Return to Transcripts main page
Nancy Grace
Girl Vanishes After School Bus; Affluenza Teen Set to Walk Free; Beautiful Jogger Murdered on Daily Run. Aired 8-9p ET
Aired September 28, 2016 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[20:00:00] NANCY GRACE, HLN HOST: Breaking news tonight. An 11-year-old schoolgirl vanishes just after she gets off her afternoon school bus.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: North Carolina police are desperately searching for a missing 11-year-old girl who vanishes after getting off the school bus.
According to police, the bus driver saw Emily Dowdle get off the bus and walk toward her home. K9 units and investigators were on the scene
searching for clues throughout the night.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A rich kid high on weed and Xanax mows four people down dead, a fifth paralyzed for life, gets straight probation. Then he and his mommy
skip to Mexico, living it up at a resort, blowing $2,000 on strip clubs. Affluenza mom on house arrest, while affluenza teen in solitary. Breaking
news right now. Is affluenza teen Ethan Couch set to walk free? What?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s the kid who killed four people when he was 16, driving drunk. His attorney claimed he was influenced by "affluenza."
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The night of the accident, he not only had three times the legal limit of alcohol in his blood, but Valium, as well.
911 OPERATOR: Listen to me. Is it just one vehicle?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, ma`am, there`s four or five. There`s another child (ph) in the ditch! (ph) (INAUDIBLE)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A gorgeous young 30-year-old vanishes jogging near her own home. But in a shocking twist, her retired firefighter dad, searching with
police, looking for his daughter, is the one to find her body, evidence she was both sex assaulted and strangled in broad daylight. Journal entries
seem to predict her own murder.
At first, it was thought this may be the man who brutally murdered jogger Karina Vetrano, police releasing this sketch. The murdered jogger`s final
moments caught on surveillance obtained by "Crime Watch Daily," capturing Vetrano on her daily run just before she is brutally murdered.
But breaking tonight, police corner a man unclothed in the densely wooded area just feet where Karina is found murdered. Is this the crack in the
case police have been hoping for?
Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us.
Bombshell tonight. A little 11-year-old schoolgirl has vanished just after she gets off her afternoon school bus. She went to school as normal. She
got back on the bus to come back home as normal.
This is in a very rural area where the school bus lets the children off near their home, not at a school bus like a quarter of a mile down the
road, but practically at the door. All she had to do was walk from the school bus around to the back of her house, which was her usual pattern. I
guess there must have been a key somewhere in the back of that house, maybe under a potted plant, maybe under the doormat.
The bus driver of the school bus sees her get off the bus, walk toward the back of the house like she always does. Her stepmother gets home just 15
minutes later, and this little 11-year-old girl has vanished. Where is Emily Dowdle?
Straight out to Dave Priest, morning show host, WRNN. Dave, let`s take it at the beginning. What do we know?
DAVE PRIEST, WRNN (via telephone): Well, as you described, it`s very common here in the Carolinas for school buses to go pretty much right to
the front door of individual students when they drop them off or even pick them up for school.
So when the school bus driver dropped off little Emily yesterday afternoon, very common, very normal for her to get off the bus, walk around to the
back of her house. And that`s the last that the school bus driver saw and the last that anybody`s seen of Emily because 15 minutes later, mom comes
home, stepmother comes home, can`t find Emily. She searches around for about 30, maybe 40 minutes, and by 3:30, she makes the 911 call and says
that her stepdaughter, Emily, is missing.
GRACE: This little girl is just five feet tall, long, light brown hair, hazel eyes. She wears black-framed glasses, which she had on that day.
The day she goes missing, she`s wearing a pink shirt and capri jeans. Take a look at 11-year-old Emily, disappearing literally from her own yard.
[20:05:06]Now, let me understand something, Dave Priest, WRNN. The stepmother comes home. She says she looks for the girl for about 40
minutes, realizes she can`t find her, and calls 911. Where had the stepmother been?
PRIEST: Well, the stepmother normally comes home from work at about that time. She normally gets home at about 10 minutes after, maybe about 2:50,
from what we understand, but she maybe had to make another step on the way home, so she was delayed by about five minutes. So instead of coming home
at 2:50, she got home at about 2:55. So it was pretty much normal operations until she went missing.
GRACE: Just a quarter of a mile from the school. In 15 minutes, this little girl is gone. So that was her, the stepmother`s, normal schedule,
correct, Dave Priest?
PRIEST: From what I understand, that was the normal schedule, and the school bus drivers knew it. And she just must have been one of the
millions of latchkey kids that are still out there.
GRACE: You know, 15 minutes is not much of a latchkey, but you`re right, a lot of children get home before their parents do.
And just thinking this through, someone must have known this child`s schedule, to know that she gets there at this time, and I guess it was
about 2:30, 2:50, and then that the stepmom gets home from work about 15, 20 minutes later.
I mean, there were many days -- as you know, Dave, we`ve talked before, my dad worked a swing shift. Some days, he was home when I got home, some
days he wasn`t. Most of the time, he had to work the night shift. And we would be there, you know, for a couple of hours before my mom would get
home from work. Anybody could have known that.
So who would have known that? Apparently -- to Michael Christian, also on the story -- the school bus driver didn`t notice anything unusual, like an
unusual car parked in the street, the front door hanging wide open, or he would have said so. And not only that, the stepmother got there 15 minutes
later, and there was no sign of anything unusual, right?
MICHAEL CHRISTIAN, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Yes, that`s right, Nancy. We know that this little girl, little Emily, lived in that house with her
father and her stepmother, just the three of them. And police say nobody else was home at the time that Emily was dropped off by that school bus.
GRACE: You`re seeing the scene right there. And let me tell you, there are literally hundreds of people that have converged there trying to find
this girl. They`ve called out K9 units, and they`ve got a grid search. They`ve been out all night long looking everywhere for this 11-year-old
girl, just walking home from the school bus stop. And listen to this. She was let off practically at her driveway. Very rural area, very low crime.
But hold on. Justin, can you pull up the number of registered sex offenders in a very small area, very small area to have a surprising number
of sex registered -- registered sex offenders. Look, 77 of them within just 11 miles away from her school and her home, just 11 miles away. Look.
Look at the yellow -- the yellow dot. OK, that`s her school, Emily`s school. Her home is only a quarter of a mile from that. Look how close
all of these sex offenders are to where this little girl is let off and walks alone into her home. Let`s just hold that thought for a moment.
And Dave Priest, morning show host, WRNN, if you look at the family`s home, you see it`s very wooded beyond the clearing where the home is. Let`s see
a shot of that, if you don`t mind, Justin. I want to see her home. If you look into the distance, you see they got their yard all cleared off nicely,
but beyond that, very densely wooded, Dave Priest.
PRIEST: Well, like you said, it`s a rural area, not too far away from Charlotte, only about 40 miles. But between Charlotte and the mountains,
there`s not a whole lot. There`s a lot of towns. Catawba`s a nice town, but at the same time, like you said, a lot of fields, a lot of wooded
areas, a lot of homes that are very isolated.
GRACE: Let`s bring on some pros. Marc Klaas, president, founder of Klaas Kids Foundation, and Harry Oakes, search coordinator with the International
K9 Search and Rescue.
OK, Marc, weigh in. We need you.
MARC KLAAS, KLAAS KIDS FOUNDATION (via telephone): Well, first of all, Nancy, you referenced this a couple of times. You know, one third of all
attempted child abductions occur on school routes. The reason for that is because of established patterns. Anybody that`s watching for a particular
child will know when the child`s going to be there, what the child is going to do, and how the child is going to do it.
[20:10:00]So it makes all children very, very vulnerable, whether they`re let off in front of their house or if they have to walk a certain distance
to the house.
Another thing that certainly comes to my mind is the interview with the bus driver. Obviously, the bus driver is the last person to have seen this
little girl. And I guess the question has to be asked, were there other children on the bus when he dropped her off, or was she the last child?
So I think that, you know, we have to answer those questions. We have to look very, very hard at the registered sex offenders in the area because
easily, the answer to this mystery could lie there.
GRACE: Yes, I want to see that sex offender map again, if you don`t mind, Justin, because I mean, you`ve got sex offenders practically living right
on top of their home. That`s the school, and the home is a quarter mile away from the school, closer to the nearest sex offender, registered sex
offender.
That is a shocking statistic, Marc Klaas, that one third of child kidnaps occur in relation to a school route, going to school, coming home from
school, walking to school, getting off the school bus, being let out in front of the school -- one third of child kidnaps.
I ant to go to Harry Oakes, search coordinator wit the International K9 Search and Rescue. Harry, thank you for being with us. What will the dogs
be looking for? Because overnight, authorities used bloodhounds to conduct a grid search. What does that mean?
HARRY OAKES, SEARCH COORDINATOR, INTERNATIONAL K9 SEARCH AND RESCUE (via telephone): Well, normally, a grid search is used with ground personnel to
rule out areas of probability and look for evidence such as hair, blood, clothing, things like that. Bloodhound is a tracking/trailing dog. It
does air scent, mostly track and trail. And to use it in a grid search doesn`t make sense at all. I would never do that with a search dog.
GRACE: Why are you saying a grid search doesn`t make sense with a search dog?
OAKES: Not in that kind of a situation. I would certainly bring in a tracking -- first thing I would do is bring in a forensic dog to the house
to see if there was any foul play done. A dog can detect whether a person has been injured or killed inside the house and somebody`s trying to cover
that up, or if the individual left on their own accord.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[20:15:58]UNIDENTIFIED MALE: An 11-year-old girl gets off her school bus and vanishes. Emily Dowdle was last seen by her school bus driver around
2:40 PM and was headed to her home on Hudson Chapel Road. Sheriff`s deputies, the FBI and the SBI all searching for clues throughout the night
with bloodhounds.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: OK, I`m checking in again just to make sure I understand the timeline. Correct me if I`m wrong, Dave Priest, WRNN. Everybody, we`re
talking about an 11-year-old little girl who is gone. She`s missing. She got off the school bus. The school bus driver saw her get off the bus.
It`s a rural area, so they let you off practically at your doorstep.
Now, you were asking earlier -- I think Marc Klaas was, of Klaas Kids Foundation -- was she the last one getting off? That doesn`t make sense to
me, Marc. And you can correct me, as well, please, but if you look at the map, she`s only a quarter of a mile away from the school. So it doesn`t
make sense to me that she would have been the last one getting off the bus, unless they go completely bass-ackwards to get to her home.
Dave Priest, WRNN, she gets off the school bus at 2:40 PM. The bus driver sees her get off and walk to the back of her home. That`s normal,
according to police. When her stepmother gets home 15 minutes later, she can`t find her, she searches.
A neighbor is stating, a Mr. Wilson (ph), that the stepmother shows up at his door crying, saying, My daughter is missing, my daughter is missing.
They contacted the district and reported Emily was not at home and that she was missing. That`s the Catawba school system. And they reached out to
see if any of the other families know anything.
Now, overnight, we know officers used K9s, doing a grid search to try to find her, but came up empty. FBI agents are at the home on Hudson Chapel
Road, and they`re speaking with the parents and taking photographs of the home and an RV.
Dave Priest, this is what I want to know. Do we have any evidence she ever went in the home?
PRIEST: Not that I`m aware of, not that I`ve seen on any of the broadcast or media reports. As you said, the last thing that we know is that she was
dropped off by the bus at about 2:30 or 2:40. The mom called 911 about an hour later, about 3:30, as you said, showed up at the neighbor`s house.
But I haven`t seen any of the reports come out from what the Catawba County sheriff`s department or the police department or the FBI or SBI have found.
GRACE: Why are they looking in the RV? What is it about this RV that was parked on the lot has gotten their interest, has generated their curiosity?
We also know this 11-year-old girl has no cell phone, money or credit cards with her. Roadblocks were set up around the time of her disappearance.
Drivers were asked if they saw anything suspicious.
Dave Priest, WRNN, what can you tell me about the roadblocks and what does that signify? That says she may be in somebody`s car.
PRIEST: That`s very possible. They were setting up roadblocks, but they also set up the investigative roadblocks this afternoon, as well, between
2:00 and 4:00, right about the same time that she would have been getting off the bus yesterday, because they figure that most people have repeating
patterns from day to day, especially going back and forth to school. So they wanted to stop drivers to find out if they had seen anything on
Tuesday when they talked to them today during the exact same time. I haven`t heard if they`ve gotten anything good or usable from any of the
roadblocks yet.
GRACE: Hold that picture, please, for me. This is the road, the route the school bus took. Now, this is the way the little girl would come home.
Look off to the right. Look off to the left. Look at that density wooded forest. Check it out.
[20:20:02]There have been bloodhounds out there all night long. You see over on the left, the little girl`s home. There it is in the opposite
direction. And you see the RV parked outside. Why are they interested in that RV? What, if anything, have they found in it?
I want to go back to Harry Oakes, search coordinator, International K9 Search and Rescue. Harry, how would K9s be able to tell if foul play had
happened inside the home?
OAKES: When a human is walking around in a normal sense, they`re going to give off 100,000 pieces of scent per minute called (INAUDIBLE) This is just
a routine scent, and the dogs are going to react by just being happy. When they get in there, they`re going to smell the person. Their tails are
going to be wagging. Their ears are going to be up.
In a person is attacked or has injured themselves or has been injured by somebody, they`re going to give off what`s called a fear scent or
adrenaline sent. The dog`s going to react differently, with its ears halfway down, tail halfway down, and they`re going to stare.
If a person has been murdered or has died and if their body has been moved, where they died, they stain the ground with what`s called a death scent.
And the dogs do not like death. They do not like the smell of death. They`re going to get upset. Their ears are going to go down. Their tails
are going to go down.
By watching the dog`s body language, we can detect in a house or in a vehicle or even on equipment that`s been used to help bury somebody, such
as rope or shovels, backhoes, things like that, what was used to transport this person and what vehicle -- what the suspect may have been wearing.
We`ve been able to identify boots that were worn by suspects because they transferred the death scent on the bottom of their boots, and so forth.
So that`s how we can detect inside of a house or a vehicle whether a person has been transported alive, dead or injured.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
[20:26:14]UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Authorities are searching for an 11-year-old girl who gets off the school bus and is never seen again. Police say
Emily`s mom arrived at the home 15 minutes later and could not find her daughter.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Look at this girl. She`s just 11 years old. Marc Klaas, you know the twins are about to turn 9, believe it or not. She`s just two years
older than Lucy and John David, just two years! She`s a little bitty thing, Marc.
KLAAS: She is, Nancy. And listen, here`s what has to happen. This was not a random crime. Somebody knew what they were doing. Once the parents
and the bus driver are excluded, law enforcement is going to have to look very closely at neighbors, at things like the mailman or the utility
individual. They`re going to have to look at the registered sex offenders within that community because I guarantee it, the answer to this mystery is
closer, rather than farther away.
GRACE: You`re absolutely -- you`re right, Marc. You`re right. And another thing, Harry Oakes, search coordinator with the International K9
Search and Rescue, they had to go somewhere. I mean, the dogs had to follow her scent somewhere because if she gets off the bus and walks toward
her back door, well, where did she go from there? I mean, we don`t have any answers. Why?
OAKES: Well, again, I`m not involved in this search in particular, so I can`t answer that question. But it would make sense to me that if you
bring in a good tracking dog, they`re going to be able to determine whether she went to the back door and then went from there to somebody else`s house
or if she got into a vehicle of after that, you know, went around the house and got into a vehicle and left the scene, if she walked to another
person`s house or into the woods to go play. Who knows?
GRACE: You know, I want to see that shot of the woods again, if you don`t mind, Justin, because did someone lure her into the woods? There`s not
enough -- there`s not enough homes on the street for there to be people going in and out. She could have been put in a car in two minutes and be
gone. Be gone, Dave Priest, WRNN.
PRIEST: I`m sorry, what was that?
GRACE: She could be in a car and be long gone in the 15 minutes it took for the mother to get home, the stepmother, and then she looked for the
girl for 40 minutes. I mean, when you look at this long stretch of road -- go back to that last picture, if you could -- because you see how far it
is. You can`t even see the next house. There wasn`t anybody driving by. Nobody saw anything.
She could be -- I mean, whoever has her had at least an hour lead time, actually more, because by the time she calls police, they come to the
scene, time is passing. I mean, they`ve got a good head start.
PRIEST: Could have been anywhere, with the rural county that Catawba County is, like you said, and the way that the houses are separated by so
much wooded area, so much distance, you just never know. And it`s really hard to see that far away, obviously. So anybody could have done anything,
and like you said, with an hour`s head start, she could be anywhere.
GRACE: And really, Marc Klaas, more than an hour because once the mom makes the call, then the cops get there, they may start searching the area.
I don`t know how long it was before they put up a roadblock. I don`t know where the tolls are. I don`t know where there are cameras on the highways
or what`s the closest interstate.
I`m very curious -- hold on, Marc. Dave Priest, is there a body of water nearby?
PRIEST: Not that I`ve seen, that there`s anything that close nearby. But again, in an area like this, there are a lot of ponds on people`s
individual property. So there could be something very close.
[20:30:00] GRACE: Okay, Marc Klaas, what do we do now?
KLAAS: Well, I`ll tell you what has to happen is parents have to buy their 11-year-old daughters cell phones, for goodness sake, and we need to set up
surveillance areas in and around school routes. We could -- we could cut abduction by a third if we just had better surveillance around school
routes, whether it be high tech or whether it be low tech.
We have this information, we can use this information. As far as this little girl goes, I have no doubt that they will find her. They`ve taken
out all the stops, the FBI is involved. They know more than anybody about these kinds of situations. So it`s just a matter of figuring out and hoping
we can get her back alive.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(START VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A 16-year-old who was driving three times over the legal limit for an adult when he killed four strangers. This video allegedly had
been 18-year-old Couch playing beer pong was posted to Twitter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Texas authority say the Couches were looking at a lifetime on the run.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Driving three times over the legal limit for an adult.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Four lives lost, many others changed forever.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A rich kid high on weed and Xanax. When I say rich, I mean rich. Mows four people down, dead. A fifth victim is paralyzed for life. And to
top it all off, he gets straight probation. Then he and his mother skipped town and go to Mexico living it up at a resort, blowing $2,000 alone on
strip clubs. Then the mom on house arrest, while affluenza teen in solitary gets a job at a bar.
Breaking news right now is affluenza teen Ethan Couch actually set to walk free. How is that happening? How can you kill four people and leave a fifth
paralyzed for life, trapped in their body, and you walk out of jail? What alternate universe is this happening? Robyn Walensky, senior news anchor,
Blaze Network. Robyn, why is Ethan Couch set to walk free? How long has he been behind bars, two weeks?
ROBYN WALENSKY, SENIOR NEWS ANCHOR, THE BLAZE RADIO NETWORK: Not long enough. And the reason -- well, he has some very tricky lawyers who are
saying that the criminal judge who sends him to four 180-day terms, so that`s almost two years, they`re saying, well, you know what? This should
be a civil matter, he was only 16 at the time and.
GRACE: Whoa, whoa, Robyn, Robyn, wait, wait. Look at this. Look, did you see that mangled car? There was a semi involved. Look at that. Who could
survive that? Oh, Robyn, hold on, hold on. I don`t want to hear about tricky maneuvering in court. What happened the night of the crash?
WALENSKY: He was drunk, went out, bought beers, and killed all these people. He lost control of the truck that he was in, and he belongs in
prison for life.
GRACE: Unleash the lawyers. Robin Ficker, Maryland, Rene Sandler, Atlanta. Okay, Robin Ficker, as I recall, he`s having a party at his parent`s other
home -- oh, there he is playing beer pong. Beer pong after -- Ficker, are you looking at your screen? Rene, don`t -- I don`t want to look back at you
and catch you smiling, okay? Did you see that?
RENE SANDLER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I saw it.
GRACE: That`s after he`s killed the people and left one paralyzed. Could you play that again? Can you hear them in the background?
(START VIDEO CLIP)
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Ficker, that is so offensive to me as a crime victim. To see him laughing and whooping it up and cackling, playing beer pong, after he has
gone and gotten drunk and high at his parent`s second home. And here he is, playing beer pong after he kills these people and paralyzes another. And
now through some slick maneuvering in court, he`s going to walk free?
[20:40:00] ROBIN FICKER, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I`m looking at the picture that you are, and what I`m seeing is, is a lack of due process here. He was
sentenced as a juvenile. He was not charged as an adult. So now later, without a waiver hearing, they`re trying to sentence him as an adult, when
he`s already been sentenced. Lack of due process, he walks.
GRACE: You know what I just heard? Blah, blah, blah. It doesn`t even make any sense to me. Okay, Sandler, jump in.
SANDLER: He`s right. You can`t.
GRACE: Says you.
SANDLER: . have a second bite, Nancy. The prosecution messed it up from the beginning, they should have charged him as an adult. They can`t get a do-
over. You don`t circumvent the system.
GRACE: I don`t see this as a do-over. Stacey Newman, what is it exactly the defense is trying to do?
STACEY NEWMAN, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Well, they`re saying exactly what the defense on this show is trying to do. They`re saying when he was sentenced,
he was a juvenile. So this case should have never been in the adult court, which is where the new judge sentenced him to 720 days in jail.
GRAC: Wait -- wait -- wait, no, that`s because he skipped town.
NEWMAN: Exactly. On top of that.
GRACE: This isn`t a do-over. Okay, I`m just going to put it out, I`m saying it, okay? Ficker and Sandler, that was an outright lie. I am saying it!
This guy got time, more time, because he jumped bail and went down to a five-star resort with his mommy and spent $2,000 at strip clubs. He was on
the lam. That`s where he got time, am I right, Stacey?
NEWMAN: Exactly. He wouldn`t have been in this position in the first place if him and his mother didn`t skip town when he was supposed to be meeting
with his probation officer. He was nowhere to be found. They had bailed.
[20:45:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(START VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He`s the kid who killed four people when he was 16, driving drunk. His attorney claimed he was influenced by affluenza.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The night of the accident, he not only had three times the legal limit of alcohol in his blood but Valium as well.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Listen to me. It it just one vehicle?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, there were four or five. There`s another child in the ditch. They`re gone!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Another child in the ditch. And then this guy, and all of his drunk buddies, take off. Look at this. Look at this. And now he is going to walk
free. And the icing on the cake, let`s see, oh, dear Lord, nobody can survive that.
The bill, the bill -- now, remember, his defense, Robyn Walensky, hold on, please. His defense was he was too rich and affluent to understand
consequences of real life. But yet look at this, what I pay. My mother is 87 years old. She`s still teaching piano. And she paid this. We the
taxpayers pay $200,000 for him and his rich family paid $11,000 for his costly rehab. What about that, Robyn?
WALENSKY: The family crying poverty, and we the taxpayers here in Texas are getting stuck with the bill. It`s absolutely outrageous.
GRACE: But the whole defense, Stacey, was he was too rich to understand what us common people are like. He didn`t understand the consequences of
his acts, because he had been sheltered in his rich mansion and their -- their second home, and all of that. That was his defense.
But then, we are ending up paying for everything. Where is Stacey? Stacey, my mother, the piano player in her 80s, teaching piano, paying taxes, she
had to pay for it, Stacey. That`s not right.
WALENSKY: Well, that defense worked through because he got straight probation. But wait for this, the mother, she also now wants us, the
taxpayers, to pay for her defense when she got arrested running off with her son to Mexico.
GRACE: Wait, wait, why do I have to pay for her, too?
WALENSKY: She now says that she has no money.
GRACE: Isn`t she working at like the Honky Tonk Woman Bar, isn`t that the name of it? Or she moved from there?
WALENSKY: Well, she was working at that bar, but apparently we`re hearing because of the publicity of this case, they couldn`t keep her on the job.
GRACE: Wait, wait, why is that my fault? Why is that our fault about the publicity of the case? And again, I`m still not sure why -- forget about
the money, that hurts me to say that, but why Stacey is he set to walk free? Tell me that.
WALENSKY: Well, it goes back to the juvenile court versus adult court and the attorneys are saying he was put on probation, that was his sentence,
from juvenile court. Now that he`s back here, they can`t just switch the case to adult court, and the judge, who sentenced him to 720 days in jail,
should not have jurisdiction over this case and shouldn`t be in adult court.
GRACE: And joining me right now is Caryn Stark, psychologist, out of New York. Caryn, do you know that now he is threatening from behind bars to sue
the judge? Sue the judge! What world is he and his family living in, to sue the judge?
CARYN STARK, PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, it just shows you, Nancy, that nothing has really changed. This guy really doesn`t understand consequences and feels
very entitled. And when you say something like that, what you`re saying is not the fact that he has so much money. He doesn`t understand consequences
because he`s a sociopath. He`s a psychopath. He doesn`t understand. He doesn`t have guilt.
And it really makes me think of Casey Anthony. There`s that sense of I`m going to go out and party. I don`t feel this fear that people are missing,
my child is missing, or I killed people. And then they get off scot-free.
[20:50:00] GRACE: Every mugshot I see of him, he looks high. Every -- right there, look at his eyes. His pupils are just pin points. And the other one
he looks stoned. Now, she had him all dressed up looking like a kid going to court. I bet he didn`t look like that in a strip club down in Mexico.
You know, another thing, Caryn Stark, forgive me, I`m just a trial lawyer, but you said he seems to be a psychopath. Is that genetic? Because the
mother is the one that -- his own mother helped him skip town.
STARK: It`s a combination, Nancy. Nobody can ever prove whether it`s genetic or environmental. So it seems to be you just need the right recipe
of the wrong environment and the genetic influence.
GRACE: Listen to this.
(START VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Listen to me. Is it just one vehicle?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, there were four or five. There`s another child in the ditch. They`re gone!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many people need EMS?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Ma`am, I`m telling you it`s dark. There`s four or five kids. There`s kids laying in ditches and street.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come with me, come here. Come here. Come here. Come here.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Oh, my God.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Come here. I need you to sit here and I need you guys to pray, okay?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Dr. Michelle Dupre is joining me, forensic pathologist joining us from Columbia tonight. Dr. Dupre, thank you for being with us. Question,
at the time of this deadly crash, his blood-alcohol was over three times the legal limit. When he was finally found and tested. What does that mean
and how would that have affected his driving?
MICHELLE DUPRE, FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST: Nancy, he would be significantly impaired. As you know, alcohol is a CNS depressant. So it depresses our
functions in our body, our brain activity. Judgment would be impaired. Certainly reflexes would be impaired. He would maybe even become drowsy, on
the verge of comatose possibly.
When you mix that with something like Valium, that is an additive. It becomes synergistic, so it works together, and the effects are much more
exaggerated.
[20:55:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(START VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The beautiful young jogger, brutally murdered as she went on her daily run.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We found her face down in the ground.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Cops find a man running around, deranged, and naked in the same area.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I said I don`t think it`s a good idea to go in there. She said, it`s okay, daddy.
GRACE: To Chris Spargo, DailyMail.com. Chris, this guy, unclothed, is found just feet away in the woods from where Vetrano was found murdered. Why is
he there, back at the scene of the crime, naked?
CHRIS SPARGO, REPORTER, DAILYMAIL.COM: That is correct. This man rather was ranting and raving around 10 p.m. apparently, high on drugs, screaming out
at night, and no one is sure exactly why he was at this exact area.
GRACE: You know, I always say there are no coincidences in criminal law. Guys, this is from CrimeWatchDaily.com and this captures Karina Vetrano`s
last moment in life. She has got her ear buds in her ear. She didn`t hear what was happening. Caryn Stark, why -- right now, we don`t know if this
guy is connected to Vetrano`s murder, but Caryn Stark, why is it criminals always come back to the scene of the crime?
STARK: They`re compelled to do it, Nancy. It`s an obsession. You know, they get very excited if they`re back in the place where it actually happened.
And they`re drawn there. They want the attention. They want to see what`s happening.
GRACE: Robin Ficker and Rene Sandler, weigh in, Sandler.
SANDLER: First of all, you`ve already tried and convicted somebody who just happened to be near the scene.
GRACE: I don`t know what you`re saying. I just said we don`t know if he`s connected to the murder, Ficker.
SANDLER: Come on, Nancy.
FICKER: He -- this is.
GRACE: That`s your argument, come on, Nancy? Okay.
SANDLER: Yes, come on, Nancy.
GRACE: You go, Ficker.
FICKER: This is a random sun worshiper. They`re trying to figure.
GRACE: A random naked man a few feet away where she was murdered.
FICKER: This -- this trail has been cold for over a month in this case, so they`re really stretching out to find someone. And in this case, he`s not
guilty. He didn`t do a thing.
GRACE: He needs to be taken into custody, Sandler and Ficker, for being out in the public naked. Unless you want to take him home tonight and let him
dance around naked in your backyard.
Let`s stop and remember American hero, army staff sergeant Scottie Bright. He`s 36. Montgomery, Alabama. Bronze star, purple heart, loved mentoring
younger troops and raising his team. Mother Blanch, brother Willie, widow Carolyn. Daughter Breshea and son Scottie Jr. Scottie Bright, American
hero.
Special tonight, our superstar intern, Chicago friend, Jackie. Isn`t she beautiful? Icon Nu-Way Weiners and Terminal Station celebrate 100 years in
my hometown of Macon. September 29, columnist, Ed Grisamore, signing copies of new book, There is More Than One Way to Spell Wiener.
I`m going to be there. Thank you for being with us, everyone. Nancy Grace signing off. I`ll see you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp eastern. Until then,
good night, friend.
[21:00:00]
END
