THE DEVIL'S ADVOCATE : ALL THAT IS BELOW IS MERELY A THEORY !
(New Profiles, part IX)
There are still a couple of other major (& hypothetical) scenarios that may not have been discussed yet. I of course am still going with the ASSUMPTION of a pregnancy because without that one variable, this case is absolutely wide-open & doesn't make much sense whatsoever. It would come down simply to:
1)an insane murder-suicide (which I think can otherwise be ruled out by now);
2)a foolish intoxication & senseless drowning through 'misadventure';
3)an enraged & possibly psychotic spurned ex-lover;
4)or, an even more bizarre attack brought on by either a complete stranger(s) or an as yet still unknown character(s).
And even though i'd originally championed #1 here as the most likely probability, now of course I clearly presume there was an obvious perpetrator involved, & in my opinion a pursuer that night who knew her.
Within the 'pregnancy' ASSUMPTION category alone, there a couple of other potential suspects out there on the horizon.
When 1st contemplating what could possibly compel a person who was being chased to not utter even a whimper or call the police, one immediately has to consider potentially the obvious, even if one doesn't really want to. And I think there are at least two possibilities that must be raised here (aside from that mentioned above, the one of silent complicity, i.e. 2 people having to keep a 'secret' a secret). The first one should be fairly apparent. If the pursuer were actually a member of the police force themselves, that could complicate things, no?
Within the larger group of possible former friends or associates of Ms. Kanally, there are at least a couple of individuals who would fit the wider description of being involved with law enforcement. But as far as I can tell they are either military police or corrections officers, which I think if it came down to it, wouldn't necessarily prevent Shantina from making a most desperate call if she needed to. Worth looking into but not necessarily the greatest motivation toward forcing herself to silence, unless there are a couple of contributing factors as well. Nonetheless I would hope L.E. has checked out that possibility.
The 2nd possibility here is one that might be even a little harder for some to accept; & that is that a person (or persons) of the cloth are responsible (or at least involved).
As we have seen already, supposedly the reason Shantina stopped into the Williams' in the 1st place is that they had a little cross on their lawn. At least that's what they told the press. And it's a very interesting statement. If this is true then it would seem to suggest a certain amount of inherent trust on Shantina's part toward the people of the faith.
Would this trust hold though for her if a member of the clergy were after her, for instance ?
But why would some member of the priesthood be in 'pursuit' of Shantina? Well, clergy are men & women too. I don't think I need to even go into some of the more repugnant items in the press recently that members of the Church have had thrown at them, in many cases with good cause i'm sure. Nevertheless, priests & pastors are people too. I knew one fellow in my college days, who after leading a life for a few years of nearly extreme promiscuity stunned all of his friends a couple years later by joining the priesthood. He took an initial vow of celibacy, followed that a couple years later with marriage, & a couple years after that, the word on the street again was that he was 'tending to his flock', or at least the women thereof. Need I say more.
Within the larger circle of Shantina's friends there is one chap who potentially fits this profile very well. A former classmate of hers, he too had recently been making a fuss about trying to reconnect with all his old school chums. And whereas Shantina was trying to start this good new life of hers, & then demonstrate to her old friends how well she was doing again, this fellow (let's call him 'Bob Religious', or 'the devout'), after a long period away from the area, has recently 'returned' in a more literal sense.
Now assuming a lot for a minute, let's nevertheless play around & suggest that he & Shantina did chat it up online. It would be somewhat likely in fact, actually. There is no evidence of them ever being 'social media' friends, but he could easily have dropped her as a 'friend' (like we've seen others do) in the early days after the disappearance, without anyone even noticing. They do have quite a few mutual friends though as it turns out, so this could well be more than conceivable (there's that word again). Lets say they decide to meet up somewhere, either casually, the next time they happen to be within proximity to the other, or more purposefully, by specific arrangement. Olympia in fact, could make a wonderful meeting point. If nothing else, geographically speaking it's in between them (although closer to her). And no he doesn't live in Castle Rock either, like so many of their other classmates still seem to. He does live over the hills a bit, but it's really only about a 3 hour journey for him, & he may well occasionally have business there. In fact, there seem to be more than a few connections between either himself or his church group to both the Olympia & Seattle areas, aside from their mutual Castle Rock connection. Oh, did I mention he was the the head of his own church? Yes, he has his own brand new congregation in fact, not bad for someone who is roughly Shantina's age. But what in God's name would she see in someone like him? Maybe one or both of them had a crush on the other, perhaps years & years ago. Or again, maybe nothing more than what she might see in any big guy, but for hormones, circumstance & safety. 'The devout' is pretty safe in that regard. He probably wouldn't go mouthing off anytime soon. In addition to him being top dom at his own church, he is also a proud new father. His wife gave birth just a couple weeks ago.
Granted, this is not your most expected case profile by any means, I agree. It's one that would have to be understandably unique to this case. Someone like 'the devout' would probably consider someone like Shantina to be actually downright sinful, especially if a conjugal act was committed. Maybe he can save his former classmate & turn her toward the light? But after a couple glasses of wine perhaps he turns around his own priorities instead. He wouldn't think well of her after that, especially when she doesn't seem to suddenly rejoice like he'd hoped & take up his new conviction. Or does she? Even if there had been new faith talk at her house, it would have been substantially dampened by her own new internal discovery of another sort. And that brings up a certainly sticky subject for a devout & earnest young fellow like him.
In the scenarios put forth above, a 'motive' then in this case all comes down to a necessity to silence the victim to prevent 'word' from getting out. However in this last variable, there is another component at play as well. Not only would a deeply religious man like himself feel threatened at the prospect of losing both his new family and his new job (his church!), but he would also end up in a very deep corner spiritually speaking as well. And that to him may mean everything.
But maybe i'm giving this chap too much lead credit. There have been others who've become brethren of the faith for more somewhat more desperate, & sometimes even insidious reasons. And no there are probably not many of these people, but they are out there. Individuals who have been torn between the perceived conflict of light & dark within themselves & so have initially entered into the fold in order to seek solace. While doing so they then ascertain that they too have the ability to guide & advise others, at least in their understanding. They then move their way up in the ranks, but unfortunately some of the 'darker' feelings are still there. We have seen this time & again over the years with some of the more Tele-evangelists types. Self-promotionalists with the occasional penchant for debacchery, ostensibly to test themselves, their faith, & perhaps their God as well.
Abortion is the 'sticky subject' I referred to above. Shantina I doubt, as I mentioned in a previous scenario, would have desired to carry an unwanted pregnancy through. She certainly might keep it if it were her fiance's contribution, but some guy she didn't really have feelings for? Doubtful. And besides he was married. What would he do, leave his wife? Again very doubtful, that would almost certainly break up his congregation. And suggesting Shantina would even be willing to start over again somewhere with him in the first place would indeed be going too far. So what was he going to do? Would he turn the cheek & look the other way while she received an abortion? I suppose that wouldn't be the first time that that had happened to a member of the cloth. But it would certainly be out of the ordinary. And would greatly lead him to question his own spiritual core. And perhaps he didn't have the $ either to help her out anyway. Thus a desperate man in a very, very desperate situation.
The one thing about following this particular lead through to it's unfortunate conclusion though, is that it's much different than the previous exaggeratedly hostile themes. In this scenario, conveniently, there may not have had to be any noisy car chases (which would have most likely resulted in damage inevitably to either car frame). There wouldn't have had to be any angry exchanges in public which would have been most likely later recalled by passersby. It would have been sordid nonetheless, but only on the dirty underbelly, & Shantina may have only felt a little creeped out as opposed to completely terrorized.
There could simply have been a series of intense, perhaps even back & forth, emotional duels, a battle of the wills, if you will. It's still a pursuit, no question about it, but it probably didn't start off like one, & Shantina may not have even realized it was going to be a trap until it was too late.
They could have even met in a coffee house. No, not a Starbucks, or the more old fashioned, independent type that can still be found in Olympia, but one where 'the devout' could, for his own selfish purposes, show off his faith. I'm willing to bet in fact there would be more than one Christian-themed coffee 'klatch' type meeting room available around 6 pm on a Saturday.
Early on in the dispute, mostly likely long before they even got to Olympia, in the hours & days preceding perhaps, she would have been requesting his help with the abortion. She had to get it.
He on the other hand, would simply be looking for a way out of his own mess. In order to do so he would have to push & pull at the same time. Giving excuses, pestering her to change her mind, telling her he has a plan, trying to make one deal after the other with her. She might not have wanted to leave Olympia without a promise by him that he would help her get rid of the fetus. To her, adoption wasn't an option, since it meant she would have to carry through the baby, & RS wasn't going to buy into that. Very hurt, RS would inevitably leave her. Or at least that's what she has to assume.
For him adoption however, had pretty much become the only option. He probably worked that out in his frazzled brain on the drive down to the capitol. And he couldn't see himself leaving Olympia without taking care of this matter either. Following her continued intransigence on the matter, he was probably unexpectedly forced to come up with a very different plan that contained a very sinister element, but a necessary& inevitable turn perhaps in his mind.
This next will sound very bizarre, but he finally would have likely said something along the lines of, ' i'll agree to support you if you agree to let me baptize you & your child'. He gave the excuse of needing to purify them. It could have, of course been done or said slightly differently, but this is the most probable way of explaining the end events.
This fellow, 'the devout' would have been the among new breed of young religious brethren. Computer literate & technologically savvy, but old-fashioned, at least in letter, morally (as convoluted however as one might care to interpret them).
At around 7:00 on Saturday evening, the 13th of March, 'the devout' opened up his laptop & entered a very cryptic message onto a certain 'social media' site. It's the very last one in fact that he's made (& he made very few prior to that). He wrote how excited he was. How he had just gotten a young family to accept Christ into their lives and in a few short hours he would baptize them.
Shantina may not have ever realized for certain what kind of predicament she was in until it was far too late.