It has been 22 days since he disappeared from Amber Dubois, and the desperate search for the straight-A student is underway.
More than 400 volunteers are combing 200 square miles of countryside on foot.
The crisis has brought together a fractured family: Amber's mother, Carrie McGonigle, Amber's father, Moe Dubois, and Dave Cave, the man who now lives with Carrie.
"Every morning she would awake before leaving for school and give me a kiss ... and tell me he loved me," says Carrie, "48 Hours Mystery" correspondent Troy Roberts.
"Amber lives in my house. And I come home with her every day. She is my daughter to me. She's my girl," says Dave Grotto.
It is the spirit of a special child that keeps their hopes alive.
"My daughter Amber is my girlfriend," Moe says Dubois. "She is a girl who always has a smile on his face recently, is laughing at me all the time ... give me a hard time about my bald head. That's my son."
"He loves reading," adds Carrie. "She has friends at school and stuff, but she is not going to the mall. She hates shopping. She does not wear makeup ... she is a bookworm."
But as the days pass without interruption in the case, the tension begins to take a toll on the three parents.
"This is the demolition of her heart Carrie," says Dave Grotto. "She's just - I hate to see what you're doing with it."
"It's you eat, you know," says Carrie. "You do not know where your daughter, your son. Just change a whole, the whole world."
"I do not want to get a month," says Moe. "I want a hug tomorrow. I want a hug tonight. I want to see that someone will call tonight and say, 'We've got her, she comes home'."
The mystery of the disappearance of Amber Dubois began the day before Valentine's Day, February 13, 2009.
"Amber, who had been waiting a year for this day. She has been in animals since she was still in diapers," says Carrie. "Your science project is to raise a lamb. I was very excited when I left that morning, she's like, 'Thanks Mom, I love you so, thanks for the lamb."
Amber was last seen around 7 am a few blocks from Escondido High School.
"She was seen by two different fathers walking down the street," Carrie says Roberts. "She was walking alone for the first time ... the second time, there was a man standing next to her or a child."
When Amber did not show up at home before 4:30 pm, her stepfather, Dave, went looking for her.
"I went to his first class and his teacher told me she had not been presented to the class and immediately knew something was wrong," he says.
"I get a call from Carrie saying," I do not know where is amber. [Is] hysterical. In tears, "recalls Moe.
His family was a panic in the immediate search mode, retracing the route of Amber to school, plastering the city with fliers and knocking on every door in the neighborhood.
Nobody in the family of Amber is ready to give up hope - even the smallest member, the daughter of 7 years, Dave and Carrie, Allison.
"She will hear people say abducted or kidnapped and that will kind of freak out, you know." Amber not kidnapped "and you want to search, so let's walk with the dogs and go look for her sister because she wants to. She wants to join," says Carrie.
Amber's father, Moe, puts his life on hold, taking a leave from his job as an electrical engineer in Los Angeles and moved to a nearby hotel with his partner, Rebecca Smith.
"Generally, finish my night for about two or three hours of crying," he says. "I have to get my release point ... If the volunteers and everyone around begins to see my frustration ... then I will drip through them."
As the days pass, hope begins to fade, replaced by a growing suspicion that he may have found Amber foul play at home.
Escondido police begin to focus on one member of the family, in particular: Amber's stepfather, Dave Cave.
"How soon after his disappearance, he realized he was a person of interest?" Dave Roberts asked.
"I do not think it really set for me for a couple of weeks," he says. "The form of the head said:" You can not be involved in the search because they do not want to be the person who is amber. And he looked at me like, 'Why not? " And they said, 'If you are the person who finds something, you're going to pin'. "
Dave, that was the last person to see Amber, walked "48 Hours" by what he says he spent the morning she disappeared:
"Amber was up and ready to go to school on time without asking, because I was doing a check for his sheep," he says.
"About when he finished dressing, Amber came into my room and said:" Dave, you got the check for the lamb? And I said, 'I'll give it to you before leaving care. "So he went several times and I think it was the fourth time I asked for the bill. I said, 'Honey, I'll check before I go, just go down. You have the control. I promise. Relax.
"So I went down and sat on the table ... and I wrote the check to the lamb ... the check sat on the arm of the sofa and Amber was sitting on the floor ... she was eating a bowl of cereal . And I said, 'Honey, here's your check for the lamb. I'll see you later I love you. "And I turned around and walked out the door and went about my day."
That was the last Dave saw Amber.
But it was what this man did the routine that quickly became a key suspect. Dave Cave did not appear to work that day. He says he went to the home gym and then do your taxes.
"When I came home, she was gone. So I thought I was going to school, she should have been in school by then," says Roberts.
While he was at home, Dave somehow not received the message from the school secretary to inform him that Amber - the girl with perfect attendance - had failed in school.
"Very early in the investigation, suspicion swirled around his teammate Dave Roberts said Carrie. "But over time, began to suspect so."
"You know, Dave had come to my work that day and brought me some chocolate covered strawberries and roses some that day," she says. "It was for Valentine's Day - was 13 Unless Dave does not celebrate Valentine's Day ... And he stayed for about 45 minutes of that day and I'm like, I must ask you to leave I am ... like, "Dave, what are you doing here. Go. "
Another concern for research centers in a certain tension between Dave and amber took the family to counseling.
"Amber and I are not always perfect," admits David. "A house rules. She is a teenager. She did not want to follow the rules. There will be a degree of conflict."
"I really did not speak during the entire month before Amber disappeared," says Carrie. "It was a constant dispute."
Dave said the night before Amber disappeared, finally a truce.
"I know the night before she disappeared and we went shopping and went to the library and other things and had a great time," he recalls.
0 comments:
Post a Comment