After startled cry, UND senior vanishes (Dru Sjodin)

Star Tribune ^ | November 25, 2003 | Chuck Haga and Richard Meryhew

[maggief]

GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- Dru Sjodin finished her shift at the Victoria's Secret store at 4 p.m. Saturday, then did a little shopping at another store in the Columbia Mall in Grand Forks.

As she walked to her car, the 22-year-old University of North Dakota senior from Pequot Lakes, Minn., used her cell phone to call her boyfriend in the Twin Cities. They talked for about 10 minutes, he later told authorities, until the call ended with a startled cry from Dru:

"Oh, my God! No!"

Nobody has heard from her since.

A few hours later, there was a second brief and voiceless call to her boyfriend, and the signal from her cell phone was tracked to a rural area near Fisher, Minn., 13 miles southeast of Grand Forks.

Throughout the city Monday, people took up her disbelieving cry: "Oh, my God, No!"

(snip)

[Catspaw]

 

Here's a little story... I'm a dumb criminal, and I just reached the point where I want to kill my girlfriend who is 300+ miles away. I know that if I am getting a call from her on my cell phone, I will provide an alibi for myself. So I drive the 300+ miles, dispatch my girlfriend, grab her cell phone and call my cell phone. Alibi established(remember, I described myself as a dumb criminal.).

So who answered the boyfriend's cell phone back in the Cities?

[Poohbah]

Given that she was in Grand Forks ND and her boyfriend was in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis-St. Paul MN) when she called him and that cell phone records are easily accessible, I'd say you're wrong on your theory that the boyfriend did it.

Possibility: boyfriend had co-conspirator call girlfriend's cell phone from his cell phone in Twiin Cities. Presto, cell phone records give him an alibi. It's not as if every cellphone call is recorded so you can voiceprint the caller after the fact.

The scenario outlined sounds too much like a made-for-TV movie to be 100% believable.

[Catspaw]

So to summarize the theories: we've got one boyfriend who is conspiring with a person or persons unknown in the Cities to make sure his phone is answered while he's in Grand Forks (300+ miles one way) kidnapping her but back in the Cities to talk to the cops, and, back in Grand Forks, she's getting harassing phone calls from someone with a foreign accent, there's someone else who wants more from the relationship than she's willing to give, and Grand Forks seemingly studded with ex-boyfriends of hers--none of whom could have possibly done it.

Have I missed anything?

[Askel5]

=== And what is a "porn addict" anyway?

A habitual user of porn.

In most cases, the car in which he was trailing his target has the mags he was using to gear himself up to make his dreams reality.

Look ... I'm perfectly aware porn has achieved a Supreme Court style respectability and I was careful to note first thing that those who fuel the gabillion dollar porn industry are more likely as not better compared to rats in a lab than rapists.

The fact remains that -- were we objective in the least on this issue -- we'd be using pornography as a definite marker for potential perps.

[Poohbah]

The boyfriend's story doesn't quite reach plausibility, especially when you try to explain the delay in calling the cops. If this were to actually happen to my wife, and she were on the phone with me at the time, I would be on 911 instantly.

[Ispy4u]

Thanks I had missed that.

Maybe the boyfriend is innocent. But picture perfect statements bother me, they just reek of scripting.

[RJS1950]

I'll second that, Minneapolis is a long way from Grand Forks.

[Ispy4u]

That is certainly strange too Poohbah.

Another thing I find strange is that the article doesn't say if the boyfriend tried to call Dru right back. I know I would have, then if I got no answer or something strange I would have called the Police, not her roommate.

[Catspaw]

The reports aren't consistent on what she said.  The first reports that she said, "Oh, my God, No!"  The second reports she said "Oh my God."  The third reports she said, "Oh my God" OR "Oh no."  Pick your source as to her exact words.

From post #1:

Throughout the city Monday, people took up her disbelieving cry: "Oh, my God, No!"

From the link in post #10:

Nov. 25 — "Oh my God," was the last thing Dru Sjodin said to her boyfriend on a cell phone before she disappeared from a mall in Grand Forks, N.D.

From post #54:

In the midst of a cell phone call to her boyfriend in the Twin Cities about 5 p.m. Saturday, she exclaimed, "Oh my God" or "Oh no," police said. The call then disconnected.

[Dead Dog]

But I can't help getting a feeling of some amount of BS in the story when the last words through the phone are "Oh my god, no!"

My thoughts exactly

[Krodg]

Generally a real surprise shocking enough for someone to think "OMG,no!" usually is verballized with a shriek or a scream.

Since you speak in general terms you must be relying some research instead of personal experience. I would be interested in reading that research.

Now from my personal experience (short story only)....

I was a widow with two teenage daughters. I tried to break off a relationship with a guy and he busted through my daughter's bedroom window in the middle of the night. He grabbed my other daughter and found my room. Three females and not one shriek or scream..lot's of 'Oh God' and some 'What the h*ll'(from me).

Next scene, year or so later...He's released from jail, he stalks me, runs my car off the road, busts out my window with a hammer and proceeds to stab me. Still no shrieks or screams.

While this is just my experience, I can attest to the fact that not everyone involved in a life threatening situation always shrieks or screams like in the movies.

Perhaps you spend too much time watching 'soap operas'.

[Krodg]

The boyfriend's story doesn't quite reach plausibility, especially when you try to explain the delay in calling the cops.

I dunno know...Do you think calling 911 three hundred miles away would have been any more effective than calling the roommate?

That was about 5 p.m. Saturday. Police think those words, uttered in or near her car, signaled her abduction. Forensic tests of evidence gathered from the car were not complete Monday, he said.

Shortly after 5 p.m. Saturday, the boyfriend called Sjodin's roommate in the student apartment she shared on UND's campus to express concern about her welfare.

Sounds to me he raised the alarm

[Poohbah]

I dunno know...Do you think calling 911 three hundred miles away would have been any more effective than calling the roommate?

Yes.

[Krodg]

How so?

[Mark17]

I hope she is safe. Being born and raised in Grand Forks, North Dakota myself. This kind of thing is not normal for Grand Forks.

[Poohbah]

How so?

Call to roomie: "No, dude, I haven't seen her...whassup?" for 5-10 minutes. Boyfriend then allegedly sits around with thumb up alimentary orifice for a while, then calls cops. Trail grows cold.

Call to 911 generates a police report of an attack in progress at the mall. If it's an abduction, the cops are onto the fact much more rapidly and issue a BOLO for Dru Sjodin, possibly while she's still alive.

Based on historical data, the odds of getting Ms. Sjodin back alive right now are close to zero.

Time is crucial in these sorts of things.

[clearvision]

Call to police and tell them what?...

"My girlfried said OMG and hung up"

How does one translate that to an attack?

[Poohbah]

"My girlfried said OMG and hung up"

"I was talking to my girlfriend, absolutely normal conversation, when she shrieked 'oh my God, no!' in pure terror, and now she isn't answering her phone at all. I'm reasonably sure I didn't tick her off. Please check this out, this is not like her."

[null and void]

Has she been missing 24 hours? No, well then we can't take a missing persons report...

[Ispy4u]

I agree it may be anecdotal, but you only have to be in public and associate with people or observe that surprises and shocks for the vast majority of both men and women when a verbalization is made an extremely high percentage of the time it is a grunt, shriek, or scream.

I would be willing to bet that the percentage would be above 80. Though it is only personal observation giving me that number. However, I don't need a "study" to give me something I have seen time and time again throughout life, and I am a keen observer of people.

You and your daughters may be more of an anomaly than you think. It could very well be that since you are all related and you (I assume) raised them, it is far more likely that your reactions would all be similar. However my assertion that most people wouldn't verbalize words is not intended to disparage anyone as weak. I'm sorry if you took it that way.