COMMENTARY | It was yet another headline none of us wanted to see, when 10-month-old Lisa Irwin was reported as missing and a possible kidnapping victim. Dad Jeremy Irwin and mom Deborah Bradley reported their baby missing on Tuesday, Oct. 3, and thousands responded via Facebook in sharing the notice of the missing child. There's not a parent alive in America who wouldn't want this little girl back home and safe with her parents -- most of all her own.
But, oddly enough, police have reported the two have stopped cooperating with investigators. What questions did detectives ask which could inspire such a response? Naturally, law enforcement officials are a suspicious bunch, due to how often they find themselves in the most gruesome of cases. Too many parents over the years have claimed their kids are missing, in an attempt to cover their own tracks after having murdered them. Casey Anthony come to mind? How about Susan Smith? Cops are certainly justified in being suspicious. If the days of the "good old boy" ever really existed, they're gone now.
Did the police push too hard? In a video carried on The Today Show, Deborah Bradley states her account of the police expressing their suspicions toward the parents, while Jeremy Irwin says he "reached his boiling point" during police questioning. There's something about their demeanor which comes across as legitimately sincere. Both parents state their support of each other during this ordeal, their gratitude for police assistance and a plea for people to keep the focus on finding their daughter. But we've all been fooled before.
The police are not wrong for being suspicious. It's the job of an investigator to eliminate all possibilities until only the answer remains. Suspects must be ruled out one-by-one, and it can be a painful, difficult process. If either or both parents were involved in Lisa's disappearance, it seems police might have been wiser to handle them with kid gloves, rather than being aggressive in their questioning. For the rest of us though, let's leave the suspicions and conjecture up to investigators and meanwhile, keep sharing the flyers for missing baby Lisa Irwin. If you have any information on the case, please call the tip line at 816-474-TIPS (8477).
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