[varina davis]

They were looking for Elizabeth, not for the perpetrator, and they probably weren't at all sure that it wasn't some sort of sneaking out situation. Most of them probably didn't hear a lot of details before they ran out searching. If Elizabeth had been kidnapped to be raped, she would quite likely have still been around -- rape victims are often grabbed, taken to the nearest secluded spot, raped, and left there. Charlotte Hansen would still have been lying in her backyard 3-4 hours later, if someone hadn't heard her cries for help sooner

I have to disagree -- if it is indeed true that Ed Smart reported a possible kidnapping with weapon to the LE right away. Do you really think 40 to 50 neighbors would run out in the middle of the night to just look for a kid who "sneaked out" for a while?

There is no way to compare Liz's disappearance with the Hansen rape. A vastly different home scenario. If that was the M.O., it would have been far easier for a perpetrator to grab her while she was jogging, or after school, or a multitude of much easier venues.

[varina davis]

Also, she went because she thought she could trust the person she accompanied out of the house.

[GovernmentShrinker]

The neighbors would run out to help look without knowing all the details, and hoping it was a sneaking out situation, but fearful it was a kidnapping/rape/murder.

And it doesn't appear that the perpetrator had much difficulty getting Elizabeth out of her home in the middle of the night. I'm not sure what you're implying is the big difference between the two cases -- the Hansen case was a family acquaintance bent on a vicious, apparently partly sexual, assault, who took the child from her bedroom in the middle of the night; there is reason to believe that the Smart case involved a family acquaintance, the perp definitely took the girl from her bedroom in the middle of the night, and we still don't know for what purpose.