Transcript of 2:00 pm press conference
Good afternoon. I am back with another update as to where we are on the investigation. We've continued, as we discussed earlier today, in trying to finish up the search ...I believe we accomplished that. We are having the investigators go through and finish up the leads that they found. I really want to concentrate on the additional unit help and agency help that has proven to be invaluable, and I want to mention another couple of organizations and agencies that we're bringing in. The US Marshall Service have been here since day one. They have been fantastic in helping us conduct searches, to canvass a neighborhood and even helping us on a couple warrants that have been served as part of the investigation process.
We have had assistance from the FBI as you are all aware. The canine units that came in last night, they have also been on the phone with the FBI's behavioral analysis unit who does work with these types of scenarios and provides insight of what to look for in an individual and we're discussing that with them and possibly we may ask for their assistance in a more up close fashion. We're going to bring in the National Center for Exploited and Missing Children. This organization helps out in these types of investigations and specialize in missing children and protocols on how to go about finding, locating, and investigating these types of events.
As I said at other press conferences, we're not turning down out help from any area because our main focus is finding Isabel and bringing her home safely. We've got border patrol who have been out here and providing resources, just in staffing to comb the areas, combing desert areas. County Sheriffs, search and rescue team has been assisting us. And a lot of volunteers have offered to come to help us conduct our search. We're actively involved in that. Our goal is to find Isabelle and bring her home. But we're also conducting things in a very conscious manner to make sure for criminal investigation aspect that we're not going to contaminate any scene or anything like that.
Questions (can't hear question):
A: We had a few residents that we had developed information on that we wanted to serve a warrant on. It doesn't necessarily mean that anything of evidentiary value was necessarily found there, but because of the high profile of this case, we wanted to make sure we followed all the rules. The safest way to do that is to obtain a warrant, which we did before we went to those residents.
Q: On the street?
A: One of them was on the street
Q: Can't hear
A: We have made it a point to contact every identified sex offender within a three-mile radius, so I'm sure we have spoken to him.
Q: Can't hear
A: Well sure, we're all aware of that. We've talked about that and it's possible we'll ask for And every hour that passes causes more concern and more distress.
Q: landfill search?
A: Either by this evening or early tomorrow morning. That's a very painstaking effort, we've brought in people from different factions around the city and it's basically combing through every
Q: How much longer will you have the neighborhood blocked off?
A: You know that's something we're going to evaluate and try to get the neighborhood back to normal ASAP, but there are some sections we'll probably keep blocked off for another day or so. We just want to make sure that we don't miss anything. I can't give you a definitive answer but we're trying to open that back up as quickly as possible.
Q: (something about the location of a room)
A: I'm not familiar enough about the layout.
Q: (something about talking to parents)
A: We constantly check back with where we are in the investigation. If that requires a re-interview with family members or neighbors or anyone else that we would do so.
Q: You asked the parents if they were interested in an interview with the media, you would facilitate that, have you made that request?
A: Yes, we have made that request. I'll tell you right now that they are not really interested in that, but
Q: Why?
A: We don't really delve into that with them. We just give them the request and we're not pushing that either way. If that situation changes, we'll let you know.
Q: What have they done to help look for her?
A: The family? Well they've had a lot of friends and family out passing out flyers and going out doing their own personal search. That's been reported on many media outlets already. I know they are very concerned and are cooperating with us on that.
Q: Have they been out actively searching?
A: The parents themselves? I don't know.
Q: Amber alert status?
A: We still don't have that last criteria met where we uyknow absolutely that an abduction occurred, that we have suspect or vehicle information or direction of travel. So it still does not qualify for an Amber Alert.
Q: Something about the dog search
A: Well, that's part of what the investigation is covering today. We are continuing with that.
Q: So you're still in the house?
A: We have the house secured at this point. We are in the process because, obviously again, as I mentioned earlier, it's such a high profile incident we want to make sure to do everything by the book, so we will be getting a warrant...obviously to go back into the residence and serve that. To make sure If we find anything of evidentiary value that we still have done that appropriately and we don't lose that.
Q: (can't hear)
A: It's still much safer to get a warrant because consent can be questioned later on, a good attorney can sit there and say, "Well, of course, they gave that because if they wouldn't then all this national attention and pressure they felt pressure to do that."
The safer bet is to just get a warrant.
Q: Do they have an attorney?
A: I don't know
Q: How many warrants have you served?
A: I don't know
Q: Dozen?
A: I'm not gonna guess
Q: (can't hear)
A: I mean we've had incidents like this that have happened within this community and people want answers very quickly and we would love to provide answers very quickly. The reality of the situation is these are very painstaking investigations, they're very complex. They require a lot of just good old-fashioned police work, drudging through the details and that takes time. That time causes a sense of what's going on, what's happening, why is this so complicated . And really we're just trying to go through the leads and cover all the bases. So short answer to your question, I'm sorry, is that yes, there have been other cases that have been as complex, frustrating, concerning as this one. Some we've been able to solve successfully, some we haven't.
Q: You were investigating ...leads. How much progress have you made today and are you closer to a conclusion?
A: We may be done with those, we're almost done with that. However what are concern and what we hope you can help us with is to continue to ask for information. We've received some additional leads today, obviously not in the numbers we received the first day of this event. But we are asking for the public anyone who thinks they have information to call 88-CRIME or 911 so that we can follow up with that.
Q: Have you followed those leads?
A: Yes, we have.
Q: can't hear (landfill search?)
A: Like what led us to this case, we've had disposal removal that morning, Saturday morning while we were out here, prior to us locking down the scene. So we had no clue if anything of evidentiary value had been removed from some of the local dumpsters. But what we were able to do is contact the waste management company, contact city waste management and find out where the trash from this neighborhood was taken, to which dump, or transfer station. We just secured that area and said "ok, no one touches that". We'll get a chance to go in and start looking. So that would be, for us, a normal protocol because we don't know what we're dealing with yet. If we found something that pointed us in a different direction that's something we wouldn't have to do, but since we haven't found that we will leave no stone unturned.
Q: Do you think she is alive?
A: I'm hoping my best that the child is alive and we're going to work on the premise the child is alive until proven otherwise. We want to remain hopeful. We want Isabel to come home safely.
Q: Anyway to narrow down the window from 11 pm to 8 am?
A: No, not at this point that's the time frame we're working with. Okay, a couple more questions.
Q: (can't hear)
A: I'm not going to talk about what the family is saying, but they are cooperating with us.
Q: Can you tell us about whatever the canine units found that led you to go back to the house.
A: No, and we're not talking about what the dogs found, other than the fact they were out there. The dogs did alert on some issues that, obviously wants us to investigate and look into that.
Q: and that was this morning?
A: late last night and this morning.
