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Nancy Grace

Missing 10-Month-Old`s Uncle Questioned by Police

Aired November 01, 2011 - 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, GUEST HOST: Breaking news tonight out of America`s heartland in the search for 10-month-old baby Lisa, reported missing from her own crib in the dead of night.

Bombshell developments tonight as we learn baby Lisa`s uncle meets with investigators, the very same uncle with baby Lisa`s mom when she`s caught on surveillance video buying wine at a local grocery store right before baby Lisa vanishes. Detectives spotted visiting a home for 30 minutes where baby Lisa`s parents have been staying. Then cops leave with the uncle of the missing child.

But Mommy and Daddy are still refusing to sit down for separate interviews with cops. Instead, they take their little boys trick-or- treating and still won`t let those boys talk to cops about what happened the night their baby sister disappeared. And tonight, a witness who sees a mystery man with a baby the very night baby Lisa goes missing joins us live tonight.

Where is baby Lisa?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Debbie says she checked on Lisa around 10:30 the night before.

DEBORAH BRADLEY, MOTHER: I said, Call 911. And he said, Where are the phones?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There were two boys in the house when Mom was drinking and maybe even blacked out. They could be a huge source of information.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My husband noticed that he was carrying a baby in his arms.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Then when Jeremy got home at 4:00 in the morning, Lisa was gone.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What`s going on in the home, in the family, what they may have seen.

NANCY GRACE, HOST: Hasn`t Mommy admitted she was passed out cold drunk?

-- drunk...

-- drunk...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And the baby appeared to not have anything on but a diaper.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Missing baby Lisa.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The mom apparently told police initially she didn`t want to look behind the house because she was afraid what she would find.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But no mother...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She said that she was drinking that night.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... who`s looking for their child uses the word "grieving."

BRADLEY: Because we`re grieving.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... unless they know their child is dead.

BRADLEY: ... grieving...

-- grieving...

-- grieving...

-- grieving...

-- grieving...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that is very striking to me.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And in fact, she may have been drunk. They`re looking for any kind of break in the case.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So who is Deborah Bradley?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She is like all of us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Cops want to interview these parents separately.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She had a very normal life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Good evening. Jane Velez-Mitchell, in tonight for Nancy Grace. The search for 10-month-old baby Lisa, reported missing from her own crib.

Straight out to CNN correspondent Jim Spellman, on the scene at baby Lisa`s home in Kansas City. Jim, what is the very latest, particularly regarding this uncle of the missing child?

JIM SPELLMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That`s right. It`s the brother of Deborah Bradley, the same man who was seen with her on videotape as she bought that box of wine the night baby Lisa disappeared. Kansas City police arrived midday today at the home where the family has been staying since this began. They took him out, not in handcuffs, nothing like that, got in an unmarked police car, brought him back two hours later. All police will say is this is an active, ongoing investigation and they asked him some questions.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I would have a lot of questions for the brother of the mother of this missing child, Pat Brown, criminal profiler. For one, he is the man seen on the surveillance video who goes to the grocery store and buys a box of wine with the mother of the missing child. And he reportedly was taking her there because she doesn`t have a driver`s license. And then some reports suggest that he just took her back to the house on the night that baby Lisa disappeared and dropped her off. But there have been conflicting reports about that.

I have so many questions for this guy, Pat Brown, criminal profiler.

All right, well, I`m going to throw that out to Steve Kardian, former police detective. And you certainly would have a lot of questions for this guy, as well, would you not?

STEVE KARDIAN, FMR. POLICE DETECTIVE: Yes, I would, Jane. And it`s a positive development. When law enforcement stops at someone`s house to conduct an interview, it`s on their terms. It`s usually a fishing expedition. The fact that he was taken into police headquarters on their territory, it is likely to have gone further through their investigation, taking a statement, developing some information. It`s a positive thing.

With regard to the phone call -- bizarre. Does he have information on that specifically? I certainly would hope so.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: What would you like to ask, Pat Brown, criminal profiler, the brother of the mother of the missing child?

PAT BROWN, CRIMINAL PROFILER: Well, we need to know where he was that whole evening. We know he was at the store with her when the wine was bought, but that`s all we know outside of the investigation. I would like to know exactly what all his movements were that evening, if any phone calls were made, if he ever showed back up at the house, if he disappeared at any point in time. I`d like to know all of those things.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, we have a very special guest with us tonight. Mike Thompson is the man that says at 4:00 in the morning, he`s driving his motorcycle, I believe, when he sees a man in the dead of night, 4:00 in the morning, 45-degree temperatures approximately, walking around this area about three miles from the home where baby Lisa lived with her parents holding a baby, a mystery man holding a baby.

And we are with Mike Thompson tonight, and he is with us. Mike, describe again, as we get started pondering this mystery tonight, what you saw on the night baby Lisa disappeared vis-a-vis this mystery man.

MIKE THOMPSON, SAW MAN CARRYING BABY (via telephone): OK. I was coming down 435 and I exited on 48th Street. As I was pulling up to the 48th Street, I seen a man walking, carrying something. And when I got closer, I seen it was a baby.

And I stopped about 30, 40 foot from him. He was going down Randolph. And I stopped, and he turned around and looked at me, and I looked at him. And I just went on. But I was thinking, What an idiot out there with a baby with no blanket, no coat, in diapers and a T-shirt as cold as it was. Anyway, and then I went on down to my cousin`s house.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Now, eventually, you were shown photographs. We do not want to identify in any way, shape or form the individual that you picked out of a group of photographs, except to say that this is a person who reportedly lives in the neighborhood. That being said, what happened vis-a-vis these photographs, Mike?

THOMPSON: Well, I finally got to see some photographs, and I had to really look at them because -- and remember what the guy looked like. Anyway, the longer I looked at him and the more I thought about it, it was the man I seen holding the baby and...

VELEZ-MITCHELL: So you ended up with cops. And what happened with that, with cops, the photographs and you? Tell us about that.

THOMPSON: Well, now, I went down to the police station or whatever it was, and they showed me a kind of a line-up picture with six guys on it. And I picked him out of the six because that was the man I seen. And they thanked me, and that was it.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Did they seem shocked by that? They are the ones who gave you a photograph of this man? So in other words, they were aware of this individual, the cops?

THOMPSON: Yes. No. They wasn`t shocked at all. They just said, Thank you, and I left.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: I`m trying to analyze all this. Alexis Tereszcuk, senior reporter, Radaronline, we have a fascinating cast of characters here. You have the mother and father of the missing child. The dad is at work until 4:00 in the morning on the overnight shift. He comes back at 4:00 in the morning and he sees the lights on and a window open and the door is unlocked. And he`s, like, What the heck`s going on? He wakes the mother up. Boom! She`s been drinking a lot of wine, she says, approximately five glasses, plus perhaps taking anti-anxiety meds. And she freaks out. They realize the baby`s missing. All hell breaks loose.

So you have the mother and the father. Then you have the brother, who was with the mother earlier on in the evening, at least, to get wine. Then you have the neighbor. When they come back from the store with the box of wine, she proceeds to drink wine with the neighbor. She puts the baby to sleep at 6:40 in the evening, she says, and then she drinks with the neighbor, this woman, on the stoop until 10:30, when the woman leaves.

Now you see at 4:00 in the morning, this man, Mike Thompson, sees a man walking around in the middle of the night, 45 degrees, holding a baby. Another couple had also seen the man, the mystery man, at 12:15, shortly after midnight.

We have a huge cast of characters here and there`s a lot of confusion. What do you make of it as you put the pieces of the puzzle together?

ALEXIS TERESZCUK, RADARONLINE.COM: Well, the one thing that we`re finding is that the police are being very meticulous about everything that they do. Now, I believe they spoke with Mr. Thompson more than one time. They`ve spoken with the neighbors repeatedly. They`ve gone back to the brother after almost a month of baby Lisa missing. They still want to talk to the parents because they obviously have a lot of questions.

There`s also he phone call that was made to Megan Wright from one of the Bradley`s phones -- Deborah Bradley`s phones, even though she said the phone was not working because they hadn`t paid the bill. Megan is somehow connected to Jersey, the homeless man that was wandering around the neighborhood that was spotted earlier that afternoon, and people think that perhaps he had something to do with it. He`s still in jail.

So there`s quite a lot of people, but the police are tracking each and every one of them. And they seem to be following up on one lead, and that lead is they want to talk to the parents only.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. And we had been hearing -- last Friday, we heard that the parents would make the two children who were in the house, a 5 or 6-year-old and an 8-year-old boy, available to police to reinterview them. They only talked to them briefly after the child went missing. They want to talk to these kids about what did they see. The kids were there in the home.

The parents have not made those children available again. And they were going to reportedly last week and they yanked them back.

Now, I want to bring in the attorneys, Peter Elikann and Lorna Owens, and ask them about that. Peter, is there anything that cops can do to get around the parents` refusal to allow the kids to be interviewed? And by the way, they`re refusing to allow the cops to interview the children even as they reportedly allowed "Good Morning America" to follow the kids trick- or-treating last night. What do you make of that, Peter?

PETER ELIKANN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, I -- Joe Tacopina says the children have already talked to them for five hours. He said he`s going to make the children -- the family says they`re going to make the children available again. Joe Tacopina says that he just doesn`t necessarily want to announce it to the media, and he`ll do it in his own time.

I know time is of the essence, but I can`t second-guess and get behind exactly what their strategy is. But he says the children have already spoken to them, the police, and they will be speaking again.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The family has cooperated in every way they could possibly cooperate.

BRADLEY: No.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Deborah Bradley.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She was definitely an attention hound.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A phone number on Mom`s hand.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who are you talking to?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) number was right on the palm of her hand. It was shown to a detective.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She got a call from the phone that was stolen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Took all of our phones so we couldn`t call anybody.

BRADLEY: You know, maybe somebody wanted a baby!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think she was stolen from that home.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you know Deborah Bradley?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, I`ve never met her.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She admits that she was drinking, that she had a lot to drink, that she passed out.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Connecting the dots in the search for baby Lisa.

BRADLEY: No questions asked.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Still very mysterious what it may mean.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Guess what that proved? She`s a truth teller.

BRADLEY: Please, please, please!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why won`t you talk to us?

BRADLEY: Because we`re grieving.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sooner or later, everyone is going to know exactly what happened to baby Lisa.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jane Velez-Mitchell, in tonight for Nancy Grace. Where is this precious, adorable, helpless child? We are trying to find out here on the NANCY GRACE show. And to that end, we`re exploring all of these very disparate events and this really bizarre cast of characters that is being assembled.

Now, Joe Tacopina, the very famous attorney who was representing the parents, has now indicated that there will be no further comment to the media from the family or their attorneys, even as, Leslie Austin, psychotherapist, the parents allow a camera crew from "Good Morning America" to reportedly follow the children around as they trick-or-treated last night, even as the family is saying, Well, we are not yet providing the children to talk to the cops. What do you make of it?

LESLIE AUSTIN, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: I have to tell you, Jane, I am really upset that they let the media follow these kids doing their trick-or- treating. They should be private. They should not be in the media eye. They should be protected from all of this. If the parents are so concerned with protecting them from police questioning, that they`ll be harmed, why in heck are they letting the media follow them? That`s completely out of bounds.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. Absolutely. I mean, the mother is saying she hasn`t even talked -- the last time we heard from her, she hasn`t even talked to the kids about what happened that night because she doesn`t want to upset them. Well, they kids have to have some reason for why this camera crew is following them around trick-or-treating.

AUSTIN: Exactly right.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: It`s bizarre. It`s bizarre.

AUSTIN: It`s -- it`s...

VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK, we`re -- go ahead.

AUSTIN: It`s just -- it`s -- it`s distorting their ability to live normal lives, and it`s very harmful to the kids to have them in the media, period.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. We`re going to open the phone lines now. They are lighting up. Laura, Washington state, your question or thought, Laura.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why won`t they cooperate? And have the police ever thought that the parents could be involved?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, the police have said officially they are not suspects or persons of interest. They have no suspects. But the parents have made themselves the focus of the investigation.

Lorna Owens, defense attorney, the very fact that the mother had said publicly that cops told her she failed a polygraph, the fact that the mother had expressed her fears that she was going to be arrested -- the police haven`t said anything publicly, Lorna.

LORNA OWENS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, what we have to understand, Jane -- this is an ordinary woman and she is undergoing extraordinary circumstances. She went to bed, and now her child is missing. We know that she was passed out drunk, We know that she takes anti-anxiety drugs. She does not know how to behave or how conduct an interview or whatever.

So now that she has an attorney that can help her cooperate with the police, help her tell her story in a manner that`s most appropriate, we certainly should be seeing a different posture. But I feel for her because now everything she says, we are going to be judging her by it. And she`s just an ordinary mother who went to bed one night drunk, and she wakes up and her little daughter is gone. And now the whole world is asking her, Tell us what happened? Tell us what happened? And she does not know.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, she says she does not know. I certainly give her the benefit of the doubt. But there`s a problem with her story. She said she put the child in the crib at 6:40, proceeded to drink and get drunk with her next-door neighbor on the stoop. The neighbor leaves at 10:30. She passes out in the bed. She wakes up to find her baby gone and the three cell phones gone.

But Alexis Tereszcuk, a call was made it from one of those cell phones between 8:00 and 8:30 at night to a woman with pink hair. How can you say that you passed out at 10:30 and everything was fine until you passed out when a call was made from the phone that was supposedly stolen after that?

TERESZCUK: And this is a phone that she has said did not have the capability to make any outgoing phone calls. Well, you know what? The police proved her wrong on that fact.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) primarily the first time when I was downtown for six hours, it was all about the phone call. Who would have had access to my phone? Who had possession of it at the time? I mean, I told them, you know, I didn`t know who was here. It`s possible that other people had came and left because I was downstairs at the time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So who is Deborah Bradley?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She is like all of us.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Cops want to interview these parents separately.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She had a very normal life.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They feel that there are some police officers who not looking for their baby and they`re just looking at them.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But the police are treating them as suspects, even though they`re not using the word "suspects."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The focus is heavily on that house and people in it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police say they`re frustrated but they won`t stop looking.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, there are miracles, and hopefully, this will be one of them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jane Velez-Mitchell, in tonight for Nancy Grace. Where is this precious, beautiful, helpless child? We are trying to find out. Cops have just reinterviewed this child`s uncle, the brother of the child`s mother, the man who went with the mother to pick up a box of wine hours before the child disappeared.

Meantime, the very night the child disappears, at 4:00 in the morning, approximately, a man sees another man. This guy is a commuter. He`s zipping by. I believe it`s on a motorcycle. He sees a man walking around, 4:00 in the morning, holding a baby who is mostly naked. And who is this mystery man?

I want to go to Mike Thompson, the man who says he saw this mystery man holding a baby. First of all, Mike, I want to thank you for joining us. And all of your questions -- my questions to you are really as a search for the truth. We`re not trying to put you on the spot whatsoever. But I do want to ask you -- it was approximately two weeks that you waited before you notified police. Why was that?

THOMPSON: No, ma`am. It was the next week.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK.

THOMPSON: See, I went to -- I go to my cousin`s on a Tuesday morning after I get off work, and I visit with him and then I come home.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK.

THOMPSON: I live 90 miles from there. Anyway, I was on my way down to his house after work, and that`s when I seen this man with the baby. And I went down there and I visited with him. I thought I told him about it, but I guess I didn`t. Anyway, he says I didn`t. And the next week, I told him about it, and he said, Well, you better call the police.

So he dials the police, and he told them that I had witnessed a man carrying a baby. They talked to me on the phone. And then the next morning, they came to my house, two detectives did, to question me and left. And next thing I know, I`m starting to get things from reporters wanting interviews and stuff.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: What did this man look like? Did he appear drunk, possibly, or high? It`s cold. It`s something like 45 degrees. Why is he just wearing a T-shirt?

THOMPSON: I have no idea, ma`am. I have no idea. And it`s where I seen him is away from -- there`s no houses for at least a quarter mile.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My daughter, Lisa, was taken from our home.

BRADLEY: We have to be strong for her!

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hair samples, mouth swabs, hours of interviews.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Using X-ray equipment that can be used to look inside walls and floorboards.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The garden area where dirt appeared to be recently disturbed or overturned in the search for Lisa, a beautiful little girl.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GRACE: The search for baby Lisa ratchets up.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Who are you talking to?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Complete mystery at this time.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: There`s a lot of confusion around the phones.

DEBORAH BRADLEY, MOTHER OF MISSING 10-MONTH-OLD BABY LISA IRWIN: Where are the phones?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The mother wrote my cell phone number on her hand during the interview.

PAT BROWN, CRIMINAL PROFILER, AUTHOR OF "THE PROFILER": These other stories continue not to add up. And it`s like a jigsaw puzzle.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have no idea what`s going on.

JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, HLN HOST: This is really bizarre.

BROWN: There`s too many people involved in this with Deborah Bradley that night.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: A man walking down the street at around the same time holding a baby that`s naked.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`ve seen a guy walking over here. I could tell he had a baby with him.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To try and find Jersey.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Is Jersey John Tanko (ph), kind of a homeless drifter who did yard work.

MARY HURT, BABY LISA`S NEIGHBOR, POLICE CHECKED HER PROSPERITY FOR SUSPICIOUS FOOTPRINTS: He`s suspicious and kind of shady, I would say. He kind of comes out of nowhere.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think she was stolen from that home.

BRADLEY: You know maybe somebody wanted a baby.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: New twists and turns out of Missouri.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jane Velez-Mitchell in tonight for Nancy Grace. Where is this precious, innocent, helpless child? We are trying to find out where is baby Lisa. Bombshell developments today as police pick up the brother of the mother of this child and take him in for two hours of questioning today. This is the very same man who went with the mother of this child to a store early in the evening and picked up a box of wine with her.

What did he see? Did anybody see this child on that day, aside from the immediate family, the mother and the father? Now we also have another bombshell development. And I want to spell this out and then go to Jim Spellman, because it`s complicated.

There were three phones purportedly in the house that were allegedly taken along with the child, but at 8:30 in the evening that night before the mother says that she passed out, a phone call was made reportedly from one of those phones to a woman with pink hair.

Now it just so turns out that this woman with pink hair used to date a homeless man who works in the neighborhood as a yard man named Jersey.

Jim Spellman, CNN correspondent -- or I`ll actually throw this to Alexis Tereszcuk. This homeless man, Jersey, has a criminal record. He was actually taken into custody not in this case but for some burglary issue, and he actually had a court appearance today. So try to connect the dots here for us. It`s something out of the show "Twin Peaks." I don`t know if anybody remembers that old show, but -- where there were a lot of cryptic developments in a seemingly perfect small town. It`s kind of having that sort of macabre feeling to it.

ALEXIS TERESZCUK, REPORTER, RADAROLINE.COM: Except it was Laura Palmer`s dad that murdered her after all in "Twin Peaks," right?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Right.

TERESZCUK: The thing about -- the thing about this is Jersey appeared -- John appeared in court today. The public defender, who has been assigned to him, said that they haven`t really had enough time to look at the case, so the case was postponed until November 15th. But he is in jail for now. It has nothing to do with this case/ He was arrested on outstanding warrants.

But he has a long rap sheet, burglaries, and in fact that`s why Megan, the woman with pink hair, said she broke up with him, because she said, I`m OK dating a guy with a bad past, as long as it`s in the past.

And it wasn`t in the past. She said she realized that he was doing things again that she couldn`t handle so they broke up. She said their breakup was very violent and she said that he got in a fight when he was in her house. He punched one of her friends and she just said that was the end of it. So he`s sitting in jail right now where the police can talk to him whenever they want.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, and he had a court hearing, and the guy you were just looking at there a second ago is Jersey.

Want to go out to Jim Spellman -- there he is -- in court on some kind of burglary issue possibly. Tell us about his possible connection to this case as we look at Jersey, the homeless man who was doing yard work in the area.

JIM SPELLMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT, ON THE SCENE OUTSIDE BABY LISA`S HOME: Well, geographically he`s connected because we know he was wandering around this neighborhood often looking for work. But he`s directly connected because of that phone call. Phone call to Megan Wright. Megan Wright is his ex-girlfriend. So we do know that he is directly involved in the investigation. Not saying he was involved in anything that may have happened.

And the geography is so important because the yard where Lisa, the neighbor, sees a man step into at 12:15 just after midnight that night is a yard that he cut through constantly. And that yard confirmed by the neighbor, confirmed by Megan Wright, they cut through there often. And just at the edge of that yard is a dumpster that was reported on fire around 2:30 that night.

So there`s definitely a lot of geographic connections that place him - - you know around the home. We can`t, of course, connect him directly to Deborah or Jeremy at this point. So we really don`t know what role he plays in this. He certainly would probably have some interesting information, a guy that`s on foot in this neighborhood so often if nothing else.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: And when you say that neighbors saw another man, that was the man with the baby, right?

SPELLMAN: Correct. The man with the baby just after midnight.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK. And apparently Jersey loved fire, according to some published reports? What do you know about that, Jim?

SPELLMAN: That`s what Megan Wright told me today. His ex-girlfriend said he loved fire and he talked about it. Now I asked did she -- did you ever see him actually set a fire, she said no, but we have just uncovered - - a criminal record for arson in New Jersey for this man John Tanko in the `90s. And it looks like from Internet -- open source Internet searches of New Jersey criminal records that he served about five years for that arson, getting out of a jail there in Jersey around 2003.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I would assume, Steve Kardian, that the cops have gone over this dumpster that was set on fire the very night that baby Lisa disappears with a fine-tooth comb.

STEVE KARDIAN, FMR. POLICE DETECTIVE, SELF-DEFENSE EXPERT, LEAD INSTRUCTOR AT DEFEND UNIVERSITY: Yes, it`s my understanding the dumpster was confiscated and it`s not usual to confiscate a dumpster that`s been involved in a fire -- an arson, a burning. So there must be some connection to that dumpster relating to this baby or possible evidence that exists inside of it.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. Let`s go to the phone lines. Diana in Nebraska. Your question or thought, Diana.

DIANA, CALLER FROM NEBRASKA: Well, hi, Jane.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Hi.

DIANA: I`d like to know -- well, I was wondering, if the brother -- we`ll just say if the brother is the one that everybody is saying that seen walking with the baby with nothing on or anything, don`t you think that since the baby was taken from the home out of its bed that it being cold out there, don`t you think that they would have wrapped the baby up?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, first of all, thank you for calling, Diana. But there`s absolutely no indication that the brother is in any way, shape or form involved in this. He was interviewed by police, but they want to interview everybody. They want to interview the 5- and 8-year-old boys who were in the house that night.

And yes, I think you raise an excellent point beyond that, Pat Brown, is that why wouldn`t anybody who was carrying around a child who`s naked or almost naked in the dead of night in 45-degree temperatures, especially if they`ve done something untoward, why wouldn`t they hide the child?

BROWN: Well, you would think so. I mean, first of all you think they would put it in a bag and carry it away. The only reason they could be taking it off in just a diaper is that they were in shock.

Now as far as Jersey goes, I find him a very nice representation of a very psychopathic felon. He`s got the -- the burglary, he`s got the arson, he is a drifter. That`s a scary guy. But he`s also -- this guy is a con artist type. And I would like to know if he`s had any kind of mixings with Deborah Bradley, because he`s been lurking around the neighborhood, and she`s been hanging out drinking.

I want to know if she`s ever hooked up with her in some way, shape and form. Because one of the things about those phones, she`s got three cell phones, she says she`s programming them. Well, they`re all not useable, why is she programming them? Or is she un-programming them? And that`s the question the police are asking.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: We don`t know what type of crime has been committed.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Dozens of massive searches.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: No closer to finding baby Lisa.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Inconsistencies in the mother`s story.

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Profoundly troubling.

BRADLEY: We don`t know where she at? Why is she gone?

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: No one knows where baby Lisa is.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

SPELLMAN: How would somebody get out of the house with baby Lisa? If they came back outside of this window or the front door, they would be very exposed to anybody in the neighborhood, anybody driving by.

This is an empty field. Police searched here early in the investigation. This entire wooded area that starts here along the edge goes down to that corner and works its way all the way back ultimately ending up at a school down this road.

And if you continue through these woods, it will take you literally to the backyard of baby Lisa`s house. They`re going to do everything they can to try to put new eyes on it, new technology, in this case using the dogs as a new tool to try to find baby Lisa or any kind of hint as to where she may be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jane Velez-Mitchell in tonight for Nancy Grace.

Where is baby Lisa? We want to find out and there is a whole giant cast of characters that is coming into play here, and we don`t know what they are connections are. But I can just tell you some of them. You have obviously the missing baby. You have the mother of the missing child. You have the father.

He`s working the overnight shift, comes home at 4:00 a.m. You got the mom who is drinking at least five drinks, she says, drinking on the stoop with a female neighbor until about 10:30. Then you have this homeless man named Jersey. We just saw him in court. He does yard work in the area.

He used to go out with a woman who has pink hair, Megan Wright, who gets a phone call at -- between 8:00 and 8:30 on the night that the child disappears from one of the phones that was allegedly taken when the child was taken. And you have perhaps the most important character, the mystery man walking about the neighborhood holding a baby.

And the only thing we know about that mystery man is that he is purportedly somebody who lives in the neighborhood because cops showed one of the witnesses a photograph of a bunch of men and he picked this man, who happens to live in the neighborhood.

So Peter Elikann, defense attorney. You`re also the author of "Superpredators." Do you think that cops have a concrete theory and an idea of who they think is responsible?

PETER ELIKANN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY, AUTHOR OF "SUPERPREDATORS": I`m not really sure, because as you keep saying there is a large cast of characters here, and I think the police are doing the right thing. Usually people who are kidnapped or murdered they usually -- but not by strangers, it`s usually family or friends, people they know, but not always.

And there`s enough -- and I think it`s great that this isn`t one of these times when they simply look at the parents, prejudge the whole thing, decide, they don`t look at anybody else. They just narrow the investigation to that.

I think it`s wonderful that they are looking sort of at all this huge cast of characters. The uncle and the homeless guy and the stranger holding the baby, et cetera. So I can`t really be sure if they`ve really narrowed it down to one particular person at all. But there`s more than just the parents to look at clearly.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Now one of the creepiest parts of all this is that Megan Wright, the lady with pink hair who says her phone rang and she received a call from a phone that was reportedly stolen from baby Lisa`s house. She said that cops told her that they found her number written in ink on the hand of the mother of baby Lisa, Deborah Bradley.

Alexis Tereszcuk, we also know that cops sometimes make things up in order to get information, but what do you make of that creepy development?

TERESZCUK: Well, she said the police told her that, but she also said that it was another reporter who told her that that wasn`t true. So the cops haven`t come out and said that this isn`t true.

Absolutely the police can use all sorts of things to tell you the truth. Stories that aren`t perhaps true. But in this case it`s only Megan Wright saying that another reporter told her that that wasn`t true. They also -- the police apparently did this with Deborah Bradley that very -- I guess the first time she was meeting with them. They told her, they showed her what she said were burned baby clothes. If they were trying to say that perhaps that the baby had been burned in the fire in that trash bin right near the house. And she said again that that wasn`t true, it wasn`t her baby`s clothing. So that`s been sort of a pattern, but the police have not come out and denied that they`ve done any of this.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, that`s interesting.

Lauren Owens, defense attorney. What do you make of -- here you have the dumpster, you have a fire in the dumpster at about 2:30 in the morning the night the child disappears. Then you have the cops going to the mother showing her burned baby clothes reportedly.

LAUREN OWENS, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, basically they`re trying to make some nexus, some connection. And as your last guest said, cops are allowed to do this, but by now I want to see them settle down. I`d want to see them either clear the parents, so they can look at this person, for example, who might have been walking around with a baby.

But if the dumpster is close by, it`s a good call because you want to suggest that maybe the baby was put in the dumpster and the fire was used as a cover up. But eventually now I would kind of like to see them settle down and for people to have a direction, because if you have a direction, then all the calls you`re getting in and people who are watching this show and many of the other shows can actually be on the lookout.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. And let me just say this. What I think of when I think of somebody writing a number on somebody`s hand is partying. That`s what you do when you`re out drinking. I say this is a recovering alcoholic with 16 years of sobriety. When you`re out drinking, you want to get somebody`s number and you`ve had a few, you write it on your hand. You don`t do that when you`re sober unless it`s an absolute emergency.

Your thoughts, Leslie Austin, psychotherapist.

DR. LESLIE AUSTIN, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: The smoking gun piece of information that we`re missing here is the homeless man, the same person who is in the photograph, and the same person who was seen by a witness carrying a baby. That`s one piece of information we have no link.

That`s crucial, because you have a timeline of what could have happened to the baby if he`s the man who was identified. If not, this is a huge mystery.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, let me say this. He is not considered a suspect in this case, the homeless man, according to police. He`s being held on something else, and my understanding is that it`s a man who lives in the neighborhood and that my understanding is that there is no nexus between those photographs and the homeless man`s Jersey.

AUSTIN: OK. I just think that we don`t know what the police are telling us and what they`re not, what`s true and what`s not, and they`re conducting their case their way. So it`s very hard to come to a conclusion. But it does seem to have a timeline that looks incriminating and I wonder if he`s involved or not, and whether we just don`t have that information.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. I would not think it`s a vast conspiracy of any sort because how could all these people or all -- any large group of people keep a shared secret under this kind of pressure and scrutiny? So I don`t think there`s any kind of vast conspiracy here of silence anyway.

Let`s go for the phone lines. Sheryl, Ohio. Your question or thoughts, Sheryl?

SHERYL, CALLED FROM OHIO: Hi, Jane. Excuse me. My question would be, the -- the gentleman that Mr. Thompson saw carrying the baby, does his description fit either the uncle or Jersey?

VELEZ-MITCHELL: We don`t know, but I`ll throw it out to Jim Spellman.

SPELLMAN: He does not resemble the brother at all. The brother is much younger, different build, doesn`t match at all. There is some similarity between the other descriptions of sightings of people.

I just want to say, Jane, to be very clear that the man that Mike Thompson identified is not Jersey, is not Mike Tanko. And I showed Mike Thompson a photograph of John Tanko, the man known as Jersey and he said no that`s the guy -- not the guy. I`ve never seen him before. I want to sure that nobody takes that implication away that it`s John Tanko that has been identified.

VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK. SO we want to be very, very clear about that, that the man that Mike Thompson identified as a mystery man carrying a baby is not the man known as "Jersey." Very good to stress that and point that out.

We are asking questions only because we want to find this adorable, innocent child, this beautiful little girl.

Where is she? We pray, we pray that somehow by some miracle she`s found OK. It`s been a long time.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did it look like anything was disturbed in her room? I mean did anything look out of place other than her not being there?

BRADLEY: No, no. It is like they just walked in and just disappeared.

SPELLMAN: Now if she was to have been taken out of the house at night, this is almost pitch black.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VELEZ-MITCHELL: Congratulations to our very own Nancy Grace for her fantastic performance last night on "Dancing with the Stars."

Nancy and her amazing dancing partner Tristan McManus gave everyone a thrill with their amazing super fun jive.

Way to go, Nancy. You can win this thing.

Watch this.

And Nancy dancing for an amazing cause, for children.

Tonight, let`s stop to remember Army Staff Sergeant Gregson Gourley, 38 years old from Salt Lake City, Utah. On a second tour of duty in Iraq. And a veteran of Desert Storm. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. He loved football and spending time with his family in their new home and in their camper in the countryside.

He is remembered as a gentle warrior. He leaves behind parents Jerome and Judy, sister Kristin, his brother Eric who is serving in the army right now. His widow, Collette, and four children, Austin, Brandon, Colton, Alexis.

Gregson Gourley, a true American hero.

Thanks to all of our guests and thanks to you at home.

Everybody, we`re going to see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern right here. Until then, have a safe evening.

And Nancy, you can win this thing, we know you can.

END