the cops needed to/were obligated to/should have/had to inspect every square inch of the house, inside and outside, for any possible clues. While waiting for the phone call, they were negligent by not doing everything humanly possible to get a jump on the perp. Did they tap the phone?
Inviting friends over was also a good move for emotional support. Imagine the fear ripping their souls to shreds. Imagine you went downstairs one morning and found that note with your name and your child's name.
Yes, they should have. But they didn't. Because of the holiday, they were short-staffed, and refused help from other LE (Denver police offered to help and Eller, feeling insulted, refused). It is unfathomable that Officer French, the first on the scene, didn't at least TRY to see why the wineceller door wouldn't open. All he had to do was look UP. It is a shame more LE weren't sent to aid Det. Arndt when she asked, several times, for help.
Phone taps are standard for kidnapping cases, which this was thought by LE to be at first. But not much has been said as to whether they did this. Because if this, I'd bet they may not have. I believe a warrant is needed for that, and Hunter pretty much stymied any warrant police asked for. He refused warrants for their phone records.
Inviting friends over TO THE CRIME SCENE was a big mistake and one police should never have allowed. Officer French should have thrown them out or prevented them from entering. I am not minimizing the support friends can offer, but they did not belong in that house that morning. It should have been sealed off to anyone not LE as soon as police arrived. If this had been done, for example, FW wouldn't have been there to touch the suitcase or the tape. In the kitchen, where a flashlight was on a counter and the Rs claimed "wasn't theirs, but they had one just like it", and which may have been the murder weapon, the Rs friends were wiping the counters down and cleaning things off. Who knows- maybe one of THEM wiped off the flashlight. And batteries.
In light of the alleged RN's instructions NOT to talk to even a stray dog, the Rs decision to have several cars and lots of people arriving at a house that the note said would be "monitored" is suspicious to me.