By Adam Allington, KWMU
St. Louis, MO – A task force investigating kidnapping suspect Michael Devlin is talking to investigators on other missing children's cases to look for connections.
Task force spokesman, Sergeant Al Nothum of the Missouri Highway Patrol said today Thursday that investigating leads across multiple states is a daunting task. "It's a collection of tedious items and things that will hopefully get at answers to some of these missing children and we may not," Nothum said. "He may not be connected to these, we don't know."
Nothum declined to comment on whether any of the leads they are looking at has produced new evidence. Devlin so far has yet to be linked to other cases.
The Devlin task force is comprised of law enforcement agencies from 6 Missouri counties plus the Highway Patrol and the FBI. In all, they're looking into cases that date back almost 20 years.
One question everyone being asked is "does a 37 year old man decide one day to start abducting children? Or does that kind of behavior show a pattern?"
Peter Krusing, a spokesman for the FBI says profiling is one available tool. "Basically it assists the investigators, gives them background on questions to ask and how they undertake their investigation."
The task force is reviewing information from a variety of other cases, including the disappearances of Arlin Henderson in 1991 and Scott Kleeschulte in 1988.