Author Topic: Missing US teens discovered alive  (Read 5433 times)

Offline Kelda

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Missing US teens discovered alive
« on: January 13, 2007, 11:21:30 am »
This is scary.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6254223.stm

Reminds me of the Austrian Natascha Kampusch. I hope this Shawn Hornbeck manges to adapt as well to real life as she has.

Two missing US teenage boys, one of whom was last seen in 2002, have been found at the home of a 41-year-old man.

Michael Devlin, 41, was charged with kidnapping after Ben Ownby, 13, who vanished earlier this week, and Shawn Hornbeck, now 15, were discovered.

His flat near St Louis was searched after police noticed Mr Devlin's white van matched the description of one seen when Ben vanished near his school bus.

Shawn Hornbeck went missing from a rural part of Missouri in October 2002.

A police sheriff in the Kirkwood, a city near St Louis, said both boys appeared unharmed.

Mr Devlin - manager of a pizza shop and a part-time funeral home worker - was initially charged with one count of kidnapping, but more charges were possible, the sheriff added.

In the St Louis area, there has been unreserved joy at the news that both boys had been found safe.

Search over

Ben Ownby's disappearance on Tuesday had sparked a major hunt in the area around his home.

Suspect Michael Devlin
Further charges are expected against suspect Michael Devlin

Prayer vigils were held and "missing" posters were fixed to walls around town.

But police out hunting for Ben Ownby were not expecting to find Shawn Hornbeck alongside him.

Shawn was just 11 when he failed to return home after going for a bike ride near his home in Washington County, some 60 miles (100km) from St Louis.

His parents, dozens of volunteers and sniffer dogs searched for weeks to no avail.

In the years after their son went missing, Shawn's parents, Pam and Craig Akers, devoted themselves to missing child cases.

Craig Akers left his job to devote his time to a foundation bearing his son's name.

They used up their savings, borrowed money and talked to psychics, until the financial strain forced them back to work, the Associated Press reported.

On the anniversary of the disappearance in October, Pam Akers said: "It's been four years. But for me, it's just been one long continuous day."

'Unbelievable feeling'

Gary Toelke, a local sheriff said officers had been "just on cloud nine" since the discovery of the boys.

Appartment block where boys were found
Police found the boys in an appartment block

"The last four days the things that we've gone through... you know you have to face the family everyday, tell them what we have if we've had any luck yet, you know that wears on you and to have something like this happen there's nothing to describe it.

"But you know the main thing is what the family has gone through. I know how we felt, I can image how they felt. That's their child and it's got to be an unbelievable feeling for them too."

The St Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper reported that when the manager of a St Charles supermarket announced over the store's PA system that the boys had been found, shoppers stopped in the aisles, clapped each other on the back, hooted and applauded.

Lisa Williams, who leads Ben Ownby's Boy Scout troop, told the paper: "We were all excited and amazed. It's unbelievable. We are so glad to have Ben back."

The authorities say they are still investigating the motive behind the abductions and have released no information on the conditions in which the boys were held.


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injest

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #1 on: January 13, 2007, 11:48:28 am »
reminds me of the Steven Stayner case....

Kenneth Parnell kidnapped Steven when he was six and kept him for seven years....when he got too old for Parnell's taste Parnell went out and kidnapped another little boy..

Steven took the boy and ran away....said he couldn't let the same thing happen to the boy as happened to him...

Parnell had told him that his parents gave him away cause they couldn't afford him and he was the one they didn't like....at six, beaten and sexually assaulted he couldn't fight the guy...

Parnell got five years in jail.

He is a free man living in Florida...

Steven died in a motorcycle accident about six years after he escaped

*edited to correct name of offender and the length of his jail sentence*
« Last Edit: January 13, 2007, 11:58:52 am by injest »

Offline Kelda

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #2 on: January 13, 2007, 11:55:56 am »
reminds me of the Steven Staynor case....

Kenneth Pannell kidnapped Steven when he was six and kept him for seven years....when he got too old for Pannell's taste Pannell went out and kidnapped another little boy..

Steven took the boy and ran away....said he couldn't let the same thing happen to the boy as happened to him...

Pannell had told him that his parents gave him away cause they couldn't afford him and he was the one they didn't like....at six, beaten and sexually assaulted he couldn't fight the guy...

Pannell got two years in jail.

He is a free man living in Florida...

Steven died in a motorcycle accident about six years after he escaped

My god,  what a tragic young boy... I had never heard of him beofre.

Natsha's uis a much more recent story- she was only found late last year after 8 years.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natasha_Kampusch

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Offline Kd5000

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #3 on: January 13, 2007, 12:03:46 pm »
Well, I think it's different from the case in Austria. He wasn't locked up in a basement for a number of years. Did he have a chance to escape and choose not to?  He was kidnapped at age 13, not at age  3, so he was more aware of the situation.


injest

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #4 on: January 13, 2007, 12:08:08 pm »
Well, I think it's different from the case in Austria. He wasn't locked up in a basement for a number of years. Did he have a chance to escape and choose not to?  He was kidnapped at age 13, not at age  3, so he was more aware of the situation.



one boy was eleven...adult kidnap victims rarely save themselves, I won't hold a child to a higher standard...

Offline Kelda

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #5 on: January 13, 2007, 12:12:23 pm »
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097553/maindetails

was just reading up on the case here - Jess - what a horrible horrible case. And then his brother was convicted of killing women too.

and the Kenneth guy despite trying to buy a child and getting 25 years for it is still out and about living a free life.

Disgusting.

They should lock child molesters up and throw away the key.



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Offline Kelda

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #6 on: January 13, 2007, 12:17:19 pm »
Well, I think it's different from the case in Austria. He wasn't locked up in a basement for a number of years. Did he have a chance to escape and choose not to?  He was kidnapped at age 13, not at age  3, so he was more aware of the situation.



Stockholm Syndrome - works the same for adults and children unfortunately.
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injest

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #7 on: January 13, 2007, 12:22:02 pm »
I know...he held Steven for seven years, using him...and couldn't be charged with his kidnapping because the statute of limitations ran out at five years!

can you fathom that? He kidnapped and repeatedly raped a child for seven years and wasn't charged...he got five years for the kidnapping of the other boy (from my memory)


Offline delalluvia

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #8 on: January 13, 2007, 02:44:55 pm »
I rejoiced though I knew next to nothing about their story.  It's always a miracle that they find the children alive.  Police stats say if you don't find them in like a day or so, they're very likely already murdered.

reminds me of the Steven Stayner case....

Kenneth Parnell kidnapped Steven when he was six and kept him for seven years....when he got too old for Parnell's taste Parnell went out and kidnapped another little boy..

Steven took the boy and ran away....said he couldn't let the same thing happen to the boy as happened to him...

Parnell had told him that his parents gave him away cause they couldn't afford him and he was the one they didn't like....at six, beaten and sexually assaulted he couldn't fight the guy...

Parnell got five years in jail.

He is a free man living in Florida...

Steven died in a motorcycle accident about six years after he escaped

*edited to correct name of offender and the length of his jail sentence*

And didn't his brother turn into a serial killer and kill that woman, her daughter and friend up in the mountains?  Tragic story and just devastating all the way around.

Offline littleguitar

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Re: Missing US teens discovered alive
« Reply #9 on: January 13, 2007, 08:38:31 pm »
what's crazy is that this happened like 20 minutes away from my house  :-\

It really is a very scary thing to realize that you have no clue who lives next to you.
‘cause the truth is, I already give him everythin’ I got to give, more than I ever even knew I had; ‘n it all for him, all of it, him who is my brother, my father, my child, my friend, my lover, my heart, my soul; my Ennis.

-- del Mar Painting, Ch. 48 by b73