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Troubling Questions Surround Case of Idaho Girl Found After Six Weeks
AP ^ | AP-ES-07-03-05 1945EDT

Posted on 07/03/2005 5:11:22 PM PDT by TheOtherOne

Troubling Questions Surround Case of Idaho Girl Found After Six Weeks

By Nicholas K. Geranios Associated Press Writer
Published: Jul 3, 2005 COEUR D'ALENE, Idaho (AP) - A day after missing 8-year-old Shasta Groene turned up with a registered sex offender at a Denny's restaurant in her hometown, investigators struggled with a troubling question: What happened to her 9-year-old brother Dylan?

The man with Shasta, Joseph Edward Duncan III, was arrested and charged with kidnapping, but he has requested a lawyer and is refusing to talk to authorities, Kootenai County Sheriff's Capt. Ben Wolfinger said Sunday.

Duncan won't be appointed a public defender until a court hearing Tuesday, Wolfinger said.

In the meantime, the search for Dylan continues, though investigators say the information they have points to the boy being dead.

"Our goal is to find Dylan one way or another," Wolfinger said.

Investigators haven't revealed what they believe happened to Dylan or how long they believe the boy was alive after the children's mother, 13-year-old brother and their mother's boyfriend were bludgeoned to death in their home on May 16.

There was no sign of the boy when Shasta was found around 2 a.m. Saturday in the restaurant with Duncan.

Shasta was recognized by a waitress at the restaurant, who called police, and the little girl was reunited that afternoon with her father, Steve Groene. She was reported in good condition at the hospital Sunday, Wolfinger said. The girl's father has declined requests for interviews.

The arrest of Duncan, a 42-year-old from Fargo, N.D., who had spent more a decade in prison for raping a boy at gunpoint when Duncan, has raised many questions and provided few answers.

"Where have Duncan and Shasta and Dylan been the last six weeks? Was Duncan involved in the triple homicide? Were other people involved? Is so, who and where are they?" Wolfinger said.

"I think why is probably the biggest question we have," he said.

Shasta spoke at length with investigators on Saturday, but authorities are treating her gently, Wolfinger said.

"She's a little girl who's been through who knows what in the past six weeks," he said.

Authorities believe Duncan, who was raised in Tacoma, Wash., remained in the Pacific Northwest with the children during the six weeks they were missing. Wolfinger hasn't said if authorities believe Duncan was involved in the slayings, and it wasn't known if he had any connection with the victims.

Half way across the country, officials were facing another tough question: Why had Duncan been released on bail earlier this year after being charged with molesting a 6-year-old boy at a Minnesota school playground.

Prosecutors in Becker County, Minn., where Duncan was released, did not return calls seeking comment. Police in Fargo said they had been looking for Duncan since May, but had no indication he had fled to Idaho.

Days before the children disappeared, an ominous message was posted on a Web site that officials said Duncan maintained.

"I am scared, alone and confused, and my reaction is to strike out toward the perceived source of my misery, society," the May 11 entry said. "My intent is to harm society as much as I can, then die."

Forty investigators were working the case Sunday, with the FBI and Idaho State Patrol backing up city and county police.

A search of the stolen Jeep Duncan was driving has been completed, and the evidence was forwarded to the FBI, Wolfinger said. He declined to describe that evidence.

The astonishing emergence of Shasta more than six weeks after she disappeared, countered by her brother's continued, ominous absence, created mixed emotions here.

"We're happy about Shasta," Bill Todd, owner of Davis Donuts, said Sunday. "But I'm sad there's no good news on Dylan yet."

"There can be happy endings," employee Darcy Furey said hopefully.

Todd's business was one of many that taped up posters of the missing children and displayed readerboards praying for their safe return. The case dominated conversations in this northern Idaho resort community of 35,000, decked with flags for the sunny Fourth of July weekend - a big event in tourist-dependent Coeur d'Alene.

Investigators had interviewed hundreds of people, searched through 800 tons of trash and fielded more than 2,000 tips.

In the end, the restaurant where Shasta was found was just a few miles from her family's home.

AP-ES-07-03-05 1945EDT


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: Idaho
KEYWORDS: abduction; childmolestor; dylan; groene; missing; molestor; shasta
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To: muawiyah

ok, i can admit when I am wrong, and of course the Judges had the ultinmate last say. Should have know that. But it was the bill Clinton signed that finally made CT hospitals close.


41 posted on 07/03/2005 6:50:39 PM PDT by gidget7 (Get GLSEN out of our schools!!!!!!)
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To: muawiyah

He went along, but he bears the burden with many others.


42 posted on 07/03/2005 6:51:19 PM PDT by TheOtherOne (The scales of Justice are unbalanced.™)
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To: TheOtherOne

I won't flame you, I blamed the wrong one too, however, Clinton I believe signed the bill that made it nationwide. I could be wrong, but it's what we were told when we accepted some of the clients into group homes.


43 posted on 07/03/2005 6:52:46 PM PDT by gidget7 (Get GLSEN out of our schools!!!!!!)
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To: beaver fever
I think Dylan is still alive. Suspicions of his death by the Police are a smokescreen to prevent alerting the perpetrators of their suspicions.

I agree 100%.

44 posted on 07/03/2005 6:53:50 PM PDT by Sunshine55 (Does Anita van der Sloot suffer from Carolyn Condit syndrome?)
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To: gidget7
By the time Clinton came along the drugs had improved a bit ~ look at how happy he seemed all the time!

But, for some folks they didn't work at all ~ just listen to Chuckie Schumer if you need an example of a tormented mind that cannot be put at ease by any means.

Mental illness and its symptoms can be handled to a degree on an outpatient basis these days, particularly the bi-polar folks who used to be such a problem. I know of 4 such folks who are out, living with their families, and leading quite normal lives ~ WITHOUT employment on a regular basis, and they need to change their dosage levels several times a year when they start cycling.

50 years ago they'd all been locked in the screamers ward.

45 posted on 07/03/2005 6:58:51 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: queenkathy; SuziQ

Dylan may or may not be dead.

However, the grandmother's confusion was understandable.

The waitress at Denny's talked to Shasta, and the report - true or not - was that she first said that her brother was still at the house where she and the perp had been staying. So it sounded like he was alive, he just wasn't with them at Denny's. Shortly thereafter, however, a second report was that she had then said that her brother was in heaven. That was kicked around awhile as to if she meant her 13 yr. old brother who was originally murdered at her home, or if she meant Dylan.

Apparently, the grandmother got the first report and thought it meant Dylan was still alive. Fox News ran with the grandmother's story. Since then, the investigators have said they think he is dead.

Remains to be seen if they really think so, or they are just saying that for a reason.


46 posted on 07/03/2005 7:02:28 PM PDT by txrangerette
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To: Sunshine55
The MO for these guys is that they don't kill their victims they trade in them.

Remember the case of the little girl who has appeared in Child porno since she was seven and still hasn't been found and she's now thirteen.

It was the Canadian police that have kept this case alive.

I think this is a child sex slavery case. The guy has a very high IO and has probably been planning this scheme for twenty years while in prison.

I also think that the Meth connection and murder of the family has a child porn connection. Meth debts for kid's.

Not pleasant but totally plausible.
47 posted on 07/03/2005 7:05:35 PM PDT by beaver fever
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To: TheOtherOne

Die, Monster, Die.


48 posted on 07/03/2005 7:06:07 PM PDT by Mr Ramsbotham (Laws against sodomy are honored in the breech.)
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To: neutrino
"Cases like this make me question the Constitutional provisions regarding cruel and unusual punishment."

I don't question the provisions one bit. I think the founders most likely believed that "cruel and unusual," would be defined with regards to the depravity of the crime in question and would have given wide levity with regards to child molesters, BTK-type killers, etc. Certainly, the criminals in these types of cases would have a hard time arguing a defense about what they considered to be "cruel and unusual."

49 posted on 07/03/2005 7:09:18 PM PDT by Joe 6-pack
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To: TheOtherOne
The arrest of Duncan, a 42-year-old from Fargo, N.D., who had spent more a decade in prison for raping a boy at gunpoint when Duncan...

...officials were facing another tough question: Why had Duncan been released on bail earlier this year after being charged with molesting a 6-year-old boy at a Minnesota school playground.

Why does this keep happening? Is it even possible to be a "reformed" child moleser?

50 posted on 07/03/2005 7:12:44 PM PDT by LongElegantLegs ("Se habla, MoFo!")
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To: TheOtherOne

Blame Clinton all you want but thats just dumb. Pete Wilson in CA also closed many many state hospitals, including camarillo state.


51 posted on 07/03/2005 7:16:48 PM PDT by merry10
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To: gidget7

Conneticut, but not CA. You can't blame him for all the states. Look at the pedophiles in FLorida - and Jeb has been governor for years. You can't blame dems or republicans, you need to blame the sick bastards that commit these crimes. This guy knew he was doing bad things.


52 posted on 07/03/2005 7:19:03 PM PDT by merry10
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To: TheOtherOne
Thanks Minnesota. You effing liberal pukes!
53 posted on 07/03/2005 7:28:18 PM PDT by mercy (never again a patsy for Bill Gates - spyware and viri free for over a year now)
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To: merry10

And you can blame the judges who let repeat sex offenders out with $15,000 bail, and legislators who don't put first time convicted sex offenders in prison for at least 50 years with no parole. We need to get some action going in Congress if our do-nothing state legislators are too busy being bribed by lobbyists to protect our children.


54 posted on 07/03/2005 7:30:29 PM PDT by kittymyrib
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To: TheOtherOne

There are, certainly, many questions.

I have the answer: Kill the mad dog NOW. AND from now on, don't put mad dogs back on the street among our innocents.


55 posted on 07/03/2005 7:31:39 PM PDT by bannie (The government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend upon the support of Paul.)
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To: neutrino

It would be mercy to kill this (deleted noun) both for the sake of the innocents who will be spared, and for the (deleted noun's) load of sin. And he could be killed in a variety of ways, which if used on all child molesters, wouldn't be unusual, since it would be the SOP.


56 posted on 07/03/2005 7:37:32 PM PDT by little jeremiah (A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience, are incompatible with freedom. P. Henry)
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To: Old Seadog
Doesn't castration remove all sexual urges and thus eliminate the danger from such people?

No, that's a misconception. From Castrati history:

Many of the castrati’s well-documented personality disorders were a direct result of their disfigurement, as well as their inability to lead normal sex lives.


57 posted on 07/03/2005 7:43:05 PM PDT by Reeses
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To: beaver fever
point to underground internet porn

interesting and plausible thesis

58 posted on 07/03/2005 7:44:30 PM PDT by Ciexyz (Let us always remember, the Lord is in control.)
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To: beaver fever
I think Dylan is still alive. Suspicions of his death by the Police are a smokescreen to prevent alerting the perpetrators of their suspicions.

Thank you. This has been my hope and what I had posted as well.

59 posted on 07/03/2005 7:47:08 PM PDT by MarMema
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Here's a clip from an atricle about the topic and there's a piece on the numb-nuts judge who let this guy out:

"Becker County, Minn., District Judge Thomas Schroeder, who had set bail at $15,000 despite prosecutors' request that it be $25,000, said Sunday that he barely remembers the case and isn't sure if he knew then that the man was a registered Level 3 sex offender.

"Usually on a bail hearing you have limited information, and so you set it in an amount that you think is appropriate," the judge said. He said if he had known Duncan's record, he would have set it high enough that Duncan would not have gone free."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,161424,00.html


DIDN'T KNOW he was a level-3 sex-offender?? He was accused of attacking a 6 yr.-old on a school yard for heaven's sake!! Why would he have to KNOW about his priors to know this monster has got a serious problem? Why is he letting guys like this walk without even checking??

They need to toss this judge in the same jail cell with the monster for complicity. THEN maybe he'll learn how to spot em, if we ever decide to give his gavel back...


60 posted on 07/03/2005 8:02:08 PM PDT by dajeeps
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