So, a young girl who mistook a gun for a knife, miraculously remembers several months later a very good description of the man? A girl who, based upon the official claims of the Smarts, may never have even seen him other than the few hours he was at the home months before Elizabeth went missing. Things don't add up.
I didn't know she mistook a gun for a knife. Where did you read this? Sources? Elizabeth has said the abductor forced her out of the house with a knife. She never mentioned a gun.
(From a Salt Lake Tribune article dated 6/30/2002) Exactly what happened at the Smarts' home that night remains a mystery. But police say that sometime between 1 and 2 a.m., an intruder entered the seven-bedroom home and left with Elizabeth as her 9-year-old sister watched in horror.
Mary Katherine Smart, who shares a bed with her sister, saw a soft-spoken man in a white shirt, tan pants and tan golf hat. He had a gun and he threatened to hurt Elizabeth if she made any noise. He told her to grab a pair of shoes.
Mary Katherine, who pretended to be asleep until the two left, got out of bed to tell her parents. But she spied the kidnapper and Elizabeth still in the house and, frightened, sneaked back to bed. Approximately two hours later, she woke her parents.
The day after Elizabeth's disappearance, Ed Smart recounted for CNN what happened next.
"When my daughter initially came in, all I heard was, you know, a man took her. And I rushed in there, and I thought, you know, she is just having a bad dream. And she -- we have six children -- and I went from room to room, because occasionally one of the kids will sleep with the other. And you know, and I couldn't find her, and I just -- I heard then at that point that, you know, it was at gunpoint, and it just, you know, it just seemed unreal. I mean, it just . . . I still can't believe that it has happened."