IA IA - Elizabeth Collins, 8, & Lyric Cook, 10, Evansdale, 13 July 2012 - #8

[Ollipop]

Good point.

Personallly I think he saw them on the way down to the lake, just after they were caught on cctv, however whether they got to their destination or were waylaid on the way is debateable.

One thing that is interesting about Mr Carpenter's account is that it contradicts something gramma said, who claimed they never went past a block or two. Mr Carpenter said he saw them all the time and he was way further away than a block or two,, being in the 1000 block of Lake Avenue..

:banghead:

It's tough for anyone who has always lived in a city to understand, but some retirees in small towns almost literally know every one, and every thing, and are actively interested in observing details of their fellow townsfolk, almost as a hobby. I have no doubt it was our girls he saw.

:moo:

I find this part odd as well. Gramma sez they never go that far, I think I'd heard someone say they didn't think the girls would even know the way to the lake (which I find difficult to believe). But the point is, she claims they ride in the immediate area, but the Carpenters claim to have seen them regularly, to have talked to Elizabeth (or at least to have seen her talking to others), and that they ride down their street frequently and turn around near their home.

Lake Ave, as I've discussed, is NOT on any normal or natural route around the lake or the trail. IF he's seeing those girls frequently, there's a reason they're on THAT street, and not Evans or the trail itself.

Look at the map: http://maps.google.com/maps?rlz=1C1...a=X&ei=4EAUUKbxJYmy9gTRuYCoAQ&ved=0CAoQ8gEwAA

If you're on a bike, enjoying the area, you can take Elmer in to the parking area and get on the trail around the lake. You can get on the trail farther to the west, and follow it back to the parking area, or around the lake. You can come from the north by way of the trail and follow it around the lake, or get off the trail at Gilbert or Arbutus, and follow it to Elmer, to get to the parking area/playground. If you've gone around the lake on your bike, having left the parking area/playground, following the trail (something I do with my family 2-3 times/week), you can exit the trail at Arbutus, either where the trail crosses or by cutting across the grass, then follow Arbutus to Evans and back to Gilbert, where there are sidewalks on both sides marked for bike use, and follow Gilbert back to the parking area/playground.

In any situation where you are riding around the lake, or riding the trail, to go down Lake Ave, which is a one-block long street parallel to Evans and the trail, is simply out of the way. If you're taking the quickest way around the lake, or from the trail to the lake, or even if you were going to go north on Evans (unlikely with all the better, less traffic options available), you wouldn't take Lake Ave. For someone to be doing it regularly, with enough frequency to be remembered as a chatty young girl, I would think they'd have a reason to be going there. And if that is the case, I would think that Gramma Cook would know about it.

 

[TxLady2]

It is kind of hard to believe that the girls would never go further than a block or two. On a mountain bike? You can go a block in seconds. So the girls had to go further than a block or two or the bike rides would be less than a minute long.

How many times have we heard of parents or grandparents of missing kids say their child/grandchild didn't do something and it turns out they did, whether it's talking to a stranger or accepting a ride from someone or going further from home than they're supposed to.

 

[Sunlight]

I've been looking at Hollye's map on the first page of the thread...Has the entire green belt down to Gilbertville been searched on foot? Just wondering.

 

[nikb]

It is kind of hard to believe that the girls would never go further than a block or two. On a mountain bike? You can go a block in seconds. So the girls had to go further than a block or two or the bike rides would be less than a minute long.

Thank you that's exactly what I've been thinking! I have a muscle weakness issue but go out riding once in a great while, and I was shocked when I found out my husband and I had gone 8 miles on our last ride. Walking anything more than 1-1.5 miles is VERY hard for me. 8 miles is probably a super short bike ride for a lot of people. A block or two for young kids w/energy? Always seemed unlikely to me. IMO.

 

[nikb]

Ha ha ha ha!! I left the house a bit ago and had to call back to ask my hubby to water the kids!! You know, super hypervigilant mommie worries about dehydration this time of year.

I am so picturing a guy with a watering can dumping it on the kids' heads right now...

 

[cluciano63]

How many times have we heard of parents or grandparents of missing kids say their child/grandchild didn't do something and it turns out they did, whether it's talking to a stranger or accepting a ride from someone or going further from home than they're supposed to.

I know, I said this days ago. Once they are out of sight, how can Grandma or anyone say where they went? Or how far?

 

[Thinkzerz]

I find this part odd as well. Gramma sez they never go that far, I think I'd heard someone say they didn't think the girls would even know the way to the lake (which I find difficult to believe). But the point is, she claims they ride in the immediate area, but the Carpenters claim to have seen them regularly, to have talked to Elizabeth (or at least to have seen her talking to others), and that they ride down their street frequently and turn around near their home.

Lake Ave, as I've discussed, is NOT on any normal or natural route around the lake or the trail. IF he's seeing those girls frequently, there's a reason they're on THAT street, and not Evans or the trail itself.

Look at the map: http://maps.google.com/maps?rlz=1C1...a=X&ei=4EAUUKbxJYmy9gTRuYCoAQ&ved=0CAoQ8gEwAA

If you're on a bike, enjoying the area, you can take Elmer in to the parking area and get on the trail around the lake. You can get on the trail farther to the west, and follow it back to the parking area, or around the lake. You can come from the north by way of the trail and follow it around the lake, or get off the trail at Gilbert or Arbutus, and follow it to Elmer, to get to the parking area/playground. If you've gone around the lake on your bike, having left the parking area/playground, following the trail (something I do with my family 2-3 times/week), you can exit the trail at Arbutus, either where the trail crosses or by cutting across the grass, then follow Arbutus to Evans and back to Gilbert, where there are sidewalks on both sides marked for bike use, and follow Gilbert back to the parking area/playground.

In any situation where you are riding around the lake, or riding the trail, to go down Lake Ave, which is a one-block long street parallel to Evans and the trail, is simply out of the way. If you're taking the quickest way around the lake, or from the trail to the lake, or even if you were going to go north on Evans (unlikely with all the better, less traffic options available), you wouldn't take Lake Ave. For someone to be doing it regularly, with enough frequency to be remembered as a chatty young girl, I would think they'd have a reason to be going there. And if that is the case, I would think that Gramma Cook would know about it.

Is there a sign anywhere near Mr. C's street that says "Bike Trail this way"? Maybe the girls saw a sign about a bike trail and headed that way?

 

[GrainneDhu]

someone said early on legally volunteers cannot be used after a certain point in the investigations in many states...not sure of IA law

I am surprised too, that only a couple days past that weekend did we hear of LE searching and why dogs were not used everywhere?

All I can think of is they know more than we do and it is not needed for some reason??

So far as I know, anyone in any state can search public land with or without LE permission. Searchers can ask property owners or tenants for permission to search private property but have no power to compel permission and must leave as soon as they are asked to. Any member of the public can go by private property, look at it without trespassing and report anything suspicious that they see to LE.

What the general public cannot do is compel a property owner or tenant to consent to a search. The general public also can't trespass on property where the owners are not home (or not answering the door); so going up to the front door is fine but walking around the back of the house and opening up the shed in back is not legal.

And of course it is absolutely illegal to go into someone's house without their permission (that's called breaking and entering, even if the doors were not locked).

They have been using dogs in the search for Elizabeth and Lyric; one example that got a lot of msm play were the dogs the FBI flew in.

I can only guess that LE does not feel a volunteer search would be any use. Maybe due in part to the horrid weather we've been having? Too hard this year to predict what the weather will do because it has been all over the place.

Right now (2:55 pm Iowa time) the temp is 70 F and it's barely sprinkling rain. Hard to believe that just a few days ago at this time of day the temp was over 100 F. And the temps will be up again by tomorrow, according to the forecast.

 

[SapphireSteel]

Exactly. It's not their belief system itself that is interesting. It's that it was held up several times in the first hours of a child abduction case. It went hand in hand with another of MCM's comments...(thinking)...something about how when Lyric wanted something she kept going after it. That she was very persistent. Again, seemed odd to me that that characterization was used.

Lotta moo!

I don't watch a lot of video clips, something to do with a slow computer, but the couple I have watched show Misty smiling.

I know I'm going to get bombarded here with cries of "everyone reacts different" but a mother who can smile while her baby might be getting raped/tortured/handed around as a freakn party treat, would not, under any circumstances smile, most especially two days after abduction.

It is a huge, glaring, obvious red flag for me that cannot be discounted, or explained away.

Mothers all over the world are alike. We would give our lives for our children, without hesitation. To think of our children in pain and fear is the most agonising thing a mother can ever, ever go through. It is far more painful than going through it yourself. There is no room or emotion left for smiley little chats with Anderson Cooper...every single breath of your body is devoted to praying and hunting for your child. This is a universal truth. The reason we are alive and posting on this board at all is because our mothers protected us, their mothers, their mothers mothers, and back into eternity...it is a basic human instinct to hunt and grieve for a lost child.

This is not occuring.

Further, it seems as though none of the family are cooperating...

Which is also unnatural behaviour for a family who believes their babies are lost, cold, being subjected to god.knows.what.

Add this into the FBI declaring on 21 July that they were still looking for live children, and it appears that perhaps Misty knows something we don't, which is almost always the case in these things...:banghead:

3:30 p.m. Saturday - EVANSDALE, Iowa --- Investigators still wouldn’t say they had any new leads Saturday afternoon, but stressed that they were “confident” both Elizabeth Collins and Lyric Cook-Morrissey are still alive.

FBI spokeswoman Sandy Breault wouldn’t say what made them confident, even as statistics show that the longer someone goes missing, the less likely it is they will be found.

“We believe the girls are alive, and we are not discouraged by the passage of time,” Breault told reporters at the Evansdale Community Response Center SaturdayOfficials said no arrest warrants had been issued but wouldn’t comment on any search warrants.

Hindering the investigation, Breault said, was a lack of cooperation from “all” of the two missing girls’ family and friends. She wouldn’t release details on who that person or persons may be.

“It’s a roadblock,” she said.

Police will only say that “physical evidence” was found relating to the girls, but wouldn’t say if it was found by police, the dive teams or by the search dogs brought in to canvass the area near Meyers Lake, where the two went missing July 13.

Breault said investigators are still following every tip that comes into the FBI or the Cedar Valley Crimestoppers hotlines and that it was a “top priority for the FBI.”

"I can't stress enough that we truly believe the girls are out there," Breault said. "We believe someone out there has information."

http://wcfcourier.com/news/evansdal...cle_507d9bca-d2b1-11e1-8f0b-0019bb2963f4.html

.

So why is there a lack of cooperation from EVERYONE? You know, they are actually not the important ones here, to be getting offended and defensive and storming out of interviews. All of this sort of behaviour detracts from what should be the main focus, finding the girls.

:moo:

 

[SapphireSteel]

Is there a sign anywhere near Mr. C's street that says "Bike Trail this way"? Maybe the girls saw a sign about a bike trail and headed that way?

Two girls biking around their small hometown.

They knew the way to the lake.

They'd been there many times before. This is not a big town.

 

[SapphireSteel]

I don't know why LE hasn't called for more volunteer searches. At this point, I tend to think that LE should be in the lead and if they don't want any more volunteer searches, that they have some other goal in mind.

I do know that LE has continued to search but they are doing it with LE personnel only.

If the families are reacting like most of the families in the cases I've followed, they are still in the phase where they cling to LE and are not willing to consider deviating from whatever LE tells them to do (or not to do).

It is often around 6 months without results when many families start to strike out on their own. Families that can afford it start hiring PIs. Other families start searching on their own.

But there is no one single way that families react. I can think of exceptions to every single generalisation by families who were proven absolutely innocent.

No one is clinging to LE, in fact they are putting up "roadblocks" in the words of the FBI.

 

[nikb]

I keep remembering cases where the victim was found very close to home.

Jacksonville's Maddie Clifton found deceased several days after disapearing. She was found in a teenager boy's bedroom across the street from her home.

Jessica Lunsford from Homosassa, Fl who was captive for days in a trailer, very near her home, before being buried there.

There was also a girl (close to Gainesville, Fl), whose name I don't remember and won't look for, because she was found alive after several weeks. She was held in a man's backyard shed within a few miles of her home. His family lived in the home and never suspected.

Jaycee Lee Dugard always comes to mind because she's pretty local for me. She was maybe a 60-90 minute drive from home? For YEARS.

 

[Snufamonbobball]

According the July 24th update, the family is cooperating now.

http://wcfcourier.com/news/evansdal...cle_578c1212-d517-11e1-9c8f-0019bb2963f4.html

Somer Thompsin's mother also smiled when she was on camera.

 

[GrainneDhu]

How many times have we heard of parents or grandparents of missing kids say their child/grandchild didn't do something and it turns out they did, whether it's talking to a stranger or accepting a ride from someone or going further from home than they're supposed to.

Well, I confess.

Around 8-10 years old, I bounced on my parents' bed even though I knew I wasn't supposed to. I drank milk straight from the carton (it just seemed colder that way). I used a flashlight to read under the covers.

Sometimes I didn't stop playing to tie my shoe, even though I knew my mom would tell me I was risking my neck if I went around with an untied shoelace.

Kids do more than their parents know and sometimes parents know more than the kids realise.

I wouldn't think it was unusual for Elizabeth to push the limits a bit, that's what kids do.

But due to what Ollipop says, I do wonder if the Carpenters were really seeing Elizabeth or not. If they were, I think there's more to the story than normal kid boundary pushing.

 

[cindersoot]

Is there a sign anywhere near Mr. C's street that says "Bike Trail this way"? Maybe the girls saw a sign about a bike trail and headed that way?

Im so sure that the girls have been on that bike trail numerous times.

 

[SapphireSteel]

The only ones I haven't heard use the past tense when talking about the girls are the fathers. I have not personally seen any footage of either DM or DC using the past tense but all of the females have at some point, including HC. Even Mrs. Carpenter used the past tense! I enjoy reading about statement analysis (I find it fascinating actually) but I'm not completely convinced of its use in some situations.

I agree...you can't take it as gospel...but it is very useful.

The FBI employs and uses statement analysts, which is where the science started. It didn't start because it wasn't useful

You have to look at all the evidence, as a whole...the forest, not just the tree, and if some of that evidence is "circumstantial" well, it's still evidence. It's only about the last 30 years or so that juries even expect forensics. Prior to that, circumstantial was enough to convict. Now, it's not.

Which is a good thing....but it doesn't make all these little tricks like LDT's and SA useless, just not PROOF as we think of it nowdays.

:moo:

 

[SapphireSteel]

Just caught up and have to log off. Round and round and round we go.

Does anyone know if the dogs were ever used anywhere other than in the area where the bikes were found? Does anyone know if LE themselves verified that the dogs hit on the girls' scents at the water? I thought they had and that explained why they were so focused on the lake the first days. Now I read here that that is not even confirmed info.

Were the dogs used on the other side of the wooded area? Have the dogs been to the little building that is in the wooded area?

I think the girls were abducted at the end of Lake Avenue, possibly right off of S. Evans where the wooded area starts. UNLESS it is confirmed that the girls' scents were detected by the dogs at the edge of the lake this is what makes sense to me. That provides physical coverage for the perp(s) to wait for them and hide them, access to the trail to dump the bikes and toss the purse, and a place for a car to pull over. Anyone could have been the perp(s).

I would think this whether or NOT there was a vacant home a spit away.

But, so what? Where are they NOW???

:goodpost:

That's how I see it, in my minds eye. Right on.

 

[MotherOcean]

In any situation where you are riding around the lake, or riding the trail, to go down Lake Ave, which is a one-block long street parallel to Evans and the trail, is simply out of the way. If you're taking the quickest way around the lake, or from the trail to the lake, or even if you were going to go north on Evans (unlikely with all the better, less traffic options available), you wouldn't take Lake Ave. For someone to be doing it regularly, with enough frequency to be remembered as a chatty young girl, I would think they'd have a reason to be going there. And if that is the case, I would think that Gramma Cook would know about it.

Yes, that's what I've tried to express. I feel so strongly about this. I have no idea if WC knew the girls were going there but I do believe they were and that they had some reason to be doing it. Could be a playmate from church or sports or whatever. The Carpenters expressed that they went down there and turned around, sounding as if they did not linger very long at the end of Lake Ave. I don't know, but I feel strongly that they had a destination in mind, they were going there with some frequency, and they weren't staying there very long.

 

[Ollipop]

Is there a sign anywhere near Mr. C's street that says "Bike Trail this way"? Maybe the girls saw a sign about a bike trail and headed that way?

There are signs on the sidewalks on Gilbert at every intersection saying that you are ON a bike trail. If you are at the intersection of Gilbert and Lake, the signs indicate to stay on Gilbert (it directs bikers to the Cedar Valley Nature Trail). The signs are posted so that bikers see them when riding on the "correct" side of the street (i.e. if you are eastbound on the north sidewalk, you might miss the signs b/c they are directed at ppl riding west, vice-versa across the street).

Other than as they intersect with Gilbert, there are no signs directed at bikers on Evans, Lake. On Arbutus, there is signage directing you onto the trail around the lake, or east to the Cedar Valley Nature Trail.

There is some overlap between what is called the Cedar Valley Nature Trail and what is called the Evansdale Nature Trail. If you look at the map of E'dale, where the CVNT intersects Gilbert, that is actually on the dike, and the sidewalk terminates on the north side, where it directs ppl down the CV trail. The sidewalk on Gilbert, on both sides, from River Forest to the dike, is clearly marked as "Bike Route," complete with miniature stop signs at the intersections.

 

[SapphireSteel]

Well, I confess.

Around 8-10 years old, I bounced on my parents' bed even though I knew I wasn't supposed to. I drank milk straight from the carton (it just seemed colder that way). I used a flashlight to read under the covers.

Sometimes I didn't stop playing to tie my shoe, even though I knew my mom would tell me I was risking my neck if I went around with an untied shoelace.

Kids do more than their parents know and sometimes parents know more than the kids realise.

I wouldn't think it was unusual for Elizabeth to push the limits a bit, that's what kids do.

But due to what Ollipop says, I do wonder if the Carpenters were really seeing Elizabeth or not. If they were, I think there's more to the story than normal kid boundary pushing.

To me, they were on a mission. The speed at which they were travelling seems to indicate that.

(I'm taking TG and RC's sightings as correct.)

Find out what that mission was, and you've found the girls.

I originally thought they were rushing to meet someone at the lake.

I am now starting to wonder if they were ORDERED to get to the lake, and quickly.

Quick, if you hurry you'll have time to....x...and be home again in time for x.