Found Deceased FL - Madeline Soto, 13, Missing Child Alert, 13500 blk Town Loop Blvd, Orlando, 26 Feb 2024 *arrest* #10

[ttjo]

[bolded by me]
That's what it looks like to me. I couldn't find earlier record of them finding that Holiday Inn garage footage.... It's possible they even told the public (in that press conference) before that footage was found.

I wonder if the thinking (re: confidence she was dead) was: we know SS is the guy, and it's not like he's holding her somewhere, alive, so she must be dead. Otherwise, the complex parking lot footage must be pretty obvious that the female passenger is dead and is MS.

I can't wrap my head around how he got her to the car though. He had to carry her downstairs and to his car--how far does he park from the door? There has been some discussion about time of death, and the later that was the later would have been putting her body in the car. Daylight starts at, say, 5:30 maybe, and people would be sporadically moving around a busy parking lot by 6:30 or so?

youre right about the hotel footage, but getting her to the car, I dont think he had many choices and was probably freaking out. I wouldnt be surprised if he simply carried her out, and even if he carried her in the dark at that time, what are the odds someone saw that. Their unit faces towards the unit across from them , parking is to the left outside their door. I'll find a pic. They also live along the trees, so have few units with visibility. As well the roommate leaves by 745?
they have no street views for their complex.

 

[LoveyG]

To public knowledge, JS is first informed of the CSAM found on SS's devices during an interview on 2028-02-28 (pg. 94), and then they paused the interview and waited for Kissimmee PD to arrive, and Kissimmee PD continued the interview and showed more explicit photos that included MS's face (pg. 341).

For those of y'all who think JS was aware of the sexual abuse and/or the murder before LE informed her, when do you think she knew? What do you think her role in everything might have been? Do you think she participated in the murder or cover up? Do you think she participated beyond awareness and parroting SS's lies? What kind of evidence do you think could implicate her?

Curious what everyone's hypothesis is right now.

IMO, willful ignorance.

 

[photoprose1122]

She was seen in the same position in later videos so likely deceased early that morning (due to all the rigor facts as we know them).

Pg 58: At 0819 hours, the Lincoln sedan appears at the front gate where the driver, Stems, interacted with a security guard before being allowed to enter the gate atthe front of the complex. Additional video collected from near the rental office, which captured the roundabout, showed the female, believed to be Maddie, in the same position as the previous video at 0736 hours. At 0831 hours the silver Lincoln exited the back gate, the video captured the female still in the same position as the other videos, still in the front passenger seat.

I'm not 100% convinced. Rigor will contract the muscles of your face making it look like you're grimacing. I'd think LE would know the difference between a rigor grimace and an agap mouth (ajar in their words).

Muscle relaxation immediately after death with opening of the eyes and mouth and subsequent fixation in rigor mortis often occurs after death, giving the face the appearance of grimacing.

rigor mortis begins to appear in the muscles of the eyelids and the jaw (at the earliest, approximately 20 min postmortem); the jaw tightens due to stiffening of the masticatory muscles. (Gemmie's note - I still can't find any info on what contracting, or stiffing, of mouth and jaw muscles looks like. I just know what my mouth is like when I'm stressed and it tightens. And it's not open)

Muscle contraction is not uniform throughout the body but begins in the muscles of the jaw and face, spreads to the trunk, then the lower limbs and lastly the upper limbs. Contractions are sustained and strong.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/rigor-mortis

I'm thinking both were fairly close to death, and that rigor hadn't started in on the face yet? It can take up to a couple of hours to start.

I think we’re beating a dead horse. I think the prevailing point was that the mouth would not be a reliable indicator of rigor/absence of rigor.

 

[ttjo]

IMO, willful ignorance.

I know I flip from her not knowing to willful ignorance. I think she is not very alert, or astute, and very preoccupied with her own stuff so... ( I'm trying to be nice)

 

[ttjo]

I think we’re beating a dead horse. I think the prevailing point was that the mouth would not be a reliable indicator of rigor/absence of rigor.

The horse is now a purse, shoes, and a drum.

 

[Ladyotm]

yes, you are correct. JS never asked if she was seen being dropped off. but yet JS proclaimed to the media 'she was seen on the video'. as if she saw it herself. Hannah McK asked her do you have it have you seen it, the answer was NO, her sister was at the 'scene' as she called it and LE told her what they saw and then mumbles no one has seen it ( her, her family). but JS delivers that info as if it was fact it was Madeline.

I think this is because the officer who informed Maddie's aunt about the church video said it in a way that made it seem like it was her. IIRC, he said something along the lines of, you can see her walking" and then when the aunt asks a question he says it was grainy. He himself thought it was Maddie and didn't express doubt in that moment. This opinion is based on the video of the cops talking to her aunt after viewing the church video

 

[Ladyotm]

I feel sort of inconclusive on JS still. Since LE has not named JS has a POI or suspect or anything, and the only charges right now are against SS, the information that is public is obviously directed at the investigation of SS, so I don't feel like we know all that much about JS, really. I think I'm more skeptical of statement and body language analysis than the general consensus of WS users, so certain things that have been red flags for a lot of folks with JS ("we" dropped her off, referring to MS in the past tense, etc.), haven't bothered me as much. I'm leaning toward, right now, there is no significant evidence (known or unknown) that JS was criminally involved in the murder of MS or the attempted cover up.

I feel a bit more confident about my general theory of the case. That is built primarily on the big doc dump because that is what I read most recently and there is a lot in there, less so on the early interviews and press conferences which I haven't watched since they happened, some general absorption of what has been shared here, and not at all on other videos/reporting (like from Court TV or Gray Hughes) because I just don't like watching videos.

Pure speculation alert...
My leading hypothesis: I actually don't think SS is a pedophile. From what we know or have heard about his other preferences and habits, I think he is more of a generic deviant--I don't want to go too deep into this area because it's more just a feeling I have, but there is a path wherein people addicted to p-rnography get numb to "normal" stuff and seek things that are increasingly extreme and end up with CSAM, and I think something similar may be the case for SS. That was more than I wanted to say on that but I think it's relevant because I don't think that MS was going to age out of SS's preferences, as could happen when a pedophile's victim goes through puberty.

I don't think MS told anyone about her abuse. It's not unusual for victims of CSA to not tell anyone or to care for their abusers, which it seems like she did. I couldn't guess how she thought about it or internalized it, but to me it seems like no one in her life had any inkling. Maybe JS had an inkling, I don't know. Maybe if she didn't, she should have. I don't think MS told her, and I definitely don't think SS thought JS knew.

In this hypothesis, SS was at a lot of points lucky and a lot of points brazen. I think he intended to assault/abuse MS on the first night he was back in town, and because he hadn't been around as much in the prior few months,I d something somehow was different and went wrong--maybe MS pushed back--and he regained "control" of the situation by killing her. He then scrambled for how to cover it up, and landed on her going missing some time after he drops her off at school, which included the absurd idea of putting her body in the front seat of his car.

I don't think he ever really assembled a full plan of what he was going to do because he was probably freaking out. I don't think he's some cold-blooded killer, I think he's a coward and killed her out of cowardice. And finally, his luck ran out and his brazen moves caught up to him because he was repeatedly caught on camera moving a dead body, his story was easily falsified, and he gave police consent to search a device he kept CSAM on.

For the JS aspect of this hypothesis, her knowing or being involved just doesn't fit.

Very well put together! And believable!

I think JS, in her gut, knew there was something wrong, but SS utilized tactics to tear that down at every turn.

His gaslighting methods as seen on his reddit lead me to believe he’s an incredibly quick story weaver who uses guilt and other manipulative tactics to turn things around fast- confusing and shaming can go a long way to controlling a narrative.

I definitely don’t believe MS turning 13 was a reason for him to do this, but perhaps was an age where she decided she was going to take no more. Jmo

I agree. She likely had fleeting thoughts of concerns or suspiciousions...couldn't quite put her finger on it AND did not want to believe it. By now, I would hope mental health professionals have reviewed all the interviews with JS and perhaps even spoke to her to be able to provide law enforcement with a correct diagnosis or medical explanation of her behavior. That should help direct them to if charges should or should it be filed against her
As for MS family, they must be faced with an incredible amount of pain, anger, sadness, regret, and self blame. SS is responsible for causing all of that.
Fly high sweet Maddie.

 

[Gemmie]

so youre saying jenn was told "they believe Maddi was deceased" BEFORE they even reviewed the footage which shows her being moved to the trunk.

It sure seems that way, doesn't it? SS putting Maddie into the trunk was on 3/1 (Pg 36) and Sheriff Mina said on 3/1 (not a direct quote: "Last night Kissammee Police Department met with Maddie's mother and they had to tell her the devastating news that even though they hadn't found Maddie, they are confident that she is dead".

So all they had when they told jenn was:
-complex parking lot footage, with her in the front seat,
-garbage bin footage which they had limited visibility of someone in front seat
( saying body was in same position, does that mean just her body because they had limited visibility of her in the garbage surveillance)
-the contents of the garbage he dumped, and the contents of his cell phone showing csam ( 1700 pics)
SS gets arrested (28th) but they dont tell Jenn about maddi being deceased till the 29th. ( they still havent reviewed the hotel footage yet)
I dont know how sure L/E needs to be to make a statement like that to jenn.

My guess? Pretty darn sure. LE doesn't like to make statements unless they are very confident that they are true. An example is the Moscow murder case. There was blood (IMO) running from the inside of the house down the outside. Yet LE called it a "red substance".

 

[ttjo]

It sure seems that way, doesn't it? SS putting Maddie into the trunk was on 3/1 (Pg 36) and Sheriff Mina said on 3/1 (not a direct quote: "Last night Kissammee Police Department met with Maddie's mother and they had to tell her the devastating news that even though they hadn't found Maddie, they are confident that she is dead".

View attachment 515006

My guess? Pretty darn sure. LE doesn't like to make statements unless they are very confident that they are true. An example is the Moscow murder case. There was blood (IMO) running from the inside of the house down the outside. Yet LE called it a "red substance".

I know they have to be so careful with what they say, I guess it's good in a way but I think it's to protect themselves from how litigious the world has become.

 

[photographer4]

[bolded by me]
That's what it looks like to me. I couldn't find earlier record of them finding that Holiday Inn garage footage.... It's possible they even told the public (in that press conference) before that footage was found.

I wonder if the thinking (re: confidence she was dead) was: we know SS is the guy, and it's not like he's holding her somewhere, alive, so she must be dead. Otherwise, the complex parking lot footage must be pretty obvious that the female passenger is dead and is MS.

I can't wrap my head around how he got her to the car though. He had to carry her downstairs and to his car--how far does he park from the door? There has been some discussion about time of death, and the later that was the later would have been putting her body in the car. Daylight starts at, say, 5:30 maybe, and people would be sporadically moving around a busy parking lot by 6:30 or so?

Well, they had footage of MS leaving the complex…. And none of her returning. That plus JS had already used past tense expression when discussing MS with police during a drive to a PC (no link so moo but it is in the massive doc Dropbox). I think it was fairly obvious that she was dead before they could even prove it really.

 

[ttjo]

Well, they had footage of MS leaving the complex…. And none of her returning. That plus JS had already used past tense expression when discussing MS with police during a drive to a PC (no link so moo but it is in the massive doc Dropbox). I think it was fairly obvious that she was dead before they could even prove it really.

No video, b/c he went to the guarded entrance and had to show his parking sticker/pass.
which still kind of bugs me, if he moved out why did he have that? Its a minor point so not going there. Anyways not sure what the guard remembers or if its included in the docs.
Im thinking they have cctv shots of him driving all over the place and she never moved.
What do police need to tell a mother they think her child is dead? DO they need solid circumstantial evidence? (like she didnt move for 1.5 hours recovered 1700 CSAM pics, and SS lied throughout his interview and the girl is still missing, is that good enough? . There were so many signs and they all pointed to SS

 

[Mack the Knife]

Well, they had footage of MS leaving the complex…. And none of her returning. That plus JS had already used past tense expression when discussing MS with police during a drive to a PC (no link so moo but it is in the massive doc Dropbox). I think it was fairly obvious that she was dead before they could even prove it really.

The alternative could be captivity somewhere. It’s far fetched, but it’s not unheard of and I think they’d want to rule out the possibility before announcing confidence that MS was dead.

I also don’t think JS referring to MS in the past tense would give LE reason to tell JS that MS is dead.

 

[ttjo]

The alternative could be captivity somewhere. It’s far fetched, but it’s not unheard of and I think they’d want to rule out the possibility before announcing confidence that MS was dead.

I also don’t think JS referring to MS in the past tense would give LE reason to tell JS that MS is dead.

he did drive somewhere in the middle of the night in Jenns truck so? never know. Forget that, the witness saw him at the recovery site ( flat tire) and then isnt there video of him throwing the tire in the dumpster too.?

 

[sunspun]

The alternative could be captivity somewhere. It’s far fetched, but it’s not unheard of and I think they’d want to rule out the possibility before announcing confidence that MS was dead.

I also don’t think JS referring to MS in the past tense would give LE reason to tell JS that MS is dead.

Considering the FACT that he had been grooming her and sexually abusing her since such a young age (I think she was SIX in the earliest photo proof?), if he had wanted to hide her away somewhere for his own "enjoyment", like in a motel room or cabin in the woods, she may very well have gone with him willingly and not even needed to be held captive. And this isn't saying anything at all negative about her either if she had. She wouldn't have known better since this was all she ever knew. And we know her home life wasn't without problems with her mom etc., so I can see her allowing something like that temporarily, thinking he was helping her escape from all that.

He would have promised her everything, all lies, of course, and she may have gone along with such a plan in her naivety. In fact, if it weren't for the video evidence LE saw where they said they could tell she was already deceased, that's what I might have expected to find out had happened. Evidence of him SAing her for years is found on his phone and she is missing, and he's the last person to be with her before she disappeared... my first thought wouldn't have been that he MURDERED her and threw her body in the woods... I would've found it easier to believe that he had her holed up in a cheap motel room somewhere, and he had convinced her that they were in love and that this was going to be her happily ever after. I don't know how a situation like that would end though, obviously could never come to any good, but she might not be able to see it like that at first anyway. It might even had ended in the same way. But there would've still been a chance that she'd survive. Not like now. I'd like to find out what really happened at the end between the two of them, but I never want to have to listen to him telling that story. So I'd rather remain in ignorance if I can avoid that. I wish there was a way to force him to never talk about her in the future in any way, never say her name, never insert her face into any of his sick sexual fantasies you know he has... she isn't his and she never was. He should never be allowed to speak her name.

 

[Gemmie]

Considering the FACT that he had been grooming her and sexually abusing her since such a young age (I think she was SIX in the earliest photo proof?),

I have not once heard that she was six. 8 is the youngest. Pg 342:

Description: Video file depicting a pre-pubescent female resembling Madeline, who would have been 8 years and 4months old

 

[sunspun]

I have not once heard that she was six. 8 is the youngest. Pg 342:

Description: Video file depicting a pre-pubescent female resembling , who would have been 8 years and 4months old

thx for that correction

 

[vls12345]

I feel sort of inconclusive on JS still. Since LE has not named JS has a POI or suspect or anything, and the only charges right now are against SS, the information that is public is obviously directed at the investigation of SS, so I don't feel like we know all that much about JS, really. I think I'm more skeptical of statement and body language analysis than the general consensus of WS users, so certain things that have been red flags for a lot of folks with JS ("we" dropped her off, referring to MS in the past tense, etc.), haven't bothered me as much. I'm leaning toward, right now, there is no significant evidence (known or unknown) that JS was criminally involved in the murder of MS or the attempted cover up.

I feel a bit more confident about my general theory of the case. That is built primarily on the big doc dump because that is what I read most recently and there is a lot in there, less so on the early interviews and press conferences which I haven't watched since they happened, some general absorption of what has been shared here, and not at all on other videos/reporting (like from Court TV or Gray Hughes) because I just don't like watching videos.

Pure speculation alert...
My leading hypothesis: I actually don't think SS is a pedophile. From what we know or have heard about his other preferences and habits, I think he is more of a generic deviant--I don't want to go too deep into this area because it's more just a feeling I have, but there is a path wherein people addicted to p-rnography get numb to "normal" stuff and seek things that are increasingly extreme and end up with CSAM, and I think something similar may be the case for SS. That was more than I wanted to say on that but I think it's relevant because I don't think that MS was going to age out of SS's preferences, as could happen when a pedophile's victim goes through puberty.

I don't think MS told anyone about her abuse. It's not unusual for victims of CSA to not tell anyone or to care for their abusers, which it seems like she did. I couldn't guess how she thought about it or internalized it, but to me it seems like no one in her life had any inkling. Maybe JS had an inkling, I don't know. Maybe if she didn't, she should have. I don't think MS told her, and I definitely don't think SS thought JS knew.

In this hypothesis, SS was at a lot of points lucky and a lot of points brazen. I think he intended to assault/abuse MS on the first night he was back in town, and because he hadn't been around as much in the prior few months,I d something somehow was different and went wrong--maybe MS pushed back--and he regained "control" of the situation by killing her. He then scrambled for how to cover it up, and landed on her going missing some time after he drops her off at school, which included the absurd idea of putting her body in the front seat of his car.

I don't think he ever really assembled a full plan of what he was going to do because he was probably freaking out. I don't think he's some cold-blooded killer, I think he's a coward and killed her out of cowardice. And finally, his luck ran out and his brazen moves caught up to him because he was repeatedly caught on camera moving a dead body, his story was easily falsified, and he gave police consent to search a device he kept CSAM on.

For the JS aspect of this hypothesis, her knowing or being involved just doesn't fit.

I agree.

I have gone back and forth from the beginning as far as whether or not JS knew Maddie was dead. After reading the big document dump, I think she didn't know about Maddie's death. And I think she was both selfish enough and gaslit enough by SS to remain ignorant of the assaults that had been going on for years. Hindsight is 20/20 and the great relationship that JS seemed to think SS and Maddie shared probably looks very, very different to her now. I think there may have been times where she might have felt suspicious but never really pursued that. Imo. I would think that she now is second-guessing every action and conversation from the moment SS entered their lives.

It has also been mentioned that Maddie may have had a close relationship with SS (grooming by a sexual predator) and a sometimes contentious one with her own mom. Maddie was a victim, had been groomed for years, but some deep instinct may have also made her resent or lash out at JS because of JS's failure to protect her from SS. That may have been an unconscious feeling feeding into that pattern.

Imo and MOO.

 

[Nattyj1991]

The alternative could be captivity somewhere. It’s far fetched, but it’s not unheard of and I think they’d want to rule out the possibility before announcing confidence that MS was dead.

I also don’t think JS referring to MS in the past tense would give LE reason to tell JS that MS is dead.

They confirmed that Samantha Murphy was dead even though they had little evidence (if any) and have yet to find her body. Or DNA for that matter. Or anything really that tells them she’s dead other than her being missing. But who knows, maybe they have reason to believe that one is dead that we don’t know about? MOO.

 

[Beekarina]

I lean more towards JS being involved and aware vs not.

There is no point in elaborating since she has not been charged with anything at this point.

 

[azure]

[bolded by me]
That's what it looks like to me. I couldn't find earlier record of them finding that Holiday Inn garage footage.... It's possible they even told the public (in that press conference) before that footage was found.

I wonder if the thinking (re: confidence she was dead) was: we know SS is the guy, and it's not like he's holding her somewhere, alive, so she must be dead. Otherwise, the complex parking lot footage must be pretty obvious that the female passenger is dead and is MS.

I can't wrap my head around how he got her to the car though. He had to carry her downstairs and to his car--how far does he park from the door? There has been some discussion about time of death, and the later that was the later would have been putting her body in the car. Daylight starts at, say, 5:30 maybe, and people would be sporadically moving around a busy parking lot by 6:30 or so?

Sunrise was at 6:53 am Feb 26th in Orlando, so first light was about ~6:23. I think by virtue of the fact that he wasn't spotted on the condo complex cameras carrying her, we have to assume he was able to do so discreetly/in darkness.