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Jane Velez-Mitchell
Where is Baby Elaina?
Aired June 18, 2013 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, HOST: Tonight, breaking news. Stunning new developments tonight as a horrifying picture emerges of what happened the day baby Elaina mysteriously disappeared from her home. But a big piece of the puzzle is still missing. Who took her? Where and why?
Could the man who secretly caught baby Elaina and her mom on camera in this WNWO surveillance video hold the key to solving this case?
Good evening. I`m Jane Velez-Mitchell coming to you live. And you will not believe what the man who took this video is saying now.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Toledo police continue their search for Elaina.
The search for clues in Elaina Steinfurth`s disappearance continue.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How does a 1-year-old girl just vanish?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The father comes to pick his daughter up a few hours later. She`s gone.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Volunteers have scoured the neighborhood. The streets are lined with posters with one goal: to bring baby Elaina home.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Toledo police giving an update on the investigation.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They won`t say when the baby was injured or if they believe the mother knows the baby`s location.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re not going to comment on exactly what we`re looking for.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Tonight, Angela Steinfurth, the baby`s mom, behind bars, accused of child endangerment. Some claim she`s not talking because she has been threatened.
Her adorable 18-month-old Elaina vanished in the middle of the day more than two weeks ago. The mom claims she put the child down for a nap at her ex-boyfriend`s home, and the baby just vanished into thin air.
Little Elaina`s father, this man, comes to get his daughter in a custody exchange. The mother hands over their 4-year-old daughter but refuses to give him little Elaina. A fight nearly breaks out between Angela`s estranged husband and her ex-boyfriend.
Later, Angela, after a couple of hours, runs out of the house screaming, "The baby`s gone." Well, now Angela`s friend is spilling some sickening secrets.
Frank`s surveillance cameras caught Angela and little Elaina just one day before the baby was reported missing. And now, listen to what he told WNWO. It`s shocking.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
"FRANK," FRIEND OF BABY`S PARENTS (via phone): She told me about the baby having a black eye, a bump on his head and just a little bit of dried blood around the nostril. I wondered what`s all that about, you know?
Then she said when she woke up, the baby was like that. I said, "Well, what did you -- why didn`t you call, you know, or take her to the hospital or call the police or whatever?"
She said that she told -- well, she told me that she asked Steven to check -- the boyfriend to check on the baby to make sure the baby was OK medically, and the boyfriend looked at the child and said that she was going to be just fine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: A black eye, a bump on the head and dried blood around the baby`s nostril? Is that the reason Angela`s behind bars, child endangerment charges staring at her? And did it only get worse for this innocent child after that?
Call me: 1-877-JVM-SAYS, 1-877-586-7297. I`m going to talk to Angela`s half-sister, and a lead investigator in this case in just a moment.
But first, Angie Gonzalez with WNWO.
Angie, you`re breaking this news with this surveillance video, this interview with Frank, the friend. Tell us what you`ve learned.
ANGIE GONZALEZ, REPORTER, WNWO: Well, Jane, we have to tell you that Frank has not yet come forward with his last name. He said that he inadvertently became a part of this story and is still not willing to come forward with his last name. But he did give us his first name yesterday, so we were able to release that to our viewers and to yours, as well.
Now, Frank tells us that he was a neighbor of both T.J. Steinfurth, Terry Steinfurth Jr., as well as Angela when they were still in a relationship back in 2012. They lived next door to Frank for about eight months with their two children, including Elaina.
Now, in addition to what he told us last night, he also said that, while Angela did disclose to him that the baby suffered this type of injury the morning she went missing, that she said she did not know how it happened. That the baby just simply woke up with this injury.
He also told us that, during his experience living next door to the couple, he said at no point did he ever see either parent hit the children in any way, shape or form.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, apparently the father is saying something a little bit different. He`s saying that he was very concerned with how his now-estranged wife, this woman, treated the children and also that she had expressed concern with how her boyfriend, her now-ex-boyfriend treated the kids.
During an interview with Nancy Grace, Angela Steinfurth`s stepfather dropped a bombshell, saying that this woman, right here, his stepdaughter, the mother of the missing child, knows what happened to her little daughter Elaina but is afraid to speak. Listen to this and then we`re going to talk to law enforcement.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD SCHIEWE, ANGELA STEINFURTH`S STEPFATHER: She knowed [SIC] what happened to the baby. She got afraid, because people threatened, "If you say anything, you`re next." That`s what she told me Thursday from the jail. She doesn`t know where the baby is, is what she told me, but she does know what happened to the baby, who took the baby out of the house.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Let`s go to Sergeant Joe Heffernan with the Toledo Police Department.
Thank you for joining us, sir. I know you`re very busy. I know that you have search teams looking for this precious child.
First of all, can you address this comment that this woman, who`s behind bars on child endangerment, according to her stepfather, knows what happened to the child but is afraid to say anything because her life has been threatened? "We did it to that child, we`re going to do it to you" or words to that effect?
SGT. JOE HEFFERNAN, TOLEDO POLICE DEPARTMENT (via phone): Well, I can`t comment exactly on what that statement there that was said. We don`t want to inhibit any part of the investigation into our procedure, as far as it goes.
We did have enough probable cause, as you know, to arrest the mother, Angela, on those child endangerment charges, because of the evidence that we obtained that the child had indeed been injured.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. OK. But I mean, if she`s behind bars, and she has nothing to fear because she`s behind bars and she`s saying, "I know who did this. I don`t know where my baby is, but I know who did this and why," then wouldn`t there be a way to convince her to talk?
And I want to ask you about her ex-boyfriend, Steven King -- not the author, but this ex-boyfriend. She was staying at his house.
HEFFERNAN: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Crashing at his house. A lot of -- the entire country is asking where is he? Apparently, he said he`s in hiding because he`s been threatened. He also feels threatened. Is he a suspect? Is he a person of interest? Is he -- I know he`s been interviewed. What`s his part in this, according to you?
HEFFERNAN: Well, he`s obviously a very important person to the case. And we have been in constant communication with him. We`ve been able to talk to them. Every time that we`ve been over there to talk to him, he`s made no effort to hide from us. He`s available to us, or has been whenever we want to talk. So, it`s not been an issue.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Sergeant, let me ask you this. The reports have said that the night before the child -- after the surveillance video, we saw her walking with her little baby there, that`s the day before. That`s 6:01. The child was reported missing 6:02. That that night, 6:01, the evening, that he was in a van, perhaps the mother`s van, with this 4-year-old girl, and Angela, the mother.
So I understand cadaver dogs have searched that van, not necessarily come up with anything. But a couple of questions. Did you talk to the 4- year-old girl? Because she might have seen something.
HEFFERNAN: Yes, we did. Actually, we had some specialists to come in that are used to -- and have expertise in training in debriefing children of that age. And we did surely do that, not only for that little girl, but the other kids that were in and around that area at the time.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: So did you get any good information out of the child? Did she see anything?
HEFFERNAN: You know, Jane, I`d love to tell you, but I can`t compromise the investigation.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK. Well, let me ask you to stand by, sir, for a second, because we have a very special guest tonight, but we might want to get back to you, so please don`t go anywhere.
Mary Schiewe, you are the half-sister of Angela Steinfurth, the woman who is behind bars right now, charged with child endangerment. Her daughter is missing, her 18-month-old precious baby is missing. We saw this surveillance video of her. There she is in court. But we saw the surveillance video of her the day before the child disappeared. She`s cradling her child.
Now we`re hearing these reports that she says to this guy Frank, she woke up, the child had a bump on her head, a black eye and a little blood around her nose and that she didn`t take her to the hospital because her boyfriend, or ex-boyfriend said, "Oh, she`s going to be OK."
So I want to ask you, tell me about Angela and her mothering skills. Was she a good mother or a sensitive mom? Is she a sensitive mom or a little bit tough with the kids?
MARY SCHIEWE, HALF-SISTER OF ANGELA STEINFURTH (via phone): (UNINTELLIGIBLE)
SNOW: OK. Mary, I think you`re going to have to get off speaker or whatever you`re on, because I can`t hear you. So I`ll let our producers deal with you for a second.
And I want to go to Wendy Murphy, former prosecutor. You`ve been listening to all of this. And what do you make of it so far?
But I want to get the audio straight with the sister, the half-sister of Angela, and we`ll come right back to it -- Wendy.
WENDY MURPHY, FORMER PROSECUTOR: Boy, you know, Jane, I have to speculate a bit. And I hope that`s OK. There`s so much we don`t know.
But I would say this: the fact that the mom is in jail is probably good for a lot of reasons, including that if she is in danger, she`s being protected there.
And also, she`s under law-enforcement`s thumb at this point, which means they can squeeze her to say what she knees.
I think it`s right that we`re not hearing the details of what she knows. You know, there`s no need for us to know, if that child is alive. Hopefully. Whatever the mother is doing to share what she knows is going to lead to her recovery, and that`s the most we can hope for at this point.
I think it`s great that she knows who took this child. I believe that. Because so many of these cases we`ve covered together over the years, you know, people say, "We don`t know. She just disappeared in the middle of the night," and a week later they -- you know, the child ends up in a swamp.
So I think it`s terrific that this mother knows. Now we have to hope that she`s going to tell where she is.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I want to go to Dr. Judy Ho, clinical psychologist. But you are a doctor. We`ll do this on the other side of the break. We`ve got new information that`s just coming in.
On the other side of the break, we`ve got some new background information on the mother. We`re going to go to our producer and find out what we just learned. Stay right there. We`ll be back with more.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
R. SCHIEWE: She`s guilty of not taking care of that baby like she should have. She should have took the baby to the hospital. She should have been truthful and done. She shouldn`t have even been at that house. She doesn`t know where the baby`s at. But she knew what happened to the baby.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I want to go straight out to our special guest, Mary Schiewe, the half-sister of Angela Steinfurth.
Mary, thank you so much for joining us tonight exclusively. You just heard your half-sister`s stepfather, OK, say that he knows that Angela knows what happened to the little girl, but is afraid to say anything because she`s been threatened.
So my question to you is, when was the last time you spoke to Angela, and what is she telling you? What did she tell you about what happened?
M. SCHIEWE: I spoke to her the day before she went to jail, and she came to me and said that she was done talking, that she didn`t have to answer to nobody. I overheard her saying stuff to other people that Elaina had a black eye, a broken nose and lump on her head, and I asked her how she got it. She said she wasn`t sure.
And I asked her why she didn`t take her to the hospital. She said she don`t know. This was before I knew anything about what she was saying in jail.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I mean, when she said, "I don`t know why I didn`t take my daughter, who has a broken nose and a black eye to the hospital," what did you say to her back?
M. SCHIEWE: I told her right away, when you seen [SIC] a black eye and blood coming out of your child`s nose, no matter what the situation is, you take that baby to the hospital.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, what was her reaction to that?
M. SCHIEWE: She didn`t really have a reaction. She didn`t really have much to say to me at all, because she knows how I feel about this whole situation.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, how do you feel about the whole situation?
M. SCHIEWE: I`m upset. It hurts me to think that my sister would ever hide something like this. It just don`t seem like her. She`s an innocent little baby. She -- I just don`t know why she didn`t open up in the first place. This could -- it would have never led this far if she would have just opened up the very first day, threatened or not threatened.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, did she tell you she was threatened at all? Did she -- did she express any fear?
M. SCHIEWE: No. She told my dad that on the phone when he spoke to her when she was in jail. She told my dad that she was threatened, that if she was to seek any kind of medical attention for Elaina, that she would be next, whatever that meant.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: So in other words, who was threatening her? That`s the missing piece of the puzzle. I heard something...
M. SCHIEWE: I`m hearing Steven and one of his friends. I don`t know if it`s one of his friends or if it`s a relative. But from what I`m hearing, it was Steven and somebody else that was with him.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I just wanted -- we have the law enforcement on with us, Sergeant Joe Heffernan. And I want to stay with you, Mary. But I`ve got to ask Sergeant Joe about this.
Sergeant Joe, here`s the family saying that she`s threatened, and that`s why she didn`t take the baby to the hospital. And she`s now pointing the finger at her ex-boyfriend.
And again, the ex-boyfriend or his mom are invited on our show or their attorneys any time. He`s not considered a suspect right now, but what...
HEFFERNAN: All I`ve got to say to that is, I know, if my child was injured, threatened or not, I`m going to make sure that child gets proper medical attention. She obviously did not do that. That`s why she`s in jail right now for the child endangering.
I think this is maybe a little bit of a red herring that`s going on with this whole, "I`m -- I was threatened" thing.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK. Well, thank you for clarifying that, Sergeant Joe.
And again, we can`t independently corroborate what Mary is saying, although we appreciate you for coming on, Mary. But I want to ask you: in terms of your sister`s history, she has a 4-year-old daughter and this 18- month-old. Had you ever seen her be rough with the kids?
M. SCHIEWE: She lost her temper a couple of times. Not rough like to beat them or anything. You know, she`s been -- she`s always been a strict person on my older niece, Kylie (ph).
Elaina has always been a mommy`s girl. I just don`t understand. I don`t know why this would happen.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Now, would you have taken her in if she had come to your house and said, "I have nowhere to stay"? Because apparently the reports are that she went to her ex-boyfriend`s house because she was kind of in transition; she didn`t have any place to stay? And...
M. SCHIEWE: No, she was supposed to stay at my house. Me and my dad both told her that she was welcome to stay there with the girls. She chose not to.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Why?
M. SCHIEWE: I have no idea.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Why did she go to an ex-boyfriend`s house?
M. SCHIEWE: She...
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Go ahead.
M. SCHIEWE: She had told my dad that -- she had asked if she could stay the night, and we told her yes. She had texted my dad later on Saturday night and told me -- told my dad, I`m sorry, that she was going back to Steven`s house, because he`s the only one that can help her through this. That was her text to my dad.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Help her through what?
M. SCHIEWE: I don`t know. That was the last text.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: So that is very bizarre to me. We want to take a short break. Mary, stay where you are, because we`ve got some more information, and we want to get your response to it. We also have a panel of experts. We want to get their intake [SIC]. So stay right there. We`ve got more. This is unfolding as we speak, right on the show. Stay right there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I want to know who in that house knows what and why somebody won`t just come up and say, "Look, give me a minute. I`ll tell you what`s going on." Somebody`s got to know.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As a mom, I don`t even -- I can`t even begin to think how Angela feels about losing her baby.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HLN ANCHOR: What did you do when you saw these bruises or this behavior?
TERRY STEINFURTH JR., BABY ELAINA`S FATHER: There were several arguments about it. I was trying to get ahold of someone at COD. I never had a chance to make contact.
The week before she went -- Elaina went missing, Angela actually gave me the girls to live with me, because she said that she couldn`t care for them, because she was getting thrown out of her boyfriend`s house, because her and her boyfriend were fighting because of the way he was treating my children.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: That is the missing child`s dad, Terry Steinfurth Jr., with his dad, Senior.
Straight out to our producer in Los Angeles, Selin Darkalstanian, in our investigative unit. What have you learned about the dad and the mom of this missing child?
SELIN DARKALSTANIAN, HLN PRODUCER: Jane, I pulled up some background on the father of this baby. And it looks as though there were -- there had been some financial issues with both of them. And pulling up their records, there`s some judgments against them which shows they`ve been evicted from their home that they share together.
So we can ask Mary what she -- if she can just confirm or deny this. But it looks as though they owed some money in the place they were living and they were evicted out of their property. So maybe Mary can speak to this.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Mary, did you hear everything that our producer said? Can you tell us what the back story is? Because we hear that your sister, your half-sister Angela, is staying at this boyfriend`s house, even though her estranged husband, the baby`s dad, said that she had complained about how the ex-boyfriend treated the kids. What about when she was living with the baby`s father, Terry? What was the situation there?
M. SCHIEWE: The situation was good until they decided that they were going to split up, that the relationship was no longer working for whatever reasons. There were many reasons. I`m not sure what the reasons were. I know a couple of them, but I`m not going to put that out. It`s not my business.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. But were they in severe financial crisis?
M. SCHIEWE: Financially, no. T.J. was working, and he made good money. And my sister didn`t work.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Now, OK, so they break up, and then she moves in with this ex-boyfriend, Steven King, who by the way, we want to stress is not a suspect or a person of interest. You just heard it from the sergeant, Sergeant Joe out of Toledo Police Department, calling the whole pointing the finger at him a red herring. So that`s important to mention.
So Angela leaves, and she moves in with the ex-boyfriend, and then they begin arguing?
M. SCHIEWE: Yes. She moved in with him. There has been several times that she has called me complaining about the way that he treats her kids. I don`t understand why she would stay there. She was welcome to stay at my house. She even gave T.J. the girls a week before this happened, because she couldn`t live there no more because of the way that he was treating them.
I ended up going over there the day that he picked the girls up to make sure that there was no arguments between anybody in front of my nieces. He took the girls, and my sister went and lived with my mom. And...
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Why on earth would she go back to the ex-boyfriend that she said -- she had complained about his treatment of their kids when she could have gone to your house and your dad`s house; and she has nowhere to stay, she goes back there? Is that more about her romantic interest in the ex-boyfriend than it is her concern for her kids? And I`m not trying to put you on the spot, but I just have to ask.
M. SCHIEWE: Right. I think that she maybe wanted to try working things out with Steven. That`s my -- that`s my only guess. I don`t understand why, because her kids were not treated fairly over there. So I don`t know why she would take them back in that environment. We had told her several times that she don`t need to be in that home, but what can we do?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, Mary Schiewe, first of all, I want to thank you for coming on our show and having the courage to just talk and be honest and tell it like it is. And I know you want to find your precious family member who`s missing tonight, your little niece, and we pray; we want to find her, too. And that`s why no stone unturned. This is not about how anybody comes off looking. It`s about finding this child.
On the other side of the break, more breaking developments on this story. We are just getting started. We`re taking your calls, and we`ve got some more new information.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
R. SCHIEWE (via phone): She doesn`t know where the baby`s at or who took the baby. Personally, from what I`ve viewed of her, I don`t think she`s shown any emotion of it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Give me immunity and I`ll tell you what`s going on. Somebody has to know.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She came back outside and told me that the baby wasn`t in the house. The baby was gone.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She knows what happened to the baby. She got afraid, because people threatened, "If you say anything, you`re next."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, HLN HOST: Stunning developments in the search for missing baby Elaina seen here with her mother in surveillance video captured the day before the child went missing. New information tonight that. This mother is telling people "I didn`t say anything about my child being seriously injured, because I was threatened that the same thing would happen to me."
Straight out to Angi Gonzalez, reporter, WNWO -- you obtained this surveillance video, and you talked to this friend, identified only as Frank. What did he tell you?
ANGI GONZALEZ, REPORTER WNWO: He told us a lot of things, Jane. He told us he was a very close -- or still is a very close friend to both the parents in the case -- that`s Angela Steinfurth, the mother, and T.J. Steinfurth or Terry Steinfurth Jr. as the public knows him. He says that in his history of knowing both the parents, he did say to us that he knew neither of them to actually hit the children.
Now, of course, you are hearing from a lot of different guests that are saying this is a sort of he said/she said thing. On Nancy Grace`s show last night, Terry said that his wife -- his estranged wife did have a history with being rough with the children.
However, Frank, our source who gave us that surveillance video that you`re showing right now, tells us that that`s not his experience. Now, he was only a neighbor of the couple for about eight months --
(CROSSTALK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Angi, let me jump in. What did he say about the injuries to the child?
GONZALEZ: Now the injuries to the child, he said that this is from Angela telling him exactly what happened to the child. She said the morning that the baby woke up -- the morning that the baby would go missing -- that the baby woke up with a black eye, a bump on the head and a little bit of dried blood around the nostril.
Now, of course, this got a reaction from him. He wondered why she never went to authorities, never took the baby to a hospital. She told him that she had the boyfriend, Steven King, look over the baby to make sure that the baby was ok and the baby said -- or the boyfriend said, rather, that the baby is going to be fine.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. Angi, I want to jump in. First of all, Steven King not a suspect, but nor is he a doctor. When your child is injured, you don`t ask your boyfriend if the child is ok, you take the child to the doctor.
I want to go out to Dr. Judy Ho, you are a clinical psychologist but you also understand the workings of the human body. A child -- a little 18-month-old child who has a black eye, a bloody nose and a bump on the head, what could that mean for her life?
DR. JUDY HO, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, a child who is 18 months old is extremely fragile, so even when they have just a routine fall, if there`s a bump, if there`s some kind of physical injury, you have to take the child in just to make sure -- just to make sure. That`s just you doing the due diligence as a parent.
So for whatever reason Angela didn`t and it sounds like there were threats that maybe the same things would happen to her but she needs to protect this child first and foremost. That should have been her first priority.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. And by the way, Nancy Grace is going to talk to this friend Frank tonight coming up at the top of the hour. So hang in for that.
During an interview with Nancy Grace last night, Elaina`s father described a fight that he had with his estranged wife and her boyfriend when he was trying to pick up her child -- his child which he had the right to according to their custody agreement.
Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TERRY STEINFURTH JR., FATHER OF BABY ELAINA: I asked her to go in the house and get the baby. She told me she had just laid her down for a nap and she wasn`t waking her up. Her boyfriend decided, for some reason, he wanted to basically start yelling and screaming like he wanted to fight, ripped his shirt off.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. Jake Schmidt, private investigator, and we`re going to describe a little bit about your fame. You have a TV show that you`re on. We`ll show a little bit of it here. What do you make of this case? Why do you think the boyfriend was fighting so hard to keep the biological father from coming in and getting 18-month-old who a couple hours later, this woman runs out and goes, she`s missing, she`s missing.
JAKE SCHMIDT, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR: Well, I immediately would suspect the family and the people that were there at the time. But I would look even harder at the ex-boyfriend`s family, immediate family. Parents take care of their children. Well, some parents take care of their children. So I would look at their family first. That`s where I would have begun.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: But I just had Sergeant Joe Heffernan from the Toledo Police Department, and when Angela, the mother`s half sister is saying Angela is pointing the finger essentially at her boyfriend, the cop says that`s a red herring. What does that tell you?
SCHMIDT: Well, it doesn`t tell me anything with all due respect for the fine officer. The laws are there to protect our privacy and our liberties and law enforcement is sometimes hindered by that. Myself as a private detective, I have a bit more freedom to look at issues in a different way and to investigate in a different way.
Me personally, I would have looked at the father of young Steven King and there`s already indications. He worked for a company it appears or he was involved with the company that owned greenhouses and nurseries on a ten-acre property. There`s some indication he may have worked with a heating ventilation and air conditioning company.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: That`s no crime.
SCHMIDT: Those things are all -- no, it`s not a crime but they could be hiding places.
My first instinct would be to grill the people that are there, and just look at where they may have tried to dispose of a body, if this young child is dead.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I want to go to Ginger Smith, little Elaina Steinfurth`s -- the missing girl`s adult cousin. But before I do that let`s set the stage here because you, Jake Schmidt, mentioned searching for the child in possible hiding places.
Last night, on HLN`s Nancy Grace, Angela`s stepfather said he went out searching for baby Elaina with Elaina`s mom Angela right before she was arrested. A fisherman reportedly snagged a duffel bag in the river 60 miles away from their home. So they both went there to see if that was the child. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When we were searching, me and her, we got a phone call that they snagged -- a fisherman snagged a duffel bag by the marina. So we went down there and it was a false report, like a lot of them are. So we searched from the marina to the high level bridge. Then the next day, I said we`re going to finish -- we`re going to finish here, tomorrow we`re going to start here and go down.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. Now, there was a report that a diaper -- this is a diaper - that is the same size and same style and the same make as the one that was found by that very river. The same size and brand that little Elaina wears.
Let me show you a map of the area. FBI divers have searched this river yesterday and they were there before. And then the fact that Angela searches it with her stepfather and that divers have revisited that river, I`ve got to wonder, does that mean that there is something that everybody who is in the know knows as they are not saying? I don`t want to think about it, because it really breaks my heart.
Ginger Smith, we`re talking about your little cousin. When I look at this diaper, it really brought it home to me. This is an innocent little baby -- 18 months old. She`s an angel. She can`t speak for herself really, except to say momma or dada, she can`t say help me, I`m being abused.
It`s infuriating that this child had a black eye, a bump on the head, and a bloody nose. And nobody took her to the doctor. I`m sure that you share my outrage, Ginger.
GINGER SMITH, COUSIN OF BABY ELAINA: Absolutely. And to be quite honest with you, just recently, we found out about the black eye and the bloody nose. We do know that she had told them, but obviously -- you know, she knew this before she was saying she had known this. Before telling, you know -- go ahead.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: She says she woke up and the baby had a black eye and bump on her nose and bloody nose. I mean, that doesn`t --
SMITH: You know --
VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- I don`t know -- it doesn`t pass the smell test to me.
SMITH: Yes, and as with us. I mean our whole thing is, you know, and the surveillance thing, obviously we can`t see anything out of that. I think she was overly loving in that surveillance video. Could it be a possibility maybe Elaina was hurt then? We don`t know. And this is only - - I`m not trying to speculate anything. I don`t know.
(CROSSTALK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: You`re making a very good point. I`m looking at it again, and it`s almost theatrical. I see what you`re saying. And I don`t want to convict her of anything. She`s been arrested on charges of child endangerment. I don`t want to convict her.
But Jon Leiberman, now that Ginger is pointing that out, it`s a little bit over the top, the cradling and all of that.
JON LEIBERMAN, HLN CONTRIBUTOR: It is and listen Jane, here`s the reality. Police are making progress. That`s why you`re seeing these searches. And the reality is police are having to waste time sorting out fact from fiction because they don`t know what they can believe from this mother. This mother is the same mother who allegedly didn`t call anybody, didn`t take the baby to the hospital, didn`t tell anybody about the injuries.
And we also know Child Protective Services has been out to that mother`s previous residence. Police know more than they`re saying, and they are putting the squeeze on this mother.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I wonder if she knew that video surveillance camera was there, because her good friend had installed it because he had had break-ins in the area. I wonder if that was an act? I`m not saying it was.
Ginger raised the point. And I`m saying she`s making a good point. More with Ginger and we`re taking your calls on the other side.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She knows what happened to the baby. She got afraid because people threatened, "If you say anything, you`re next." That`s what she told me Thursday from the jail. She doesn`t know where the baby is, is what she told me, but she does know what happened to the baby. And who took the baby out of the house.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: More on the search for baby Elaina in just a second. But first, a huge week in the Jodi Arias trial -- both sides back in court the day after tomorrow for a big hearing that could have a major impact on whether Jodi Arias lives or dies.
We are all over it. And tomorrow, we`re going to preview what`s next in the Jodi Arias case, right here 7:00 p.m. Eastern. Breaking news on that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: All right. And I want to get analysis from our very special guest tonight. We have several special guests, but you might recognize this one from E`s hit show "Kourtney and Kim Take Miami". He`s a private investigator who has worked with superstar Kim Kardashian. And he`s a top flight private eye who`s joining us tonight to analyze this case.
Jake Schmidt, private investigator, you are helping us find this precious child -- you`ve been listening all night. Obviously there`s a lot of finger pointing. Angela`s family is pointing a finger at the ex- boyfriend, and the girl`s father`s family is pointing the finger at Angela and saying, you know, Angela is rough with the kids.
SCMIDT: Yes. You know, I think it`s amazing that after 9/11, we lost several thousand Americans and as a country, we allowed the Patriot Act to come in and influence our life and limit our freedoms. Yet every year more than 50,000 children go missing and we have no special circumstances or tools for law enforcement. Maybe a suspension of search warrants, freedom to check phone records -- that sort of thing. That`s 50,000 children a year, and we have no special circumstance to allow for special investigations.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes, I agree with you. I think we should have a video camera on every street, because none of this would happen. If we had a video camera on the block where she lives, we would know what happened to this child and we wouldn`t be speculating right now.
Ginger Smith, you are the cousin -- the adult cousin, what do you think happened?
SMITH: Again, like I said, I really don`t want to point any fingers. I know that somebody knows in that house what happened to that baby. Somebody has to know. You have how many adults in that house -- ok?
(CROSSTALK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Angela says she knows. According to her stepfather.
SMITH: Exactly. Exactly.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: So why isn`t she telling?
SMITH: That`s what we`re wondering. You know, you`re there -- you`re already. If it is true, in fact, she was threatened, ok, we could have helped you had you told a long time ago. You know, when you walked out on that front porch and said that baby was missing, you were protected right there, you had people all around you. And then she waits 11 days to tell us that the baby was injured. And then she tells her dad she knows what happened but she doesn`t know, you know, who took what or who took the baby.
No, it just doesn`t sound right. It does not sound right. When they tell us that, you know, Terry and T.J., they`ve seen Steven, they`ve seen Angela, and they`ve seen Julie, the mother. They all walked back into the house. They were all in the house except for T.J. and Terry but nobody ever came back out with the baby. And now you`re talking like -- I`m not for sure, I think it`s 45 minutes or so, I`m not sure. The time frame of when they`re arguing over this baby. She walks back in the house, 15 to 20 minutes pass, she comes back out and says the baby is missing.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MOTHER OF BABY ELAINA: I just want her home in one piece. I want to know that she`s ok. It`s very hard not having her around. My other daughter is going insane without her sister. They need to be together.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Quick round robin with our expert panel. Wendy Murphy, former prosecutor, what do you make of it?
WENDY MURPHY, FORMER PROSECUTOR: You know, there have been so many secrets described during the show. I don`t want to say -- some of the people close to the family -- I don`t want to say, it makes me think drugs are involved. If you owe a lot of money to a drug dealer they sometimes take kids to punish you for not paying up. That`s what I suspect. Something ugly like that or child porn -- I`m just heart broken.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: It is heart breaking. And we don`t have the answers. Those are theories and speculation. But there`s some missing piece of the puzzle, Dr. Judy Ho, clinical psychologist. When you listen to this mother, what do you take away?
HO: When I listen to this mother, it sounds like she`s really trying to hide something and really brings to light this case of the hidden epidemic here in our country. There are over 3.3 million cases of abuses, of child abuses and maltreatment every single year and we lose five children every single day to abuse-related deaths.
And there might be some type of cover-up. She was afraid to go to somebody for help. She was afraid that she might be arrested if she actually hurt the child or didn`t take care of the child. But this is exactly the problem we have here as a whole country.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jon Leiberman.
LEIBERMAN: Well, look, Baby Elaina needs to be found. It is heart breaking. I`ll tell you take with a grain of salt what this mother says. I don`t think you can take it as fact until it`s corroborated because it appears that she has a lot to hide.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Anybody who sees a child with a black eye --
MURPHY: So does the boyfriend.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- a black eye, it says here. "Look at her honey. Do I need to take her to the hospital? She`s got a broken nose and a black eye?" "Oh no, she`ll be ok."
Give me a break. More on the other side.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Irene, New York, your comment ma`am.
IRENE, NEW YORK (via telephone): Hi Jane. She knows exactly who took this baby and where this baby is. It`s such a shame that this mother is not telling police where to look for the 18-month-old baby.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I agree with you 100 percent and Irene I want to thank you for your patience. You waited all night to get on our show.
Nancy Grace with complete coverage of missing baby Elaina. She has an interview with Frank, the friend of Angela who obtained that exclusive videotape of her just hours before the child disappears. Was the child already injured? You may find out, coming up next.
END
