Why Did Bloomington Police Wait Four Weeks To Search The Obvious?

 

The case of missing IU student Lauren Spierers has pretty much reached the full media saturation point, at least locally. I'm a little surprised the cable news stations haven't been covering it like they did in the cases of Lacy Peterson and Natalie Holloway when they first went missing. Bloomington Police Department has had a spotlight shining on their every move, and they've conducted regular press briefings to give the impression they're really on top of the case. What I found a little bit surprising today was this news report on Fox 59 News tonight indicating BPD was only today conducting searches of the apartments of the several men who were known to have been with Spierers on the night she went missing, as well as her boyfriend's home. You're not searching the homes of the persons of interest until the four-week mark of her disappearance? As I understand it from reading other news reports, most of these guys cleared out their personal belongings and left town shortly after Spierers' disappearance and lawyered up. BPD is using canines in their search of these individuals' premises. You would have thought they would have brought out the canines the weekend following her disappearance, not one month after the fact.

The Bloomington Herald-Times has more on the searches conducted here. HT reports the police and Spierers' parents are planning a press conference for tomorrow, the first BPD has held in a week.