It's my opinion that SS was trying to convey that something was amiss, like hey we need help. He couldn't text that he needed help, but he could text something that made them go, Hmmm something is wrong here. They are saying now that what they saw then was troublesome/ amiss yet what he was able to say in voice mail/text feel on death ears, (so to speak). jmo idk
The thing (well, one of many) that perplexes me is that SS supposedly spoke with his sister on Thursday morning (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local...36d0aa-fb24-11e4-9ef4-1bb7ce3b3fb7_story.html) . If I was going to try to discretely send an SOS I'd definitely do it with my sister rather than an employee (not that I have any of those)...I could come up with all sorts of things that would set off alarms for her but would mean nothing to somebody holding me hostage. That said, everything I think I'd "definitely" do in a situation like this might fly out the window once I was in the situation.