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Nancy Grace
Nancy Grace Mysteries: Elaina Steinfurth
Aired June 21, 2013 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The case of missing toddler Elaina Steinfurth is receiving national attention.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This Toledo toddler remains missing, but we are learning more about the alleged injuries.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just basically told me that the baby had a bruised eye, a little bit of dried blood around one of the nostrils and a bump on the head.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This video shows the room where Elaina was reportedly last seen, torn apart by authorities looking for evidence.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They searched here I think a total of four -- four or five times.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Angela Steinfurth sobbing in court.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Angela appeared in the front door, reporting that her child had vanished.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just afraid by some chance that maybe she had gotten out the back door, into the pool.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I ran into the house, directly into the bedroom where she said she was sleeping at. I didn`t see Elaina anywhere.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I never got a straight answer. She said -- her -- her statement was she did not know where the child was.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Everybody (ph) in that house knows where that baby`s at.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: When I first head about the case of baby Elaina, I immediately thought somebody`s lying. That was at first blush. And the only people talking at that time were police and the mommy. I don`t think police are lying. I then immediately felt a horrible ache for baby Elaina because the more I hear about the circumstances under which she was raised for her 18 short months -- were very, very disturbing, very disturbing. And now she`s gone.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This video obtained exclusively by WNWO shows the room where Elaina was reportedly last seen, torn apart by authorities looking for evidence. And according to the home owner, it has remained untouched since the search. A big question in the case is a gap in time when the ex-boyfriend of Angela Steinfurth, Steven King, is unaccounted for. Witnesses report that Steven ran out the back door of this home immediately after Angela appeared in the front door, reporting that her child had vanished. Julie says she was with Steven that entire time, and they were worried Elaina may have wandered into the back yard. That`s when he was said to have left for about 30 minutes. That is the missing time that many have questioned. But she says Steven was with another neighborhood boy, searching for Elaina.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Basically, we stopped talking about it and...
GRACE: Wa-wait! Wa-wa-wa-wa-wait! Wa-wait! The baby`s missing! The whole town is upside down! And you stopped talking about it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well...
GRACE: (INAUDIBLE) where is the baby?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was talking to the police officer...
GRACE: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... who was getting the video surveillance off my cameras at the time.
GRACE: OK. All right. So did she ever indicate to you where`s the baby?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.
GRACE: Did you ever ask her?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Multiple times. She said she did not know. And I said, How can you not know? There`s too many people in that house, OK? The baby`s laying down. Why didn`t you check on the baby? You know, I can understand once or twice, you know, you have a little faith in your spouse or your partner. But if that baby had injuries, why didn`t you check on your child? I never got a straight answer. She said -- her -- her statement was she did not know where the child was.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Angela came out of the home. She told me that Elaina was missing. I darted into the home and checked the bedroom where she was supposed to be. She said, The baby`s gone. The baby`s gone. And to me, she was showing no emotion. She wasn`t crying, nothing. I wouldn`t call it a scream. I`d say a little bit louder than normal, but it wasn`t a scream or a yell. I ran into the house, directly into the bedroom where she said she was sleeping at. I didn`t see Elaina anywhere. I turned around and I seen that the back door was wide open. So I asked where a couple of the other people who were in the home -- I`m not going to say names -- asked where they were at. She had told me they had ran out the back door, the boyfriend and a friend of his. And at that point, I jumped in my vehicle.
GRACE: There you see the mom holding the baby. Take a look. This is -- she`s kissing the baby. The baby appears well, well-nourished. It looked clean. She`s on her cell phone. She`s holding the baby.
Maybe this doesn`t mean anything to you, but it means something to me. Look at her rocking the baby. She`s loving on the baby. She`s holding the baby. I don`t know if all of you can see what I`m seeing. She`s sitting alone on the front porch. She`s holding the baby. And I am just telling you -- I`m telling you that this a mother -- I don`t care what anybody says, she loved this baby.
Now, did she lose her temper and hurt the baby? I don`t know. Did somebody else in that home of her boyfriend -- did they hurt the baby? Is she covering for somebody? I don`t know. But look at that. Look at her lovingly putting the baby in the carriage. This is important. This matters. This is just before baby Elaina is abducted.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: The chances that baby Elaina is alive are slim to none. The mother`s story went from bad to worse. We learned a couple of days into our own investigation that the mother says that she woke up and looked over, and baby Elaina suddenly had a black eye, a bump on her head and bleeding around her nostrils.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The whole time that we were out here looking for Elaina, she had -- we`re asking if she knew anything, anything at all, any ideas of where she could be and who hurt her, and what happened. And she kept telling us, No, I don`t know anything. I wish I did. I don`t anything.
But really, this whole time, she knew pretty much that Elaina was hurt and she was taken out of the boyfriend`s house. But she don`t know where she`s at.
I heard that she was dropped, but to have a broken nose and a black eye, you`re not just dropped. I`m guessing that the way that it was bleeding, that there was -- I mean, for it to be bleeding as much as it was, she thought it was broken. There`s no way that I would have waited. I would have opened my mouth the very first day, friend (ph) or not. If this was my kid, oh, my mouth would have done been open!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She wants to come home. She misses everybody. I`d like for her to come home and the baby to come home, too. I`d like to see the other people in that house in jail. You know, it`s not fair for one person to be in jail and the other people out, you know, having a good old time about this. It`s not just about my daughter, it`s about everybody.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Now, how do you wake up -- it`s like those movies where you wake up and there`s a dead body beside you. That`s in the movies. That`s not real. So I find it very difficult to imagine -- and I think I can be very creative -- to imagine a scenario where a mother goes to sleep and her child is fine, and she wakes up and the baby is lying there with a black eye, blood on its nose and a bump on its head.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... search for missing 18-month-old Elaina Steinfurth continues tonight. Now, the east Toledo toddler remains missing, but we are learning more about the alleged injuries. That may have been what led to the arrest of the baby`s mother.
Now, the man providing us with the information is the same source that released this surveillance video of little Elaina and her mother Angela just hours before the little girl was reported missing.
Now, up until tonight, he`s remained anonymous. But tonight, Frank is letting us use his first name to share with you what he told police about a conversation he had with Elaina`s mother, Angela, about Elaina`s condition before her disappearance, something he`s going to share with a national audience on Nancy Grace`s show tomorrow night.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She told me about the baby having a black eye, a bump on the head and just a little bit of dried blood around the nostril. But I was, like, Well, what`s all that about, you know? Then she said, well, 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 -- what 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 overlooked the child and said that she`s going to be just fine.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Now, it was after that conversation that Angela Steinfurth would be arrested on a child endangerment charge. But during a press conference last week, Toledo police would not go as far as saying what happened to Elaina or what type of injuries that she suffered, but said that her mother, Angela, did know that the baby suffered a serious physical injury on June the 2nd but did not seek medical treatment for the child.
Now, Frank tells us he`s releasing this information now so that people know what Angela told him happened.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: She then says that she showed the baby to her boyfriend and said, Do you think she`s OK? And the boyfriend said, yes, sure. What? Unless he is a pediatric ER doctor, then why would she ask him? It`s not even his baby!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: At Toledo police and the FBI continue following leads and Elaina`s mom remains in jail on a child endangering charge, folks in the baby girl`s east Toledo neighborhood are growing more and more frustrated and desperate, hoping and praying that they`ll find answers soon.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Up and down Federal Street, pink ribbons are now wrapped around trees, poles and cars, a solemn reminder of east Toledo`s missing baby girl, 18-month-old Elaina Steinfurth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I have it on my windshield wiper, my antenna. It`s on the van`s mirrors around the corner. It`s everywhere.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It actually came from the yellow ribbons from the support for the troops. Support for Elaina. Keep hope alive. She`s still somewhere. She`s not home yet. Bring her home.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: FBI divers packed up after a second day in a row of combing this portion of the Maumee River near the High Level Bridge. We`re told the crew, with the help of a U.S. Coast Guard boat outfitted with Sonar technology, found nothing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For the past two days, this has been the spot on shore where crews set up shop. They had a tent here and their equipment, kind of as home base as they searched the river. But after clearing out today, it appears the search of this specific location has ended. Yellow crime scene tape has been removed, and TPD officers no longer stand on guard.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Karl Pageant (ph), who went to high school with Elaina`s dad, helped put together this donation jar, which he placed on the counter of the Facet (ph) Mini-Mart at the corner of Facet (ph) and Oak. He says money collected will go towards food and water for volunteer searchers. Plus...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If we bring her home, we want to throw a welcome home party for her and help her out, getting her new clothes, new toys, stuff like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Now we are hearing stories attributed to her, all of these stories attributed to her. I didn`t hear her say any of this, but these are stories attributed to her, that she felt threatened, that if she called police about the baby being missing or hurt, that she would be done in.
And you know, I think you can ask 80 out of 100 moms, they would take a bullet for their child. I would. But she was so afraid of taking the child to the doctor or calling 911 or contacting the police -- I just don`t believe that. I do not believe it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Twenty-five-year-old Angela Steinfurth breaks down in court on Thursday, her daughter missing for more than a week. Steinfurth is charged felony child endangering of 18-month-old Elaina.
ANGELA STEINFURTH, ELAINA`S MOTHER: I need all of the support that I can get to bring her home.
GRACE: Where is baby Elaina?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The toddler disappeared almost two weeks ago, when her mother says she put Elaina down for a nap. Her estranged husband says he came for a custody visit with his two daughters. At first, he says, Angela refused to hand over Elaina. When she did agree, Elaina was gone. Family members say the mother`s story just doesn`t add up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She doesn`t know where the baby`s at or who took the baby. Personally, from what I have viewed of her, I don`t think she`s showing any emotion of it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Investigators believe the child may have been hurt.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was known to us that the baby was injured at one point. She was aware of it and did not seek medical attention for the baby.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Volunteers have scoured the neighborhood. The streets are lined with posters with one goal, to bring baby Elaina home. But so far, no clues.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We do hope the child turns up alive. Right now, it`s a mystery. We don`t know what happened to this little girl. So the mother cannot be charged, for example, with murder because nobody no body, no case.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Bond for Steinfurth has been set at $250,000 dollars.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... search for missing 18-month-old Elaina Steinfurth continues tonight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Angela came out of the home. She told me that Elaina was missing.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE) They don`t even know what`s going on.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: She`s guilty of not taking care of that baby like she should have.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The baby was injured at one point.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: While I`m waiting outside, I was talking to Angela. She made it clear that, you know, the baby had a black eye, dried blood and a bump on the head.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Investigators combed through the wooded area along the river while dive crews searched the water.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No signs of Elaina.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was him and I looking in the pool and the garage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Something has to break. Somebody knows something and somebody has to talk.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I asked the captain of the police force, the Toledo PD, why they were looking at the body of water, the Maumee River, and I was told because it was so close to the home. It has -- there have been divers in it. There have been FBI divers in it, local divers. It`s been dredged. Nothing. Nothing. Where is baby Elaina?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: To captain Brad Weis, Toledo Police Department captain. Captain, were you aware of everything Frank`s just told us?
CAP. BRAD WEIS, TOLEDO POLICE DEPARTMENT (via telephone): Yes, everything came out during the initial investigation. We were aware, and that`s why we continued to have interviews with Angela.
GRACE: Is she speaking to you from behind bars?
WEIS: We`ve had conversations, yes.
GRACE: Captain, how many people were in that home?
WEIS: Besides the adults, there were I think two or three children, but I think three or four adults were in the house at the time.
GRACE: OK. So three or four adults, three or four children, so we`re getting around six to eight people in the home. And Captain, why did the mommy, Angela Steinfurth, say she had to leave the home? Didn`t she say she had to leave the home to go to the store, comes back, the baby`s still napping, she doesn`t open the door, and she only goes back there when the husband comes to get the baby for visitation, and miraculously, the baby is gone.
Why did she leave to go to the store? What was it, a Family Dollar?
WEIS: (INAUDIBLE) according to the -- what she says, she went to the Family Dollar to make a purchase. Anything else is part of the investigation (INAUDIBLE)
GRACE: A purchase of what? Why did she have to go leave the baby to go to the Family Dollar? What did he need so badly she had to leave her baby.
WEIS: That would be part of her statement to us, and I can`t disclose that.
GRACE: Was it cigarettes? That`s what our sources are saying, cigarettes.
WEIS: Again, I can`t answer that.
GRACE: I`m going to talk that as a yes.
Is that true? Three inmates, after she goes in general population, apparently starts yakking, three inmates go downtown for interviews?
WEIS: Basically, we`re investigating the case, and I`m not going to go into details on who we`re talking to.
GRACE: OK. Very wise. Very wise. You know, another question I want to ask you, Captain, if it doesn`t compromise your investigation. With me is the Toledo police captain, Captain Brad Weis.
The baby clothes -- is it true that baby Elaina was last seen wearing orange shorts with flowers on them, but that those same shorts were found the home?
WEIS: There`s a discrepancy on what she was wearing. That was the initial -- what they did state she was wearing. And whether those (ph) clothing is still in the house or not, I can`t confirm.
GRACE: There she is with her little Easter basket this past Easter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The search for clues into Elaina Steinfurth`s disappearance continued below the High Level Bridge Thursday. Investigators combed through the wooded area along the river while dive crews searched the water. Meanwhile, in the east Toledo neighborhood the toddler vanished, her family has a simple message.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know, I just wish that, you know, that somebody, whoever has her, would bring her home safely to us, just return her.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eighteen-month-old Elaina disappeared Sunday afternoon after her father came to this Federal Street home to pick her up. Since then, flyers have been posted on trees and handed out. As days passed by, I asked Elaina`s grandmother how the family gets the strength to face another day.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just all of us standing together in prayer.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And this family and community is praying that this little girl will be returned safe.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And if you don`t want to give your name or anything like that, just drop her off to a church or somewhere and just put in an anonymous call. You know, just bring her home. Bring her back to us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She just said, I don`t know, Mary. She`s, like, I know she was hurt. She`s, like, I don`t know where she`s at. And that was pretty much it. And then the second time that I had asked her was when she told me that she didn`t have to answer to anybody anymore. I just don`t understand that -- she`s missing and she`s been hurt and it took her a lot of days to tell us that she knew that she was hurt. But where is Elaina? That`s what we want to know, is where is she at. Somebody has to know where she`s at.
GRACE: There is no evidence that has been brought to us that your daughter has abused either child in the past.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s all hearsay. When I got to over there, when T.J. called me, everybody`s standing around and setting on the front steps all nonchalant, like nothing happened. I ran up, and I was ready to kick him (INAUDIBLE) Steven`s dad`s butt. I wanted to know where they were at. But that`s -- you know, you just don`t set around and talk. Get your butt up and start looking. Everybody was just setting on the steps. That`s a bunch of BS. That`s -- that`s just BS. That`s the first time I ever heard that.
GRACE: So I`m talking about...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They were in the house. If you read the newspaper, I think it was the next day, stating that the boy`s mother changed the diaper and gave her a bottle. Why ain`t they in jail? What the hell is wrong with these people?
You set around on the porch and lollygag around. Get out and look for the baby. Don`t be setting around campfires, talking all smack and stuff. Look for the daggone baby.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hundreds scoured an Ohio river bank over the weekend, looking for a missing toddler. They looked through streets and even garbage cans, searching for clues to find missing 18-month-old Elaina Steinfurth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Angela Steinfurth.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Her mother, Angela, is in jail, charged with child endangerment after her daughter disappeared. The search has been going on for two weeks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The baby was injured at one point. She was aware of it and did not seek medical attention for the baby.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m not going to say she was directly responsible for anything, but my daughter was in her care at the time this has happened, and the police are handling it the way they feel they need to.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: The way the baby`s disappearance came to light is this. Her natural father, who was married to the mother -- they`re estranged now while she`s with her boyfriend -- Terry Steinfurth, Jr., the bio dad, goes over to pick up Elaina Steinfurth, his 18-year-old (sic) daughter. And he gets there, and the mom won`t hand over the baby, won`t hand over, won`t hand over. They go `round and `round and `round and `round about it.
So Steinfurth, Jr., leaves. He comes back with his own father, Steinfurth, Sr., the grandfather. They all get into it with the mother and the group of people that were there in the home. They want the baby. So she goes in to get the baby, and then comes out and says, The baby`s gone. That doesn`t even make any sense.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They`ve searched here I think a total of four -- four or five times.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He was gone probably about a half an hour, I`d say. Steven and I, both of us went running out the back door. And I was just afraid by some chance that maybe she had gotten out the book door, into the pool.
I told Steven to go down the alley to look, to maybe she had gotten out the gate. He didn`t go running out the back door by himself. He didn`t go running out the back door with the baby. It was him and I looking in the pool and the garage.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I walked into the house and she showed me where the baby was supposed to be, I looked at her and I said, You had that baby sleeping in that pigsty? And I went out the door. That`s the way I - - that`s the way I would have worded it, too.
I walked in the front room. The front room didn`t look bad. I asked where the baby was. She said it was in the front bedroom. I looked in the bedroom door. There were clothes stacked on the floor all the way around the bed. You had to step over clothes to get -- well, you had to step on clothes to get to the bed. And I just looked at her, and I said, You had the baby sleeping in there? I said, That`s a pigsty. And that`s when we went out front...
GRACE: What did she say?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... and I wanted to call the police for finding my baby.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I understand from reports that just a few days later, the mom reported to work at Taco Bell as if nothing had happened. We also are hearing reports her story is changing behind bars. Police have followed every single lead there is.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Right now, the mom is behind bars on child endangerment. The affidavit does not really set out specifics, but it tends to show that police believe, at the least, she did not help her child when her child needed medical help.
I also find it very interesting that in face of your child being missing, gone, that her father, Mr. Schiewe, had to basically pry information out of her. And she says repeatedly, I`m not going to talk, I`m not talking, I`m done talking, I`m through talking.
Why? Why are you through talking? If you want to find your child, why are you through talking? What are you afraid of?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANGELA STEINFURTH, ELAINA`S MOTHER: A nervous wreck. I 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`s going insane without her sister. And they need to be together.
Well, if I had their support, I wouldn`t feel the way I do, but not when people are pointing fingers at me when they don`t even know what`s going on. I need all the support that I can get to bring her home, anything to keep me comfortable and from losing my mind.
I don`t know how to explain them (ph) because there`s -- (INAUDIBLE) crazy: I have been shaking for the last three days, and I just want my baby home. She has problems, and the only way they`re going to get handled is if me and her father can do it for her.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: I spoke in depth with a friend of Mommy`s named Frank. And we`re withholding his last name at his request. He showed me surveillance video taken from his front porch. His home, like many of our homes, has surveillance cameras all around it. And I saw Mommy with the baby, cradling it, holding baby Elaina, kissing her, you know, making sure that she was appropriately buckled into her stroller. She seemed like any loving mother.
What, if anything, triggered? Anger? I don`t know. There was no black eye or goosebump or blood on the nostrils in that video. And that was just hours before baby Elaina goes missing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let him open his mouth, and he`ll go to jail (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What the hell is wrong with these people?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Drama outside the courthouse.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, just keep it down. You`re being recorded.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Keep him away from me. I got a restraining order against him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got a restraining order on him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It`s about the daggone baby. It`s not about what this person said and what that person said.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mom Angela in court for a preliminary hearing.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He had his mouth going when we first come out.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... everyone together in a courtroom. The emotions are running very high.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The whole time that we were out here looking for Elaina, she had -- we`re asking if she knew anything, anything at all. She kept telling us, No, I don`t know anything. But really, this whole time, she knew.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let`s bring the baby home. Then after the baby`s home, then you can start slandering people and talking.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Angela Steinfurth has been moved from solitary to the general population at the county jail. What do I make of that? I think she`s going to blab. I think she`ll either do it voluntarily, or people will come up and ask her questions and she will give one story after the next. She`s already changed her story, is my understanding.
I saw YouTube video of Steinfurth, Jr., asking Angela to marry him. They seemed very much in love. I don`t know what could have gone wrong in so few short months, but it did go horribly wrong. They`re estranged. They both have new love interests, and the baby`s missing.
I know the family is devastated. While FBI dive teams are out searching the water, can you imagine your child missing and there are dive teams dredging a nearby river, sending out K9 dogs, including cadaver dogs, to look for your child? I don`t think I could put one foot in front of the other.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let him open his mouth and he`ll go to jail (EXPLETIVE DELETED)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey, keep it down. You`re being recorded everything you say.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get him away from me. I`ve got a restraining order against him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`ve got a restraining order on him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: There was a huge family drama. A physical fight actually broke out at the scheduled preliminary hearing at the end of this week...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One thing after another. He had his mouth going when we first come in.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: ... when the mom, Angela Steinfurth, was supposed to come into court. On either side, the emotions are running high. Schiewe, which is the mom`s father, says people are driving by his house, calling him a baby killer. He`s saying it`s not about that, we got to bring the baby home. Let`s all go look together. Everything is erupting.
And can I tell you something. That is not unusual at all. Very often, I would have to put witnesses in separate rooms, even on separate floors of the courthouse, worried about if they would break into a fight while I was trying the case. That`s what happens when a baby goes missing.
Family in-fighting can hurt or stymie a police investigation because the police have to spend so much time trying to interpret statements and read through all of the animosity between the sides, it slows everything down. It becomes a grudge match instead of an effort of everyone coming together to find the baby.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: Now psychics have been brought into the case, and we have been told that both of them have visions of baby Elaina crying in a field. Now, as to psychics, you know, the reason I have always shied away from psychics in relation -- in connection to a case is because it`s inadmissible at trial. So whatever they may tell you, you can`t use it at trial. So in my mind, as a trial lawyer, if I can`t bring it into evidence, it doesn`t matter.
However, I will say that my mind is completely open, and I wouldn`t rule anything out unless I could absolutely disprove it, and I cannot absolutely disprove psychics. So if I were the family, I would listen to them, too. I absolutely would. I mean, I really think only a fool says no to any possibility of getting a lead in a case like this. So conventional wisdom be damned. If you could bring home baby Elaina with a psychic, do it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I mean, we need to look at all avenues. If we`re going to find anything, we have to be open to everything.
GRACE: Why do you have a cadaver dog?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, I`m out there looking. If I have a cadaver dog, then it`s a possibility that, you know, we`re thinking she`s presumed dead. She`s not out there 18 months old living off the land on her own.
GRACE: OK. So as you are following your intuition or whatever visions you may have, you have a trained K9, a certified -- your a certified K9 handler -- with you. Tell me, did the cadaver dog hit anywhere?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When you say hit, see, there`s a fine line there. Indicating would be saying for sure, you know, that the dog has come across scent...
GRACE: Did it show interest?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Both dogs showed interest.
GRACE: Did you say both dogs?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Both dogs.
GRACE: You have two. I thought you only had one.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I actually have three. I have one that`s trained in live air scent and two that are trained in cadaver.
GRACE: OK. This makes that even stronger. Now, as you all know, a cadaver dog`s only going to hit on a dead human or dead human tissue. They could hit on blood. This is not...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Any fluid.
GRACE: This does not mean it`s a dead body. So Gale, where was it that the dog showed interest?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, all I can say is I did have -- I did get permission to do a perimeter search of the home. And that was after the first dog, Simon, went up and down the alley, which I had no clue which house was which. They wanted me to check the alley for different things that had been thrown out there -- no interest whatsoever, even came across a dead squirrel, all this stuff, just kept going.
GRACE: Where did it show interest? That`s my question.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wow. It`s really hard to disclose that information, but it was in the center of the yard.
GRACE: It was where?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In the rear of the yard.
GRACE: In the rear of the yard, back out where that aboveground pool is?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Further, towards the alley.
GRACE: Has someone asked you not to reveal it?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know, it`s a difficult situation because I walk the line between psychic, but I`m also on a task force team working with police. So I...
GRACE: Did somebody ask you not to reveal the location, Ms. St. John?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They haven`t asked me not to reveal it...
GRACE: OK.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... but I`m doing it out of respect for Toledo police.
GRACE: Good to know. With me, Gale St. John, who took her K9s out to the area. The K9s did not hit, but they did show interest in an area in the back yard where baby Elaina had been staying with Mommy`s boyfriend.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We know that she is in jail. The mommy is in jail. She`s talking to the family. We still can`t find out what she`s telling to the family, if anything. And we know that she`s talking to police because they wanted to held her through the weekend. They delayed letting her go until Monday. But again, we don`t know why the police are holding her through the weekend.
GRACE: Wait! Wa-wa-wa -- wait! I don`t know that anybody delayed letting her -- are you referring to letting Mommy go? They`re not about to let her go. That`s not what the delay was about. The delay was about putting up evidence to send her to felony court to be prosecuted for felony endangering a child.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That would be the technical terminology that you would be familiar with, but yes, they`re not -- they`re -- they want to delay it until Monday, but no one is saying why.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: This very rarely happens. At the end of this week, a preliminary hearing was scheduled, where the state puts forth at least enough evidence for a judge to bind over or send the case, direct the case to the appropriate court.
For instance, if it`s, say, a shoplifting, the judge would hear the evidence and send that to misdemeanor court, typically is the way it works. If it has anything to do with a juvenile, the case is going to be sent to juvenile court. If it has to do with a felony, the case will then be bound over to a superior or felony trial court. That`s what happens at a preliminary hearing.
At the end of this week, baby Elaina`s case came up for preliminary hearing. The mother, Angela Steinfurth, was scheduled to be in court for a preliminary hearing. And then at the last moment, police on the case, on the investigation, asked for the case to be delayed until next week.
Does that mean they are this close to finding baby Elaina? Does it mean they are this close to getting a confession, this close to finding out the baby was sold or given away? Very rarely do you see police ask for a delay because what happens in a preliminary hearing is they basically explain why they made the arrest, what supported the arrest, why is it a felony, why should it go to superior court for trial. Well, all that should be contained in the police report.
But here, something is brewing. Something is brewing that we don`t know about. Police wanted more. They wanted a few more days. They wanted one more weekend, 72 hours before they`re back in court before a judge.
What do they hope to find? What do they hope to nail down? What piece of evidence are they looking for? We don`t know, but we know they`re looking for something over this weekend.
What disturbs me most is that a little girl, a tiny little baby, has probably been abused and murdered. I pray to God that Elaina comes home, and I plan to do everything within my power to help bring her back alive. But if she is dead, somebody`s going down.
END
