That then gets aerosolized, where it goes into the air, and air samples could be critical. They`ll be looking at the standard DNA.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BROWN: A car was found earlier today. A call was made into the Norman Police Department. Norman PD as well as the OSBI and the U.S. Marshal Service has been out to there, looked at the car. It is confirmed it is the car that Mr. Hobbs used in the kidnapping of Aja Johnson, the daughter of the -- his estranged wife whom he killed, we believe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s just amazing that we have not had a positive I.D. on the car, a positive I.D. on the child or a positive I.D. on Lester. And this may explain why there are reports out there at this time that there could possibly be a body in the car and another body outside of the car.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LALAMA: I`m Pat Lalama, in for Nancy Grace. Just a horrible, horrible presumably an ending to the life of Aja Johnson. And we do have one last piece of breaking information from Ellie Jostad, our NANCY GRACE producer.

Ellie?

JOSTAD: Yes. This is actually through the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation. They said that in the car or near the car, a note was found that addressed what happened in the situation. Now they didn`t reveal the contents of that note or say who wrote that, but they are investigating that right now.

LALAMA: All right. Now wait, let me get this straight. So there is like a goodbye note presumably?

JOSTAD: It`s hard to tell. All we know is that there is a note and it apparently does address what happened.

LALAMA: Wow. All right. You know back to Aja just for a second, and perhaps Dr. Makary can answer this. The child required medication. Can you tell how this may have played into this whole sad scenario?

MAKARY: Well, when kids require medication, sometimes it can be an avenue for somebody to find a way to do mischief. They can manipulate the medication, overdose the medication, and who knows what happened? But kids are especially dependent on other people to administer these medications. So, you know, there`s a possibilities there as well.

LALAMA: And can you talk to us a little bit about bipolar and about attention deficit? You know, what a horrible thing for this poor child.

MAKARY: Well, it`s certainly one of the most difficult things for a parent and a child to deal with. You know, they go through extreme depression and extreme phases of excitement where they really can`t control themselves, they act like attention deficit disorder. They deal with anxiety. But the most frightening thing is that there`s a higher rate of suicide among people with bipolar.

LALAMA: Oh my goodness. And we can only hope that this child, whatever the case is, that there is some peace somehow for her.

All right. I think -- I think now maybe what we`re going to do is go back to Ellie.

Ellie, I guess it`s a done deal now if this is in fact Lester Hobbs and this is Aja, end of story.

JOSTAD: Well, the medical examiner is there right now. They are working to determine the identity of both of them, and as Jessica Brown said before, they were hoping to get fingerprints or dental records to confirm the I.D.s on those two bodies.

LALAMA: And most likely there`s just no other scenario, can you imagine?

JOSTAD: Well, like I said, they don`t believe this is anybody but Lester Hobbs and little Aja Johnson.

LALAMA: OK, Ellie, thanks so much.

Tonight, let`s stop to remember Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Steven Dougherty, 28, Barstow, California. Killed in Iraq. He was awarded the Purple Heart, the Bronze Star, loves spending time with family and friends. Outdoor sports and activities. Playing guitar. Watching classic music and listening to music.

He leaves behind grieving parents Thomas and Lydia, brothers Robert and Richard, sister Christine, son Steven Jr.

Steven Daugherty, American hero.

Thank you to all our guests and to you at home for being with us. See you tomorrow night, 8:00 p.m. sharp Eastern.

Nancy, thank you so much for the opportunity to sit in for you. Until then, everybody, good night. Have a wonderful evening.

END