Friday, December 19, 2008

Not saying I told you so, but...

The Associated Press is agreeing with me that maybe the Adam Walsh case isn't so neatly closed as the police and prosecutors from Hollywood, FL want to believe.

Questions linger in Adam Walsh probe More than a quarter-century after his gruesome slaying, police say the murder case of 6-year-old Adam Walsh is closed. But did the man who confessed really do it?http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28314608/from/ET/

This guy confessed to lots of murders. In many, if not most, of those cases, police know full-well he didn't. His various "confessions" in the Walsh case sometimes matched what police knew and sometimes didn't check out. And there is no physical evidence to tie the suspect to the crime. The evidence that once existed, the suspect's car and a carpet sample with blood, have long since been misplaced. Finally, there is at least one other credible suspect, an individual known to be in the area at the time and with a name any of you would recognize. (I'm choosing not to use that name just as I've chosen not to use the official suspect's name.)

So the Hollywood authorities held a nice press conference and announced the case officially closed not because they had found new evidence that made an airtight case against the lead suspect, but because they wanted to make themselves feel better. The case was apparently bungled and mismanaged throughout. I don't know the extent of that bungling beyond the obvious loss of major evidence. (How exactly do you misplace a car?) If that evidence hadn't been misplaced, DNA tests could certainly be done and perhaps a case made against a suspect. But that didn't happen and it can now never happen. The Hollywood authorities have no one to blame but themselves. They should not now be allowed to throw a sham press conference naming their suspect, especially since they know that the dead suspect can't now defend himself and few others will try.

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