I was able to have a private conversation with a criminologist, which was especially nice since no one among my family or friends are into discussing this case except for my 13-year-old son. It was not a professional who is involved in this particular case, to be clear, but the person was able to answer some questions and correct me on some assumptions I had about criminal behavior and investigations (I admittedly say this as someone who typically can’t handle following true crime stuff). But this is a private individual and not someone who wants to be on the record as having been a resource in the case, and who is not following the details other than asking me questions about details in order to answer my questions. Can I share the thoughts/input under a ‘MOO’ sort of thing or is that considered speculative/unsourced, when I’m not stating the criminologist’s info?
Re: Conversation with a criminologist acquaintance who is NOT working this case: I did not mean to leave anyone in suspense; I asked if I could post and then my family was hit by the flu the next morning after a mod said I could post under MOO. I did take some notes but this was nearly a week ago now, so some parts of the case understanding may have shifted since that conversation, and if there are errors in accuracy, I am sure they are mine. All of this should be taken with a dose of JMO, etc.
Amidst the family illness, I’ve given up on trying to get it all out quickly, but I will post some in pieces.
I should also say anything is possible. Outliers exist. But we were discussing probabilities, not rare exceptions beyond this whole thing being a rare exception. As we say in my own field, first think horses, not zebras.
So my own understanding now, part 1:
Regarding the theory that Savannah had an obsessive stalker who went after her mom: Unlikely. In general, abducting her mom would be a very rare expression of that sort of obsession. If Savannah had a stalker like that, that person would have made increasingly intimate and extreme efforts at forms of contact with SG before trying to abduct someone, so that person would very much be on the LE radar. But the behavior after NG’s disappearance also does not fit that at all. The person would desperately want to communicate with Savannah directly and would feel compelled to tell her specific and probably very outlandish things. Instead, we have no direct communication with SG re: the abduction, random, etc.
What is much more possible re: SG is that someone local discovered there’s an accessible individual with a high-net-worth family member, making NG someone to target not because they care about SG other than her being a source of funds, but because NG is convenient to them, appears vulnerable on some research/recon, etc. That might be because someone mentioned to them a famous and successful ‘hometown girl’ whose mom still lives around here, or from Today Show coverage that included SG, etc.
And NG had lived 50 years in that house without being targeted, and without violent crime in her neighborhood, so it was not a focus as a possibility. So while we can all think in hindsight they should have made NG more secure in X, Y, or Z ways, NG was just living her life by her long-term standards of peaceful expectations, and people should be careful not to shame or blame her family, who are going through hell, for not anticipating this incredibly rare risk.
Again, MOO after the conversation, etc.
Will post more in the next day or two as I can.
www.knpr.org
leb.fbi.gov
www.tucsonaz.gov
