The other side of the story

For what it's worth, here's a posting on Reddit that shows the other side of the story. Granted, it's not an official news article, so as with everything on the Internet, take it with a grain of salt. But it does make the claim that the reporter for the Orlando Sentinel misreported several facts. I've quoted the posting here, and linked to it at the bottom.

I've posted a number of times on reddit that my dad is a police officer in Central Florida--I'm going to go ahead and come out and say that he works for the Orange County Sheriff's Office. After reading the really shocking Orlando Sentinel article yesterday, I gave him a call and asked him what the heck was going on. He was furious about the Mike Thomas article, and here's why:

Mike Thomas's article is full of a number of blatant lies, which are easily disproved by a viewing of the Burlington Coat Factory store's security video. Edwin came up to the little girl when she was by herself in the "toy" section, playing with toys. She was not crying, looking for her mother, or in any way visibly distressed. Edwin leans over, whispers into her ear, and takes her by the hand. He then walks her directly out of the store, without stopping to talk to his mother, or the store's front desk, or any other people in the store. He takes the little girl outside and in the opposite direction of the group of people that is leaving--the group of people that he claims he thought might have included her mother. He at no point makes any attempt to call out to the group of people, stop them, or go after them. He does not turn back to the store.

The girl's mother runs out of the store and grabs the child. A huge brouhaha then takes place. Edwin is not allowed to leave the store. The police come, the mother is hysterical and insists on pressing charges. Edwin is taken into custody.

During questioning, Edwin is calm and collected. He consistently plays with his phone while not being directly questioned. Under VSA (voice stress analysis, I believe? I didn't ask my dad what that stood for), he shows signs of deception frequently. Of course, that's not admissible in court, and doesn't really mean anything, but it's still another piece of evidence.

Edwin's mother lied to the police when she stated that her son told her he was looking for the girl's mother, as proven by the security footage.

Two days later, the mother of the little girl decided that she didn't want to press charges. However, the Sheriff's Office, including a number of officers and a sex crimes specialist, had become certain that Edwin was guilty of, at the very least, taking the little girl outside of the store without trying to let anyone know where he was taking her.

Mike Thomas, who wrote the article, refused to talk to the superior officer of the officer who made the arrest. He also refused to talk to the sex crimes specialist. Furthermore, he chose to sensationalize the story by purposefully stating incorrect facts.

So, you can take all of this with a grain of salt, of course. I have no proof personally of any of this, just my dad's word--and YOU have no proof that I'm not just making all of this up. However, if you check out my comment history, you can see that I've repeatedly referred to my dad being a police officer in Central Florida. If you go way back, you can see that all of the information that I provided about the SeaWorld trainer death was eventually shown to be correct by the media a day or so later.

Anyway, I fully expect to get downvoted for this, and I imagine few people will ever even see it... but I wanted to provide the non-sensationalized side of the story, from the police officers who handled the case.

And, a little teaser... my dad told me a few other things that make me personally convinced that Edwin has some real issues and, at the very least, needs serious counseling. I can't state what these facts are, but I hope they come out in the media eventually.