Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 25

06/30/02 - Sunday | Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 25

[stlnative]

Please keep adding 6/30/02 Elizabeth Smart dated updates to this thread...
Remember to keep checking back to this thread today for today's developing news on the Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping.

Some people may consider today to actually be day 26, but I count 1 day for each
24 hours that have passed since Elizabeth was kidnapped. Elizabeth was taken from her home
at about 1:30am on the morning of June 5th, 2002.

Brigette's Ping List - (How To Join & How It Works)
If you would like on my Elizabeth Smart Ping List,
Please send me a "Private Reply" with your request... Please do not post a "Public Thread
Request" as I may accidently overlook it. Also you can click here to visit
my profile page and to view the list of people on my Ping List's.
People on my Elizabeth Smart Ping List will only receive ONE ping
daily from me at the beginning of the thread each day. This single ping will help you find the daily Elizabeth Smart thread faster
when you check your own "My Comment's" FR feature. If something large breaks in the case during
the day I will send out a new ping to everyone on my Ping List. Something breaking to me is if they find
Elizabeth or actually arrest a person for kidnapping her. It is up to you to visit this thread several times daily
as others and I will continue to add the latest breaking news reports as they are released throughout the day.

Links

Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 24
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 23
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 22
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 21
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 20
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 19
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 18
Elizabeth Smart Kidnapping - Daily News/Chat Thread - Day 17
Salt Lake City Police Department Website
FBI Kidnappings/Critical Missing Persons - Elizabeth Smart
FBI - Salt Lake City Branch
Elizabeth Smart Website
Smart Residence Real Estate Listing
Brigette's Scanned Copy of House Layout from Newsweek Magazine
(Please do not link to the picture on my server space, if you wish to use it...
copy and paste it to your own hard drive and move it to your own server space)

Short Timeline

May 30th, 2002 -Thursday
~ Ricci returns to pick up his Jeep at the auto repair shop before the shop has a chance to fully fix it
He tells the repairman that it needed for an emergency.

June 4th, 2002 - Tuesday
~ Ricci is at work from about 9am to 5:30pm
~ Ricci claims he spends the evening with friends

June 5th, 2002 - Wednesday
~ 1:05am - 2 cars are spotted on the SLC Shriner's Hospital Parking Lot by a hospital security guard
~ 1:30am (approx) - Elizabeth is kidnapped from her home
~ 1:30am - Ricci claims to be in bed asleep with his with wife.
~ Ricci is scheduled to be off work all day today.
~ 8:30am - Ricci and his neighbor talk about the kidnapping of Elizabeth, Ricci seems to know too much information about it.
~ Sometime during this day Ricci is visited by police in regards to Elizabeth's kidnapping as reported by Angela Ricci (Richard A. Ricci's Wife which is an ex-convict herself)
~ Ricci is seen by his neighbor digging a hole by his (Ricci's) trailer early in the morning. (heard the neighbor say this on TV)

June 6th, 2002 - Thursday
~ Ricci is scheduled to work from 9am to 5:30pm today, but instead works from 10:30am to 7:00pm
~ Police talk to Ricci this day about the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping. (The media is reporting this, so it could be wrong)

June 8th, 2002 - Saturday
~ Ricci returns the Jeep to the repair shop to get it fix. The Jeep is muddy and the repair shop owner sees Ricci
remove seat covers from the back of the jeep and place them into a plastic garbage bag that already contains
other stuff in it. Also the repair shop owner said a muddy post hole digger tool was in the back of the Jeep, Ricci removes
this also from the Jeep. Ricci has a man waiting across the street to give him a ride. Ricci takes the plastic bag
and contents along with the post hole digger with him. Also there is 500 to 1000 extra miles on the Jeep since
Ricci picked it up on May 30th, 2002.

June 14th, 2002 - Friday
~ Ricci is taken into custody for a parole violation, this being the 2001 robbery of the Smart Home in which he admitted to.



A note to the people who read this thread because they hope and pray that Elizabeth will be returned to her family and who wish to stay up to date with the facts in the case. Please do not let yourself get sucked into a heavy HEATED discussion or argument from someone who wishes to come on this thread and make posts that will disrupt this thread. The best thing to do it not to bring attention to these post or reply to them.

[stlnative]

(PING) - Day 25

[Utah Girl]

Thanks Brigette!

[stlnative]

Sorry for the delay... The hubby got home early tonight from being Park Ranger at a local lake, they had an early 4th of July Celebration. He works for US Goverment during the week and does the Federal Park Ranger stuff on the weekends when they need extra manpower. I had to ask him about his day, before he went to bed. The computer is in my home office and I hate not to greet him when he walks in the door.

[Utah Girl]

No worries at all. Your husband is much more important. :)

[stlnative]

On to the Case...

I think Ricci will be cleared or officially charged within the next few weekdays. I heard last night they are waiting for some forensic tests to come back in a couple of days. I think they are hoping something will pop up on them that points to him. But it is very possible that nothing will pop up, maybe then we will get a statement through his attorney that explains the extra miles on the Jeep, the removal of seat covers, why he took the Jeep out of the shop and so on.

Right now it looks like SLCPD & the FBI are back to square one especially if they don't get any good results on the forensic tests.

It would be so great that if we woke up tomorrow and the news was flashing that Elizabeth was home safe, and that she was dropped off somewhere and called the police to pick her up.

[ChocChipCookie]

I read the interview with Ricci's wife (might have been on Greta's show), and thought it was extremely odd how she claimed her husband thought highly of the Smart family. She said that twice. If Ricci had been fired by ES for theft, it's doubtful Ricci would be feeling all warm and fuzzy about ES or any of the Smarts for that matter.
Just one more jarring element in Mrs. Ricci's statements in support of her husband.

[stlnative]

Ricci says he has cooperated, is innocent

By PAUL FOY
Associated Press Writer
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) (June 30) — The man police say tops their list of potential suspects in the apparent kidnapping of 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart said he has fully cooperated with investigators and would never hurt a child.

Richard Albert Ricci said an exhaustive search of his home and belongings by police has turned up nothing.

“I have cooperated fully with the FBI, the police” and probation officers, Ricci’s statement, distributed by attorney David K. Smith, says.

Ricci said he has undergone 26 hours of interviews, given blood, taken polygraph tests and surrendered his vehicle to detectives. Police searching his home even dug up his garden.

“They have found nothing,” Ricci’s statement says.

Fred Louis, a spokesman for Salt Lake City police, confirmed that Ricci has been cooperating, and detectives have conducted several interviews with him

“They have some questions about some of the things he’s telling them,” Louis said. He wouldn’t reveal what doubts detectives have. “They keep that pretty close to their chests.”

Louis confirmed that police have searched Ricci’s property. He would not comment on the results of any polygraph tests given in the investigation, nor would he confirm that Ricci has taken one. Louis said he didn’t know if Ricci’s blood or DNA had been evaluated.

Ricci has not been charged in the Smart kidnapping.

A federal grand jury is looking into the case, with many of the witnesses apparently testifying about Ricci, who has felony convictions spanning three decades.

“I think the reason I’m involved is because of my past. I would not — nor could not — hurt a child in any way,” Ricci said. “I have no knowledge of Elizabeth Smart’s abduction, disappearance or whereabouts.”

Authorities have repeatedly refused to discuss evidence, and grand jury proceedings are secret.

But Ricci’s friends and family members have talked about some of the potential clues investigators are looking at.

His father-in-law, Dave Morse Sr., told the AP that police and the FBI seized one of his Scottish-style golf hats from his mobile home next to the trailer shared by Ricci and his wife. The two were married on Valentine’s Day.

Elizabeth Smart’s sister told police the intruder was wearing a tan-colored Scottish-style golf hat.

Morse said he never loaned his tan Haband wool cap to Ricci.

“I think they’re grasping at straws,” Morse, 68, said Thursday. “There’s always a chance, but I don’t think he did it.”

Morse said authorities also took a knife with a foot-long blade from a shed more than a week ago. Morse said he used the knife to trim tree limbs. He said it was always locked in the shed and Ricci didn’t have a key.

Ricci insists he never borrowed the hat or knife, his lawyer said.

Smith also rebutted a neighbor’s report that Ricci was digging a hole the morning of the girl’s June 5 disappearance.

“He was actually doing some weeding. He was boarding up an entry hole at the bottom of his neighbor’s mobile home to keep cats from going in and out,” Smith told The Associated Press.

Smith refused to discuss the 1,000 unaccounted-for miles that were reportedly put on Ricci’s Jeep Cherokee around the time of the girl’s disappearance. Smith said he was withholding an explanation to dispute a possible prosecution theory.

Ricci, 48, was a handyman at he Smart home more than a year ago. In custody on an unrelated parole violation, Ricci has not been charged in the disappearance of the 14-year-old girl.

Authorities are using a federal grand jury to question potential witnesses.

One witness, car mechanic Neth Moul, told The Associated Press that Ricci brought his 1990 Jeep Cherokee into his shop on May 30. When Ricci returned the mud-caked Jeep to the shop June 8 for other repairs, Moul said he noticed about 1,000 more miles on the car’s odometer.

When Ricci returned the Jeep a second time, he rolled up seat covers and also removed a post-hole digger and two large bags, Moul said. Ricci walked to a nearby gas station to catch a ride.

The FBI and Salt Lake City police impounded the Jeep from the shop.

Cynthia Smart Owens, Elizabeth’s aunt, said Friday that Ricci’s behavior at the repair shop “clearly sounds suspicious.

“Our bottom line is we don’t have Elizabeth,” she said. At its daily news conference, the family announced that hundreds of volunteers will spend another weekend searching Salt Lake suburbs for any trace of the girl.

Police have circulated fliers with pictures of three vehicles Ricci has driven, including the SUV. Ed Smart, Elizabeth’s father, gave Ricci the Jeep in exchange for doing handyman work last year.

Ricci says he knows nothing about the kidnapping.

“We pray for her safe return.”

Ricci has spent 29 years in and out of prison on burglary, attempted homicide, armed robbery and other convictions.

Angela Ricci told police her husband was in bed by her side the night of Elizabeth’s abduction. Investigators have said they aren’t satisfied with his alibi.

Angela Ricci will return to the federal grand jury next week after testifying Wednesday, Smith said.

Ricci says his own 9-year-old son died in an accident in 1985.

“I know what Ed and Lois [Smart] are going through.”

•• On the Net:

http://www.elizabethsmart.com

[Pistacio]

don;
re; tinfoil scenario's in the SMART Case.

I'm too tired to post tonight..but had to say; That is HYSTERICAL!!! And, Oh so fitting Today.
stash

[stlnative]

I wanted to post this... I found this post on the about.com crime Elizabeth Smart forum. I don't know the poster, but what they had to say I found very interesting and right on the mark.

Having escaped a very similar abduction attempt at age 7, and knowing the perp, I believe I have a deeper appreciation for some of these issues, for what it's worth. For one thing, a failed attempt may inflict more eventual terror than the briefer act of torture and merciful death, at least considering that one is vulnerable to a future attempt. So, here are my opinions, born of some experience. I say them not from certainty, but the probabilities are on my side. The man is not distant kin, but a peripheral coworker who lives alone and within a mile. He relied on several social/job visits for familiarity with the house and back routes to take the girl. He is shrewd and knows that everyone will be looking in the wrong places and blaming the wrong people. The girl almost certainly died the first night under torture. The evidence was not terribly difficult to get rid of, and he will not likely be caught, though we hope otherwise. It would be natural for family members or others to act suspicously because the horror of such a thing would cause them to feel responsible. Elizabeth herself would have felt that way more than anyone, but we believe God would have spared her too much. Still, the perp is counting on the failure of others to recognize him while he lives and works right under their noses, laughs up his sleeve, and feels both empowered and justified because of this. It would be possible to identify him from a pscyhological profile, but he will not provide sufficient reason to allow him to be caught and will probably even escape serious suspicion. I concur, that both the family and community are conspirators, not consciously, but only in the sense that it is not possible for them to confront such wickedness or forgive themselves. Please keep in mind that a slanderous focus on the family's habits only further serves the abductor's purposes and pleasure, if not your own. This is the real axe he relishes.

[JudyB1938]

So which thread are we supposed to be on? Gonna be hard trying to keep up with two running threads. Thanks.

[stlnative]

The other thread is a joke (for the Tinfoil folks) that Don did, it will probably be deleted sometime today.

[JudyB1938]

Thank you. And hopefully the argue-ers will stay out of here!

[DreamWeaver]

thought it was extremely odd how she claimed her husband thought highly of the Smart family. She said that twice.

Right there, is an outright lie. He thought so much of them that he stole items from their home ? Either she is lying or he is lying about thinking so highly of the Smart family. In fact, I wonder, didn't she ever question where he got the items that he stole ?

[The G Man]

He thought so much of them that he stole items from their home

I THINK I recall hearing thar Ricci was part of a crew working at the Smart house and when things turned up missing the whole crew was fired. Later, Mr Smart became convinced Ricci had nothing to do with it and rehired him back in that deal involving the jeep.

[mystery-ak]

You are not alone, I heard that also....explains why Ricci worked there as a handyman and how he acquired the jeep.

[Types_with_Fist]

Ricci Denies Jeep Jaunt

[JudyB1938]

That is so weird.