Keep an eye on "The Lineup" tonight on Fox News. It's a 2-hour special, starting at 9, Eastern Time. Late in the second hour, between 10:30 and 11:00, there may be a discussion of the murder of Michelle Young, a still-unsolved case in Raleigh, N.C.
My original blog entry mentioning the Young murder is here:
"Of Janet Abaroa and Michelle Young, and Murder..."
Hopefully I'll be on the show for a bit, but remember always -- it's live TV.
The comprehensive entry about the recovery of Ben Ownby and Shawn Hornbeck is here.
Note, 1/13/07
Ben Ownby, Shawn Hornbeck Found Alive!
(UPDATES AT THE BOTTOM OF THE BLOG ENTRY.)
An Amazing Development in a Terrible Story...
A reader has informed me that both missing Beaufort, MO teen Ben Ownby, age 13, and Shawn Hornbeck have been found in a St. Louis apartment. Hornbeck has been missing since October of 2002 -- more than 4 years.
That's all I know for now, but if this amazing development is true, all recovering of past entries to post here will cease for the moment while I continue to get confirmation.
For the record, if this is a false lead, the reader's name screen name is "reannan."
Here is a comment I received as I prepared this entry:
Shawn Hornbeck and Ben Ownby have been found alive. Michael J. Devlin is being held on 1million dollar bond. They were found in an apartment in Kirkwood, MO. 63122, about 30-40 miles from their homes/places of abduction...reannan has always been sane in the past, so I'm going with this. More as the story develops. Feel free to help me blog it by hitting the comments below.
UPDATE 1
Regular Crime Blog reader Soobs helps with a link to a Fox News article. Quoting from the article:
FBI agents stormed a house Friday in Kirkwood, Mo., and found missing 13-year-old Ben Ownby in the company of another missing boy, Shawn Hornbeck, who vanished in April 2002...That report was from KTVI, according to the brief blurb on Fox's website. Here is a quote from that St. Louis station:
Police say they went to serve a search warrant and that resulted in the recovery.May be the crime story of the year, if true.
Both boys appear to be okay. They will be checked out.
There was a tip on the truck that led them to the area.
Under arrest is, Michael J. Devlin, 41, of Kirkwood, Missouri with one count of kidnapping. He is in custody being held on $1 million bond. More charges are likely to be filed.
Shawn Hornbeck was 11 years old when he disappeared. He is now 15...
And I have a dreadful feeling that while they may outwardly seem all right, neither Ben Ownby or Shawn Hornbeck are truly okay at all.
UPDATE 2
The entry I wrote in August of 2005 about Shawn Hornbeck's disappearance has been recovered and posted here:
"Traveling Alone Westbound..."
My theory of the crime was incorrect.
But I wonder if the man who appears to have kidnapped Hornbeck, Mike Devlin, will not end up resembling Joseph Edward Duncan in many respects, after all.
For the sake of Ben Ownby and Shawn Hornbeck, I hope not.
UPDATE 3
A Michael J. Devlin is on the Utah Sex Offender registry. The charge? In July of 1997, Devlin was convicted of 2 counts of indecent exposure. [Note: I think it's been established that the guy on the Utah registry and the man in Kirkwood in jail are not the same person.]
If you comment, think of a nickname to use, please. An "anonymous" commenter left the tip about the Utah registry, and I would love to thank someone more uniquely-defined than "anonymous." Still developing...
(UPDATE 4 deleted to correct previously published information. Devlin quite possibly is being confused by both myself and the media with another sex offender entirely.)
UPDATE 5
Until the information becomes clear, I've removed photos of the Michael Devlin found on Utah and Texas state sex offender registries. Both states have photos of the same man, and The Kansas City Star reports the following:
So if I have it wrong here, so do the officials. Thanks to the poster who referenced the Star coverage in the comments below. Nancy Grace's CNN Headline News show is on now, and they are using the Utah Sex Offender registry photo. So I think the anonymous commenter who said this was not the same Devlin may have been in error.Sheriff Gary Toelke said Ben Ownby and Shawn Hornbeck were found in a Kirkwood home belonging to Michael Devlin, 41. Devlin has been charged with one count of first-degree kidnapping, and Franklin County prosecutor Robert Parks said more charges are likely. He is registered as a sex offender in Utah, officials there said...
(NOTE: To the anonymous commenter -- you may have been right after all -- it just isn't clear yet. But the guy seen on TV looks heavier and hairier than the man seen in the SO registries. My apologies for doubting you.)
UPDATE 6
Heartbreaking. One of the St. Louis area media outlets reported this:
http://snipurl.com/shawndevlin.
In the guestbook for ShawnHornbeck.com, the site maintained to keep the search for the boy alive, the following two posts were made on December 1, 2005:
The earlier comment:shawn - Thursday, December 1, 2005 - 2:56 PM devlin
hey sorry about that last thing i put on there,i write poems and i was wounding if it would be ok to write a poem for the hornbeck fam. and they son "shawn Hornbeck" it would be cool if i could but if you dont want me to i can understan why i guess but i was wounding if i could write a poem in his horner (sorry i dont know how to spell that last word)
The boy was trying. Stunning, sad, scary.shawn devlin - Thursday, December 1, 2005 - 1:59 AM kirkwood
how long are you planing to look for your son?
UPDATE 7
Via a comment left by a poster here and at CrimeRant.com, the superb blog run by true crime writers Gregg Olsen and M. William Phelps:
http://profiles.yahoo.com/shawn_the_pumpkin_king, and another a reader pointed out to me;
http://profiles.yahoo.com/kyo_kmk_forlife.
These appear to be Shawn Hornbeck's Yahoo profiles. The second one has very little posted to it. Quotes from the first profile, "shawn the pumpkin king":
Yahoo! ID:Shawn had another online profile:
shawn_the_pumpkin_king
Real Name:
Shawn Devlin
Nickname:
Kyo
Location:
St.louis MO kirkwood
Marital Status:
No Answer
Sex:
Male
Occupation:
not jack shit
More About Me
Hobbies:
listen to music,playing games,talking to ppl on the computer,hanging out with friends,writeing poems,and some other shit
http://mindviz.com/profile.php?id=dirtbike_rider
He used the same photo.
I couldn't help but wonder if Shawn had actually made those profiles after all. If perhaps he'd aged out of Devlin's preferential zone, and was now being used as a lure. It wouldn't be the first time a pedophile with a kidnapped child in his possession had done such a thing.
It is now becoming clear that either something is hinky on Utah and Texas registries, or with Michael J. Devlin. The man in the photos did not match the man seen on TV, and the descriptions don't match. The Devlin arrested in Kirkwood was born 11/19/65, the Devlin on the registries born 11/27/65. I wonder if the news outlets still giving out the info about this man being a registered offender are correct. I also wonder if someone has been swapping ids with other like-minded men to throw the registries off.
Like the man says, developing...
UPDATE 8
Shawn Hornbeck's Yahoo profiles may have been taken offline -- not certain at the moment.
The following is simply strange, and I don't know what to make of it. But I figured it was worth pointing out.
A poster at the Court TV message board discussion about this amazing turn in two different missing boy cases pointed out the following message found on the message board at ShawnHornbeck.com. Link:
http://snipurl.com/joeblack.
Quote:
Joe Black - Sunday, April 11, 2004 - 6:09 PM San antonio,Texas
**ALERT** My phsycic seemed to no straight away what I was talking about. He said he is under hiding. I couldn't figure out what he meant though.
The least likely possibility to folks familiar with missing child cases. Elizabeth Smart's return, Shasta Groene coming home alive -- they are exceptions, much of the time.
Was Michael Devlin playing around on that guestbook, or perhaps even Shawn himself, sending his first message? We probably won't find out. Maybe it was even a real psychic or friend of a psychic leaving that oddly-worded message.
Thank you to all my readers for the active comments below, and for the updates and links you are providing there.
UPDATE 9
In a news conference being broadcast on Fox News this morning, Shawn Hornbeck's stepfather stated that "we've lost our sense of community." In one way, he is right. In another, maybe not. It's been transferred to places like weblog comments, message boards, news aggregation sites like Digg.com. Why? feels safer here.
Laura Bauer's article in the Kansas City Star (link actually takes you to the Wichita Eagle), today is about me, crime-blogging colleague Laura James, and the community of people who post in comments on my weblogs. Laura Bauer touches on and explores to a degree how that community expressed itself in discussing a case I began covering last week.
That discussion, even with two of my blogs being down right now, has continued with the remarkable recovery of Shawn Hornbeck and Ben Ownby. I just wanted to direct you to Ms. Bauer's article and -- again -- thank all who are reading and posting.
Incidentally, another teen missing for years has been discovered to be alive and well. Very different story from the one you've read about here, though -- apparently the girl in the AP article I just linked was a runaway, not an abductee.
UPDATE 10
I removed the link in this update -- I've concluded it was a coincidence. Remember, this case has been full of them.
I have copies of some of the content of Shawn's removed pages, so that's been preserved (thank you to P.M. for those!) However, I'm holding off on posting them for now.
UPDATE 11
My friend in law enforcement out in a western state cybersleuths on her own time if she simply finds a case interesting. As a result, she found this:
http://profiles.yahoo.com/mdevlin65@sbcglobal.net.
Note that the e-mail screen name is mdevlin65 -- but the photo is of a young teen, and through a piercing in his right eyebrow there is a long push-pin.
And the name above that chilling photo is "Shawn."
The information on the profile is virtually the same as the profile (now offline) kept by "shawn_the_pumpkin_king." Quoting:
Yahoo! ID:I wonder if Shawn Hornbeck even knew that this profile existed. Perhaps Shawn had "outgrown" Michael Devlin, in Devlin's mind... so, about two years into Shawn's captivity, Devlin may have begun to use Shawn to try and lure others -- again, perhaps without Shawn's knowledge.
mdevlin65@sbcglobal.net
Real Name:
shawn
Nickname:
devil,vampire
Location:
st.louis
(...)
Marital Status:
No Answer
Sex:
Male
Occupation:
dont do jack shit
(...)
Hobbies:
listen to music,hanging with friends,talking to ppl on the computer
Latest News:
well its would be stupid to put my latest news o here cuz i might not be so if you want to know just ask
Favorite Quote:
peckerhead,crackhead
The overall outcome of this story is so positive and miraculous that at the moment everyone -- talking heads in the media, mostly -- seems to want to dance around the grim revelations that may come in the future, especially about what Shawn Hornbeck may have endured while captive for 4 years. I personally have real trouble addressing them too directly, myself.
But thanks to my friend PM, this Yahoo profile may eventually prove a real clue into what was going on. And why one hopes the police find reason to put Devlin away forever, maybe even to death. Either fate would probably be too good for a cretin like Michael Devlin.
UPDATE 12
Thanks to elle for posting this link in the comments:
http://profiles.yahoo.com/xxdevildevlinxx
The Yahoo profile above is virtually identical to the one mentioned in Update #11.
UPDATE 13
Reader ZL sent me their comparison between the images of "Shawn" on the Yahoo profiles above, and Shawn Hornbeck as he was seen in the press conference broadcast from Missouri earlier today. You can click on the image on the left to enlarge it.I believe the boy in the Yahoo photos was Shawn, but who knows as to whether he actually posted the profiles in question. That's one reason this is such a strange story, to boot.
Additionally, an empty MySpace profile came back when the mdevlin65 e-mail was entered into the MySpace search form:
http://www.myspace.com/23093653.
The name on the profile is "Shawn," and it looks like the profile was maintained between July 27, 2005, and August 19th of the same year. There may never have been any content there.
One reason I have to wonder if it was actually Devlin setting at least a few of these profiles up is all of them would have provided Shawn with some way to tell someone who he really was. Devlin didn't let him go to school for 4 years... but he let him have computer access?
Stranger and stranger. Thanks to ZL and the folks who sent me the MySpace link.
UPDATE 14
"ge2u" posted this in the comments on this entry -- http://allpoetry.com/poem/2050693.
The link takes you to a poem posted by Devlindev10.
The poem was posted June 3, 2006, and though the author said it should be considered "humur" (sic), it was titled, "death." Quoting:
Little Shawn smokes six Ax's a day.Left by Shawn Hornbeck? Well, in one of the posts left on the ShawnHornbeck.com guestbook (mistakenly called a "blog" by at least one talking head on a cable news show -- listen folks, every single personal expression posted to a webpage is not a blog -- someone get that straight one day), a "Shawn Devlin" from Kirkwood did mention writing poetry. So, perhaps it was him.
He started smoking when he was three.
Now he's burried under the willow tree.
Regardless, it is yet another strange and sad note struck in this story that is filled with the strange and terribly sad. At least for Shawn Hornbeck and Ben Ownby both, things surely can only improve from hereon out.
UPDATE 15
Wow -- I don't know that this would have happened without the aid of sharp-eyed sleuths sending me e-mails and making comments on this post, but The True Crime Blog got a mention in an AP story: "For years, abducted boy had chances to escape." Quote:
A Yahoo user homepage belonging to "xxdevildevlinxx" was created in April 2004 and shows a partial picture of a boy, strongly resembling recent photos of Hornbeck, with an eyebrow piercing. On Saturday, the boy had a lip ring and three ear piercings.My crime blogging has gotten the nod from the AP before, but this was unexpected, so a little more pleasant.
Another Yahoo profile using the same picture is registered to an "mdevlin" in Kirkwood, Missouri.
A separate profile was taken out under the name Shawn Devlin in November 2005, according to the Yahoo page. It contains a full picture of a young boy similar to pictures of Hornbeck; the page says the user lives in Kirkwood, Missouri.
A Web site called the True Crime Blog mentioned the pages this weekend...
Thank you, all of you -- for the most amazing two days of traffic in the history of any of my weblogs and for your excellent contributions and insights.
UPDATE 16
Any further news relevant to the case of Ben Ownby, Shawn Hornbeck, and alleged kidnapper, possible predator Michael Devlin will be in a new blog entry.
A reader named Liz sent me a message pointing out the Google cache of a page from the ShawnHornbeck.com guestbook -- last I checked, the actual site was down: "Hornbeck Guestbook."
Early on I'd quoted what may have been two posts from Shawn himself. Liz pointed out the following:
David Beckham - Friday, April 16, 2004 - 3:59 PM Madrid,SpainI must admit that as nice as it would be to think that a star athlete with Beckham's fame might do such a thing, the post above set off my b.s. meter. It was the "famous soccer player" part. Then again, Beckham, if it was him, might have made note of the fact that he was signing the guestbook for a site devoted to an American missing boy, and realized he needed to be specific about who he was. Soccer has never really picked up over here like it has with the rest of the world.
As you may no i am a famous soccer player from England who plays for Real Madrid. I used to play for Manchester United. I was looking on this website and i just think it is very touching. I pray for Shawn and my heart and soul is with him at this moment in time. Good luck. D.Beckham
I know media folks with major contacts in the entertainment world read this weblog. So if any of you have Beckham's publicist on your contact list, get word to the soccer star and just check it out.
If that truly was the soccer star, who just made news himself by signing with a "major league" American soccer team, then this would be one of the oddest overlaps of headline stories in the news I've ever seen.
Until then, I'll stick to being skeptical.
Looking for....
Recent entries about Arkansas City teen Jodi Sanderholm?
For entries I've copied to this blog about Dr. Rafael Robb, now in jail, charged with murdering his wife, Ellen:
Otherwise, for the moment, just poke around. I'm stopping for the night, but I've now loaded some odds and ends on to this blog, so there are definitely things to read here, comment on if you wish. Tomorrow I'll be calling my host again and deciding whether or not to make the damned re-directs that have sent you to this page permanent and begin the arduous process of moving all my blog entries over to this domain.
About that time, of course, watch blogger have one of its infamous outages... *grumble* ...
And PLEASE, be sure to read this entry, which gives some explanation of why putting huffcrimeblog.com or crimeblog.us into your browser plops you down here for the moment. This is not a hijack or a hack, this is the real Steve a-talkin' atcha.
WHAT FRESH HELL IS THIS?
Where's HuffCrimeBlog.Com? Where is CrimeBlog.US, dammit???
Somewhere out there still, but at the moment, they are inaccessible to me, and the normally very helpful dudes at my host, BlueHost.com, have gone all slacker on a cracker.
Have the blogs vanished? Hell no. But when it hit me that I was an idiot and could simply go into my control panel and re-direct you folks for a bit, this new option, the Crime Blog Annex, felt pretty solid.
Stay tuned. The discussion will continue.
A note: don't be disconcerted if this blogspot blog seems to change even as you read -- I'm fiddling with the look, like a guy wearing a freshly-starched shirt, tugging at his collar.
NOTE, added 10:08 p.m.
Because they have been receiving such a considerable amount of traffic, I've recovered both entries to date about the disappearance and death of Jodi Sanderholm and posted them with their date stamps duplicated -- so they are below this entry. Scroll down if you arrived here looking for blog entries about Jodi.
NOTE, 11:00 p.m.
So, what I'm saying is -- your patience while I complete what I'm planning here is greatly appreciated. Believe me, no one is more torqued than I am at having these problems again.
I will begin copying old entries here, past-dating them where appropriate, but as I plan to continue with new, fresh posts, that will be slow going. Just an FYI for the impatient, obsessive-compulsive, and ADD among you. (Incidentally, all three of those descriptions fit me perfectly. Or hadn't you noticed?)
"OH, SNAP!" (Andrew Erickson's Error)
We should probably be glad that Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson is apparently about as dumb as alleged kiddie-porn fans could possibly get.
From The Herald-News Online, an article published December 30, 2006: "Student faces child porn charges." Quotes from the piece:
Andrew Erickson, 18, of 57 Lee's River Ave., Swansea, was arrested by Fall River and Swansea police late last week. He has pleaded not guilty to the charge and was released after a family member posted his $500 cash bail.
The Bristol Community College student was to submit his computer information systems final examination on compact disc last week.
But instead of submitting the class work, Erickson allegedly handed in a disc that contained images of children as young as 7-years-old in sexually explicit situations. The disc, according to police reports, listed each youth by age, ranging from 7 to 14...
(...)
Prior to being arrested, Erickson apparently realized he had handed in the wrong disc to his professor.
Police reports quote an e-mail Erickson sent to his professor, in which he appears to attempt to shift ownership of the disc from himself to an unnamed friend.
"Oh snap, I am sorry. I accidentally gave you my friend's mixed music CD that I meant to keep here and install the music on my computer," Erickson said in an e-mail to his professor. "I found the CD with the (final exam) on it. If there's some way I could send it to you, that would be great.
"I am sorry about that, and hope it didn't affect the grade at all. Again, if I could get that CD back so that I can install the music. Sorry for the mix up." ...
Translation -- "Oh snap, dawg, my buckass nekkid shawtie picshurs is in ur D-Drive, pervin' up the 'puter!"
I added the emphasis that lets you know why I'm calling this young man "Oh Snap."
Snapper has himself a MySpace, of course:
http://www.myspace.com/12876320.
For obvious reasons, I doubt Snappy Erickson's screen name before December 30th was "Just Go Away."
Erickson left most of his page up, apparently. So we can get some idea of what this particular 18-year-old alleged child porn consumer might be like. His general interests, for instance:
My interests involve my knives, guns, hanging out with my friends, and listening to my music. I am always up for something new though if it's interesting and has the prospect of being fun...
Nice. Allegedly into child pornography and his knives and guns, too.
Fortunately for the true-crime corner of the blogosphere, Andrew Erickson wrote a pair of blog entries himself. They can be found here, at the moment:
http://blog.myspace.com/12876320.
The following is a portion of an entry dated July 7, 2006. He erroneously calls the blog entry a bulletin. But then again, we may have already established that Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson is not the sharpest barb on the wire:
If you actually are reading this I thank you for your time and effort. It shows that somebody pays attention to me. I won't cause much trouble just wanted to get a few points across. The first point is that for those of you who I don't know send me messages I want to get to know you. If I added you that means that I knew you at the time and I want to get to know you again. If I know you then leave me comments if we haven't hung out in a while. This is probably the only place you will all see me for a while. I barley leave my house except for work on saturday and Sunday and even then it isn't for that long. So like I said Get in touch with me if I barley talk to you or don't talk to you at all anymore. I wouldn't add you if I didn't want to get to know you. That is all and I thank you for your time. Alright peace out.
Erickson
Since Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson's tawdry story of misplaced media has been in the news for a few days, it is only natural that a few people have reached his MySpace blog already and left commentary indicating their opinions about this young man. Here is a sampling:
"Oh snap! Looks like your life is over!" ~ Posted by "Oh SNAP" on January 9, 2007.
"Oh snap! Install music or hand in kiddie porn? Retard." ~ Posted by "Kevin" on Wednesday, January 10, 2007.
"OH SNAP!
"At least you weren't caught with that illegal music instead. That would have been harsh. Haha, dumbass." ~ Posted by "Kahlua" on January 10, 2007.
"I hear not only are the prison buddies coming after your ass but the RIAA is going to sue your ass for illegal download of music on that mix CD.
"AND your buddy is going to kill you for snitching on him! SNITCH!
"THE PRISONs DO NOT LIKE SNITCH LIKE YOU" ~ Posted by "Oh SNAP" on January 10, 2007.
(My favorite follows, from a MySpace 'wag' named "Dave...")
"While labeling a CD 'Hot, slippery child pornography' might be incriminating, it might be wiser than labeling it 'Computer class assignment'.
"Sometimes keeping an organised desk will give people a nice impression. In this case, it wouldve saved your life. Here's hoping prison teaches you to splurge on a sharpie and a CD spool next time, chief." ~ Posted on January 10, 2007...
If Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson had been any other snaggle-toothed fat-assed weirdo, the preceding abuse would have made me feel a twinge of sympathy for the guy.
But I dug deep this time, and lordy, that well was dry. As commenters on Erickson's weblog kept pointing out in one form or another, "[7-14] year olds, dude."
Snappy Erickson's other blog entry was a story, or the start of one. Selected quotes from that piece of genius, posted online May 13, 2006, are below. You don't need to read the whole thing to see where I'm going with the added emphasis. I made only the most minimal corrections for Erickson's abysmal spelling:
Gerald walked through the doors to the empty town hall looking around calmly. His boots making a clanking noise on the hardwood floor the blades resting firmly on his back. He began to travel through the rooms making sure to check each one. He had heard this town was haunted and it was localized inside of the town hall, but in the many days he had been here he had yet to find but one ghoul...
... [Slowly] he walked in looking around for the location of the noise only to see a pair of cold blue eyes staring at him from the mayors large padded chair. He looked at the man placing a hand safetly on the sword hilt as the very muscular man rose from his seat his eyes a clear crystal blue seeming to peirce into the very soul of Gerald...
... The man then seems to laugh cruely at Gerald slowely walking around the desk his body seemining to be illuminated by a faint blue light. Gerald continued to see this light and unsheated his weapon pointing the tip at the man's body. The man laughs as he raises a hand a ball of blue light forming just above his palm and glowing softly [two] smaller orbs seeming to circle around it...
... The man continues to walk towards Gerald a very angry expression on his face as the walls around Gerald begin to shake and tremble. Gerald continues to hold the blade firm however as it begins to glow softly one side turning a dark red the other side turning a deep purple...
... Gerald looked at the blade and then back at the Muscular man as he gripped the blade in two hands fire bursting from the blade going up the hilt and rideing up his arms. He looked as his body was slowely engulfed in flame yet not feeling the burn at all as he looks back towards the muscular man. Slowely Geralds eyes turn a dark red as his skin begins to shift and shape itself into scale plating the blade still glowing brightly. The muscular man continued to hold his blade as well the two countering off each other glowing brightly as they looked towards each other.
Then rapidly gerald charged towards the man the blade held limp glowing behind him as he brought it up quickly attempting to catch the man offguard. A loud clash can be heard as the mans booming laugh fills the air as his blade shake and rumbles with the clash of the two. The man grins as he stares at the demonic figure of gerald now infront of him as the man's eyes begin to glow a soft baby blue. With a quick twist of his arm and the clash of the blade gerald is tossed back by the power of the sword as the man looks down towards gerald. Geralds vision however begins to blur as he looks at the man. His vision turning black as night with only a ghostly visiage of the muscular man glowing in a soft hue of blue as the two stared at each other. The vision of gerald twisted and distorted from that of any normal picture as his skin changed too a dark red hue his body contorted to an unnatural shape. The sword still continueing to pulse as it glows. The other man continued to look on at gerald his eyes a light hue of blue his sword soft and glistening...
Feeling utterly unclean, yet?
Snappy Erickson is out on bond, but a particularly cruel thing to do would be to send that torrid story of limp, purple, soft, glistening swords to Erickson's cellmate, should the young man be convicted of any charges and imprisoned. I bet the boys in lock-up would love the storyteller's combination of blood and gore and bepurpled weapons intent on impaling soulless ghouls.
No examination of Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson's MySpace weblog would be complete if I left out the comments left on Erickson's "story." MySpace user "Oh SNAP," who appeared to create their profile solely to post on Erickson's blog, was back:
"OH SNAP! BUBBA IS GOING TO BE MY NEW BOYFRIEND.
I DO HOPE HE'S ONLY 7-14 years old..."
But the comment left about this "story" by "electro soundwave" was probably the most snarky:
"that's almost as good as the nitwit who decided to give his professor a CD full of kiddies pr0n, then tried to get it back. LULZ..."
The Internet can be a spectacularly cruel place, and not even a fraction of the people who get targeted with cruelty deserve it.
Yet there are rare times, like the story of Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson, when such a lambasting may very well be richly deserved.
Now friends of Erickson might be trolling the web and want to lay out the old "innocent until proven guilty" line of b.s. -- someone always does in cases like this, where I decide to let my sacasm show -- but that's a stupid dodge. That term has legal power once you are inside the courtroom. This isn't a courtroom. And Mr. Snappy Purple Glistening LimpSword rings every creep bell in my head.
As funny as this crime story is in one respect -- it's a classic "stupid criminals" kind of tale -- the reason it isn't just human comedy in the end is the fact that somehow, child porn was involved. Anyone purveying child porn has simply committed the act recorded on the video all over again.
Viewing Andrew Erickson's profile, his stated pursuits, his bizarrely freudian little story, a melding of the erotic and violent seems to suggest itself. As easy as it seems to be for us to laugh at this creep, the fact is -- I worry at just how much time he could get if he is found guilty of possessing the porn. Being into creepy stuff is fine, but being into creepy stuff and kiddie porn too is another level of perversion entirely, and one that I find scary. It's been present in too many criminals I've researched who committed much more violent, gruesome crimes.
Many states still just don't have very harsh penalties for this crime. We've all heard of a certain incredibly Kreepy guy who claimed to be a killer, was proven to be a liar, still had to face child porn charges, and managed to not face those, in the end. And the guy I'm speaking of at the moment (just click the link in "Kreepy") would not have faced significant time for the porn charges, either.
Andrew Erickson may end up (if convicted) placed on the sex offender registry, of course, which will be a serious punishment, but in Massachusetts, will he be tested, evaluated as to what sort of threat he might really present? I'd hope so, but I'm not sure I have much faith in Massachusetts when it comes to law enforcement on certain issues.
Child pornography shouldn't just be viewed as a slip, a minor offense. Some states are learning this, and the Feds appear to know it. In an 18-year-old who also seems to be drawn to dark and violent imagery, a child porn charge seems pretty ominous indeed.
Let's hope that if Erickson comes back in the news one day in the future it isn't for something far worse than owning whatever it was he accidentally gave to his professor. No one will be laughing then, that's for damn sure.
UPDATE, 11:25 p.m. ET
Diane, you're awesome.
In the comments left on this entry, regular reader and cybersleuth Diane left this:
http://snipurl.com/ohsnaperickson.
The link will take you to Andrew Erickson's MySpace as Google captured the page on November 24, 2006.
It is enlightening, to say the least.
Here's Snappy Erickson's "About Me" now:
About me:
Just a little about me. I am not a fake account first off. I am just a regular guy I guess. I might not have the best looks but I really won't let that get me down. I am still going to have fun with my friends and still enjoy my life. I mean it's the only one we get as far as I know so I want to have fun with it...
From the same profile, cached on the 24th of last November:
About me:
That one guy that you where always told to avoid. That one guy who you where warned against speaking too. Your looking at him. I'm the reason you drive defensivly. I am the reason you don't help random people in the street. I am the reason you lock your house at night. I am the thing that waits in your closet for you to sleep with a knife in my hand.
Completely unnecessary bold emphasis added by yours truly.
Mr. Smiley Snapper's greeting to visitors now: "Nice to meet ya."
When the page was cached on the 24th: "I was the guy you where warned about."
Stephen King once wrote a terrifying short story about a character called "the Library Poleethman" -- the Library Policeman. It was essentially a horror tale with a child molester who hung out at the town library as the monster.
The character I pictured when I read that short piece years ago looked a helluva lot like Mr. Andy Snappy-pants Erickson.
My thanks again to Diane, who has often behind the scenes helped me find more fascinating stuff about stories I was covering than I could have by myself. I'm glad you stick around. Wish the subject matter was a little "lighter."
Andrew Erickson is potentially dangerous. I think so now, after seeing what his site once looked like. If he was some schmoe I just happened across I'd have thought the original version of the site a little creepy, but not that unusual. Plenty of harmless dorky white boys try and front like they're hardcore. The added element of Andrew "Oh Snap" Erickson allegedly having child porn so close at hand that he mixed it up with his damned homework changes the whole game, though.
At least maybe now, if Erickson gets off easy in court, there might be some folks out there who will remember, and keep their cyber-ears to the ground, their eyes open.
Jodi Sanderholm, Part II.
There was no one but the workers in the Subway, the Ark City Glass Co. wasDays ago I knew that if Jodi Leann Sanderholm, a beautiful 19-year-old college student from Ark City, was not found soon, her disappearance might become a “high-profile” case. Hearing Ann Curry read Jodi’s name on the news segment of NBC’s Today Show this morning only amplified that feeling.
I wish I’d been wrong.
Jodi, a valedictorian of her 2006 graduating class at Ark City High and a current member of the Cowley College Tigerettes dance team, has been missing since the afternoon of January 5, 2007.
She attended dance team rehearsal that morning, and around 11:30 she called her mom Cindy. With her husband (Jodi’s father) Brian Sanderholm, Cindy owns Ark City Glass.
Cindy Sanderholm and her daughter considered having lunch together, but Jodi said she was too grubby from practice. Instead, the Sanderholms figured they’d see Jodi at their home or business a little later in the day.
Jodi never showed. The last time anyone saw her was at a Subway Sandwich Shop. Jodi was wearing a Tigerette jacket with her name on it, leggings, cut-off sweats, and flipflops.
Jodi and her vehicle, a black 2003 Dodge Stratus Coupe, seemed to vanish from the face of the earth.
Wichita, Kansas is a little over 60 miles due north of Ark City. The following is from the Wichita Eagle, an article published earlier today that covers the most recent developments in the search for Jodi:
The search for a missing Arkansas City woman focused Monday on Cowley State Fishing Lake. Divers explored the lake on U.S. 166 near 256th Road, about 15 miles east of downtown Arkansas City, for any trace of 19-year-old Jodi Sanderholm, who has been missing since Friday…
“We’ve recovered evidence out there, and we’re continuing to recover evidence,” interim Police Chief Sean Wallace told The Eagle…
(…)
Monday morning, Wallace asked rural residents to check garages, outbuildings, barns and abandoned structures on their property for Sanderholm’s car, a 2003 black Dodge Stratus coupe.
At 3:30 p.m. Monday, divers began searching the 84-acre man-made lake. The lake is 32 feet deep in parts and is surrounded by 113 acres of prairie. Farms and pasture surround the area…
KatK has posted here at my weblog and in the discussion I began at Websleuths.com about this case, and she’s been able to give readers a unique view of the case — not an insider’s view, exactly, but still, a look only someone living in the general area could provide. She and her husband DK took all the photos you see in this blog entry. With the photos, KatK provided me via e-mail with some pretty compelling observations of Arkansas City, Kansas, a town riven by fear and anxiety over one gifted and beautiful young woman’s disappearance.
The following passages in italics were written by KatK in an e-mail to me — I’d gladly credit her by her real name, but am using her screen name only at her request...There was no one but the workers in the Subway, the Ark City Glass Co. was dark and forbidding (…) Subway seemed to be a “no man’s land”, as if people wouldn’t eat there because it was accursed. When we got into town it was the dinner hour, there should have been customers, but all we saw were workers.
As we were eating Chinese buffet (…) I overheard a cell phone conversation. Paraphrased after the person got off the phone it went something like “She said: They had a subject on foot in Hidden Valley. There was a cut off 911 call from Hidden Valley and the Sheriff was on the way.” I don’t know if that snippet has anything to do with Jodi or not. Maybe not, probably not. I don’t know if it’s that we were “outsiders” so people held their tongues, or maybe it’s that we weren’t in any of Jodi’s haunts, but we didn’t hear people speak of her directly. Even so, her poster was all over and people were somber or grim faced. (Maybe they were being careful because the reporters had invaded and they wanted their privacy? Kansans are pretty private, and subtle in their self expression at times.) We must have got there this afternoon after the helicopters and fire truck had left the scene, but the police were still out there, and the news trucks were there reporting. (And a tow truck had been called in….strange how that is omitted….)
A citizen, not a journalist or media person, simply observing a moment in a town that probably never saw something like this coming, and doing it with some eloquence.
People of all ages, races, and genders disappear daily. No, all those cases do not receive the attention they deserve. Something I’ve tried to do in any crime weblog I write is treat disappearances with an even hand — but I do think there is a reason some missing persons cases capture more attention than others, and it isn’t the most obvious and politically-charged reason, either.
In this interview published by true crime writers Gregg Olsen and M. William Phelps at their brilliant and feisty true crime blog, CrimeRant.com, Edgar Award winning author Harry N. MacLean answered some questions about his book, In Broad Daylight, a true-crime classic. One portion of the interview was particularly striking, for in his answer to a question, Harry N. MacLean put into words why real-life stories with a particular combination of elements — stories like the disappearance of Jodi Sanderholm — will capture public attention, sometimes:
[CR]: Would you consider writing another TC book?
[HNM]: You bet. I find myself attracted to the out of the way not-so-famous crimes, that are rich in context, where the setting and the culture play a large role in the story. A small town in the South, for example…
I placed bold emphasis on the words from Harry MacLean that resonated with me and made me think of why I’ve been tracking the story of Ark City and Jodi Sanderholm’s disappearance. KatK’s observations and even the photos of locations in that town only enhanced my sense of those things — the context.
But a true crime writer has to be careful to remind readers and his or her self that the story is not fiction, and the people are real, and they are suffering. That is most certainly the case here. What follows now are quotes pulled from comments I’ve received on the first entry I wrote about Jodi Sanderholm:
“Hello everyone. I am a relative of the family on Jodi’s sister’s side. I will not comment on anything written so far, but I want to remind everyone to pray….
“Pray that Jodi is found safe and alive. Pray that God watches over the family. Pray that their faith keeps them strong.
“Thank you.” ~ “AliceDiane,” January 8, 2006.
“…I would just like to remind everyone that Jodi has not been found so as of now we can presume she is still with us. Please continue to pray for her safe return. Also to please allow the family some privacy. They are in an emotional state right now and all of the rumors and accusations really aren’t helping. Please if you would like to help, keep an eye and ear out and continue to pray and offer support. Allow the police to do their job and remember that there may be things that the police are not saying due to the fact that many things are being leaked and then misconstrued and taken out of context….” ~ “Crystal,” January 9, 2006.
In other posts, the young man that Ark City police have in custody and are allegedly questioning about Jodi’s disappearance is mentioned. I will let the comments about Justin Thurber, age 23, speak for themselves for the moment. A caveat — Thurber is only accused at the moment of impersonating a police officer in Ark City, and this was in a case unrelated to the investigation into Jodi’s disappearance:
“I was born and raised in Ark City and now just live south of there in Oklahoma. I graduated in the same class as Jodi’s older sister as well as Justin Thurber. Not really wanting to post too much until his involvement is comfirmed, but in high school he was suspended from the football team and school for sexual harassment.
“I will continue to pray for the family and hope that Jodi comes back home.” ~ “From Ark City,” January 8.
“I went to school and church with jodi when we were younger.. we are the same age..
i hope for the best..
i also know the guy in connection with this or whatever you want to call it..
he’s really not all there.. from what i know he has quite the criminal past..
drug charges..
counterfeitting money..
impersonating an officer..
and now maybe this?..
who knows…” ~ “asdf,” January 8.“please only post things that you know to be accurate. many of you already have this Thurber kid ready for trial. he may/may not be a good person, but that is not relevant.
I have faith that she will be found safe and returned home soon…” ~ “jb1kunnobee,” January 9.
KatK and all the comments left above — voices from South Kansas, from Ark City, speaking for themselves, speaking, rightly or wrongly, for others. Providing some sense of the setting, the context, and the culture.
Other info about where the investigation into Jodi’s disappearance might be focused was posted in those comments, but it was vague and even more tenuous a rumor than suspicion towards Justin Thurber, so I’ve decided to leave it alone for now.
For now I’m drawn back to those photos and KatK’s observations of Ark City on a January night — the nearly-empty sandwich shop, the business run by Jodi’s parents, darkened, the window filled (according to other reports) with flyers about their daughter’s disappearance. The impression I have of this fairly small Kansas town at night, quiet and anxiously waiting under the vast dome of the midwestern sky.
If you pray, pay the most attention to the comments from good people asking for your prayers for the Sanderholm family. And extend those prayers to anyone who has ever sat through that endless night, staring into the maelstrom of their own fear and anxiety as it swirls around the question: where is my child?
This entry will be updated below.
UPDATE, 1:52 p.m. ET
In the comments, “Melissa” left a link to KSWO TV, and an article at that website about one significant and chilling piece of evidence that was found in this case yesterday. From the article:
Police searching for a missing 19-year-old Kansas woman are saying little about evidence found at Cowley State Fishing Lake near the Oklahoma state line.
Divers have searched the 84-acre lake for signs of Jodi Sanderholm of Arkansas City who hasn’t been seen since last Friday.The search has extended into Kay County, Oklahoma, and police now say they’re focused on the lake and areas near the Oklahoma line in trying to find Sanderholm and her car.
Sheriff Bob Odell says authorities were tipped that a letter with Jodi’s name on it was found in the bathroom at the lake…
In the comments left on the first blog entry, someone telegraphed this development. I decided to wait and see if anything came out in the mainstream news. Now that it has, here is the comment in question:
“in a restroom, by the lake, is what I heard from a good source. The letter rumour is just that until further notice.
“this hurts so much.
“Love to B/C…” ~ “Bill W.,” comment left on January 8, 2006.
Texas Equusearch is now assisting the investigation, as well.
Keep checking this weblog, any of the Kansas TV stations linked from either blog entry, or the Ark City Traveler for updates.
UPDATE, 3:33 p.m. ET
I have not had less than a thousand visitors a day for almost two years, between Huff’s Crime Blog and this weblog. But so far today, entries about Jodi Sanderholm’s disappearance are receiving a remarkable amount of traffic. There were nearly 1,200 unique visitors between 2 and 3 p.m. alone, today.
I don’t make this statement to brag, but to remind anyone who wants to leave a comment — and I make it a habit to encourage casual blog readers to read what you post here — to behave yourself. The midwesterners and southerners among you will hopefully find that plain-spoken enough to get what I’m saying. Take great care if posting rumors, etc. If it smacks of b.s. to you, don’t post it.
That said, so far, rumors first found in the comments on the previous entry have turned up in the mainstream news hours later. So that’s why I’m quoting this comment:
“I work with a girl who’s sister was personal friends with Jodi, and she said the evidence they found at the lake was Jodi’s clothes……I haven’t heard this anywhere else, but the girl was over at the Sanderholm house when she found this out…” ~ “JPo,” today, 2 p.m.
Even as I was writing this update, I received this comment:
“I am a good friend of Jodi’s. I grew up with her and have been close to her family for years. Yesterday I spend most of the day at her home with her family and other friends. The police chief has confirmed to Cindy that her clothes had been found in a dumpster at the state lake. I am at work now but just got off of the phone with someone who is there now. They do have more leads but everyone is very tight lipped. Despite the ambulence and tow trucks, they have NOT found Jodi or her car and there will be a press release with all of the new information sometime today…” ~ “cass,” comment left today, at 3:46 p.m…
Based on level-headed cautions people are leaving in the comments below, I want to re-emphasize: Justin Thurber, the young man arrested by Ark City police for impersonating a cop, has not been officially named in any way in connection with Jodi Sanderholm’s disappearance. No one posting comments here or e-mailing me has disputed Justin being the same guy who some referred to as “stalking” the Cowley College Tigerettes, Jodi’s dance team, either.
Finally — a comment still in moderation as I complete this update stated that the poster had a reliable source indicating Jodi Sanderholm had been found, and she was not alive.
That post will remain in moderation until there is a report in the mainstream news that corroborates the information.
UPDATE, 4:35 p.m. ET
“lkjh” linked to this KAKE (Wichita) article in the comments — “Ambulance Called to Search.” It doesn’t look good:
An ambulance and tow trucks have been called to the Cowley County State Park in the search to find a missing teenager. 19-year-old Jodi Sanderholm hasn’t been seen since Friday. KAKE News has learned that authorities are no longer conducting an active search at the lake and several officers have been called back to Arkansas City, for reasons unknown.
Investigators aren’t commenting on what they have found, or if the teenager has been located…
In more rural, less-populated areas, the ambulance will frequently double as a hearse. Some things you just don’t want to know off the top of your head, but that was the first thing that occurred to me upon reading the article linked above.
That said, “cass” has posted a response in the comments:
I just spoke to someone at the Sanderholm residence and they have NOT found Jodi or her car. They have, however, found very important evidence and they will be having an unexpected press release sometime today. Despite the trucks and ambulance Jodi herself has not been found…
I think that should stand as the final word for this update, at least.
UPDATE, 5:22 p.m. ET
Readers monitoring this blog entry for new comments are already aware of this, but it is being reported that Jodi’s vehicle may have been pulled from the Cowley State Fishing Lake. Still nothing (that I could find, that is) on KAKE-TV’s website, though.
UPDATE, 5:59 p.m. ET
Thanks to Melissa for posting this link in the comments: “Missing Woman’s Car Found.” From the article posted on KWCH-TV’s website:
Authorities in Arkansas City have just pulled the car belonging to a missing 19-year-old woman, out of a nearby lake. The car was taken past our crews covering the story, on a flatbed truck.
The Dodge Stratus had been a focal part of the investigation as authorities pleaded for residents to be on the lookout for the vehicle, last seen driven by Jodi Sanderholm last Friday…
Authorities will be processing the Stratus for evidence.
There are more rumors being posted in the comments. Just scroll down to read. Thus far, even some rumors that received serious criticism from other posters and raised my own doubts — set off my b.s. meter — have proven true. Commenters, or ‘blogmenters,’ if you will, are practically breaking news in this case well in advance of the local Kansas media — and you have some very good newspapers and TV stations in Kansas, who know how to cover major news.
Thank you for reading and showing how participatory blogging can be at times.
UPDATE, 7:47 p.m. ET
Those who have followed the comments being posted on this entry already know the following: “Body Found, PD Preparing Charges.” From KAKE-TV:
Searchers found the body of a female early this morning in a rural area of southeast Cowley County. By noon on Tuesday, they recovered Jodi Sanderholm’s car from the Cowley County lake. Police also say they are preparing charges against a known suspect.
In a statement released from the Arkansas City Police Department Tuesday night, authorities would not say if the body was that of Sanderholm. They did say the body would be transferred to the Sedgwick County Forensic Science Center for identification and autopsy…
Yes, too many of these stories seem to end this way, that’s true.
I’m still glad I withheld the comment that forecast this development, even though I believed the person who left it (it has been published now). I guess I didn’t want to be perceived as the first to bear the news to the public.
Where is Jodi Sanderholm?
NOTE: Most mainstream media sources are linked in superscript numbers at the end of a paragraph. Any other source webpages are hyperlinked and the result of my own research.
I hate to tell you this, but a very pretty, very smart white girl is missing in the Midwest. That’s her on the left. The photo comes from her MySpace, but don’t get revved up — it’s private.
I do not mean to be crass, I simply mean to address a contingent of people that will always come out and start grousing Web-wide if this case becomes “big.” I’m usually not among their number, and I’m not here. Especially because at the moment, it does not sound like Jodi Leann Sanderholm has vanished of her own accord. Still, people will bitch because the news channels will be interested, because the girl was in college, beautiful, white, you name it.
Thing is — girls like Jodi do not actually disappear all that often. So it is worth it to pay some attention. Once upon a time, about 30 years ago, pretty college girls were disappearing in the Northwest and West, and eventually we discovered they were victims of a handsome monster named Ted. And just so you know — that could happen again.
If Jodi Sanderholm has vanished as completely as a girl named Natalee Holloway once did from the island of Aruba, you can expect to hear a lot more about Jodi, soon.
Jodi Sanderholm is a member of the Cowley College Tigers Dance Team, The Tigerettes. As you can see on Jodi’s profile at the Cowley College Sports site, she is also essentially a pre-med student — pre-dentistry.
Last spring, Jodi Sanderholm graduated from Ark City High in Arkansas City, Kansas. She was one of the top four graduates in her class. A quote from an article posted at Arkcity.net about the ceremonies that day in May, 2006:
“The graduates sitting before you have done you proud,” said Jodi Sanderholm, one of the top four students of the class, addressing the crowd. “These are the students who stood up as a unit and vowed to correct the embarrassment of last year’s graduation, and they’ve done a pretty good job today.”
Students in the class also “established revolutionary clubs called the Kennel Krazies and the Students Taking a Responsible Stand,” she said. “These are the future of Ark City and of the United States,” Sanderholm said…
In 2005, Jodi Sanderholm was even a finalist for Outstanding Student of the year in Arkansas City.
Jodi Sanderholm was not just another pretty face, obviously.
Records that can be found online about Jodi Sanderholm show a legacy of achievement, already.
Even while building a rep as a superior student in high school, Jodi was already part of a dance team, and that team was winning awards, at least in 2003.
I begin to see why people would seriously worry as to where Jodi Sanderholm could be.
The last time anyone saw Jodi was Friday afternoon, January 5, 2007. She attended dance practice at Cowley, was seen afterwards, around noon, and then — nothing. Aircraft has been used to search for Jodi. There’s been no activity on her credit cards, no activity on her cell phone. 1.
At this point, just a day later, Jodi Sanderholm has been the subject of searches that even reached into Oklahoma. Arkansas City police Chief Sean Wallace sounded frustrated in a quote given to reporters earlier in the day on Saturday, January 6: “”We’ve searched every street, every alley and every driveway in town…” 2.
The Arkansas City Traveler has the most comprehensive article I’ve found about Jodi Sanderholm’s disappearance so far. Much of the info found there is already in this blog entry (what could be found quickly on the Web, essentially), but other details are unique to the Traveler article, written in part by correspondent Chansi Long:
Sanderholm’s parents talked to her Friday by phone at about 10 minutes to noon. Jodi lives at home. Her parents are Cindy and Brian Sanderholm, owners of Ark City Glass.
The conversation with her mother centered around lunch plans. Jodi decided not to go with her mother to eat because she had just finished dance practice and was dirty and sweaty, Cindy Sanderholm said.
They agreed to see each other later. But she did not come home, nor did she stop by the glass company. They called her several times but received no answer. She was last seen at Subway around 1 p.m. in her Tigerette dance jacket with her name on left side, black leggings, gray cut-off sweat pants and flipflops…
(…)
“She’s never done anything like this,” Brian [Sanderholm] said. “We’ve been desperately trying to get a hold of her cell phone.”
But the cell phone is now dead, they said. The parents are working with Cellular One to track any calls. The family is hopeful and determined that they will find Jodi, who they describe as very responsible. The family had plans together today.
“This is completely out of character,” Cindy Sanderholm said.
The search for Sanderholm, broadcast on television and radio, has jarred the whole community and put residents on alert…
I’m sure they are on alert. I apologize to Wichitans in particular, but with Wichita just over 60 miles north of Ark City, I can’t help but think of the area as BTK country. Kansas has had more than its fair share of monsters like Dennis Rader, if you consider that otherwise, it is a pretty crime-free state.
But you know, young people, even high-achieving young people like Jodi Sanderholm, do sometimes just vanish of their own accord. Last year I wrote about a young woman who was a senior in high school, who had a similarly successful background. She’d just vanished before school one morning.
She was found safe and sound about two weeks later. As far as I know, nothing sinister in this girl’s disappearance whatsoever. At her mother’s request, I’ve helped take articles referencing the young woman offline ever since — because even the best and most sane among us will have some moment in life where we feel like we’re going to fall apart.
A young man named Wade Lurk vanished one night last year — completely. Turned out Wade Lurk drove off a bend in the road by a lake. His car sank just far enough under the water that searchers did not readily spot it for some time. Wade apparently died by misadventure, in the end. And the worst part for his friends and family was how suspicious some of his buddies with whom he’d partied that night looked before Wade was found.
The chance that Jodi Leann Sanderholm could have willingly taken off is there, however slim.
But just a day or so into Jodi’s disappearance, I do get the feeling a lot of people are already feeling in their guts that this will not end well.
Jodi Sanderholm is 5′3″ and weights about 105. She has brown hair and brown eyes. The license plate on her Dodge reads WOT-921. If you live in the region, keep an eye out for her. Anyone else spare a prayer for Jodi and her family, as well. 3.
Updates will be posted below.
UPDATE, 5:59 p.m. ET
If comments left on friends’ MySpace pages are any indication, there’s no sign of Jodi yet.
For the time being I’m not linking all the pages in question, though they will be easy enough to find.
Jodi Sanderholm was one of the top friends on “LoriLou’s” profile. On January 6, others began to leave comments referencing the missing girl:
Hey if you hear anything about Jodi will you please let me know! I am praying for her!!!! ~ “Kelsee.”
hey lori! i know we didnt exactly leave on the best of terms but i feel this is more important than our stupid conflict i wanted to give u my prayers and to JODI aswell this is a crazy time but stay strong and im sure it will work out i just felt that i needed to show my support!!! thanks AUS… ~ “NATE.”
Colby appears to be Jodi’s boyfriend: http://www.myspace.com/8971132.
There are no comments about her disappearance on his MySpace profile as of 6:15 on January 7th, but Jodi’s profile was the first one listed Colby’s top friends (MySpace users can dictate the order of anywhere from 4 to 24 top friends, if they want), and this was the last comment she apparently left on his page, on December 11, 2006:
hi sweetheart. you’ve been getting all kinds of comments lately, what’s that all about? just kidding. hope you are having tons of fun at work today, i’ll see you when you get off…
Two days later, “JEN” left Colby a comment that seemed to give some idea of how long he and Jodi had been together:
Hey, happy birthday you old man!!! Are you 20 now? Wow… that sounds old considering you have been with Jodi since you were like 14 years old…
This newspaper announcement for a wedding joining Jennifer Sanderholm and Andy Mayfield was published in March, 2006. In the article, Jodi Sanderholm is identified as the sister of the bride.
A check of MySpace.com for “Jennifer Mayfield” gave back the same “JEN” who left that comment for Colby, whose last name is Wilson. It is probably safe to conclude that the former Jennifer Sanderholm left that particular comment for Colby.
It would appear that Jodi Sanderholm had been dating Colby, or “with” him, for something like 6 years.
What we can’t know at this point is the status of Jodi’s and Colby’s relationship at the time she disappeared, or if police are even concerned about her boyfriend. I’d assume at the moment they are not. I could find only one mention of Jodi even having a boyfriend in any of the articles published since the young woman vanished. It was a positive mention, as well. From the article in the Arkansas City Traveler by correspondent Matt Mendoza, titled, “Candlelight vigil held for Jodi Sanderholm”:
Hope was in the air, and floating among the rising fog of warm breath were thoughts and prayers going out for Jodi Sanderholm.
This was the scene Saturday night outside the Ark City Dance building where community members, family, friends, colleagues and dance partners held a candlelight vigil for Sanderholm, a Cowley College freshman and Ark City native, who disappeared Friday afternoon.
The search continued Sunday with no specific leads.
“She just disappeared.” Brianna Branine, a close friend of Sanderholm’s, said, at the vigil. “She was in a good mood and was practically married to her boyfriend so she had no reason to leave.”
According to Branine, there were no signs of anything out of the ordinary except a man who had been following many of the Cowley Danceline girls. Police have questioned the man but said there is no evidence he was involved in Sanderholm’s disappearance…
At the moment, the disturbing mystery surrounding Jodi Sanderholm’s disappearance is only getting deeper.
UPDATE, 7:22 p.m. ET
Another story from the Arkansas City Traveler gives more detail about why it is unlikely that Colby Wilson is the subject of any suspicion:
Police thought perhaps Jodi had taken off to Dallas to see her boyfriend of five years, who was staying there. They contacted the boyfriend and he hadn’t heard from Jodi, Wallace said.
The boyfriend cut his trip short to return to Ark City and be with the Sanderholm family, Cindy Sanderholm said.
Jodi also has a sister in Kansas City who has given birth since Jodi went missing, Wallace said…
It is so easy in cases like this to look askance at boyfriends or husbands. But I’m more interested with each new article I read in the dude who was a “groupie” of the Cowley College Dance Team. The article linked above indicates he is in custody in Ark City on unrelated charges, but police are still questioning him.
(NOTE: This blog entry has been cross-posted to UnsolvedBlog.com.)
UPDATE, 1/08/07, 4:22 p.m. ET
According to the Wichita Eagle, police have recovered evidence in their search for Jodi Sanderholm, and they are seeking more:
Arkansas City police announced this morning that they have recovered evidence connected to the disappearance of 19-year-old Jodi Sanderholm, and are asking rural Cowley County residents to check their garages, outbuildings, barns and other structures for the missing woman’s car.
In a prepared statement, Arkansas City Police Capt. Sean Wallace said “important leads” have been developed in the case. With the help of trackers from the Arkansas City Fire Department and the Dexter Fire District, police spent Sunday evening searching rural areas of the county…
That doesn’t sound good at all.
The Arkansas City Traveler has been setting a pretty high standard for (relatively) small-town newspapers everywhere with its coverage of Jodi’s disappearance. Just head to ArkCity.net to monitor what’s posted there about the case. This article expands on the Eagle piece. Quote:
The search for Jodi Sanderholm continued Monday with cime scene investigators scouring the Cowley State Fishing Lake and surrounding areas for evidence that would lead to her whereabouts.
Arkansas City Police Chief Sean Wallace said Monday that authorities were focused on the state lake and Oklahoma state line using dogs and teams of trackers “trying to find Jodi and or the car.”
“We have officers at the Cowley State Lake doing a pretty extensive search,” he said Monday afternoon. “We’ve got crime scene guys out there now covering that area for evidence.”
Cowley County Sheriff Bob Odell said Monday that authorities were investigating a tip that a letter with Jodi’s name on it was found in the bathroom at the Cowley State Fishing Lake, but “I haven’t gotten any confirmation on that,” he said…
No, not good at all. Keep praying for the Sanderholm family and Jodi’s long-time boyfriend, Colby. They need it.
UPDATE, 5:29 p.m. ET
KatK has been great about posting observations in the comments on this entry that she made while in Arkansas City today. She and her spouse had to travel through on their way to another destination. This comment, made about 30 minutes ago, presages some bad news on the way:
Well, out by the Cowley County State Fishing lake, there were police, a news truck, and several other cars. About 1/4 mile (At the opposite end of the lake.) away from there we saw one person on the opposite side of the highway in an orage vest and camos searching the ground, and two other people searching the ground along the highway and going down a side road. We also saw a tow truck going down this side road, towards a barn. It doesn’t look good…
I don’t know that most police departments would just have a tow truck on stand-by. That’s something typically called once need is determined. The Cowley County State Lake is on Highway 166, 15-16 miles east of Arkansas City, KS.
Another quote from KatK now — you can just scroll down to the comments to read the originals — in the following, I added a hyperlink:
There was a palpable feeling, grating on the nerves in Ark City…worry, sadness, and an outcry for justice. I noticed a KAKE news car at the gas station we stopped at while gassing up and grabbing sodas before turning around and heading for Dexter and the candy factory. Definitely they found something, and the grim looks on the searcher’s faces spoke plenty. While heading back towards the lake en route to Dexter, we were passed by a car that sped at tremendous speed towards the lake. I wondered if they were a relative of Jodi’s. As my husband pointed out, “They’re either a relative, or a fool because this whole county is a cop trap today!”…
You can read a rant I did recently about what blogging is (and what it’s not), at my personal weblog. That rant prompted a reader who reads this weblog as well, “Naturalangel,” to suggest some terms she’d learned for frequent posters to blog comments, who are not technically bloggers themselves — one term I liked was “blogmenter.” Not a pretty word, though.
And the thing is, in spite of what I said in that rant at my personal weblog, posts like KatK’s really are an example of news-driven blogging by independent (non-mainstream media-sponsored) bloggers at its best, an example of how an online community of readers and posters to a weblog can control public information, even break news. KatK and her husband were everyday folk who had to drive through the region, yet KatK’s comments may be hinting at news that won’t be published by mainstream outlets for hours. That’s pure “citizen journalism.” Thank you, KatK.
I only wish sometimes that I ran a weblog where the subject matter were not so dark that thanking someone for information is about the only positive writing I do. But with true crime, most readers will agree, we’re sometimes simply compelled to keep on trying to find out just what the heck is up.
I wish for Jodi’s family and friends that it was good news, instead of people in orange vests and camos searching roadsides and tow trucks near a lake out on Highway 166.
UPDATE, 7:56 p.m. ET
In a comment left a short time ago on this entry, someone using the screen name “boomer” wrote the following:
The “Stalker” in question is named Justin Thurber, and he was arrested just last week for impersonating a police officer here in Ark City. He works as a bounty hunter, and I’m told he carries pepper spray and a tazer in his person. He has been stalking the dance line girls for awhile I hear. The last I heard, clothes had been found at the state lake, but they were pretty tight lipped about anything else. But one thing I know is that the rumors are running rampant here, and you can never fully believe what you hear until it’s confirmed…
I added the emphasis to “boomer’s” comment because it’s important to keep that in mind.
Here is the article in the Ark. City Traveler about Thurber’s arrest: “Ark City man arrested for impersonating an officer.”
Quoting from the article, which was written by Rhonda Ross:
Justin Thurber, 23, of Ark City, was arrested over the weekend for false impersonation.
Interim Chief Sean Wallace said Thurber, a bounty hunter/bondsman employed with Morris Bail Bonds on North C, claimed to be working with the Ark City police in order to gain entrance to an Ark City residence to conduct a search…
So “boomer” was on the up-and-up with this information. However, at the moment, we need to remember that Thurber has only been arrested for impersonating a police officer. Also, it should be noted that the article in the Traveler was posted on January 3, before Jodi disappeared. So, if Thurber was still in jail then, “boomer’s” comment was just a rumor.
More updates as information becomes available.
Selected mainstream media sources:
1. “Aerial search underway for missing woman,” KWCH TV, Wichita, Kansas, 1/06/07.
2. “Police seeking missing Ark City woman,” Wichita Eagle (KS), 1/06/07.
3. “Extensive Search for Teen Underway,” WIBW 13 News, 1/06/07.
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