A connection to the critical analysis paper...

I sat at my kitchen table on Monday night thinking for what seemed like an endless amount of time trying to come up with something to write about in my critical analysis paper. I then remembered a story I had heard about in the news recently. The story was about a girl named Jaycee Lee Dugard.

Jaycee Lee Dugard had been kidnapped when she was 11 years old in California. Her dad saw it happen, and apparently rode his bike after the car trying to catch her. My initial thought when I heard about that was why on earth would he try to ride his bike after her? He should have drove after her if anything, and if he didn't have a car available he should have gone inside and immediately called 911. He could have told the police what direction the car was headed and what it looked like, then they would have had a better chance of catching the car.

Clearly, chasing the car on his bike was highly ineffective for Dugard's father. She was kidnapped and it took them eighteen years to find her. During those eighteen years she lived with a couple named the Garridos, just a few hours from where she was kidnapped at. She was undoubtedly raped by Phillip Garrido, and she had the first of her two children when she was just 14 years old. She had another child, also fathered by Garrido, when she was 19.

When I was researching the story online, there were quotes on the FBI website from the neighbors of the Garridos. The neighbors said that they had no idea that there was anyone living in the Garridos' home besides Phillip and his wife Nancy. How could there be three young girls living next to you or across the street from you for eighteen years and no one ever saw them? Clearly someone was trying to protect the Garridos, because another quote from a different neighbor said that Jaycee Lee had answered the front door at the Garridos' house, and when asked she said that she was their daughter Allissa.

Not to mention, the Garridos had two large tents and a shed all fenced in the backyard where Dugard and her two daughters were living. Wouldn't you think that if you saw that your neighbors had all of that in their backyard, you would get a little suspicious? Apparently the police had come to the Garridos' house a few times, but never thought to look inside the tents or shed in the backyard. Phillip Garrido was on parole for previously kidnapping and raping a young girl, and the police didn't think to check the backyard???

Don't get me wrong, it's good that Dugard and her two daughters are now safely away from the Garridos' clutches and both Garridos are in prison with bail set at a million dollars. However, something about this story just doesn't seem right to me. There were so many things that the police should have noted as suspicious, that would have been clues that the Garridos were harboring three young girls in the backyard. How or why the police didn't catch that is absurd to me.