Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Help Us Bring Missing Children Home!

Episode Date: December 22, 2023

A prime mission for "Crime Stories" is to raise awareness of missing children cases with the hopes that someone somewhere knows something that could help find these precious boys and girls. Today we look at three cases: Serenity Dennard, Karlie Guse and Myra Lewis.  Help us bring these missing children home. Joining Nancy Grace today: Dr. Angela Arnold - Psychiatrist, Atlanta Ga www.angelaarnoldmd.com Chris Byers - former Police Chief Johns Creek Georgia, 25 years as Police Officer, now Private Investigator  Daphne Young - VP, Communications & Prevention Education, www.Childhelp.org Wendy Patrick - California prosecutor, author “Red Flags” www.wendypatrickphd.com Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet,"  Host of Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan   Ray Caputo - former lead news anchor for Orlando's Morning News, 96.5 WDBO See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. For so many of us, we have our families and are so extremely blessed. But the reality is, is that the search goes on for missing children. Let's take a look at just three of those many, many missing children in the hopes that this year is the year they will be brought home, starting with a beautiful little girl named Serenity. Listen. Authorities in Rockerville began a search for a nine-year-old girl. Serenity Denard was last spotted leaving the Children's

Home Society around 11 20 in the morning. The little girl has blue eyes and shoulder-length dirty blonde hair. She was last seen wearing a long-sleeved gray shirt with flowers and blue jeans. Temperatures the night Serenity went missing were expected to drop below zero. What happened to Serenity? This beautiful nine-year-old little girl in South Dakota runs away in freezing temps without a coat. First of all, why didn't anyone go after her? What are the facts surrounding her disappearance? Who is she with now? What has become of Serenity? Joining me, an all-star panel to break it down and put it back together again. First of all, Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author of Red Flags and host of Today

with Dr. Wendy on KCBQ. You can find her at WendyPatrickPhD.com. Dr. Angela Arnold, renowned psychiatrist joining us out of the Atlanta jurisdiction. You can find her at AngelaArnoldMD.com. Former police chief, Johns Creek, 25 years on the force now pi daphne young is joining us today vp of communications and prevention education at childhelp.org very dear to my heart professor forensics jacksonville state university author of blood beneathath My Feet on Amazon, Joseph Scott Morgan. But first, to Ray Caputo. Ray, let's start with you. How does this little girl just wander off and nobody figures it out until it's too late? Well, Nancy, she was at the Black Hills Children's Home in South Dakota.

That's close to a little town called Rockerville. And, you know, Mount Rushmore is in the area. Rapid City is in the area. And it was a really remote area. Very familiar, Ray. It's a beautiful country. Remember, I took the twins on an RV trip. We camped all around that area.

Beautiful, but deadly. Go ahead. Absolutely. The terrain there is rough. The weather there this time of year, well, the time of year it happened was Super Bowl Sunday, February 2nd. So the weather was about 36 degrees outside. But the little girl just opened up a gymnasium door and walked out. You know, there was a little bit of a distraction.

But her and another child had distracted one of the caretakers in the gym, and then she made her getaway. You know, I want to examine what Ray Caputo has just told us. And I want to go to a very special guest from ChildHelp.org, who has ChildHelp has been our partner for so many years. Since we first launched Crime Stories and CrimeOnline.com, ChildHelp.org was there in the thick of it. Joining me, Daphne Young from ChildHelp.org. Not that he's wrong. He's always right with his facts, everything Ray Caputo said, but it was also all wrong in a larger sense. So a little girl age nine has run away before.

And what do they do? Stick her in a home for children where she runs away and they don't have a protocol for this. I mean, you know, I always say when you don't know a horse, look at his track record. If this child has run away from home before, and I'm curious why. I threatened to run away from home, but never did, of course. I changed my mind when it got to be supper time. Why did this little girl run from her home would be my first question. And why is the answer to that to stick her in a children's home where she then predictably runs away?

She's only nine years old. I don't know what she's running from, but I do know that there should be protocols in place to keep a child from running out the door on Super Bowl Sunday of all time. Well, Nancy, Serenity, first of all, is a really tough name to deal with, right? Because that name means calm and peaceful and untroubled. And that's the antithesis of missing child, the opposite feeling of caretakers who can't sleep because they don't know where she is. And it's the opposite feeling of a little girl that's running, running for her life. And it hits us so hard at child help because we have residential treatment facilities. You know

about them, Nancy, the child help villages. They're isolated. They're in natural environments. They receive equine therapy. They hike, ride bikes, fish. These are such safe places to heal, but they're remote. And in our work, a little girl like that's called a runner. And she's just a little hurting heart who's acting out.

She's in crisis. We know that that child was prone to self-harm. And we see children like Serenity all the time. And something happens to them that makes them run from their pain. And what breaks my heart is there's a protocol that you have to have in place to prepare for runners. So when we have a child that's identified as a potential runaway, we set a whole procedure ahead of time. We determine it on the age, size, behavioral development level of the child. We consider it a runaway plan. And if that child runs, our senior staff and duty officer are immediately notified.

If the child is in sight, we follow at close distance, but do not intervene physically. We don't lock the child away, but we do intervene in case of danger, if she's coming to a precipice or a cliff. But what we do is in 30 minutes, that child has not been found and we are not following the child and a child has gone missing on a property, the sheriff is notified and we take care of all the paperwork afterwards. Right in that moment, it's find the child. You know what, Daphne Young, joining me from ChildHelp.org, why, why, why couldn't you be everywhere at once? Why couldn't you be everywhere at once? Why couldn't you be there the day this little girl runs away?

And there's so much wrong with this scenario. Listen. ATVs and command center radios were used during the search for 9-year-old Serenity Denard. Over 80 searchers from local fire and law enforcement departments headed out looking for the girl. Nice weather made it possible for searchers to get days ahead of a planned weekend surge. Officials had been watching the weather and the snow melt to determine when searchers would get back into the woods again. Snowy conditions covered possible clues and made it difficult for searchers to get around. In addition to searching on foot, a helicopter and two canine units were deployed in the effort.

Each individual stocked with bags of food and water to lessen the downtime, to make the best of the improved weather. At the time, police believed the girl was most likely still in the area, but they didn't rule out the possibility of Serenity being picked up. Investigators continued a parallel investigation while the ground search continued. We are talking about a beautiful little girl named Serenity. Why did she run? I don't know. I'd like to know. But what I want to know more than that is where is she now and why she wasn't followed immediately. We're talking about Serenity Denarges, nine years old, missing in South Dakota. Listen to more. It was 10.45 a.m. on a Sunday morning.

Serenity is in the gym at the Black Hills Children's Home with two staffers and three other kids. One child causes the disturbance, and a staffer attends to that child. Serenity then ran out of the building. When she did, the other staffer stayed with the other two children. At 11 a.m., Serenity is last seen walking near the home. At 1226 p.m., a 911 call goes out to the Pennington County Sheriff's Department. A deputy arrives at 1240. By 116, several deputies are on the scene, and the decision is made to bring in search and rescue.

Joining me, Ray Caputo. Ray, did you hear that timeline? 10.45, little Serenity was in the gym with two adult staffers. One other child did something called some disturbance, and Serenity ran out of the building. Why? Why did she run out of the building? But the two staffers didn't follow.

Neither one. One of the staffers was chasing one of the kids who caused the distraction. The other one had looked and saw her running away. But you're right, Nancy. They didn't chase her. It seems like they weren't ready for this. Now, the weather outside was about 36 degrees. You know, it was a little bit.

Hold on. Can I just, Ray, can I just get you to look at the timeline with me? That was at 1045. Then she's seen outside at 11 a.m. walking near the home. That's 15 minutes later. She's spotted. But they do nothing. Finally, an hour and a half later, they call 911. Do I understand the timeline correctly, Ray Caputo? Yes, you do, Nancy. 80 minutes went by from the time that she left to

the time that the staff called 911. They weren't looking for her, but they had issues with their walkie-talkies and proper communication. It wasn't really a thorough search. And because of that, the little girl got away. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. To Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, author of Red Flags, and the host of Today with Dr. Wendy on KCBQ. You can find her at WendyPatrickPhD.com. Wendy, there's so much wrong with what's happening here at this children's home. You know, that's absolutely right, Nancy.

I mean, as soon as a child runs, the search and rescue should be on because every precious second counts. We know that, Nancy, because all the cases you cover where this type of thing unfortunately happens, every minute is precious. Just as young Serenity's life is precious. We want to believe she's still alive, and that's one of the reasons why she should have been followed immediately. She didn't walk away. She ran. And that is one of the facts in this timeline, Nancy, that is so important. The timeline that Ray Caputo just gave

us means that they did know what time she left and that 911 was called so far afterwards. You know, Dr. Angie, Dr. Angela Arnold, renowned psychiatrist, joining us at the Atlanta jurisdiction, AngelaArnoldMD.com. I know that I'm overprotective. I understand that. I'm that way for a reason. That's right. I'm a crime victim.

I finally have children late in life. And I will be D-A-M-N-E-D if I let anything happen to them. Right. Okay. That's just not on my watch. Now, I started really hard to believe that this child in my world is out of their vision, out of their knowledge of where she is for an hour and a half, and they're not worried.

Just hear Ray Capito say how cold it is outside. Aren't they worried? I can't understand how they couldn't be worried. I hate to say this, but it sounds like they don't even care. That's what it sounds like to anybody outside. And also, they've been entrusted in her care. I'm sure the parents are paying an awful lot of money for her to be there. There's always that.

How could they not be concerned, even from a legal standpoint, that they've lost this little girl? You know what? You're so right. You're so right about that. So many things to take into account. And to Chief Chris Byers, former police chief, Johns Creek, we know that with every minute a child is missing, it hurts the investigation. Just say she's in a car, that somebody saw her on the side of the street and grabbed her, which is, I think, a very distinct possibility in this case.

Every minute you've got is another mile. If you go 60 miles an hour, and in those first three hours, they're critical, Chief Byers. Why? They're so critical because, I mean, those are the moments that you've got, like, you know, you're talking an hour and a half here before law enforcement arrives. So the first thing they're having to do is figure out how far could she have gotten because they're wanting to put the perimeter there and make it the proper size. Those moments are critical because you're looking for, I mean, you heard earlier in this say that they had two investigations going. They had the search investigation going, but they also had a criminal investigation going where at that point you're looking for, you know, sexual predators in the area.

You're getting to their houses. You're going house to house searching. You're checking, you know, traffic cameras to see any of the vehicles that were in the area, any tag readers doing interviews quickly because you've got a very small time frame before harm can come to this child. And you need to get the resources in the right place quickly. And waiting an hour and a half to call 911 is just absolutely absurd in this case. I just think about this child potentially alive in someone's home. What is happening to the child? Is she dead or alive? If she's alive, who has her? Listen to more. Serenity Denard ran away in the middle of winter

without a coat. More than 80 minutes passed before 911 was called. The last person to see Serenity was a woman dropping off a relative at the children's home. The physical search for the nine-year-old included more than 1,500 personnel from 66 agencies. More than 6,000 miles of terrain were covered during 220 search attempts by people on foot, air searches, and the use of cadaver dogs. The first days of the search were hampered by rain that turned to snow and the temperatures were below freezing. As the ground search continued, a simultaneous criminal investigation was launched to rule out foul play. Some 538 people were

interviewed or contacted by authorities. The children's home, nearby residences, and outbuildings were searched repeatedly. Six search warrants were executed. The search for Serenity Denard was formally suspended in January of 2021, nearly two years after she disappeared. What puzzles the searchers and investigators is that no evidence of Serenity has ever been found. Serenity Denard would be 15 this year. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the Pennington County Sheriff's Office have released new age-progressed images of Serenity in hopes that it will generate new leads. The tip line regarding Serenity Denard, 605-394-6115. Repeat, 605-394-6115.

Let's turn our attention to another missing child in the hopes that this will be the year she's brought home alive. Take a listen. My name is Melissa Gousset. If you're going to watch this video, please do not have the kids around. Carly Lane Gousset is missing still. She's been missing since... Breathe.

She's been missing since 6.30 a.m. The last time that I spoke to her was 5 30. The heartbreak in this mother's voice is raw and right at the surface of every word she says. Melissa Gusei, this is Carly's stepmother, taking to the airwaves to beg for help finding her daughter. Straight out to you, Ray Caputo. Ray, what happened? Well, this young girl, she was living in California, and she had done what a lot of kids do. She was going to go out to a football game or so her parents thought, and she ended up going to a party. Carly was off that night.

According to her boyfriend, Donald, she had started to experience like delusional type of behavior, said she was afraid of the music and started to direct some of that paranoia towards him. So being alarmed, you know, he's kind of keeping a close eye on her. And she basically says out of nowhere she wants to leave. And it's a very erratic behavior that night, Nancy, something completely out of the ordinary. So let me understand this, Ray Caputo. She starts once she gets to this after the game party, she starts acting

oddly, as you said, paranoid. To Jesse Scott Morgan, Professor of Forensics, sounds to me like something flipped. Someone flipped her something in her drink. Yeah, that is certainly a possibility you would need to entertain if you're an investigator when you're trying to determine. So what do we need to do first?

Well, everybody that was in her proximity at this party, they need to be locked down, Nancy. Statements need to be taken from these. There are any kind of bad actors in this environment. Everybody's got a history of doing things like this, you know, trying to slip something into somebody's strength, you know, where they're trying to take advantage of someone, particularly a young girl like this. So if you suddenly, let's just say that suddenly, you know, she suddenly acts out in this, you know, as he described in a paranoid way, whereas you have no history of this kind of behavior.

Now, if this is something that had been ongoing and developing for a protracted period of time, I'd say, yeah, maybe it's some kind of mental problem. But just suddenly to start like this, it's kind of an odd, odd, odd benchmark. Take a listen to more of Melissa Gute. It's going on 10 hours that she's been missing. And I want to put this on blast because I don't think she's out in the desert.

I think that she could have been abducted or taken because we do live by a highway and it happens and I'm being real. And I just want to let everybody know. Alicia, you're calling me. Are you watching the video? She's not watching the video. That's okay.

I want to put this on black because I don't know what to do to consider her a missing person. You can't do an Amber Alert because she didn't leave in a car and I don't have a physical description of a vehicle. Now, here comes a very significant inconsistency. Take a listen to Melissa Guse. Seven, about 115 pounds. She has blue eyes and the cutest little nose and a great smile. And her hair goes all the way down past her, like to her belly, let's say, mid waist. And she left in her jeans and a t shirt. So I'm putting it out there. And just go for

it. Everybody help me out here. I love you all. Everybody, please watch. Share your friends. Share my friends. Share everybody's. Just share the s*** out of it. All right? Thank you.

Now, we're hearing the last known clothing in a physical description, but then listen to what Melissa, you say, tells me. Now, on your Facebook Live, you said that she was wearing jeans, I think. Yeah. I only said that because she always wears her skinny jeans. So I just assumed that she had her skinny jeans on. Would she have worn blue jeans to bed? I had picked her up and she had her blue jeans to bed? I know, but I mean when you were in bed with her at 5.45 a.m., did she still have on her jeans?

Okay, so... Yeah, a t-shirt and just her underwear. Okay, let me understand. Because in the Facebook Live, I'm trying to get the description of what she had on the last time you saw her out there. So in the Facebook... The last time I saw her in our home, she only had a t-shirt and her undergarment. Okay. Then that Facebook Live that she blasted out saying, look for her in the skinny jeans, what are we supposed to do with that? Yeah. That's not right.

Well, yeah, I was in a panic. Now, before we give nefarious intentions on the stepmother, now I understand Ray Caputo. The daughter wasn't last thing running down the street with a boyfriend. She had been picked up by her stepmother and brought back home. And the stepmom had gotten in bed with her. It was around 5 a.m. in the morning. But then she goes missing.

So the stepmom probably assumed she had put on her skinny jeans and went missing. It's a lot different from being paranoid at a party. This young girl goes missing from her own home. Am I correct, Ray Caputo? Yes, you are, Nancy. That's exactly what happened. She went missing right out of her own bed. And you figure that everything that had happened that night, there's so much could have went wrong.

But this young girl found herself safely back at home. And that's really where a lot of this tragedy starts. Straight to Daphne Young, VP of Communications and Prevention Education and one of our longtime partners, ChildHelp.org. Daphne, what do you make of it? This is a complex case because you have this young woman who comes home, and I believe there's a little piece of the story where her mother films her, or records her in some way, I guess in a parental sense, wanting to play that back to her, right?

Listen how you sounded. Did you take drugs? You know, a parent might do that to try to teach a lesson. But one of the things that we do at Child Health is we do forensic interviews. And when we're dealing with families in crisis at one of our advocacy centers, one of the things we look for is inconsistencies in stories. We have a big social media presence here, and it can be a great tool to help spread the word, but it can also spread disinformation. It can be used as a tool to try to perhaps plead or make your case and sometimes can even hamper law enforcement efforts. So there's a lot going on here above and beyond what happened at that

party. And my concern is what happened at that house that night. Now, there were reports that Carly Gusset was recognized at White Mountain Estate Road, Route 6 on Mono County, California. I want you to hear this. FBI investigators say Carly Gousset left home in the early hours of the morning. She left her things behind, including her cell phone. It was found on the kitchen counter. That afternoon, the Mono County Sheriff's Office began search operations. During the days that followed, multiple agencies and hundreds of volunteers searched for Carly using helicopters, search dogs, search and rescue

teams, and off-road vehicles. At least three eyewitnesses reported seeing someone fitting Carly's description that morning. One was a nearby neighbor, Richard Eddy. He told the Review Journal that around daybreak, he noticed a tall, slender woman with long hair walking with something in her hand. He says she was looking up at the sky. Another neighbor said he thought it was strange to see anyone walking so early in the morning wearing only a t-shirt and sweatpants. The temperatures the night before had only been in the 40s. An unidentified witness said he spotted a girl fitting Carly's description standing in the sagebrush near Highway 6. This is the same area where tracking dogs lost Carly's

scent. Police searched the Guse home and completed a forensic examination of Carly's phone and computer. There was no incriminating evidence. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has issued an age progression photo of what Carly could look like today, five years after she disappeared. The tip line in the search for Carly Guse is 916-746-7000. Repeat, 916-746-7000. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Will this be the year that another little girl finds her way home? Little two-year-old Myra Lewis.

Listen. Family members say they think someone kidnapped the baby. The toddler disappeared in the morning. Her mother says she left Myra with her older sisters, but when she returned, the two-year-old was gone. The parents begged for whoever took the little girl to release her, to take her to a police department or anywhere that could get her home. Father Gregory Lewis said he noticed Myra missing around noon. He says his other children told him Myra was with their mother. They only realized Myra was missing when his wife came home around 3 p.m. The family members then began a frantic search around the house. At 4 p.m., they dialed 911. Straight out to Ray Caputo. What happened? Well, little Myra, she's two years old.

She's playing out in front of her house like a lot of kids do and it seems like there was a miscommunication between the parents nancy we hear about this when we hear these tragic hot car deaths where parents just space but it seemed like in this case maybe it was a little um less irresponsible mom thought that the little girl was with dad in the house dad thought that the little girl was with mom and before they know it hours have passed and this precious little two-year-old girl is missing. I don't quite understand the confusion about what happened. The FBI offering a $20,000 reward in the search for a two-year-old girl who seemingly vanishes into thin air. She goes

missing near the family's Camden, Mississippi home. Joining me, an all-star panel to break it down and put it back together again. First of all, to you, Daphne Young, VP Communications Prevention Education at ChildHelp.org. Weigh in. Well, this is a tough one because we have a family struggling. We know some of the details of the case, condemned housing. And so when I hear about a family like this that's teetering on the edge and definitely has some economic issues and concerns, I'm so worried about the judgment that goes out to parents like this who are just struggling to make it happen. And when you're under undue stress, these little mistakes can happen, right? I think you're with mom. No, I thought you were in the house with dad. And then those moments in between when you're being judged, when you're being questioned are so difficult.

And it breaks my heart to think that this could have been a tragic accident that spanned hours. And what happened during those hours? Was there a predator? A vulnerable family is often in a vulnerable community. And where do predators go looking for prey? In desperate situations. I'm trying to analyze what we know about this little girl, Myra Lewis, just two years old, a disappearance. I know that she goes, according to reports, missing from outside the family home there in Camden,

where she was sitting outside playing with her sister outdoors. How many times have children gone missing from outside? I'll never forget the case of Samantha Runyon. It became friends of sorts with her mother, Erin, who went on to be a victim's rights advocate for children. Samantha was playing outside in the front yard of her grandmother's home with other children. The grandmother had eyes on Samantha. A car pulls up.

A guy gets Samantha and takes off as Grandma runs outdoors. It was too late. Samantha was killed within a couple of hours. And isn't it true to Wendy Patrick, California prosecutor, that in the first three hours is when we often discover a child has been killed? Absolutely. You know, that's why every second counts. It's that window of opportunity that everybody has to leap into search and rescue mode. It is unusual to vanish without a trace.

People don't disappear into thin air. And a child as young as two years old, that child doesn't strategize or run away. Do they wander off? It's usually more likely. An adult comes in and facilitates whatever it is that happened. It's a kidnapping. It's an abduction. It's something that somebody usually sees a part of.

So that's what makes this incident so unusual, Nancy. Guys, take a listen. Nearly a dozen members of the MHP Special Ops team fanned out across the woods in North Madison County. They specialize in search and rescue and tracking. These tracking experts circled around two-year-old Myra Lewis's home in Camden and combed through miles of the brush on foot in a grid search pattern. The search started after Myra's parents called 911 to report her missing. Multiple law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, joined the massive hunt.

You know, it's jumping out at me to former police chief Johns Creek, Chris Byers investigation. Chief Byers, that she goes missing between 10 and 11 a.m. That's very rare to go missing in broad daylight in the morning hours. Statistically. Yeah, absolutely. I was just thinking that as well, looking at some statistics here. That is extremely rare. And so I think that just moves to even intensify the unknowns in this case. Straight out to you, Joseph Scott Morgan,

Professor of Forensics, Jacksonville State University and author. What do you do with a thing like this? Where do you even start? Well, I got to tell you, Nancy, the first thing, what really strikes me about this case is that she was, in fact, in the front yard. And there have been cases where children have been snatched like this. And so what do you look for? Well, the first thing you're going to look for is traveled routes. If there is a home road right in front of the house, who's going up and down that road? You know, nowadays we have more and more homes

that have ring cameras and those sorts of things. Did they collect that data? Do we have any eyewitnesses on the scene that may have seen a suspicious vehicle going by? Because let me tell you something, Nancy, if you're talking about a predator that would snatch a child this age, this is something that they would be, they're like hunters. They're going to go out into a particular area and look

for a child. They might not be local. And keep in mind, this area of the state is actually split in two. You've got I-20 down to the south. And in addition to that, you've also got I-55 over to the west. So you've got two major thoroughfares that are running through there. Maybe they're just kind of trolling through this area looking for young victims to kind of spare it off with, unless people are thinking that maybe she just wandered away from the house, which for a two-year-old, they're not going to get too far. You know, I was just thinking that Canada, Mississippi sounds so much like where I grew up, literally out in the middle of nowhere. And who's going to be driving by to grab her?

Well, some unknown. Let me just point out what happened to Shasta and Dylan Groney in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, in the middle of nowhere. They were near an interstate, like Joe Scott's just telling you about I-20. And a guy looks over off the interstate and sees Shasta playing at an above-ground pool. Did not know the family at all. Pulls off the interstate, waits, goes in, kills the whole family, takes Shasta and little brother Dylan, molests them, ultimately kills Dylan and Shasta is is saved. My point is anything could have happened to this little two-year-old girl. But what can we do about it?

What we can do about it is continue to look for this girl, Myra Lewis. The tip line, 601-859-2345. Repeat, 601-859-2345. Please don't forget those children waiting to be brought home. Nancy Grace Crime Story signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.