LA - Mickey Shunick, 21, Lafayette; 19 May 2012 - #23

[mahmoo]

I'd like to mention too, that besides the woods & water in Acadiana/S. LA, there are thousands of acres of sugar cane crops and the cane is well tall enough and thick enough right now to conceal a body until harvest time comes at the end of the year. The cane fields have access roads running through them and it would be quite easy to pull deep off into one of those fields, without being noticed, to dispose of a body. I hope LE and the search teams have considered that possibility.

 

[fleurdenola]

In the same vein, people should be informed that "not-for-profit" doesn't necessarily mean that the people involved aren't receiving any sort of pay at all. The term simply means that the involved organization has been approved as a 501 (c) (3) organization by the IRS. Such groups are considered tax-exempt, but are allowed to pay employees an annual salary. Surprisingly enough, there can be a significant amount of profit drummed up by a not-for-profit organization.

None of what I've said should belittle or undermine the good work done by many search and rescue organizations. I simply mean to clarify some points that might be confusing to people with no experience in the realm.

Great point! Most healthcare organizations are 501 (c)(3) entities, and there is definitely the potential for individual profit as an employee of one of those (doctor, nurse, administrator alike). The good news there is they do have to, to keep their status, report their highest paid and/or executive salaries regularly. So if someone wants to sleuth the motives of that team from a financial angle it should be easy.

 

[GulfCoastKAT]

www.findmickeynow.com

Where is Mickey?

 

[justwannahelp]

I'd like to mention too, that besides the woods & water in Acadiana/S. LA, there are thousands of acres of sugar cane crops and the cane is well tall enough and thick enough right now to conceal a body until harvest time comes at the end of the year. The cane fields have access roads running through them and it would be quite easy to pull deep off into one of those fields, without being noticed, to dispose of a body. I hope LE and the search teams have considered that possibility.

ayyiyi, didnt even think about the cane fields. but wouldnt a heli spot a body in all that green in perfect rows?

 

[mahmoo]

ayyiyi, didnt even think about the cane fields. but wouldnt a heli spot a body in all that green in perfect rows?

I don't know ... it gets very dense as it matures. Not the best view but you can look along Hwy 90, south of Lafayette, on the Google Map satellite view and get at least some idea of just how thick the fields get.

 

[GulfCoastKAT]

ayyiyi, didnt even think about the cane fields. but wouldnt a heli spot a body in all that green in perfect rows?

Not necessarily.. There are a lot of cane fields around Lafayette. I live adjacent to several. No helicopters have flown over that I know of- well, no SAR or Police helicopters. I see PHI and oilfield choppers all day.

 

[audie]

Me too, seriously, that was his baby girls body that had laid there. Just kills me.

Another body was found first by kids. When LE and others were searching for more evidence, they found Laura's body. Two more bodies of girls would be found a couple years later in the same field.

 

[jennapuppy]

On the topic of the SARS group there. Just because it was reported they are working independently of the LE don't let that get to you please. Out here The Klass foundation has been doing the same thing looking for Sierra. But they do talk to the LE and vice versa. I am sure this is happening with the group there right now. And I am positive it was being done when TES was there.

My understanding was that the SARS group was working independently of the volunteer search groups, but I did not read that they aren't working independently of LE. I also remember one of the verified SARS posters commenting on the Lisa Irwin thread about how SARS dogs work. IIRC, she said that the handlers would prefer to work without news helicopters overhead, because the wind affects how the scent travels and creates an unnecessary distraction for the dogs to overcome while tracking. I don't know if local news stations use helicopters, but perhaps they are hoping to avoid that situation, as well. IMO

 

[fleurdenola]

I'd like to mention too, that besides the woods & water in Acadiana/S. LA, there are thousands of acres of sugar cane crops and the cane is well tall enough and thick enough right now to conceal a body until harvest time comes at the end of the year. The cane fields have access roads running through them and it would be quite easy to pull deep off into one of those fields, without being noticed, to dispose of a body. I hope LE and the search teams have considered that possibility.

Yeah...our environmental conditions are very conducive to pulling off something like this and being able to hide evidence and/or a body. We've name most, if not all factors: countless swamps and waterways, woods, expansive private farmland, spread out country living areas. We either really need some help here (a confession) or a stupid/unlucky perp who didn't cover all his tracks and the truth will come out, hopefully sooner than later.

 

[justwannahelp]

the highway, hwy 975, off whiskey bay exit is only road there and if you take that hwy it hooks up to airline hwy at krotz springs. are they searching along this 975?

 

[Donamena]

Yeah you have to have them, I'm just wondering, those gutters we see like on Versaille, do you have manhole covers? I know you must but I haven't seen any on Google Earth.

Lafayette has a different topography than Nola. It has some areas above sea level & some slight hills/dips. Nola is, for the most part, below sea level. As she said, there's gutters, but they ain't typical.

 

[justwannahelp]

Yeah...our environmental conditions are very conducive to pulling off something like this and being able to hide evidence and/or a body. We've name most, if not all factors: countless swamps and waterways, woods, expansive private farmland, spread out country living areas. We either really need some help here (a confession) or a stupid/unlucky perp who didn't cover all his tracks and the truth will come out, hopefully sooner than later.

you are right. it's overwhelming to think of all the areas she could be. we need more leads

 

[HouDat]

I so admire your optimism, and like any other theory, it's possible.

Please understand, I was merely presenting one possible, plausible scenario.

There's also a cynic in me which could spell out a scenario where LE (collectively, starting with LPD) couldn't detect a fart in a baked bean cannery, much less a criminal.

And a pragmatist, a realist, etc. which could present their own detailed scenarios.

I do have a hunch about what happened but, like most hunches, there is a lack of supporting evidence to substantiate.

But anyway, just trying to keep an open mind about what's going on here, since we've all been given very, very limited info.

Cheers.

Come home soon, Mickey.

 

[Lacole]

The only good thing about the farm land is that farmers are usually on their land daily they wake up before the sun comes up an usually leave right before the sunsets if she would have been hidden there I believe she would have been found already!

 

[RaginCajun77]

Think about this, if the perp was willing to drive 30 minutes from Lafayette to dump the bike, then draw a circle with Lafayette as the center and have the circle encompass all areas within a 30 minute drive. Lots of area to cover.

 

[BayouBelle_LA]

ayyiyi, didnt even think about the cane fields. but wouldnt a heli spot a body in all that green in perfect rows?

I had not thought about the cane fields. They are very easy to access and easy to go unseen.

 

[chicken fried]

But...I always considered a ditch to be the thing in front of someone's house, that valley the driveway goes over. The coulees are those larger, cement paved valleys. Ditches drain to drains which drain to coulees which drain to the Vermilion. Is my lingo wrong?

You have it exactly right. I was just keeping it simple.

 

[mahmoo]

The only good thing about the farm land is that farmers are usually on their land daily they wake up before the sun comes up an usually leave right before the sunsets if she would have been hidden there I believe she would have been found already!

The farmers may be checking their cane from the access roads but I doubt at this point they are driving tractors down through the crops unless they want to destroy them ... you do realize how tall the cane gets I assume??

 

[JDB]

My understanding was that the SARS group was working independently of the volunteer search groups, but I did not read that they aren't working independently of LE. I also remember one of the verified SARS posters commenting on the Lisa Irwin thread about how SARS dogs work. IIRC, she said that the handlers would prefer to work without news helicopters overhead, because the wind affects how the scent travels and creates an unnecessary distraction for the dogs to overcome while tracking. I don't know if local news stations use helicopters, but perhaps they are hoping to avoid that situation, as well. IMO

You are correct. The point I was trying to make was some people were reading that the SARS were doing this on their own . And not working with the LE at all. Iirc the volunteer search groups the core base were trained by TES. I know in Sierra's case the core group were trained by the Klass Kids Foundation.

 

[Frogzilla]

There isn't any new info to toss around right now, but there is one thing that keeps sticking out to me. Since I am not a local I may be off with this, but it really seems like the possible streets that MS took on her path home were all local streets. As in, would non locals have reason to be travelling on those streets at 2AM, none of them seem to be direct feeds towards the interstate. They seem like streets somebody would use to go home in the area, or be leaving a friends house from. IMO this has felt very local from the get go.
A side note that is noticeable in this case are the amount of RSO in the general area of her disappearance and LE not saying a word about checking them out (I know they are though). I can't remember the last young missing women where RSO's weren't thrown into the spotlight, at least for LE to say- yes were looking at them.