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Nancy Grace
Air Force Nurse Missing
Aired February 08, 2011 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Vanished into thin air.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look for her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We just need to kind her.
GRACE: So many cases --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We`re still looking.
GRACE: -- so few leads.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Missing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Missing.
GRACE: Missing person.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s our duty to find her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Missing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The witness had seen the suspect on NANCY GRACE.
GRACE: There is a God.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The NANCY GRACE show was out there for us.
GRACE: Found alive.
Fifty people, 50 days, 50 nights.
Let`s don`t give up.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CANDICE DOTSON, MOTHER OF NONNIE DOTSON: That`s mommy. Somebody`s got her.
That somebody`s got her. And doing who knows what, you know, to her? She would be here if she could.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (voice-over): Friends and family describe Nonnie Dotson as a survivor. The 33-year-old has had her share of wins in life.
She beat childhood cancer. She worked her way to becoming an intensive care nurse in the Air Force. And most recently, she proved victorious in a courtroom fighting for back child support for her 16-month- old daughter. It`s going on five years since the single mother vanished from her older brother`s home in Littleton, Colorado, on November 19, 2006.
KEVIN DOYLE, STEPFATHER: Every time the phone rings, you jump. Every time somebody knocks on the door you jump. And it`s just -- it`s a cumulative effect.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: November 19, 2006, Dotson planned to meet up with friends for smoothies just about a half-mile away from her brother`s home. Before she left, she called down to her brother to let him know she was leaving. That was the last time she was heard from.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have a woman that`s missing. And we`re waiting for some shred of evidence that will actually lead us in a more definitive direction. And we don`t have it yet.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Reportedly, her sister-in-law told authorities the 33-year-old left with an unknown female in an unknown vehicle. The night prior to her disappearance she spent out kicking up her heels to country music. While family says she met some people while out, there had been no commitments for future meetings.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is really a story that has led to a lot of dead ends for investigators. Sheriff`s department officials triangulated her cell phone. They did not turn up a location on the cell phone. The search dogs then went out, thought they had picked up a scent, did find a scent, but that scent went cold.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No activity on the cell, credit cards, or the Internet have led her family to fear the worst.
DOTSON: Nobody will forget you, Nonnie, and we`ll keep looking for you until we find you. OK? We just want you home. We just want you home.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Every day 2,300 people go missing in America. Disappear. Vanish. Families left behind, waiting, wondering, never forgetting. And neither have we.
Fifty people, 50 days. Fifty nights we go live, spotlighting America`s missing children, girls, boys, mothers, fathers, grandparents. They are gone, but where?
Tonight, a brunette beauty, an Air Force nurse, Nonnie Dotson, vanishes on the way to the local upscale shopping mall. Her 16-month-old baby girl left behind. The young mom heads out for smoothies. Never seen again.
Tonight, who took American hero Nonnie Dotson?
To Jean Casarez.
Jean, give me the timeline.
JEAN CASAREZ, "IN SESSION": Well, the timeline is, back in November of 2006, she went on a vacation from San Antonio, where she was a critical care nurse, Lackland Air Force Base, Wilford Hall Medical Center. She went to Colorado to spend time with her brother, and she enjoyed it for a couple of days with him.
Then, all of a sudden, one afternoon she said she was going to go out for smoothies. And they don`t really know how she left, because she didn`t take her brother`s car but she was gone and she didn`t come back. And her little 16-month-old was still there. So in the evening, they called police and that`s how it all began.
GRACE: OK. Wait. I don`t get it.
Jean Casarez, she tells the brother to his face, I`m heading out for smoothies, or I`m going to meet friends? How did she have friends there? She didn`t live there. And if she said that to his face, didn`t he see her walk out the door or didn`t he say, how are you going to get there?
CASAREZ: He was in the basement with the children and with her daughter, and he didn`t see her leave. She did just say she was leaving, but he realized his car was still there.
She had taken the family`s car the night before to go out to do some good old Texas country western line dancing, but she didn`t take the car that afternoon. So it`s remained really a mystery of how she left the house.
GRACE: OK. Go through it one more time with me, Jean. So he`s downstairs, like, in a basement?
CASAREZ: With the kids.
GRACE: With the children.
CASAREZ: Playing with the kids, that`s right.
GRACE: Playing.
CASAREZ: She sticks her head in the basement and says, "I`m going to go. I`m going to go out for a while, run some errands" -- she mentioned the smoothie -- "Be back." And she didn`t come back. That evening, that`s when they called authorities.
GRACE: Joining me right now is Kate Battan, lead investigator, Jefferson County Sheriff`s Office, joining us from Golden, Colorado.
Kate, thank you for being with us. The scenario of her saying -- poking her head downstairs, saying, "Hey, I`m going out, I`ll be right back," did the brother assume she was taking the car?
KATE BATTAN, LEAD INVESTIGATOR: The way that it was reported to us, Nancy, is that she just yelled down and said that she was leaving. She never indicated she was going to the smoothie shop. She never indicated how long she was going to be gone.
So we later heard through other people, through hearsay, that other people were saying that possibly she went to that smoothie shop. We went to that smoothie shop which was about a mile away. So it`s unlikely that Nonnie would have actually walked there, and they had never seen her that day.
GRACE: Now, Kate Battan, why do you say it`s unlikely she would have walked there?
BATTAN: In talking to friends and family, Nonnie wasn`t much of a walker. And she`s in a very suburban area, and it`s a mile away just to get to where the businesses begin. And it would have been much easier and convenient and logical on a cold November morning to take a car.
Plus, she left her coat behind. So when she left, the last thing she was seen wearing was black pants, a white T-shirt, and a gray hooded sweatshirt. No coat.
GRACE: To Marc Klaas, president and founder of Klaas Kids Foundation. Marc joining us today out of San Francisco, California.
Marc, that doesn`t even make sense. The whole scenario about her leaving doesn`t make sense to me.
MARC KLAAS, KLAAS KIDS FOUNDATION: There`s ambiguity in the case file that I`ve read. Some says that she left with an unknown female in a white car, and other articles say that she said she was going to get a smoothie and had walked to the mall. So it`s very unclear even from the moment that she stepped out the door exactly what was going on with this young lady and what she had intended to do.
GRACE: Well, Marc, think about it, though. According to Kate Battan, the lead investigator in Jefferson County Sheriff`s Office, she didn`t even take her coat. That, alone -- whether you`re going to walk or whether you`re going to hitch a ride with a friend, or whether you`re going to walk to your car to get into your car, ultimately to get out to go to a shopping mall, why not take your coat?
I`m just having a problem with her even getting out of that house. I have got a problem right there. She didn`t even take her coat. It was cold, November.
KLAAS: Yes, I agree with you. No, I agree with you, that from the moment that apparently she walked out the door, nothing really makes a lot of sense.
GRACE: To Michael Board, WOAI News Radio, joining us out of San Antonio.
Michael, what do we know about her cell phone, her purse, activity in her bank or ATM card?
MICHAEL BOARD, WOAI NEWS RADIO: She took all of that with her from the house. She took her purse, she took her cell phone, she took her credit cards.
From the moment she left, there was no activity on her cell phone. There was no activity on her credit cards.
They did trace her cell phone to an area over by a highway not too far away from that home. They searched extensively for that cell phone, trying to find that. That cell phone was never found.
GRACE: Michael Board, when do we know the last time that she used the cell phone or that she was seen by anyone other than her brother?
BOARD: That would probably have been the night before. She had gone out dancing with some friends at a country western bar in the suburb of Dallas. She had struck up a conversation with several guys at this country western bar.
This was the night, early morning, before. They actually wanted to take her out to breakfast the next morning and she said, "No, guys, I`m sorry. I have got to get home to my little daughter."
So that`s the last time anybody saw her before her brother saw her that morning.
GRACE: Anything after she was at the country western bar, Jean?
CASAREZ: There`s a time gap there, because the bar closed around midnight. She arrived home, it`s believed, around 2:30 in the morning. So what happened during those two hours, that`s a mystery.
And also, Nancy, she logged on to a Web site -- she`s a single mom -- singleparentsmeet.com. She logged on to it when she got home that night, and then the next morning, and at 1:00 p.m., before she left the house.
Who did she talk to? What did she find out? Could that be a clue?
GRACE: OK. So I know she made it home from the country western bar because we have got her logging in that night. I know she was alive the next morning because she logged in.
I know she was alive at 1:00, unless somebody else snuck into the house and logged in under her name, which I don`t believe. I know she`s alive at 1:00 p.m. Now, right there, that`s where the trail goes dead.
To Kate Battan, the lead investigator, Jefferson County Sheriff`s Office, joining us out of Golden, Colorado.
Kate, I assume that law enforcement took the computer and read the hard drive to see who she was contacting. How do I know she wasn`t being picked up by somebody or contacting somebody to go have coffee or meet them?
BATTAN: Well, let me clarify a couple of things, Nancy.
First of all, we do know that she made two phone calls on the morning of November 19th. The first phone call, according to the cell phone record, it was at 10:30. She didn`t leave a message, and it was to a friend of hers who she`s known for many years. And she just called, she did not leave a message.
The second phone call was 11:15 a.m., and she actually called another friend that she was planning on spending the rest of her stay in Colorado with. And she left her message saying, "Hey, give me a call later on." That happened at 11:15.
We also know that at -- later on in that afternoon, that friend tried to call her back and no one answered the phone.
GRACE: What time was that?
BATTAN: It was some time -- she wasn`t sure exactly when it was, but it was some time after 1:00 p.m.
GRACE: OK.
BATTAN: As for the computer, we did do forensic analysis on the computer and the hard drive. We also (INAUDIBLE) and got information from all of her Web sites and her e-mail accounts. We also got a hold of her records on her cell phone and did a forensic analysis of those records.
GRACE: Well, what was she doing on the single parents Web site? Was she trying to meet somebody?
BATTAN: No. She was just checking e-mail.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: That is very, very disturbing, for her cell phone to stop pinging. In other words, it`s either cut off or the battery is dead. No ATM withdrawals, no credit card, nothing. She`s not out gallivanting or having a good time or doing a walkabout.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, that`s definitely some things that concern us, too. As far as the cell phone goes, we tried three or four times to, as they call, triangulate where that cell phone was, and we came up to the same location each time we did that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (voice-over): She served our country. She provided aid to our brave troops as a U.S. Air Force nurse. And now she`s gone.
DOTSON: Nobody will forget you, Nonnie. And we`ll keep looking for you until we find you. OK? We just want you home.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: November 19, 2006, Nonnie told her brother she was going to a mall nearby to get smoothies with some friends and asked her brother to watch over her 16-month-old daughter. That was the last time anyone saw Nonnie.
JIM SHIRES, JEFFERSON COUNTY SHERIFF`S OFFICE: We have no indication that she has disappeared voluntarily or on her own, that she doesn`t want to be found.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: According to her sister-in-law, Dotson left in an unknown vehicle with an unknown female, and there`s been no sign of her since.
Friends waiting at the local mall say Nonnie Dotson never showed up.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have a woman that`s missing, and we`re waiting for some shred of evidence that will actually lead us in a more definitive direction.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: We are taking your calls. The friends actually waiting for her at the mall, is that correct, Kate Battan? Her friends were waiting for her and she never showed up?
BATTAN: No, she was supposed to meet some friends later on that evening, but she did not have solid plans yet. The friend that she called at 11:15 actually called back to her cell phone at 1:15 p.m. and left a message. Nonnie did not answer the phone.
GRACE: See, that`s very odd, because the brother says it was around 1:00.
Didn`t she log on, Jean Casarez, around 1:00 to the singles Web site?
CASAREZ: Yes.
GRACE: The brother says around 1:00, she says, "I`m leaving," and see you later. And then at 1:15, already no answer on her cell?
Is that correct, Jean?
CASAREZ: Yes, 1:00 is when she logged on to the computer. She may have told the brother "I`m leaving" a little bit after that.
To Levi in Louisiana.
Hi, Levi.
LEVI, LOUISIANA: Hi.
It sounds like she had a lot of different boyfriends and numerous different people that she dated. Did police look into all of that?
GRACE: OK. Wait, wait. Hold on, Levi.
Why do you make that assumption? All we`ve said is she had a child and she went line dancing. Why did you assume she had -- you`re basically trying to say she slept around, it sounds like to me.
Why are you saying she had a lot of boyfriends?
LEVI: Well, the dad is saying that the baby was a bastard, that she`s logging into singles Web sites. I mean, did police look into all the different men she dated?
GRACE: May I ask you, Levi in Louisiana, if you`re married?
LEVI: Yes, I am.
GRACE: OK. You seem to frown down upon singles Web sites. But in this day and age, that`s how a lot of people meet each other.
I hear where you`re going. And I assume -- thanks, Levi in Louisiana, for that enlightened look on single motherhood.
To Darryl Cohen in (INAUDIBLE), you say that`s exactly where a defense would go as soon as we get a suspect in this case, that she was dating a lot of guys just because she went line dancing the night before.
Darryl Cohen, please don`t insult me by denying that that is where a defense would go.
DARRYL COHEN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I`m not going to insult you, Nancy, but the defense goes where it needs to go.
GRACE: So in other words, yes?
COHEN: The answer is yes. Clearly.
GRACE: What about it, Giudice?
RAY GIUDICE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, let me just put a little better spin on it. What a defense counsel would do is show how many different people may have had opportunities to have contact with this lady before her disappearance. Male, female, and any other kind of person available. That`s what I would be doing, is to get -- deflect attention from my client.
GRACE: Now, of course, Jean Casarez, you`re not only reporting today, but you`re also a practicing lawyer as well. Jean, the state never has to prove motive. We don`t have to crawl into somebody`s brain and figure out what they were doing when they committed a crime. But in your analysis from what we know right now, who could possibly have motive?
CASAREZ: Well, someone that had an alibi. But here`s another piece of the puzzle. All right?
His name was Edward Vehle, and he was found to be the father of her child. They had a short relationship. He lived in San Antonio.
And she brought a paternity action after the birth of her baby because he didn`t want to claim parenthood. Well, it was found he was the father. Immediately, he was in the arrears of $10,000, $900 a month for child support.
And he allegedly told her, look, I`m going to try to get custody of the child. I`ll give it to my sister and then I won`t have to pay child support.
GRACE: So you`re saying $10,000-plus could be a motive for murder?
CASAREZ: Nine hundred dollars per month until the child is 20.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: So are you saying that somehow, because this young mom went out and had a good time, and stayed out late, and closed the place down, that somehow that`s connected to her disappearance the next day in the afternoon, after she`s been at home with her child and goes to get a smoothie?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nancy, it depends --
GRACE: Because she`s a party girl? Is that what you`re saying?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nancy, you know, it depends on who she met. Apparently in reports, she had some run-ins with some bad actors, bad characters that night.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Say, "Hi, mama."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (voice-over): Sixteen-month-old Savannah is too young to understand why her mother is missing.
DOTSON: She would be here if she could.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But her grandmother knows something horrible may have taken her away.
DOTSON: That somebody`s got her. That somebody`s got her. And doing who knows what, you know, to her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nonnie`s family is doing everything they can to find her --
DOTSON: That`s mommy.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: -- before her little girl asks where her mother is.
DOTSON: We`re trying not to think about that, but that`s the reality. Somebody knows.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: We are taking your calls.
Out to Sue in Georgia.
Hi, Sue.
SUE, GEORGIA: Hey, Nancy. How you doing?
GRACE: I`m good, dear. What`s your question?
SUE: Well, what about Nonnie`s parents? Where are they?
GRACE: Where are they right now or where were they at the time of the disappearance?
SUE: Well, both.
GRACE: OK. Hold on.
Keep Sue in Georgia.
To Michael Board with WOAI, where are the parents, now and then?
BOARD: The parents now, I believe they`re back in Colorado. They were living here in San Antonio for a short time while they were involved in a custody battle with Mr. Vehle over who was going to have full custody of little Savannah.
From what I know, from what I remember about this case, is in March of last year, Ed Vehle was given custody of Savannah while Nonnie`s parents, Savannah`s grandparents, were given grandparents` rights, which means once a month they could visit her. And from what I`ve been told, that`s been very contentious.
The past couple times, that Mr. Vehle has not allowed them to see Savannah. He`s fought an ongoing court battle to try to keep Nonnie`s parents away from Savannah.
GRACE: Now, wait a minute.
Jean Casarez, is that the bio dad?
CASAREZ: That is the bio dad. And according to documents -- and they use this in court -- when the little baby Savannah was born, a birth announcement was sent from Nonnie. He ripped it up and wrote, "It`s a bastard," and sent it back to her.
GRACE: And that`s who has custody right now?
CASAREZ: After she went missing, he filed for full custody. And that`s when the battle ensued, because the grandparents said he doesn`t want this child.
GRACE: I want to go back to Marc Klaas.
And of course we know that police have not named anyone, including the bio dad, a person of interest or a suspect. Nothing.
But, Marc Klaas, don`t most investigations, missing people or murder, start right there in the family? You start with who saw her last, they`re investigated. Then you go to lovers, boyfriends, husbands, ex-husbands.
What do you make of this?
KLAAS: Well, this bio dad seems like a complete jerk. There`s no question about that. But he has a very clean alibi for the time that she disappeared.
So in order to believe that he was involved, he would have had to have somebody follow her and track her for the various days that she was on leave, and then on that afternoon have had somebody kill her. So I don`t believe that at all.
I do believe he`s a creep, a jerk. He`s put the family through a lot of hardship. But I certainly don`t believe that he`s involved in her death.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Vanished into thin air.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Look for her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We just need to find her.
GRACE: So many cases.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re still looking.
GRACE: So few leads.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Missing.
GRACE: Missing person.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It`s our duty to find her.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Missing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The witness seen the suspect on Nancy Grace.
GRACE: There is a God.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nancy Grace show was out there for us.
GRACE: Found. Alive. 50 people, 50 days, 50 nights. Let`s don`t give up.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That`s mommy. Somebody`s got her. That somebody`s got her and doing who knows what, you know, to her. She would be here, if she could.
GRACE (voice-over): Friends and family describe Nonnie Dotson as a survivor. The 33-year-old has had her share of wins in life. She beat childhood cancer, she worked her way to becoming an intensive care nurse in the air force, and most recently, she proved victorious in a courtroom fighting for back child support for her 16-month-old daughter. It`s going on five years since the single mother vanished from her older brother`s home in Littleton, Colorado on November 19th, 2006.
KEVIN DOYLE, STEPFATHER OF MISSING MOM, NONNIE DOTSON: Every time the phone rings, you jump. Every time somebody knocks on the door, you jump. And it`s just -- it`s accumulative effect.
GRACE: November 19th, 2006, Dotson planned to meet up with friends for smoothies just about a half mile away from her brother`s home. Before she left, she called down to her brother to let him know she was leaving. That was the last time she was heard from.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have a woman that`s missing. We`re waiting for some shred of evidence that will actually lead us in a more definitive direction, and we don`t have it yet.
GRACE: Reportedly, her sister-in-law told authorities the 33-year-old left with an unknown female in an unknown vehicle. The night prior to her disappearance, she spent out kicking up her heels to country music. While family says she met some people while out, there had been no commitments for future meetings.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is really a story that has led to a lot of dead ends for investigators. Sheriffs department officials triangulated her cell phone. They did not turn up a location on the cell phone. The search dogs that went out picked up a scent, did find a scent, but that scent went cold.
GRACE: No activity on cell, credit cards or the internet have led her family to fear the worst.
CANDICE DOTSON, MOTHER OF MISSING MOM, NONNIE DOTSON: Nobody will forget you, Nonnie, and we`ll keep looking for you until we find you, OK? We just want you home. Just want you home.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE (on-camera): It is my understanding that the grandparents, Nonnie`s parents, have actually left their home and moved to San Antonio, so they can be there to fight for custody or, at least, grandparents visitation rights with the little girl. What about it, Jean?
JEAN CASAREZ, LEGAL CORRESPONDENT, "IN SESSION": That`s correct. Originally, they got protective custody of that little girl probably namely because of that birth announcement that was ripped and half and sent back with those words on it of what that child meant to the bio father, but they have lost that full custody.
GRACE: To Kate Battan, lead investigator with the Jefferson County Sheriff`s Office. I understand that all of the people that she came in contact with at the country western bar the night before have all been checked out and cleared. What about the brother? What about his story? Has he taken a polygraph?
VOICE OF KATE BATTAN, LEAD INVESTIGATOR, JEFFERSON COUNTY SHERRIFF`S OFFICE: No. Nobody in this case has taken a polygraph, and I will tell you, the polygraphs are just a tool, and oftentimes, they shut down communication. And I want to keep communication open with everybody in this case. So, we continue to do interviews. We`ve recently done new interviews of people who were briefly interviewed back in 2006, and we are still actively working this case.
GRACE: You know, Marc Klaas, we all know, most of us on this panel, either investigators, former prosecutors, defense attorneys, lawyers, we all know that polygraphs are a tool just like, you know, forensically looking at a computer or checking out phone records. It`s a tool. It may or may not be entered into evidence, but as I recall, you did not have any protests whatsoever when police checked you out when your daughter, Polly, went missing. You`d be happy to take a polygraph or give DNA.
MARC KLAAS, PRESIDENT & FOUNDE, KLAASKIDS FOUNDATION: There`s no question about that, and I find it incredulous that they`re afraid of asking the brother to take a polygraph for fear that it`ll break down communication. I would think that he would want to volunteer to do that as would any other member of the family just to clear themselves and move on and find out what actually did happen.
GRACE: Agree or disagree, Stacy Kaiser?
STACY KAISER, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: I agree 100 percent. It`s often the people that are closest to someone missing that are guilty.
GRACE: To Tom Shamshak, of course, obviously, the brother is not a suspect or person of interest, but it seems to me that Marc Klaas is right. That everybody close to her would be happy to take a polygraph just for general purposes.
TOM SHAMSHAK, FMR. POLICE CHIEF: I agree wholeheartedly. I`m right on the same page with you there. I find it very difficult to believe that the brother only heard her voice, and then later, in the media he is saying caustic things about her that, oh, that she had closed down the bar. I think he needs to be examined a lot more closely than the authorities are doing at this particular point in time, Nancy.
GRACE: Of course, not a suspect, not even a person of interest. Is that correct, Kate Battan? Was it the brother that said she closed down the bar?
BATTAN: I believe that he did say that in the media, but in terms of the interviews, we have interviewed Tony Dotson on multiple occasions. And I don`t have anybody that I have named a person of interest nor have I named anybody that I`ve cleared.
GRACE: All of the people close to her, people that she came in contact at the bar the night before, the bio dad of the little girl, the brother, the last one to see her, have they been approached about taking polygraphs?
BATTAN: There has been some discussion with some people who I`m not going to name about potential polygraphs, but again, I want to keep the communication lines open.
GRACE: Well, I`m sure you just heard Marc Klaas, who is a crime victim. His daughter was kidnapped and later murdered. Police asked him to cooperate with polygraphs, DNA, search his place. He was happy to do it. It`s been four years. Do you think that these people would be happy to take a polygraph, to volunteer for a polygraph if it would help the investigation, Kate Battan?
BATTAN: You would think so.
GRACE: Excuse me?
BATTAN: I`m not sure I understand your question.
GRACE: Well, it seems to me, I mean, you`re hearing Marc Klaas, who`s the father of a young girl, his daughter, that was kidnapped and murdered later. He was happy to give a polygraph. Having been a crime victim, myself, it`s my belief that a crime victim`s family would be happy to give DNA or a polygraph if that would further the investigation. OK. She`s been gone four years. Don`t you think that the family would be happy to -- or the people she saw at the bar would be happy to take a polygraph?
BATTAN: Again, I think the polygraphs tend to shut down communication --
GRACE: Why?
BATTAN: And now, those communication lines are open.
GRACE: But why would it shut down communications? I don`t know what you`re talking about.
BATTAN: Because it`s a very accusatory thing asking some people to take a polygraph.
GRACE: What about it, Marc Klaas?
KLAAS: I never thought that they were really accusing me of anything when they asked me to sit down for the polygraph. I just felt that they were trying to clear me, as they explained to me, so that they could move on to other possibilities. You know, they need to deal with family members. They need to deal with registered sex offenders in the community. They need to deal with strangers.
They`ve got all of these scenarios that are out there, and you never really arrive at the truth until you eliminate the various scenarios, and obviously, the place to start with that is in the home and with the people that are closest to her.
GRACE: And of course, Marc, I`m sure you agree with me that a missing persons case is not a mixer at the fraternity house. It`s not a tea party, all right? She could be dead. People need to line up and volunteer for a poly.
Everyone, tonight, please help us find the missing woman, Rebecca Gary, 32 years old, vanishes Christmas day 1988, Baton Rouge. 5`1", 105 pounds, brown hair, green eyes. If you have info, please call 225-389- 2000.
If your loved one is missing and you need help, go to CNN.com/nancygrace. We want to help.
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GRACE (voice-over): She was set to meet friends at the Jefferson Village shopping mall for girl talk and a smoothie, but Nonnie Dotson never made it. The 33-year-old mother and U.S. air force ICU nurse just months from finishing her military duty goes missing without a trace.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Investigators continue to look for clues but with no activity on her cell phone or bank account. Authorities are running out of leads.
GRACE: The investigation uncovers an expensive child support battle between Dotson and her baby`s father, but he`s been cleared by police with proof he was nowhere near Colorado around the time Dotson disappears.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The family has raised $100,000 reward hoping the large amount offered could bring about new leads.
GRACE: Do we know, Kevin McGue (ph), whether she ever made it to the smoothie shop? I think I`ve got --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, she, apparently, did not. Again, this is a situation where it was a ten-minute walk, and apparently, where they located not only the pinging but the scent was also about ten minutes away from her brother`s house. All indications say, no, she never did.
DOTSON: Nobody will forget you, Nonnie, and we`ll keep looking for you until we find you. OK? We just want you home. Just want you home.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE (on-camera): We are taking your calls. Out to Margaret in Florida. Hi, Margaret.
MARGARET, FLORIDA: Hi, Nancy. Oh, it`s such a privilege to talk to you.
GRACE: No, it`s my pleasure. Thank you for calling in. What is your question?
MARGARET: I love what you do.
GRACE: Thank you.
MARGARET: My question is, I watched your show last night, and the interview with the husband. He did not look stressed at all. He had like a smirk on his face, you know? And I`m also wondering how come the cell phone that was broken, how come the police didn`t do anything about that? Have psychologists interviewed him or anything like that? Because his demeanor, he didn`t look like he was sad at all.
GRACE: You`re talking about Margaret Haddican. Yes. The former military, left behind children, including a months old baby girl, sleeping. Yes, I don`t buy that for one minute. So, your question is about his demeanor? Do I have Margaret with me? Was her question, Liz, about his demeanor? You know, I think she`s right. I think Margaret -- she`s right about Margaret`s husband. His demeanor was like completely flat affect. What about it, Jean? You saw it, too.
CASAREZ: I watched his eyes. And the eyes could not look the interviewer straight in the eye. They were shifty eyes, and that always, that body language always sends up alerts.
GRACE: Yes, the thing is, though, Raymond Giudice, Darryl Cowen, as much as body language tells us, you can`t build a murder case on it, Darryl.
DARRYL COHEN, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: No, you can`t build a murder case on it, but Nancy, let me go back to the polygraph and the DNA. I completely agree with you about any scientific evidence regarding DNA search warrants. Polygraph, you and I have both been through this. It depends on the examiner, it depends on the person, it depends on their nervous system. And I don`t like them. I use them only as a tool of last resort.
GRACE: Put him up. But you just said, eh-eh, I don`t like them, but you use them, don`t you, Darryl Cowen? Just a yes/no. Do you use them?
COHEN: Sometimes and very rarely.
GRACE: OK. So, I say, I assume that as much as you don`t like -- remember, I`m a JD, not a DDS. I don`t know how to pull teeth, but you just said you do use them and you use them as an investigative tool. That`s what you said in a crazy roundabout defense attorney way. What about it, Giudice?
RAY GIUDICE, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, I don`t like them when they`re being used to create a theory of culpability.
GRACE: Nobody said that.
GIUDICE: Wait a second. What everybody is saying including Marc Klaas is, let`s get everybody in the inner circle. Let`s them (ph) all take polys and let`s see who shows some deception so they can become a person of interest. Poly should be used to confirm a theory, not to create a theory.
GRACE: Really? Says who, Ray Giudice?
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GIUDICE: You mean, the same constitution that doesn`t let them come into trial evidence? How about that constitution?
GRACE: That`s not in the constitution, actually. And as a matter of fact, Ray, if you would be so kind to give me the same opportunity that I`ve given you to spout off, recheck your criminal code.
GIUDICE: Uh-huh.
GRACE: Because polygraphs, if stipulated by both sides --
GIUDICE: If stipulated.
GRACE: As I was saying, don`t make me cut your mike, because right now, nothing would make me happier. Do come into evidence as stipulated, so they do come into evidence in criminal cases, and they do come into evidence.
GIUDICE: Pick the -- tell me the last one that it came into evidence. Pick your case, show me. They never come in.
GRACE: Let`s see. Obviously, there`s the glaring case of O.J. Simpson. The whole world knows about that. So --
GIUDICE: Yes, and --
GRACE: And I can also point out, as I was saying. OK, Liz, you can go ahead and cut his mike. As I was saying, in cases that I have had, we used polygraphs and stipulated ahead of time. And then after the attendant failed it, they took a guilty plea. So, chew on that. Back to the lines. Pam in New York. Hi, Pam.
PAM, NEW YORK: Hi, Nancy. I would like to know, this woman was in the military. Is it possible that she had post-traumatic stress syndrome and killed herself?
GRACE: No. She was out the night before having a great time at a party. She was meeting friends at a mall. Her body, I mean, her body has never been found. There`s no evidence she had post-traumatic stress syndrome and killed herself. Michael Board, is there any evidence she had PSTD?
MICHAEL BOARD, REPORTER WOAI NEWSRADIO: No, none at all. She was not on medication. She was on medication. She had prescribed drops for her eyes, and she did not take that prescription eye drop with her. So, if you`re asking, you know, was she a runaway? Obviously not because she probably would have taken that prescription with her, but as for PTSD, no. No signs whatsoever. Never been in counseling, never been treated, nothing for PTSD.
GRACE: Jean.
CASAREZ: She was going to be discharged from the military in four months, and she was excited because she was thinking about moving back to Colorado where she originally was from.
GRACE: Francis in Pennsylvania. Hi, Francis.
FRANCIS, PENNSYLVANIA: Hi. She`s a very attractive woman, and I was wondering, did she have a stalker, people who were stalking her in the army?
GRACE: You know what, that`s a good question, and virtually, impossible to locate. The possibility of a stalker. What about it, Michael Board?
BOARD: She was a nurse. She did come into a lot of contact with a lot of people. She helped, she saved lives. You could think maybe one of those people might still have some unrequested love for her, but you know, this is a scary thing. I remember a report. This was about five years ago, and I remember talking to a family member and that family member had asked Nonnie about, you know, her time in San Antonio, her time as a single mother, some of the problems she had had with her custody battle.
And at the time, from what I remember, is that Nonnie had told her family, whom I believe is her brother saying, you know, there were times that I remember, I felt like someone was watching me. And if you`re a mother and you got that intuition, that`s a very scary thing.
GRACE: I want to go back to you, Marc Klaas, we know that in this case, there`s no suspect, there`s no person of interest, but in most murders, in most disappearances, you`ll find the perp close to the victim, within the family. I`m talking about husbands, exes, boyfriends, a member of the family, then you step out, but it could have been as simple as someone grabbing her of the street, Marc Klaas.
KLAAS: It could have been that. It also could have been somebody close in the sense of the last people to see her were the people at the country and western bar the night before.
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GRACE: I don`t like it. Here`s the father of this baby. He`s 53 years old. He`s a grown man. He should know better. What`s he doing not cooperating with police? All this time passing, and finally, he breaks down and talks to police? What`s the holdup?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, I`m not going to characterize it that way. I mean, it sounds like the gentleman did what -- anybody who is smart would do in the beginning, somebody disappeared, police are asking questions, the media gets involved. You need to ask an attorney to help you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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GRACE: These are the faces of America`s missing. Every 30 seconds, another child, a sister, a brother, a father, mother, disappears. Families left behind, wondering, waiting, hoping. We have not forgotten.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kyanja Vanwey is missing from Des Moines, Iowa. She disappeared five years ago, and at the time, had a pierced nose and scar on her right hand. Her nicknames are Kiki and Carrie.
Eve Maestas vanished from Wagon Mound, New Mexico in June of 2009. Her mother is desperately searching for her girl.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She was at home the night before she disappeared. I went into her room, and there was a candle that had been burning for quite some time. I just started to call all her friends and, you know, ask if she was with them. And her laptop was on and, you know, she wasn`t home.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you have information, call 1-800-the lost.
Jeremiah Huger was playing in his yard with other children when an unknown male called the child over and kidnapped him. Jeremiah would now be 30.
Twenty-one-year-old Joab Hudson was last seen leaving his father`s home in Georgia just over a month ago. Since his disappearance, Joab`s stepmother says his bank account has not been touched, and his cell phone has not been used.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He had his wallet, from our understanding, which had his bank card in it. No cash that we`re aware of. He was wearing a gray hooded sweater with his high school logo (INAUDIBLE) on the front, blue jeans and some romper boots. Didn`t have any enemies that I know of at all. I mean, everybody just attached themselves to him when they, you know, there wasn`t a stranger he met.
Overall he`s a great kid. I mean, he`s one of those kids that woke up every morning, made his bed every morning, you know, military style. The only person I`d ever trust to watch my children, you know, to get off the bus. Very loving, caring person. Would be there for anybody, you know, at the flip of a hat.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Brian Andrew Hayes and Mark Anthony Degner were in their early teens when they vanished from Jacksonville, Florida in 2005. They may be in each other`s company and in the local area.
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GRACE: I`m Nancy Grace. See you tomorrow night, 9 o`clock sharp eastern. And until then, we will be looking. Keep the faith, friend.
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END
