Posted on 09/18/2002 7:02:56 AM PDT by Bug
Police were on to killer quickly
Investigators say first few days key to cracking case
By Kristen Green
STAFF WRITER
September 18, 2002
San Diego police detectives who investigated Danielle van Dam's kidnapping said if it had taken a day or two longer to identify David Westerfield as a suspect, it's likely the case would have ended differently.
"If we hadn't homed in on him so quickly, it would have given him a little more time to think up better stories, do some more cleaning," Lt. Jim Collins said.
More importantly, police might never have found his green sport jacket stained with Danielle's blood. Westerfield probably would have picked up clothing from the dry cleaners, Collins said, and police wouldn't have known about the physical evidence that convinced jurors he killed the second-grader.
"If things had not worked out the way they did in those first couple days, he may very well be walking free and this might be an unsolved homicide," said Detective Johnny Keene, the first police officer to interview Westerfield.
When police learned of Danielle's disappearance Feb. 2, they didn't have anything to go on.
"We had absolutely nothing," Collins said. "All we knew was that she was missing."
Supervisors assigned more than 50 detectives to work leads in the case and transformed a police substation in Rancho Peñasquitos into a "war room." They covered the walls in butcher paper and mapped out members of the van Dam family and the couple's circle of friends. Interviewing Westerfield wasn't an immediate priority.
"He didn't jump out as somebody we needed to talk to," Collins said.
But by Sunday, Feb. 3, Westerfield was on the list of people detectives should contact. He was the only neighbor who hadn't been home during the weekend, and Brenda van Dam had mentioned running into him Friday night at Dad's Cafe & Steakhouse. Plus, the hose lying on his lawn raised Detective Maura Mekenas-Parga's suspicions.
When Keene caught up with Westerfield on Feb. 4, his rambling explanation of his weekend adventures grabbed the detective's attention.
Then Westerfield mentioned chatting with Brenda van Dam at Dad's, and told Keene, out of the blue, "I could have sworn she said she had a baby sitter. I didn't know her husband was home."
"That was just like a big red flag to me," Keene said.
Later that day, police interrogation specialist Paul Redden heard a series of warning signals while interviewing Westerfield for three hours. At the end of the meeting, Redden told Westerfield he was on to him.
"There's no doubt in my mind that you're somehow involved in the disappearance of Danielle van Dam," Redden told him.
Westerfield denied it.
During the interview, Westerfield was clearly nervous. Sweat rings under his arms grew bigger as talks progressed. And he spoke slowly, taking his time answering every question. "He wanted to make sure that each sentence fit the previous sentence," Redden said.
Westerfield's description of his journey from Silver Strand State Beach to the desert and back to Silver Strand was "as crazy as it gets," Redden said.
"I think he was in somewhat of a panic all weekend to figure out how he was going to dispose of this little girl," Redden said.
Collins said he hoped to return Danielle to her parents, but he thinks the 7-year-old was already dead by the time he was assigned the case at 10:30 p.m. Feb. 2.
Westerfield likely had killed Danielle before he returned to Sabre Springs that afternoon to watch the madness he had created, Collins said.
"His curiosity was getting to him wondering what was going on. He wanted to see," Collins said.
In the weeks that followed, Collins and Sgt. Judy Woods visited the van Dams each night to update them on the investigation's progress and answer their questions. After a long day at work, they would spend two to three hours with the couple.
"I was in the van Dams' house more than mine," Woods said.
When the couple asked what the odds were that Danielle was still alive, Collins was frank. He told them "the chances aren't really good and each day the chances are less and less."
By that time, police officials were "pretty confident" the girl was dead.
But until Feb. 22, the day Westerfield was arrested, Collins didn't tell the van Dams he thought their daughter was dead. And it wasn't until a few days later that he informed them that when young girls are kidnapped, it's usually for sexual reasons, and they're typically killed within four hours.
When her body was found badly decomposed the following week, Collins dissuaded Brenda van Dam from going to the morgue.
"Brenda, you don't want to do that," he told her.
Investigators poured their hearts into the investigation, regularly putting in 16-and 18-hour days.
The effort required cooperation from all segments of the department, from the homicide team to the laboratory.
"It'll be the case I always remember," Woods said.
But they still have so many questions about what happened the night Westerfield kidnapped Danielle.
"I'd still like to know for sure how he got into the house, and how he got her," Collins said.
He's unsure if Westerfield went to the van Dams' home to grab Danielle. Maybe he wanted Brenda. Or maybe he wanted the baby sitter he thought was looking after the children.
"You can speculate from now until the cows come home and never know for sure," Keene said.
But they know there's a good possibility that Westerfield had focused on Danielle for a while, that he had watched her from his bathroom window with a pair of binoculars.
The one thing they can't stand to think about is how long she was alive or what Westerfield did to her before her death.
"That just really drives you crazy," Collins said.
"I never met Danielle, but I feel like I know who she was. I know everything she liked to eat, I know everything she wrote," Woods said. "It's surprising to realize I never knew her."
Copyright 2002 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Most of the concocted "stories" they hear are simply themes and variations of what they have heard before.
Experience counts. Most perps facing police questioning are less experienced (their first or only crime) whereas the police have been through the whole routine countless times.
Most of the concocted "stories" they hear are simply themes and variations of what they have heard before.
It seems the cops are pretty good at concocting stories themselves.
According to the article Det. Keene was:
...unsure if Westerfield went to the van Dams' home to grab Danielle. Maybe he wanted Brenda. Or maybe he wanted the baby sitter he thought was looking after the children.
I wonder why Keene left out the dog. Westerfield had bestialty pictures on his computer.
It would'nt sound any dumber than Westerfield being after the baby sitter. How he know the sitter would'nt be a 90 yr. old man.
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