Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Parents distraught as their teen Ebby Steppach found yards away from where car was found in 3 years ago!

Episode Date: May 24, 2018

Ebby Steppach, who disappeared after a party has been found just yards away from where her car was found in a Little Rock, Arkansas, park in October 2015. Cold case detectives who found the the 18-year-old high school senior's remains are now searching for her killer. Nancy Grace talks to Ebby's mother Laurie Jernigan and Doc Washburn of Little Rock's NewsRadio 102.9 about the case. She is joined by forensics expert Joseph Scott Morgan and Crime Stories co-host Alan Duke. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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assembling the data together in one report. Members get unlimited searches, so you can also look up those close to you and make sure they're not hiding something. Visit truthfinder.com slash Nancy. Enter your own name. Get started. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. A major break in the case in the search for a beautiful young teen girl, Ebby Stepak. What this family has been through is tortuous. Now, is it finally over? I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories.

Thank you for being with us. I remember the day Abby went missing. Guys, joining me shortly will be Abby's mother, Miss Jernigan. But right now, with me, Joseph Scott Morgan, Forensics Expert, Professor of Forensics at Jacksonville State University, renowned psychologist out of Manhattan, Dr. Patricia Saunders, and Alan Duke joining me from LA. Let's start at the beginning. Alan, exactly when did Eby go missing? Ebby Jane Stepak was 18, disappearing October 24th, 2015. And this was a day after she told her mother

she had been sexually assaulted at a high school party. And she wasn't seen since that day. No sign of her. Alan, that cannot be a coincidence in my mind. I just don't think that she tells her mom she gets assaulted, sexually assaulted at a high school party. The next day she goes missing. What do we know about the clues left behind, Alan? Well, the one thing they found her car. They found it in a park in Little Rock. It was a little Volkswagen, right? Yeah, it was registered to her dad, but it was

the car she used. Also, her cell phone was pinged in the park. So that was a big clue. And you would think that that would be the thing that would lead them to this child. Well, in the last hours, a major break in the case. Alan, what happened? They found her near the car, near where the car was. Whoa, whoa, wait, wait, wait, wait. She goes missing in her car in 2015. They find her car, and now her remains are found beside the car how can that be two years have passed yeah you would think that they would have found this this this young lady uh she was in a

drain pipe and nancy little rock police have just announced the results are back from the arkansas state crime lab confirming that it is ebby it's remarkable to realize the drain pipe where her skeletal remains were found was just yards away from where ebby's car was found three years ago and where friends and family erected a memorial for her oh oh the the thought of that joseph scott morgan forensics expert i don't understand we. We're learning right now that although no formal ID has been made, we believe remains found in the West Little Rock Park are Ebby Stepak. Now, her car was located shortly after she goes missing in that same park, the missing teen girl, but her remains were in an underground pipe.

Right now, public works crew have dug up more of the pipe, searching for evidence. It's an underground drain pipe at Chellamont Park, and that's just south of J.T. Robinson's school on the western end of the neighborhood. She was reported missing October 24. Her Volkswagen found a few days later in that park. The park has been searched many times since her disappearance. Nobody can explain how the body wasn't found. Joe Scott, it seems to me if the police had brought in cadaver

dogs, they would have found her, even though it's an underground drain pipe. Yeah, cadaver dogs live to go down in spaces like that. It's obvious that this probably did not occur. This is a very confined area, and it's something, in my experience, that the normal person would not want to egress through. Let me paint the picture for you. In this pipe itself, it's going to have a big, thick base of silt that's sitting down there. Her body, if this is her, has been down there. We're three years downrange at this point, Nancy. So anything that's contained in that pipe is going to be skeletonized.

So they have to be very, very careful. One report that I'm seeing is that they're literally digging the pipe up, extricating it from the ground. They're going to put it on top of the ground. And it would not actually surprise me to see them take this thing out in sections and take it to the crime lab. But you never know. I don't know how they'll be doing this in Arkansasansas that's the way i would handle the case to keep it contained it's just making me just sick to my stomach because the parents have long say they had to beg beg police to convince law enforcement that ebby was taken against her will she had never run away. She had never gone missing. She was an honor student,

just scrubbed in sunshine. Ebby disappears just after telling her parents she was sexually assaulted at a high school party. Then, all this time later, she hasn't been found, but right now, a break in the case of Ebby Stefik. Now, according to her parents, police delayed interviewing witnesses, starting to search for her, or even getting some Walmart footage that may show what their daughter was doing in the hours just before she goes missing. Now, what else do we know? We know a few days after Ebby's disappearance, cops told the mom Ebby's cell phone was last used in the middle of the woods. And the officers refused to search the area. So the mommy, Lori Jernigan, goes out in the woods herself to look for her daughter. And then after all that, with the mom out in the woods, calling exhaustively into the night for her daughter.

Can you imagine? Then cops tell her they had entered the wrong phone number. That's just a little bit of what the parents have gone through. Right now in Psychologist, Dr. Patriciaricia saunders joining us from new york dr patricia the visual the mental image of them holding the memorial the candlelight vigils where her car was parked and now they know that a few feet under them is their daughter's body or was she even possibly still alive with them standing over her, Patricia? It's double trauma in any event. First, the daughter goes missing after telling help parents or families with a missing 18-year-old, don't think too very much.

And in hindsight, for them to realize that they were standing right on top of a daughter who might have been saved is the worst nightmare for a parent. I mean, I can hardly take it in. In the last hours, we find out that human remains have been found in an underground drainpipe. Justice Scott Morgan, forensics expert, you have studied the facts. What would someone have to do to get her dead or alive into that drainpipe? Who would even think of that? Well, there's two ways that you can access a drain pipe, Nancy. I've been thinking about this.

First off, you would have to know where the thing terminates. That is where it opens up where you can access. Wait a minute. That tells me it's a local right there. Go ahead. Yeah, yeah. Or you would have to have manhole access. Again, you would have to be aware of where this is.

And I find it real curious, Nancy, that this is in a park. Her car is there. Maybe Wood's adjacent to it. Well, you know, what if, and this is a big what if, what if she was summoned to that location by somebody just to have a talk, if you know what I mean? And then they get out there, and then something bad goes wrong and they're looking for a quick way to dispose of her body after this has been facilitated a grown person could take her she's not a very large child take her and literally bring her the

length of that pipe to have her secluded in this area. I think that's going to be key. So yeah, I think you're right. I think that this is probably a local that has an awareness of this area. She got summoned to that park. I'd like to know the nature of that park. What goes on there? Do teenagers hang out? Is this a lover's lane kind of area? Who frequents that park? So has she ever been known to go there before? This is, I think there's a lot of meat on the bone here relative to the investigation and things that they can look into. I am just shocked, absolutely shocked, that they didn't pursue this any further than they

did when this thing initially kicked off. You know, to Dr. Patricia Saunders, not only dealing with, I don't even know what I would do if I did not have the twins to look forward to at night, to, you know, making their supper or helping them with their school projects. I mean, it's my whole world. And I'm thinking about Evie's parents, not only dealing with her not being there, but the not knowing Dr. Patricia. That's probably the worst part of this. And that's why I said this is a double trauma. Not only losing a daughter that she's missing and not knowing, but the people who are supposed to help don't really.

And this is a far-out thought, but if this was a local, is there possibly some cover-up? That will be investigated, I'm sure, because if what we are hearing from the parents about the way the case was handled, apparently police didn't even believe she had been taken against her will. To start with, guys, right now, let's go straight out to a police press conference. Little Rock Cold Case investigators came out here to Chalamont Park. We utilized our public works department with the city and they began to follow up on, I won't say leads, but they just began to follow up on the investigation into the disappearance of Evie Steppett.

We've been working on this case since 2015. We've been back out to this park in 2016. I was actually one of the ones out here and we never found anything. Today those cold case investigators decided that we needed to look in a drainage pipe that runs here down the back of the park and we used public works to pull up the pipe and to dig it up and once we got the pipe up they were able to see that there was human remains inside that part of the pipe. Immediately stopped, contacted more detectives. We've got crime scene out here.

We've contacted the FBI. They have sent their evidence response team out here to assist us. The Pulaski County coroner is out here also to assist because what we're doing now is a recovery situation where this is going to take quite a bit of time. As you can imagine, the remains are going to take time to sift through the pipe that we have. We're going to pull up possibly more of that pipe and go through that also. Right now, I can just verify that it is human remains. I can't verify who it is. At this time, we'll have to take the remains that we do gather up to the medical examiner's office and from there have an autopsy, do DNA, and

try to confirm the identity. So you can confirm that the remains were found in a drainage pipe? That's correct, yes. Were they skeletal remains or were they, I mean, can you describe the remains? At this point, we're still going through the pipe. So at this point, what we have is skeletal. We still have dirt and other debris that's been pushed through that pipe to go through also. But right now, what we're seeing is a skeleton.

So I know everyone is wondering, is this Ebby Stepek? Do you believe there's any connection or any update with that? Cuz this is the park where you searched for her in 2016. This is where her car was found. Yes, and those are all good points. That's why we were out here today, to follow up on the missing report on Miss Steppett. So yes, where we started, as you can see the memorial back here behind us is where her vehicle was found.

And that drainage pipe starts not far from there. So this is all based upon following up on that case. Detectives, we've never given up on this. I know it's taken a while, and sometimes these things do. And then with the creation of the cold case squad, we were able to utilize them while homicide detectives and the violent crime detectives were able to work on the new stuff that comes in daily in Little Rock.

And then Cold Case was able to continue to look through the file, do follow-up, and one of the investigators decided that, hey, we need to look further into this, and then that's what led us here today. So a tip didn't lead you here? No. No, this was purely our investigators and mainly the Cold Case guys just following up and kind of using gut instinct and going through that file and seeing what we could do next.

Can you describe, so you said once again, where was the drainage pipe in relation to the park here? It runs behind the park. Of course, you can't see it now. It runs down, there's a parking lot back there and it runs kind of parallel. Besides human remains, were there clothing found or can you comment on that? Can't comment on that because right now we're still, this is gonna be a slow process.

We're still gonna slowly remove the stuff out of that pipe and I haven't been informed of any clothing yet, but it's still way early. No tip lettuce here, we knew this is the last place that we knew she was, but based on her car, and the detectives just came back here again today. Is there some sort of opening, like in the park, to where that pipe is? It's a typical, like a manhole cover that goes down into that. Okay. So is this the first time they ever checked that no it's the first time we've entered that depth indeed i believe it's go that far yes

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Straight out to our special guest, Ebby's mother, Lori Jernigan, also with me, Little Rock radio host, Doc Washburn. To both of you, welcome to Sirius XM 132. I want to hear all about Ebby. First to you, Lori Jernigan. Tell me what happened when Ebby went missing. Start at the beginning for our listeners that don't know Ebby. This is so overwhelming. I'm sorry if I start crying. Ebby was a senior, had just started high school, had started a new school by her choice.

Um, and she went to a party. She was staying with my son, her brother. She went to a party on Friday night, October 23rd and was assaulted, sexually assaulted. Um, she found out that it was being recorded. So she left the party. She contacted my husband Saturday evening and told him about it. She didn't want me to know about it. Told him that she did call the police. They were not helpful. She told my husband exactly what happened she mentioned she had also text other friends and

told him what happened so this guy that raped her she knew him correct from? From school. From school. And is that one of the guys that went on to get a scholarship to school? Exactly. Okay. So that happens that night. She doesn't tell

you because she doesn't want you upset. She tells her dad instead. Did they report the rape no he did not ebby called the police before she told my husband which is ebby's stepdad um she did not get any answers from the police what to do uh they did not give her any answers of coming downtown, reporting it. So after she told my husband in text message everything that happened, he was going to meet her and go to police station with her. Before they met, Abby disappeared. The night before, she was raped by a guy that she knew.

She's still in high school. That she called police. Nothing was ever done about it. She disappears, and he goes on to get a sports scholarship, is my understanding of what happened. And then the next morning, she goes with her brother. She's supposed to go with her brother to visit the grandma in West Little Rock.

Your husband, her stepfather, was supposed to meet her there. But when he gets there, she's gone. Her family never saw Ebby again. Is that correct? That's gone. Her family never saw Abby again. Is that correct? That's correct. She was at her grandmother's house around 7 p.m. She texted my husband, told him everything that happened. He said, I'll meet you.

She didn't want him to come to my parents' house. She didn't want them upset. So she said, yes, we'll meet. He left, called her to get a place to meet. He never heard from her. He couldn't get in touch with her. He verified with my parents that she was there, that she left. She actually told my parents, I'll be back later. Love you, was not upset and left. We don't know where she went or who she met or what happened to her until 5.30 Sunday afternoon the next day, 5.30 the next afternoon. After all of us trying to reach her, she finally answered the phone. My son called her.

She finally answered the phone. He said, where are you? And she said, I'm in front of your house. So my son Trevor hung up and said, okay, I'm on my way out. He went out there. She wasn't there. He called her back. He said, you're not here.

Where are you? And she said, I don't there. He called her back. He said, you're not here. Where are you? And she said, I don't know. I'm with my car. Isn't it true that in that conversation, your son says, Abby sounded very disoriented, that she didn't seem to know what was going on. What do you mean by that? What do you mean by she sounded disoriented?

She didn't sound drunk or slurring, but she did not know where she was. She didn't know who was with her. All she could say to him was, I'm in my car. I'm with my car. And the more he tried to question her, that's all he could get from her was, and this conversation went on four minutes. And all she could say over is, I'm with my car. I don't know who I'm with.

I don't know where I am. And he, that's all I could get from her. He called my husband to get her phone ping to find out where she was. That's what was going on. He called my husband to get her phone ping to find out where she was that's what was going on he called my husband that's what they were trying to do at the same time my husband's driving everywhere looking for and when Trevor called her back she never answered again we've never heard from her again since that phone call. To Doc Washburn, Little Rock radio host joining us, isn't it true that a few days after she disappears, her car, it was a silver Volkswagen,

and her belongings, including her cell phone, her contact lenses, were found in West Little Rock? What do we know, Doc? Yeah, the car was found, and the guy who found it it was i guess the security guy there at the um at the development the the neighborhood there in west little rock and he contacted the police saying i don't know why this this car is out here um i guess the um the keys are still in ignition the battery was dead it was out of gas and it took several days for the police to respond why did it take several days for the

police to respond ebby had already been reported missing and this is her car yeah sure well the the guy the guy didn't know it was was ebby's car apparently but when the police did finally went out there and got the car you know ebby's name was is on the title and her birth father's name is on the title and even though everybody in town knows she's missing the police call the birth father and say hey hey, we found your car out here. What's going on? As if they didn't know. Nancy, let me interrupt you here. That security guard, Guy Hooper, is speaking to reporters about the discovery of the remains in the drainage pipe. Let's listen.

Three long years. When I got the call about what they had possibly found, it hit me real hard. It was probably within 100 yards where that young lady lay, or whoever it is that was down there. We think, we hope for closure. The other way, we hope it's not. But then we still don't have answers. unimaginable to me that this girl, this young girl, a high schooler for Pete's sake, goes missing

in a relatively small town. I mean, we compare it to New York or L.A., San Francisco, this is a small town. Everybody knows she's missing, and there's her car. And it takes days for police to get there and then they call

the day and go oh hey we found your car for that matter the guy who finds the car um you know ebby's family was told oh yeah we interviewed him and everything etc etc months later to find out no they didn't months later to find out that that apparently this guy had a video on a thumb drive that they never bothered messing with. For that matter, the refusal to try to find out much about the people she was hanging out with. Nobody with a police department, with a crew that was investigating this at first, was interested in trying to get cell phones of people that she was with. I mean, it's just one thing after another. And the verbal abuse, I believe, and of course, Lori can speak to this better than I can, that she and her husband experienced from people who are still on the force with Little Rock Police Department.

Hold on. Hold on. Verbal abuse on a victim's mom? With me is Ebby's mom, and if you could see the photos of this girl, she is absolutely stunning. She's just precious. And in a few short years, my little Lucy would be her age.

And my John David, too. Lori Jernigan, who is Ebby's mom, what is Doc Washburn saying about what verbal abuse is Doc talking about? Lori? It happened during the whole case.

These officers, this lieutenant, the sergeant, the detective, no one would investigate this. No one. It went on, and I would show up at the police station. I brought, I can't tell you how many copies of phone records I brought. Every time I would show up, it would be ugly. And they got mad because I would come down and confront them. They got mad because I would show where they were lying to me. It got so bad that the prosecutor here in Little Rock sent one of his ex-employees with me so she could take notes.

Just to have someone there taking notes that's a third party. When I asked them for the phones, the boys' phones, they said, no, we didn't get them. And I was just, I couldn't believe it. Another one of Abby's friends had Abby's original phone and had been sharing the cloud with Abby. I asked if they got her phone. No, we didn't get them. I asked them, are they? No, we're not.

We don't have probable cause. I was just outraged. I can't even describe how I felt, how I still feel about it. I'm so angry. When I got so angry that the whole police force, like the captain, all the lieutenants, everyone met with me. I went over reason after reason after reason to get these boys phones, to get subpoenas for them. And that captain looked at me and said, there's no probable cause. And I looked at him and said, what does it take for probable cause?

And he looked at me and said, I decide what's probable cause. I can't even express what that did to my family over and over. It got to be so bad. I had the lieutenant, well, the sergeant that was head of this case at the time. We were very angry at each other and we had text messages back and forth. They took my husband. They didn't ask for polygraph tests for us from the beginning, which we were absolutely would have done in a second. Um, there, this sergeant, for whatever reason was hell bent-bent on putting this on my husband. There's no record. I mean, everything.

There's nothing that would suggest my husband had anything involved. Well, the last person to talk to her was her brother. Right. And your husband's whereabouts have been verified at the time of that conversation. He was not with her. Right. Lori, tell Nancy Grace what happened when you apparently committed the unpardonable sin of referring to some of the guys that Evie had been hanging out with as thugs. Yeah, I want to hear exactly what happened, Lori,

because you confronted the police about the guys that were at that party that night, and they didn't want to hear anything about it. They did not want to hear one word about it. So, Lori, my question is, what has become of those guys that you believe raped Abby? Nothing. They've gone to school. They're on with their lives. They've not been questioned again. They were questioned at the very beginning, briefly. The guy said, no, you're not getting our phones and they were left

so they've gone on with their lives now Ebby had a very unusual tattoo what did it say Lisa with every with every darker night becomes a brighter day and is that on her arm?

That's on her torso. On her right torso. With every darker night, there comes a brighter day? Yes. And that was her heart. A major

break in the case, in the search for Ebi Step stepak in 2015 they find her car and now her remains are found doc washburn little rock radio host i find it too much of coincidence that she was raped the night before, and it was videoed by the creep that did it. And then within 48 hours, she goes missing. Her car is found abandoned in an unrelated, upscale suburban housing development. I find that very, I mean, there is no coincidence in criminal law, I very often say. So it's hard for me to think that one night she's raped, she calls the police, she tells her stepdad, there's an outcry witness, two of them, and then suddenly she's gone.

I'm just not buying it, Doc. No, I'm not either, Nancy. And obviously you're thinking like a prosecutor, and I've never had any law courses, but I've talked to plenty of lawyers, and usually I think the most reasonable explanation is the correct one. And the fact that the people at the Little Rock Police Department who are supposed to be investigating are telling Lori and her husband right off the bat, well, don't go to the media. Don't publicize this. And the fact that they told this family for months, yes, we interviewed the custodian there at the residential area where the car was found.

And then months later, when Ebi gets a hold of a private investigator, he finds out, no, they didn't interview the guy. And the guy had video on a thumb drive for months that might have helped. But now the thumb drive is gone. And the fact that they're refusing to follow up with these guys that Ebi was hanging out with, I mean, the whole crew that was handling, supposedly, this investigation for the first eight months seemed determined to not want to know what happened to her. I think that if they had actually conducted a competent investigation from the start, then we would have found out. Abby was planning to go to the Little Rock PD to report a sex assault, a rape.

But before she could actually talk to police, before she could get to the police station, she disappears. Why? She's become famous within the Little Rock, Arkansas community. But for what? For going missing. Ebby goes to a house party. That was the end of the trail for Ebby. For all intents and purposes.

She goes to a party on a Friday night. She is sex assaulted there. It was videotaped. Police never got that video. To her mom joining me, Lori Jernigan. Lori, when you wake up in the morning, and you put your feet on the floor and you think of your girl, Abby, what goes through your mind? I'm devastated.

I miss her so much. I have so much anger towards the police that were involved in this in the beginning. I have so much gratitude for the detectives that have it now. I miss her so much. I miss her so much. I want her back. I miss her so much. I want her back. I want her body back. Well,

I'm going back over all the evidence in my mind. I mean, what teen girl leaves behind her cell phone or clothing or makeup, contact lenses and her cell phone? I mean, that's their world. Why would she willingly leave that behind? There was a $50,000 reward offered. She was last seen at her grandmother's house. She made one mystery call to her brother, but was disoriented and was clearly asking for help, but couldn't seem to be able to say where she was or who had her.

Days later, her car turns up in an upscale area near Little Rock. It was sitting there. It took police three days to come get her car. In the car, her cell phone, her makeup, her contact lenses. No teen girl wants to be separated from her cell phone, her makeup, her contact lenses. No teen girl wants to be separated from her cell phone. I can tell you that much. So let me go to our special guest, Doc Washburn, Little Rock radio host,

and Ebby's mother, Lori Jernigan. Ebby was all about social media. She was on social media all the time, as kids are on social media. I'm reading a post that you, Laurie Jernigan, posted. It says, Lord God Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, I ask boldly, give me Ebby today. Tell me what was going through your mind when you wrote that, Lori. You know, I write that.

I feel that every day. I pray to have her every day. I have very strong faith. But this will sure make you question it. I plead. We have Ebby's Facebook page, and we have so many followers that pray for her and pray for us every day. I don't even know most of these people,

but Ebby has touched their heart. And the mystery, you can't just disappear. You just can't disappear. You know, it's amazing to me. It's amazing to me Dr. Washburn, police told the parents not to go public? Yeah. Why? You know, that's a $64,000 question, Nancy. I wish I knew, but again, the way they treated this family, at least the police with the Little Rock Police Department who were supposed to be doing the investigation after the first eight months seem to have been doing a good job, but so much was lost in that alleged rapist, I can't outright say rape,

because it was never even investigated. So nobody's a suspect, nobody's a perpetrator, nobody's a person of interest, because it was never investigated. And then the videotape, as I understand it, was on a hard drive, and that's been lost? Explain that to me, Doc. The thumb drive that I was talking about was the video of where the car was found. The security guy at the development. Wait, wait, wait. There's surveillance video of her car being driven. What do we know about that video? Is it is that her car well you know if the little rock

police department if the people at the little rock police department hadn't lied and said yeah we interviewed the security guy out at the development and months later uh the pi found out well no that's not true they didn't interview him and he had a thumb drive with video of that area for several months before he got rid of it. There's so much like that that has been missed by people who seem to be determined to not find out what happened to this young lady. We're very close. She would spend the night out, but she would come home. She wanted to be at home. She wanted her friends to be at our home. She was more comfortable at home.

There's not a day that has gone by in her life that we haven't been in contact or with her. Let's talk about the facts. Let's talk about her cell phone. What evidence, if any, was about um her cell phone what evidence if any was recovered from her cell phone what were her last phone calls and texts do you know that no i don't why i've not been told that where's the phone uh the fbi has it the fbi would they allow you to see it? We first got the phone in the very beginning. The Little Rock Police Department gave us the phone and asked us if we knew how to unlock it. Oh boy, that's not a good sign. No, and they couldn't get it unlocked. Well, I don't know

her passcode. I assumed police officers knew how to do that. Well, ours didn't. They didn't know how to get into her Snapchat, her Instagram, her Facebook. I literally had to download and copy the directions for law enforcement to get information from apps. I had to download that. That's what you agree to when you download any app. I had to copy that and give that to them so they could figure out how to contact Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. So the FBI has it now. It's amazing to me that you don't know, they haven't told you her last text, her last voicemails, who spoke to her last. And you can definitely triangulate or figure out where her cell phone had been prior to finding it and where it had been prior to those last pings.

If anybody contacted her, said, hey, meet me, anything like that. And why do you think, Doc Washburnburn that her car turned up and this upscale housing development that she has no connection to it looks like somebody dumped the car to me i mean look if they had the search done out there and they couldn't find any trace that she had been in that development outside that car you know even if was abducted, it doesn't look like she was abducted there. That's the one thing. The other thing, as to what Laurie was talking about, about how it seemed to be like pulling teeth to get the Little Rock Police Department

interested in checking out social media, my understanding is, and I don't know if it's changed since Ebi disappeared, but the Little Rock Police Department didn't have an IT guy. They didn't know anything about social media. Oh, dear Lord in heaven. I mean, it wasn't that long ago, for Pete's sake. Every force has an IT guy.

This is what we know. Ebi Stepak disappears October 2015. No one has come forward with any information. The reward has increased. It is now $50,000. That's a lot of money. Back to Lori Jernigan, mother of missing Abby Jane. Lori, tell me, how do you keep your hope alive?

Faith. My belief in God. That's the only thing that keeps me going. And when I don't have it, it's other prayers that keep me going. That's the only way I can keep going. I will fight whoever I need to fight until I find her, until I find her body, until I find her. I will fight till my last breath. I have made so many enemies in our legal department, in our law enforcement here in Arkansas. And I've had, I've also had advocates show up in our police department.

That's where my, that's where my hope lies is our detective right now, Tommy Hudson. He's obsessed with this. He came out of retirement for this case. That's the case he works on full time. We had an assistant chief Buley, Wayne Buley, that when he removed the case from our original group, he apologized to me over and over of how we were treated, how the case was mishandled. We had files falsified. We had our original group investigators get into her Google account and manipulate her account. There are so many things that were done to, like Doc said, prevent us from finding our daughter.

They wanted to stick with their theory. She's a runaway. She'll come home. Of course, police always look at those closest to a victim, and that would include her stepfather. Police investigated him, and he has totally been cleared. There was even no suggestion that he was involved in this. And I want to put that in the listeners' minds right now, because there was nothing at all to suggest her brother or

stepfather or bio dad had anything to do with her disappearance. And I'm saying that because that's the first place all homicide or kidnap investigations start with those family members and then it goes out to love objects, romantic interests, exes. It goes from there. I'm going to put it on the record right now. The stepfather, the bio dad, the brother have absolutely nothing to do with Ebby's disappearance. To Ebby's mom, Lori Jernigan. Lori, when you think of Abby, what is your most vivid memory? How happy she is. Her love of people, animals, and her happiness. Her affection. She loved, loved, and her happiness, her affection.

She loved, loved, loved, and she helped others. That gave her so much joy to help others. Her friends, the constant theme is she would do anything for you, and she would. I don't have that anymore. I don't have her here. I don't get to see that face, hear her funny stories. I don't have that anymore.

And those that have come to know her through this investigation, she's touched so many lives. She's touched so many lives. Through all this, I have to fight for her because Ebby's a fighter. I search and search, and I share everything I search, and that's what Ebby would do for me. The irony in the discovery of these remains that we believe are Ebby's tomorrow is National Missing Children's Day. And we are devoting ourselves to finding missing children.

And my heart is breaking for the Stepics now. And if you have information regarding who killed little Ebby and put her parents through so much misery, please call 501-371-4636 or 662-420-6518. There is a $50,000 reward. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. There's a brand new website causing a lot of trouble for people with something to hide. Have you ever had a bad feeling about somebody?

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