Two weeks after two young siblings vanished without a trace in rural Nova Scotia, experts are pointing to anomalies in what they say is an unprecedented case that deviates from a typical missing children investigation.
Lilly Sullivan, 6, and brother Jack Sullivan, 4, have been missing since May 2. That’s when police received a 911 call reporting that they had wandered away from their home in Lansdowne Station, a sparsely populated area about 140 kilometres northeast of Halifax.
Nova Scotia RCMP then launched a search that included ground search and rescue officials, dog teams, drones and helicopters. But after six days of scouring the heavily wooded areas surrounding the home, there was no sign of the children and the search was called off.
Police have said they do not believe the children were abducted, but have not ruled out that the case is suspicious.
Michelle Jeanis, an associate professor in the criminal justice department at University of Louisiana at Lafayette, said the facts of the case and apparent lack of evidence makes it an “anomaly.”
“It doesn’t meet a lot of the normal criteria for what we would see for these types of cases,” said Jeanis, whose research areas include missing persons and juvenile justice.
“Usually there is evidence in some way that would suggest something nefarious has happened. It mirrors … those adult missing persons cases where we call it ‘quiet disappearances.’ There’s no evidence.”
A few details stand out to Jeanis as unusual, including the children’s absence from school that week.
The children’s stepfather, Daniel Martell, told CBC News the children were not in school on Thursday or Friday — the morning of the disappearance — due to illness. They also were not at school on Wednesday due to a professional development day.
“It could just be incredibly bad timing that they had 48 hours unaccounted for before the disappearance. But that’s just one of the things that stands out in my head,” she said.
Police will not say if anyone else had contact or saw the children in the days leading up to the day they went missing.
Jeanis said she believes police should be considering whether a person played a part.
In a stereotypical kidnapping by a stranger, the offender doesn’t usually target a specific child or children, they create a plan and whoever is in the environment at the time falls victim, said Jeanis.
“It doesn’t seem like that would be the case here because … what we know is they were in their backyard in a rural community, so it’s not like they were walking to school or to the gas station or something where it can be an easy snatch situation,” she said.
“So, if it was a stereotypical stranger kidnapping, it would have had to have been somebody who said, ‘I want those kids in particular.”
Nova Scotia RCMP said on Tuesday they were following up on more than 180 tips from members of the public and exploring all avenues in the investigation.
RCMP continue investigation 2 weeks after Nova Scotia children disappeared
The Mounties said 35 people were identified for formal interviews, including community members and those closest to the children.
Michael Arntfield, a criminologist at Western University in London, Ont., called the case “unprecedented,” saying it’s highly unlikely for two siblings who live together to vanish when a parent is not involved.
“And there’s no evidence of that. If that had been the case, I think we would have heard about that very quickly,” he said.
“This case, when you overlay it on a hundred other missing children cases, it just doesn’t add up at many levels.”
Arntfield said he thinks police could be more forthcoming with information about the case, given the public is being solicited for information. He said following up on 180 tips requires a great deal of resources.
“Police can’t be everywhere, so they rely in cases like this on the eyes and ears of the public. And that needs to be a two-way street in terms of information,” he said.
“Otherwise they’re just going to get tips that really just bogged down the investigation and aren’t necessarily of any substantive value.”
He also said police should have said publicly in the early days of the search whether the case was considered suspicious.
“I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt that there is some active lead being worked and they don’t want to upset the equilibrium that they’re in,” said Arntfield.
“But based on appearances, this went in the wrong direction early on and key momentum and leads were lost when they were out in the fields looking for kids that maybe were never there.”
Martell did not return a request for comment Friday.
The children’s maternal grandmother, Cyndy Murray, has said police have advised the family against speaking to the media.
Nova Scotia RCMP declined an interview request and would not answer specific questions about the case.
In a statement, spokesperson Cpl. Carlie McCann said police have spoken to the majority of people identified as potentially having information to support the investigation, and other interviews are scheduled to take place in the coming days and weeks.
“Officers involved are also continuing to follow up on all new tips that come in,” said McCann, adding that to ensure the integrity of the investigation, no further details will be released.
McCann declined to provide more information about why police believe the children were not abducted.
On Friday, Kevin MacLean of Colchester Ground Search and Rescue said searchers will be back in the woods on Saturday and Sunday with volunteers from multiple search and rescue teams.
A plan is being prepared to define the search area, MacLean said.
