Found Deceased IA - Mollie Tibbetts, 20, Poweshiek County, 19 Jul 2018 #22

[Stormy21]

I agree with your thinking. They could still charge he perpetrator with murder, but that would require a great deal of evidence. If not that, you certainly have the possibility of a kidnapping charge (if you can gather enough evidence). Further down the list you have obstruction, and certainly misleading an investigation. But if they do have a suspect, this could very easily be a waiting game, as you suggest. Suspects have unwittingly lead LE to a body in the past, and that could be the hope here.

Always nice to have eyewitness testimony to put a perp on the crime scene at least.

 

[Mr. Obvious]

No I did not say it was normal activity for a 20 year old girl. I said “it’s a possibility that a normal 20 year old girl might...”

Gforce previously wrote this:

I don’t think LE cares whether we are checking SM as long as you aren’t doing anything illegally. I think you have your head in the sand if you don’t think it’s a possibility that a normal 20 year old girl away from home for a year, whether she has a bf or not, would go on a date or two And married men have been known to ask 20 year old college girls for dates.

Can't we all just get along?????

 

[EllieGato]

My thoughts hang in the areas of confusion...

MT might or might not have been on her computer doing homework later that night, say 10-ish. Can a Snapchat be scheduled in advance to send later without you at your computer? Or other device? I'm not on SM so I would not know.

Observed running at 7:30 and again at 9:30. Two hour span for a 5k run? If someone I know took 2 hours to run 5k I might assume they had a problem while on the run.

With the ear buds, I think the hit and run theory is possible. It also makes it seem she could have been grabbed easier, not knowing it was coming. Not only could she have landed in a ditch, she could have been moved.

And the video of her in church talking about not being able to breathe, and that she prayed to God, and then ran her best time... I am thinking about an old episode of Six Feet Under where a main character died at a friend's house after a long hard run from, I believe, an aneurysm, possibly pulmonary. An aneurysm could contribute to breathing problems if a blood clot was entering the lungs. It would be interesting to know if she had bruised either leg badly in the 4-8 weeks prior. But the 2 hours between sightings on a 5k run doesn't sound right. Maybe a personal problem contributed to that. Maybe that personal problem was the demise of the situation... cutting home quickly, going to a house for help, getting picked up by a stranger, looking for water, or hiding feeling vulnerable. I hope she let a doctor check out her breathing problem in addition to the prayer.

Also, the only person I know who was murdered was followed by the perp and shot for seeing something that they really wished they hadn't seen, and certainly didn't mean to all while pumping gas.

And last, the military recently put out a warning that service members can be tracked by an enemy when wearing a device with GPS capabilities, specifically Fitbits and iwatches. I saw this in news somewhere very recently.

A lot of good insights on here.

 

[Momma2cam]

All text messages are saved... They are saved at the Switch level and there are copies of every message sent, no matter the carrier. They require a supeana to get copies, but they are often obtained for divorce court and criminal cases. This is why people get "burner" phones and air gapped laptops... There are ways to limit your digital footprint or throw people off...

I thought this, too. But when I went to find the data to support it, I came up empty. I found a lot on subpoenas and warrants to include text messages but mostly related to obtaining the physical device and retrieving them (even those deleted) from there. I wasn't successful finding much about obtaining the information without the device aside from Verizon. I hate to be the one to ask, but am genuinely curious- do you have any links?

 

[Justice101]

following.... anything new?

 

[Stormy21]

I fared detects heat.... A body would be the same temperature as the surface it was on...

Infrared detects metabolism. I remember over 90 degree (?95) on my body which is much hotter than the ground (I have an infrared camera that attaches to an Iphone). For instance I could see dogs and cats (very helpful). A dead body continues to metabolize for a long long time.

As I said I think I could see graves in the cemetery, which could have been an artifact.

 

[otto]

The only reason I would tend to think it's someone younger is the technology end of it. I'm in my 50s and I had no clue that Fitbits have GPS capability until this case, and if I was a perpetrator, I'd probably assume MT's Fitbit was a watch. Not saying that older people aren't more hip than I am, but there are many who are not knowledgeable about newer tech gadgets that are marketed to a younger generation.

I'm also thinking the abductor is someone in late twenties to early thirties, in part because of the technology angle.

 

[MsBetsy]

Good to hear you made it home safe. Every time I see any of them I just wish there was more I could do.

I don't think he's home yet, he's having his icecream. I also am anticipating his findings. Hope something useful came out of his " experiment".

 

[cshea99]

*Wasn't the ping 10 miles from where started? This is beyond her running routine and would push her well into darkness on return and route to house would be an additions 10 miles or even to her moms as that was 1 mile away from the house she left, Right? Thus, it is unlikely that she ran to the Guernsey "ping" corn field and was abducted by a person lurking in the corn. MOO

Well there are children in the corn...or was it children of the corn? Either way...twisted movie

 

[RavenCC2020]

Last time I ran the NYC marathon, I got a pop up message on my Samsung Galaxy Note (which I had been carrying in a small fanny pack the whole way) congratulating me for taking 56,000 steps or something along those lines. Apparently Samsung Galaxy Notes have a Health App which tracks your "workouts". Who knew.

ROFL! I would have freaked out hahaha! I am embarrassed to admit this but until 3 years ago I never even texted. Yes, I had the capacity to but never felt I needed to. Never even felt the need for the phone tbh but hubby liked it so he could ask me to stop and get something on my way home. No stores around us. I received my first text 3 years ago from my then 4 year old granddaughter. Yes, true story. She sent a bunch of flowers and smilies and I had no idea who it was and how it happened. My son then texted me right after and said if your little granddaughter can figure out how to text don't you think it's time her grandmother did as well. So I was shamed into it LOL

 

[First_responder]

I thought this, too. But when I went to find the data to support it, I came up empty. I found a lot on subpoenas and warrants to include text messages but mostly related to obtaining the physical device and retrieving them (even those deleted) from there. I wasn't successful finding much about obtaining the information without the device aside from Verizon. I hate to be the one to ask, but am genuinely curious- do you have any links?

I worked for Verizon for years.... I have contacts still at Verizon, AT&T, and other carriers.. They are saved...

 

[MsBetsy]

Well this is confusing. Is her mother's house not in a part of Brooklyn?

Yes, I thought it's a mile away. That can't be another town, can it?

 

[Momma2cam]

Gforce previously wrote this:

I don’t think LE cares whether we are checking SM as long as you aren’t doing anything illegally. I think you have your head in the sand if you don’t think it’s a possibility that a normal 20 year old girl away from home for a year, whether she has a bf or not, would go on a date or two And married men have been known to ask 20 year old college girls for dates.

Can't we all just get along?????

The "possibility" and "normal" is causing the debate. The way I read it was that it is possible for a typical 20 year old to be flattered by someone's attention or go on a date and that we shouldn't assume it not a possibility bc we have the "girl next door" image of her in our minds. Likewise, even if she did do something like that, it would not make her "abnormal" or any less deserving of the empathy and concern and certainly no more likely to be responsible for what happened to her. Moo.

 

[cluciano63]

We don’t know if the perp tossed the Fit Bit because he thought it was a locating device, or what...may have been scattering evidence all over to confuse the trail. Assuming it was tossed.

 

[MsBetsy]

No you said that's what normal 20 year old girls do, and it's not. A possibility? That's one thing, but normal activity for a 20 year old girl? Hardly. It's not "normal" activity for a 20 year old girl to date a married man or go out on a couple of dates when she's in a committed relationship. I strongly disagree with that sentiment. Strongly.

True that. Good for you

 

[Momma2cam]

I worked for Verizon for years.... I have contacts still at Verizon, AT&T, and other carriers.. They are saved...

My husband has worked at AT&T and currently at T-Mobile in management. I'll have to ask when he gets home... I'm almost 100% certain he personally does not have access to the information even if it does exist.

 

[Mom24]

I'm also thinking the abductor is someone in late twenties to early thirties, in part because of the technology angle.

Or someone older who has a tech background. At the risk of totally creeping myself out, when someone logs into their school account, do TA's and lecturers see that? Or perhaps other students within the class if it's homework? It was bitnet when I was in college and I know we could run a scan to see who was logged in, can students still do that?

 

[Jabarn]

It seems that you are assuming that her phone was active until she stopped moving, but that isn't necessarily how it works.

Imagine, for a moment, an abductor who understands the basic technology of a Fitbit and cellphone, and that they have to be in close range of each other for the Fitbit signal to be sent via wifi to a remote device. If the abductor disabled Mollie's phone or Fitbit at the moment she is abducted, that would provide a clear location to police regarding where she was abducted. The smart thing to do is to leave the Fitbit and phone active and in close proximity to each other, and to drive to a rural location, such as Guernsey, to un-sync or disable the devices.

The result is that police will spend days searching the Guernsey area. This is what the abductor wants police to do - to waste time and resources looking for Mollie in the wrong place. Mollie could very well be alive after leaving the Guernsey area regardless of the last signal from her Fitbit and/or cell phone. Intensive searches in Guernsey may be a complete waste of time.

Great thoughts!

I think it (what I think will be the key to solving this case - the Fitbit and iPhone pairing) will be because this small town brought in the FBI and expert techies. The hang up will be whether or not data privacy laws, and fear of breaking them, will hold these companies up, like Fitbit, and whatever running app she was using on her iPhone.

It’s maddening it could be that simple, and hard at the same time.

 

[Deleted member 228069]

Other then having been abducted and taken to a further out location I think the corn field is exactly where her body will be found. It makes sense. They are apparently plentiful around there and no one would want to risk driving around with either a girl who is fighting against you or harmed in their car. Easy way to ditch someone sad to say.

I feel LE isn't aiming in that direction. They had over 400 volunteers willing to systematically search those fields and they didn't have them do it. Those fields are vast, but with the amount of volunteers, it could have easily been accomplished.

 

[CheetosDust]

Another tidbit I have observed looking at the terrain of Brooklyn...there is a park across the road from the road that Mollie’s mom lives on. So here’s a possibility. ...someone she kind of knows picks her up saying they want to talk, Mollie says she’s on her way to her mom’s and tries to decline. Then the person suggests they go to the park and she will be left off at mom’s after they talk and then she is subdued there.