My youngest child is only a month younger than Shawn Hornbeck and she's probably the most vulnerable of our 3 kids because she's just not street-smart at all (we're working on that part...). I can only imagine the terrible heart-ache these parents have gone through. It's almost worse than having the child be suddenly killed in a car crash. At least then you can go through the grieving process and get through it knowing what happened. The pain and ache never goes away as long as that child is still missing.
I believe the parents are going thru a grieving process. They are grieving the lost years and the lost innocence of their son.