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

[otto]

Due to Casey's location I wouldn't be surprised. I figure I probably drove past it 8 times today.

The question has been corrected from "per day" to "per hour":
Would 138 people in a town of 1500, plus surrounding farm population, visit a store like Caseys each hour every day?

That would be 2-3 people in the store at any one time, with some peak and low times.

 

[Q.E.D.]

Right--but I was responding to a theory that she might have gone into the corn voluntarily, and had an incapacitating asthma attack there. For theories of that sort, we have to believe that her phone died enough earlier that it wouldn't help searchers find her, and that the ping ten miles away was just a rumor, and false. (But that raises the question of what made LE search so long there.)

Or the ping really did stop there. Maybe the phone just ran out of batteries when the vehicle was driving south at that point. Maybe the phone was still with her (and who ever picked her up). Who knows? If true, it is even possible that the fact that WC lives nearby the last was a coincidence ... the biggest, unintentional red herring there could be. Not at all probable, but possible.

 

[EmilyVan]

My conclusion is that she was likely taken by someone who knew her from her bfs house and who she had interacted with at least a few times. This person likely knew her well enough to know that she would feel better about leaving the house if she knew the dogs would be fed if she did not return. He knew her well enough to know her routine and when she would be most vulnerable. I imagine this person stalked her, which means he would have had to possess the time to do so. I would guess that he is likely a divorced father, a college student, unemployed, disabled, retired, and/or someone whose profession it is to sit around in a car and wait for something to happen (LE) (no offense).
The absence of a crime scene tells me that his attack was planned out, and that this person is meticulous and organized, and would also lead me to believe that it is probable that he older than college age.
He probably owns a gun.
I believe he probably was knocked on the door while she was doing homework. He lied and said there was something he needed help with (ie. Flat tire). She let him in for a minute. He pulled a gun. She said, ok dont shoot, let me feed the dogs and I will go with you. He follows her downstairs. She feeds dogs. He tells her to get her phone. She gets phone. They get in his vehicle, he tells her to power off the phone, and they leave.

If I was LE, I would be looking at divorced dad's who occasionally picked their kids up from daycare, who own guns, and who have large properties with multiple structures on site or second properties where they could hold someone hostage without being discovered.

This was SO interesting. Thank you for this.

Agree 100% about iCloud. I will text from (not home) then continue from home on the MacPro. All the texts are there.

Most SM is easily accessed via home or work computer with ability to post and comment (except Snap from my experience)

The idea of a 'dad' from daycare has also been mentioned prior in one or many of these threads.

A stalker is highly probable to me as well. Especially one she's met.

The idea he came to the door is so bold and brazen... but so are stalkers.

 

[thesaint]

I also wonder if they have checked the router logs from her boyfriend's house. At the very least that would give them an idea of the last time one of her devices was connected to the wifi network within the house and would, therefore, give them an idea of whether she was taken from the house or whether she disappeared during the run.

The router logs would also contain the MAC addresses of any devices that successfully logged on to the network. If this was someone who had visited the house before, they might've been given and programmed the WiFi password into their device and chances are it would automatically grab that authorized connection when in range.

Correct me if I am wrong, but we don't know for sure that the last ping came from near WCs pig farm. That is speculation, correct?

Even if we were 100% certain of the last tower the phone pinged that doesn't necessarily give a highly accurate representation of her location, especially if we don't know the locations of other cell towers in the area.

Well, the police were all over the pig farm where the ping happened at least once, maybe more than once. Possibly with search dogs. Sounds like they had very good reason to be at that very specific location--suggesting the police were working off of a narrowly-defined GPS ping and not a super-broad, several mile radius cell tower ping.

Hopefully she is being held somewhere and she is not dead. If I was LE, I would be looking at divorced dad's who occasionally picked their kids up from daycare, who own guns, and who have large properties with multiple structures on site or second properties where they could hold someone hostage without being discovered.

I was thinking maybe someone connected with her work; but who either lives and/or has a place out of state, maybe down in southern Missouri:

IA - Mollie Tibbetts, 20, Poweshiek County, 19 Jul 2018 #21

 

[Mr. Obvious]

Welcome! Thank you for the information on the accuracy of the location of the phone ping. I was just trying to look up that information.
I agree completely with your theory. Thank you for your technical expertise and for taking the time to share your thoughts on what might have happened to MT.

ETA The dogs were allowed to sleep in the bed with the homeowners at night. They were apparently kept in the basement when nobody was home because it kept them more calm.
I do have food out at all times for my dogs, but they seem to know how to pace themselves and fortunately neither has gone into a diabetic coma yet.

Hi,
I am new here. I am a technology professional and a bit of a hacker and technology forensic as well.
My thoughts are:
If they have MT's laptop and her phone was synced to a Google or an iCloud account (which nearly all phones are these days) then LE should have to all of the location information they would need to track MTs location up to the time she disappeared, especially if she was taking her phone on her runs, as many witnesses have claimed. Moreover, the back up of the phone should include all of the data files LE would need to read all of the messages that were on the phone when it was last backed up. That said, it seems that LE may be wasting time trying to obtain the Fitbit information via warrants when that same information is probably within an apple or Google account.

Browser and application use history would also be useful information to have. This would be useful in understanding MT's state of mind before the disappearance. I can't imagine she would have disappeared willingly without looking up something related to the topic of doing so.

I also wonder if they have checked the router logs from her boyfriend's house. At the very least that would give them an idea of the last time one of her devices was connected to the wifi network within the house and would, therefore, give them an idea of whether she was taken from the house or whether she disappeared during the run. Under ideal circumstances, the router data could give them browser history, password hashes, etc.

Correct me if I am wrong, but we don't know for sure that the last ping came from near WCs pig farm. That is speculation, correct?
Even if we were 100% certain of the last tower the phone pinged that doesn't necessarily give a highly accurate representation of her location, especially if we don't know the locations of other cell towers in the area.

Assuming:
-that the FBI has someone who is better at this stuff than me, and knowing that if I had MTs laptop, I would have been able to gather and analyze all of the aforementioned data within a timeframe of 1-5 days
- that RTs messaging to the public about "someone she knew took her" is strategic;
- that anyone who loves their dogs enough to hire a dogsitter for them wouldn't normally be keeping them in the basement with plenty of food and water. ( I feed my dog two times a day a rationed portion of food, because if I let him have access to unlimited amounts of food, he would eat himself into a gluttonous diabetic coma)
- that if she left her boyfriend's house after her run to walk to her mom's, she would have communicated that to her mom in some fashion.

My conclusion is that she was likely taken by someone who knew her from her bfs house and who she had interacted with at least a few times. This person likely knew her well enough to know that she would feel better about leaving the house if she knew the dogs would be fed if she did not return. He knew her well enough to know her routine and when she would be most vulnerable. I imagine this person stalked her, which means he would have had to possess the time to do so. I would guess that he is likely a divorced father, a college student, unemployed, disabled, retired, and/or someone whose profession it is to sit around in a car and wait for something to happen (LE) (no offense).
The absence of a crime scene tells me that his attack was planned out, and that this person is meticulous and organized, and would also lead me to believe that it is probable that he older than college age.
He probably owns a gun.
I believe he probably was knocked on the door while she was doing homework. He lied and said there was something he needed help with (ie. Flat tire). She let him in for a minute. He pulled a gun. She said, ok dont shoot, let me feed the dogs and I will go with you. He follows her downstairs. She feeds dogs. He tells her to get her phone. She gets phone. They get in his vehicle, he tells her to power off the phone, and they leave.

Hopefully she is being held somewhere and she is not dead. If I was LE, I would be looking at divorced dad's who occasionally picked their kids up from daycare, who own guns, and who have large properties with multiple structures on site or second properties where they could hold someone hostage without being discovered.

I believe her Fitbit was detected 10 or so miles South of town - and her phone would have to be on for that to register - right?

I thought your analysis was Aces!

 

[NewYork625]

Well, I think there is a reason that law enforcement stated that she returned home after her run. They probably found that information in browser history, and like I stated I don't believe she would have walked somewhere late at night or planned to go to her mother's home without her mom knowing in advance that she was coming over.
Re: type of person.
If it happened at home which I highly suspect it did, this person must have known she would be at that house, at that time, and alone. That means, he must have stalked her to some degree. To be able to stalk someone, one must have the environmental conditions in their life to be able to do so. For instance, they must have a great deal of alone time, during which they have nothing else to do and no one expecting them to be somewhere (ie. No kids, or have kids part time, and No wife). I would say that it's likely this person has a lot of extra time on their hands. If they have a job, it is likely requires minimum time requirements and they don't have a whole lot going on outside of work. I think that the fact it was so cleans says a lot about how the individual's brain works. Organized and efficient. College kids brains' frontal lobes are not fully developed. They don't have the executive functioning (ie. ability to plan, organize) that someone over the age of thirty does.

I believe the person did work and it was sufficiently near a location that MT spent time in Brooklyn that he could observe her.
I also agree he was likely single or divorced.
I also agree with your previous comment that he would be most likely to live on the outskirts of town in a place with outbuildings.

 

[MsBetsy]

Hi,
I am new here. I am a technology professional and a bit of a hacker and technology forensic as well.
My thoughts are:
If they have MT's laptop and her phone was synced to a Google or an iCloud account (which nearly all phones are these days) then LE should have to all of the location information they would need to track MTs location up to the time she disappeared, especially if she was taking her phone on her runs, as many witnesses have claimed. Moreover, the back up of the phone should include all of the data files LE would need to read all of the messages that were on the phone when it was last backed up. That said, it seems that LE may be wasting time trying to obtain the Fitbit information via warrants when that same information is probably within an apple or Google account.

Browser and application use history would also be useful information to have. This would be useful in understanding MT's state of mind before the disappearance. I can't imagine she would have disappeared willingly without looking up something related to the topic of doing so.

I also wonder if they have checked the router logs from her boyfriend's house. At the very least that would give them an idea of the last time one of her devices was connected to the wifi network within the house and would, therefore, give them an idea of whether she was taken from the house or whether she disappeared during the run. Under ideal circumstances, the router data could give them browser history, password hashes, etc.

Correct me if I am wrong, but we don't know for sure that the last ping came from near WCs pig farm. That is speculation, correct?
Even if we were 100% certain of the last tower the phone pinged that doesn't necessarily give a highly accurate representation of her location, especially if we don't know the locations of other cell towers in the area.

Assuming:
-that the FBI has someone who is better at this stuff than me, and knowing that if I had MTs laptop, I would have been able to gather and analyze all of the aforementioned data within a timeframe of 1-5 days
- that RTs messaging to the public about "someone she knew took her" is strategic;
- that anyone who loves their dogs enough to hire a dogsitter for them wouldn't normally be keeping them in the basement with plenty of food and water. ( I feed my dog two times a day a rationed portion of food, because if I let him have access to unlimited amounts of food, he would eat himself into a gluttonous diabetic coma)
- that if she left her boyfriend's house after her run to walk to her mom's, she would have communicated that to her mom in some fashion.

My conclusion is that she was likely taken by someone who knew her from her bfs house and who she had interacted with at least a few times. This person likely knew her well enough to know that she would feel better about leaving the house if she knew the dogs would be fed if she did not return. He knew her well enough to know her routine and when she would be most vulnerable. I imagine this person stalked her, which means he would have had to possess the time to do so. I would guess that he is likely a divorced father, a college student, unemployed, disabled, retired, and/or someone whose profession it is to sit around in a car and wait for something to happen (LE) (no offense).
The absence of a crime scene tells me that his attack was planned out, and that this person is meticulous and organized, and would also lead me to believe that it is probable that he older than college age.
He probably owns a gun.
I believe he probably was knocked on the door while she was doing homework. He lied and said there was something he needed help with (ie. Flat tire). She let him in for a minute. He pulled a gun. She said, ok dont shoot, let me feed the dogs and I will go with you. He follows her downstairs. She feeds dogs. He tells her to get her phone. She gets phone. They get in his vehicle, he tells her to power off the phone, and they leave.

Hopefully she is being held somewhere and she is not dead. If I was LE, I would be looking at divorced dad's who occasionally picked their kids up from daycare, who own guns, and who have large properties with multiple structures on site or second properties where they could hold someone hostage without being discovered.

Excellent, informative, inciteful post
Thank you for spending all that time with such a detailed post. I agree with your theory , although some small details vary. But your scenario is almost exactly what I had thought from the beginning! Keep posting!

 

[Mr. Obvious]

Well, I think there is a reason that law enforcement stated that she returned home after her run. They probably found that information in browser history, and like I stated I don't believe she would have walked somewhere late at night or planned to go to her mother's home without her mom knowing in advance that she was coming over.
Re: type of person.
If it happened at home which I highly suspect it did, this person must have known she would be at that house, at that time, and alone. That means, he must have stalked her to some degree. To be able to stalk someone, one must have the environmental conditions in their life to be able to do so. For instance, they must have a great deal of alone time, during which they have nothing else to do and no one expecting them to be somewhere (ie. No kids, or have kids part time, and No wife). I would say that it's likely this person has a lot of extra time on their hands. If they have a job, it is likely requires minimum time requirements and they don't have a whole lot going on outside of work. I think that the fact it was so cleans says a lot about how the individual's brain works. Organized and efficient. College kids brains' frontal lobes are not fully developed. They don't have the executive functioning (ie. ability to plan, organize) that someone over the age of thirty does.

Or perhaps - work next door at the Electric Coop???

 

[FindHG]

Does anybody remember this case?

• " ... investigators are unable to obtain medical records and cellphone tower information because there is no evidence of a crime."

Also:

• "She probably went for a walk," Turner told Fox News on Wednesday. "And she's unable to come home at this point in time."
  (This sounds eerily like how Mollie's dad has spoken.)

Of course, the ending wasn't what some expected.

I don't get the same vibe at all.

 

[Confusion]

Why would she get into someone's car willingly if she was jogging on her way to her mom's house to eat and collect the car? What would induce her to stop jogging to her mom's house?

Meaning if she was snatched at all, the only place that looks even remotely possible is in her own driveway. Up for debate if that's plausible or not, but that's really the weakest point.

If she got into a car anywhere along that route I believe she had to have done so willingly.

I guess I can respond to both of these posts at the same time. How likely do you think it might be that she was just finishing her run after doing her homework, and someone met her at the house unexpectedly when she got there? It's possible that he/she (he for the rest of the post) was someone from work or school who just called out to her and asked what she was up to, and said he was just passing through town and thought he'd look her up to say hi. When she said she was going to go to her mother's for dinner (or supper!), and then she had to come home, take a shower and get some sleep. He could have offered to give her a ride over there since it was warm and she looked beat. Once she got into the car, he could have told her he had a better idea, and that he was going to take her out to eat.

When she realized they were getting quite a way from town (by the farm, maybe?) she might have taken off her phone and said she'd better call her mother and let her know she was going to skip the brats and would be there to pick up the car later, but he grabbed her phone from her right away and turned it off. Since I have no idea who he was or where he was from, that's as far as this "what if" goes for now.

 

[NewYork625]

I believe the person did work and it was sufficiently near a location that MT spent time in Brooklyn that he could observe her.
I also agree he was likely single or divorced.

 

[Stephen Smith]

I believe her Fitbit was detected 10 or so miles South of town - and her phone would have to be on for that to register - right?

I thought your analysis was Aces!

I think it depends on the type of Fitbit that she wore. Some have GPS functionality without needing to be synced to another device. Either way, the Fitbit gps data should have logged to her account dashboard accessible from another device.

 

[SharonNeedles]

Good stuff Needles. How about any of the in-town streets west of Jackson that could be part of her loop. Street lights working or not, remote locations like Boundary St., things like this. Also, is Jackson St. near the HS still without sidewalks?

I couldn't stick around till dusk to check out the street light situation. Jackson is still without sidewalks, and cutting through that parking lot isn't as level as I thought it looked. That's pretty much the major artery through town too, looks like a street I'd try to avoid walking or biking on. Boundry street doesn't feel weird if that makes any sense (or maybe because I live on the edge of my town I'm just used to how that feels). I'd wonder if maybe Mollie would get to her mom's house by via Mills street if she were on foot. That would be my route of choice and stay off Jackson altogether.

 

[FindHG]

Let me help.

Again, thank you, Otta, the Blaise Pascal, I swear.

 

[Marie224]

Hi,
I am new here. I am a technology professional and a bit of a hacker and technology forensic as well.
My thoughts are:
If they have MT's laptop and her phone was synced to a Google or an iCloud account (which nearly all phones are these days) then LE should have to all of the location information they would need to track MTs location up to the time she disappeared, especially if she was taking her phone on her runs, as many witnesses have claimed. Moreover, the back up of the phone should include all of the data files LE would need to read all of the messages that were on the phone when it was last backed up. That said, it seems that LE may be wasting time trying to obtain the Fitbit information via warrants when that same information is probably within an apple or Google account.

Browser and application use history would also be useful information to have. This would be useful in understanding MT's state of mind before the disappearance. I can't imagine she would have disappeared willingly without looking up something related to the topic of doing so.

I also wonder if they have checked the router logs from her boyfriend's house. At the very least that would give them an idea of the last time one of her devices was connected to the wifi network within the house and would, therefore, give them an idea of whether she was taken from the house or whether she disappeared during the run. Under ideal circumstances, the router data could give them browser history, password hashes, etc.

Correct me if I am wrong, but we don't know for sure that the last ping came from near WCs pig farm. That is speculation, correct?
Even if we were 100% certain of the last tower the phone pinged that doesn't necessarily give a highly accurate representation of her location, especially if we don't know the locations of other cell towers in the area.

Assuming:
-that the FBI has someone who is better at this stuff than me, and knowing that if I had MTs laptop, I would have been able to gather and analyze all of the aforementioned data within a timeframe of 1-5 days
- that RTs messaging to the public about "someone she knew took her" is strategic;
- that anyone who loves their dogs enough to hire a dogsitter for them wouldn't normally be keeping them in the basement with plenty of food and water. ( I feed my dog two times a day a rationed portion of food, because if I let him have access to unlimited amounts of food, he would eat himself into a gluttonous diabetic coma)
- that if she left her boyfriend's house after her run to walk to her mom's, she would have communicated that to her mom in some fashion.

My conclusion is that she was likely taken by someone who knew her from her bfs house and who she had interacted with at least a few times. This person likely knew her well enough to know that she would feel better about leaving the house if she knew the dogs would be fed if she did not return. He knew her well enough to know her routine and when she would be most vulnerable. I imagine this person stalked her, which means he would have had to possess the time to do so. I would guess that he is likely a divorced father, a college student, unemployed, disabled, retired, and/or someone whose profession it is to sit around in a car and wait for something to happen (LE) (no offense).
The absence of a crime scene tells me that his attack was planned out, and that this person is meticulous and organized, and would also lead me to believe that it is probable that he older than college age.
He probably owns a gun.
I believe he probably was knocked on the door while she was doing homework. He lied and said there was something he needed help with (ie. Flat tire). She let him in for a minute. He pulled a gun. She said, ok dont shoot, let me feed the dogs and I will go with you. He follows her downstairs. She feeds dogs. He tells her to get her phone. She gets phone. They get in his vehicle, he tells her to power off the phone, and they leave.

Hopefully she is being held somewhere and she is not dead. If I was LE, I would be looking at divorced dad's who occasionally picked their kids up from daycare, who own guns, and who have large properties with multiple structures on site or second properties where they could hold someone hostage without being discovered.

Thank you and I agree except making sure to feed the dogs.. I could see the dogs already put away for the day and he knew this and was fearful of being attacked and planned accordingly.

Also, I was gonna say if she left everything behind why ask her to bring her phone along? He could want MT's phone for himself, to be able to see the text communications from the family/friends, with location services and whatever else, turned off, to gauge when he needed to move and where. He could have taken her SIM card out and inserted it into another phone already pre-set NOT to track or give away any clues to LE.

Also, if this was planned and she is alive, he would have had to stock up on food, water, and feminine supplies for MT. But with amazon prime delivery, it's hard for anyone to recall and come forward to say I remember a guy buying feminine supplies from our store in July and he is single. Far-reaching I'm just typing as I think of things.

 

[MsBetsy]

We know that she was last seen jogging. Why would her disappearance be described as an abduction if she voluntarily hopped into someone's car? If she was forced into someone's car, that is a version of "snatched."

I don't know if you are referring to my post, but we don't know if she hopped into someone's car, or if she was abducted while jogging. Im not sure who described her disapearance as an abduction. It is all speculation at this point.

 

[Q.E.D.]

I don't get the same vibe at all.

The main point of my post was originally only to highlight the hard time LE had in getting digital records despite the disappearance. I wonder if LE is having any similar problems in this case. When I was reading through the article I saw that strange quote. Just to be clear, I do not currently believe in any way that Mollie committed suicide (nothing points in that direction), but a stranger outcome (of any kind) than expected in this case wouldn't surprise me at this point. Not in the least.

 

[jmk59]

I'd be really interested now in knowing if jogging or walking to her mom's house was something she even does. Most of what I saw on the South side of town and especially the SE seemed like excellent routes to run. Getting up to her mom's place on the NE side of town just seems awkward.

That's what I'm thinking. How do you get from any loop to Mom's without the Jackson St via HS road? Is there some shortcut that Googlemaps doesn't show?

 

[NewYork625]

deleted

 

[Scepter]

The question has been corrected from "per day" to "per hour":
Would 138 people in a town of 1500, plus surrounding farm population, visit a store like Caseys each hour every day?

That would be 2-3 people in the store at any one time, with some peak and low times.

In a tiny town, a Casey's is most always hopping.