Friday, August 1, 2008

PIEHL: Smiley Face update: Your suspicions





From Investigative Reporter Kristi Piehl:






The emails keep coming and many of you are finding unsolved or closed cases that fit the pattern. Individually, these accounts got a blurb in a newspaper or a mention on the evening news. Now that the NYPD Detectives theory about a connection with drownings is out there, you're taking another look at these cases.
In most cases, the young man was last seen with friends at a bar. After an exhaustive search, his body is found in a river and his identification and wallet are in his pocket. The Medical Examiner finds no signs of foul play and the case is either closed or goes cold.
Many of you have asked for a list of the 40 men that NYPD Detectives Kevin Gannon and Anthony Duarte claim are victims of the Smiley Faced Killers. At their New York news conference, a spokesperson for their company agreed to release a list. To my knowledge, this has not been made public. It's unfortunate, because it leaves many families wondering if their child's drowning was investigated. During my interviews with the Detectives, they discussed many names and cases. The majority of these have been included in my stories or have been intentionally excluded because the family does not want more publicity.
From the emails that I'm receiving, there are many people out there doing their own investigations because they are frustrated that law enforcement appears to be uninterested.
Here are a few men who's cases I hadn't heard about until they were emailed to KSTP this week.
DANNY CLUNE: www.finddanny.com
This account is from the website:

"
Dan Clune disappeared from the Long Bridge Bar and Grill (Sandpoint, Idaho) on November 6, 2004 just before 2AM, he was wearing a blue hooded sweatshirt and blue knit ski cap. Detectives, family and friends have searched the surrounding areas and don't believe Danny wandered off alone. Danny had just recently moved to Sandpoint from New York City. He loved his new small town life and was looking forward to settling down.

Friday November 5th Danny and some friends went to The Long Bridge Grill outside of Sandpoint, ID. Just prior to the bar closing, he and his friends began to regroup for the car ride home. The last time Danny was seen, he was looking for a friend and retrieving his blue hooded sweatshirt from the bar at about 1:45am. Cell phone records show Danny tried to call one of his close friends at 1:57am, this was the last call made from his cell phone to date.

Friends waited about 15 minutes in the parking lot, but didn't see him. Thinking he may have decided to walk home, they began driving toward Sandpoint, stopping to see if he was among the pedestrians on the Long Bridge walkway, but he was nowhere to be found.

On December 17, 2004 a duck hunter discovered a badly decomposed body in an Idaho river. On December 22, 2004 dental records were used to positively identify the body as Danny.

Danny's case is still open and we will continue to search for answers."

This account is from the website:
"Arvin had been missing since April 15, on the night he had gone to a club in downtown Washington, DC, with a group of friends. When his friends gathered to leave the club, Arvin could not be found. After looking for him frantically and calling his cell phone, they contacted the police. The family put out appeals for any information about his whereabouts and waited anxiously for any news throughout the following week. Tragically, his body was pulled from the Anacostia River Monday morning, April 25."rong>
Shankar Palaniappan: DISAPPEARED IN TOLEDO, OHIO ON OCTOBER 9, 2005
This account is a compilation of stories from the "Toledo Blade:"
"Toledo police are looking for a 26-year-old physician that authorities said disappeared near Gumbo's Bayou Grille at The Docks early Sunday. Sgt. Tim Noble said Dr. Shankar Palaniappan, a first-year resident at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ypsilanti, Mich., was with friends at the restaurant on Saturday night and Sunday morning. Sergeant Noble said Dr. Palaniappan drove to a friend's house in Toledo, and both took a taxi to the bar at Gumbo's."
"A preliminary autopsy of a young doctor who was found dead in the Maumee River close to downtown revealed the man likely drowned, authorities said yesterday. The body of Dr. Shankar Palaniappan, 26, of Ann Arbor was retrieved Saturday morning from the Maumee River near International Park. He disappeared Oct. 9 outside a restaurant at The Docks complex in East Toledo."

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