Word: samanthas
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From the very start, the investigation into Samantha's kidnapping had a sense of urgency--and not just because she was scooped up in broad daylight with her grandmother inside the apartment nearby and a playmate by her side. Her nude body was found in a wooded region only 50 miles from her home. The corpse was unburied and posed in such a horrific way that the man who came upon it begged the police dispatcher he reached to let him flee the scene. "Please hurry. I'm scared, and I want to get out of here," he said...
...face of an upturned blossom, but she was born under the sign of the lion and her heart belonged to Hercules. The first-grader adored Disney's version of the hero and hung a poster of him over her bed. So Samantha Runnion, 5, reacted as her idol would have when a stranger first asked her to help find his chihuahua and then--as she bent down to show how small the dog might be--carried her into his car. She fought with all the might of her tiny arms and legs, and screamed to her friend, "Help me! Tell...
...Samantha's mother Erin, an analyst with British Petroleum in Long Beach, Calif., had moved to the Smoketree complex of $200,000 condominiums because it seemed safe. Even after the abduction, her neighbors wanted the world to know just how convivial a place it can be. "The garage doors open, and people socialize," says Mike Pace, who lives two doors down from the Runnions in Stanton. "We use that as the patio." But when cops arrested 6-ft., 200-lb. Alejandro Avila, 27, for Samantha's rape and murder, residents had to reckon not only with the casual intrusion...
...Indianapolis, Ind., that manufactures pacemakers, defibrillators and other medical supplies. Disturbingly, he has a history of molestation charges: the daughter of his ex-girlfriend Beth Veglahn, along with another girl, accused him two years ago. The Veglahn girl lived with her father in the same condominium complex as Samantha, Veglahn's foster brother Lewis Davis told TIME. A jury acquitted Avila on all those counts in 2001, however, and Avila's mother says the case was an attempt by the ex-girlfriend to seek revenge for the failed relationship. Says Avila's mother Adelina: "He bears a certain resemblance...
...with its bear market in stocks and bull market in terror warnings, every bit of bad news resonates tenfold. And while there hasn't been any real increase in the number of child abductions it certainly seems that way, with the images of Danielle Van Dam, Elizabeth Smart and Samantha Runnion on every TV screen and the nights filled with the sound of mothers weeping for their children because they...