I might have missed this in previous posts-if so, please forgive. Didn't the Dammans divorce after the kidnapping? I think Mr Damman remarried and if Pam's mom is the 2nd wife then the Mtdna test should show they do not have the same mother. I wonder when Mr Damman remarried?
Pamela is the full sister of Steven. Both of them were outside the store, but only Steven went missing. I think I read that Mr. Damman has children from his second marriage, but they are both sons. Surely the FBI would have asked if the children had the same mother before running that kind of DNA test?
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_...bi_says_michigan_man_is_not_missing_tot_.html
Excerpts:
As the FBI unveiled its findings, The News uncovered its own evidence undermining Barnes' claim: His birth certificate.
The document showed he was born in Florida's Escambia County on Aug. 18, 1955. The father was listed as Richard Lewis Barnes, and the mother as Elizabeth Anne Converse - her maiden name.
There is a birth certificate. I don't think the Barnes family was saying he'd never had a birth certificate, just that they didn't have a copy. Which isn't all that strange, since it could have been lost or destroyed in the last 50 years. I think most states allow you to use any of a number of forms of ID to get a driver's license, such as passport or military ID. (Although that's changing.) I'm pretty sure I used my military dependent's ID to get my first driver's license in the 1980s; since then, the only thing I've needed for a new license is the old license. I'm not sure the need for ID was as restrictive in the 1970s as it is now--a lot of states didn't even put photos on the driver's license back then.
I can understand why the Barnes family hasn't taken a DNA test; in a way, it's kind of insulting to be asked to prove you are your own child's parent, when you know for a fact that you are. I wonder if they'll get tested now, just to set the matter at rest once and for all. Although from the sound of it, I have a feeling that John Barnes wants badly enough to find another family to claim, that he wouldn't trust the results of his father's DNA test unless the results are what he wants:
I'm disappointed," Barnes told the Daily News Thursday. "I believed that I belonged to another family. I still do."
Barnes convinced himself of the link to the Damman family after spending hours in the local library, five days a week, researching the case and his past.
From the sound of it, he's convinced himself that he's not a Barnes, and I don't know if anything would change his mind. I'm sorry for him (and it sounds like there's some long-term resentment going on). In the article, he says that he will always love Pamela Damman as a sister, and he hopes to keep in contact with her for life...yet he already HAS a sister that he could be having that kind of brother-sister relationship with. Just sad. I wonder if he's going through some kind of midlife crisis, and trying to build up a sense of importance, that he's not just some balding middle-aged guy who doesn't particularly get along with his family, but instead is a Man On a Mission For the Truth. Some guys buy a red sports car, others run-off with their high school girlfriend at their 30th reunion...he's on a mythical quest for something that's not there, like Don Quixote.