Unfortunately, the problem with using the Sheriff or Chief as the spokesperson for the media is that they usually don't actually know what has been done in the investigation. Plus, this is the Spartanburg County Sheriff speaking, so he probably would not know what Anderson City has done over the course of their investigation. I think we are going to have to sit back and wait a little longer to find out exactly what all was going on behind the scenes. I think we may be surprised. I do wonder why it took 2 months to find her if she was working for him and he was a known sex offender. I read in one story that LE was following up on a last known ping of a cell phone related to the case that brought them to this location, while other reports say they were following up on another case and happened to be on the property to hear her banging on the storage container. I watched the interview with the Sheriff and he just said it was during a joint investigation with Anderson City that leads brought them to the property. He did say that they would be following up with Facebook to see if TK was involved with the FB postings. It's hard to say exactly what led them there. I bet they had a lead on him the whole time with the cell pings and with her having started working for him recently, but with his sex offender history and history of kidnapping and so much interest in the case, LE didn't want to show that card for fear that if he was keeping her somewhere alive, he would either move her or kill her.
I also have been observing the dynamics with all the family and friends and there seem to be many that came from the fringes and want to put their two cents worth in just for their 15 minutes of fame, which is an absolute shame, because it clouds the investigation. This was one that from the outside, personally, I had no clue which direction to go in. It seemed like every time it felt like we should be going this way, something would land in the path and turn us back another way. I went from wondering about various exes to wondering about accidents to wondering about a dark and sordid lifestyle. I was never brave enough to check out "those other sites" because sleuthing is just a hobby and I don't want to put my relationship on the line by signing up for any of those sites and having my fiance question why. I only briefly envisioned the outcome of the case being something this horrible, but quickly dismissed it.
As far as the media reports go as I have said in other posts, I learned as a dispatcher to take everything reported in the media with a grain of salt. They never get it completely right, especially on the first pass because they are trying to be the first news outlet to break the story. I worked the 7p - 7a shift in the Anderson County 911 Center and we'd be shaking our heads watching the news at 6 am in the dispatch center as they reported on our calls that went on during the night, saying to each other, "That is NOT how that happened at all!" Media gets their reports from listening to radio traffic on the scanner, by piecing together interviews and even by reading another outlet's story. So, hypothetically speaking, say I took a 911 call on this case with information that K was being held on the property by this guy. As soon as I keyed up on the radio to have officers go en route, the media would be tuned in and would start live reporting every move the minute they thought it was going to pan out to be breaking news. Sometimes that means they report the initial "tentative" information that comes in and hasn't been verified. It's so frustrating when you're on the other side of it, knowing everything you say can and will be repeated, you're just trying to get as much information out to your officers as you can and sometimes all you have to work with is heresy for them to go check out. Yet it still gets reported as the gospel. So, always remember, take the media reports with a grain of salt. Ultimately, they're just trying to make a buck off this story. Read them all, piece them together, but don't take them as final word. We may never know the whole story.