The News Channel 11 report was well produced and did a good job summarizing the case so far.
According to their website, they are affiliated with both CBS and ABC.
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Any other CBS or ABC station could air this piece if they wished. They could edit it if needed.
This is why imo it would have behooved the parents to at least return the phone call. Even if they just asked over the phone for the abductor they have told us about to please let Summer go. Just a basic appeal for Summer to be let go (which the reporter did for them).
The national news stations are not going to go so far out of their way when no one would talk to even the Johnson City TV news. Especially since it is abundantly clear from that piece that there was a search for Summer, but she wasn't found.
It is clear from the snippets of old interviews that LE is mired in a difficult investigation. And anyone seeing that and knowing nothing else about the case would go immediately to the lost in the woods theory (which might even be true, we don't know).
So, if I live in NYC or Seattle or a small town in Arizona, i might feel sad a little girl has probably died from exposure long ago, but i am not going to think there is even one thing i can do to find her unless i go to Hawkins County and start tromping around in the woods.
I am in Tennessee, and i don't have any super awesome ideas about how to find Summer. Hawkins County is pretty far from me and i don't know much about it other than it has some caves and a lot of wooded land. And it has a river. I have watched some videos of people driving around HC and those are interesting. The freight train runs through the county. I don't know if that is relevant just like i don't know if the Rogersville airport is relevant.
I feel like little Summer is in a place where it is not so easy to find her. You would have to know where to start. From that piece, the TBI sounds like they barely know where to start.
I believe they know what they are doing, but i am from Tennessee. So, i feel they won't give up because I have seen they can be tenacious. But, if i wasn't, i might not even really understand their particular role in this case.
Plus, i have told people about this case. And they are immediately suspicious. So....