You are so right about bio mom's burns and why LE didn't check the burn pile much earlier. Guess they did not want to jump to the conclusion that something nefarious had occurred. However, the majority of us didn't buy bio mom's story on what had happened from the first day.
So, I found something interesting related to this. I only found one article that reported this, but apparently someone had called the local fire department about the out of control "brush fire" and it HAD been checked out that day.
Here's the write-up: (
https://www.westplainsdailyquill.net/news/local/article_fd50d4fc-7e96-11e7-b93b-2bd3f31c37cc.html)
Theodosia Area Volunteer Fire Department responded to a report of a structure fire on Ruud's property on County Road 905 five miles west of Theodosia. When firefighters arrived it turned out to be a brush fire, said fire chief Tim Jeffery. According to Jeffery, Ruud had a burned arm but refused medical help at the time. The fire chief said firefighters wrapped the arm and Ruud said she would see a doctor the next day. According to Jeffery, firefighters were called back to the Longrun property next day to began searching for the missing Leckie. The fire chief said ATVs, airplanes and people on foot began the search but nothing turned up at the time.
So, if RR started with the story about "we had a burn pile that got out of control, Savannah felt like it was her fault and felt guilty", they would have had official backing for that story from the Fire Department. The Fire Chief was right there to say "yeah, we checked that out, it was just a brush fire." It explains why that didn't immediately look suspicious. I have family in that area, and huge brush/bonfires or burn-piles are NOT an unusual occurrence.
But, what is interesting about this article is that the fire chief says that happened on the 19th, NOT the 18th like RR stated in her interview that we have in the search warrant packet. If the fire happened on the 19th (not the 18th), and then the fire department was called back the next morning to help search, what they witnessed would have most definitely been the body being burned (maybe not the first round, but one of the subsequent burnings of the bones). It will be interesting to see if the police can find any records of RR actually going to the dr and filling her prescription on the 19th, or if that was all just a story. Those dates were relayed in the "interview" section of the packet, so they wouldn't necessarily have been fact-checked to be recorded as "evidence" yet. I'm trying to think of what motivation RR would have for lying about the date of the fire, though? If the fire department had been called out, surely she would know that the date of the fire was on record? I'm not sure that any of that is of any significance, but starting to see little lies here and there about the days leading up to the "disappearance" will be interesting to piece together as she tries to concoct a defense story.
Also, from the same article, there's this:
Leckie and Ruud were well-known to the Theodosia firefighters. Leckie is a junior firefighter with the department, said Jeffery. Ruud also serves as a firefighter.
RR was a firefighter! She KNOWS fires. She would know about accelerants without creating a suspicious web-search history. She would know how to make remains most difficult to find using a fire situation.
RR probably had a big sigh of relief when she got away with that day passing muster.
