The Megyn Kelly Show
Police Narratives, Mystery Man Holding Baby - Part 2 of Megyn Kelly Investigates: Baby Lisa's Disappearance | Ep. 1023
Tue, 11 Mar 2025
In part two of Megyn Kelly Investigates on the disappearance of Baby Lisa Irwin, Megyn Kelly explores the facts that we know about the case, the sightings of a man with a baby in the neighborhood, the details of John "Jersey" Tanko, the police's focus on mother Deborah, and the way the police work with the media to craft a narrative about the case.Find out more and watch all episodes here: https://www.megynkelly.com/2025/03/10/megyn-kelly-investigates-the-disappearance-of-baby-lisa-irwin/BeeKeepers Naturals: Go to https://beekeepersnaturals.com/MEGYN or enter code MEGYN for 20% off your orderByrna: Go to https://Byrna.com/MEGYN to save 10%Follow The Megyn Kelly Show on all social platforms:YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/MegynKellyTwitter: http://Twitter.com/MegynKellyShowInstagram: http://Instagram.com/MegynKellyShowFacebook: http://Facebook.com/MegynKellyShow Find out more information at: https://www.devilmaycaremedia.com/megynkellyshow
Chapter 1: What happened to Baby Lisa Irwin?
I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show and episode two of our special series, Megyn Kelly Investigates, on the disappearance of baby Lisa. How could a baby vanish in the middle of the night? It's a question that has lasted more than 12 years after the disappearance of then 10-month-old baby Lisa Irwin.
In this episode, I will be joined just a bit later by investigators Bill Stanton and Phil Houston with their expert analysis. But first, we return to Kansas City, Missouri, where new clues emerge and police begin to look beyond Lisa's mother for some answers. Here's one way to clean up your medicine cabinet this season and replace toxin-filled conventional products with more natural options.
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After hours and hours of police interviews that felt more like an interrogation, Deborah and Jeremy decide there's nothing left to say. Deception expert Phil Houston has interviewed Deborah at length, finding her credible. And I asked Deborah some hard questions about her drinking that night as I was covering the story for Fox News 12 years ago.
Thanks to anonymous benefactor Christy Schiller, there's now a $100,000 reward. And Lisa has been missing for 10 days. Hi. The scrutiny on Debra is relentless.
I want to know why baby Lisa hasn't been found. The parents under suspicion.
Mommy and daddy refused to talk to cops separately. In order for mommy to talk to cops, she's got to have daddy there. Why?
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Chapter 2: What new clues emerged in Baby Lisa's case?
Cindy Short had another reason to be so deeply committed to finding Lisa. As a young girl, Cindy was very nearly abducted by a stranger in her own home. Is it possible, Cindy, I mean, is it actually possible someone just walked in there, took no other measures besides wearing a pair of gloves, took the baby, walked in the front door, walked out the front door, and that was it?
It was no more sophisticated than that.
Yeah, I think so. You know, having been in the house, the house is a ranch-style house. It's very small. As I recall, there were wood floors. And so the distance between the front door and that baby's room is maybe five to seven to eight steps. It's very short. I spent many hours in that neighborhood late at night. And that neighborhood is extraordinarily quiet, very, very dark.
So I do think that someone could come in and come out.
Now, if she was to have been taken out of the house at night, this is almost pitch black.
Reporter Jim Spellman showed viewers just how dark by turning off the camera light. And if someone got in and out, could they do it without a trace? I mean, I imagine one of the things that they were doing was taking fingerprints. I never heard anything about a recovery on any sort of a hit on the fingerprints.
Nor have I. They only took fingerprints. They were prepared to take tool marks. That would be if somebody used a screwdriver or something to claw their way into a window. It was a very active investigation centered around the house. So there were searches. There were dogs. There were investigators in hazmat-type suits going in and out. They cut pieces of carpet that they took away.
They took soil samples from the backyard.
Investigators have been taking blankets, toys and clothing from the home. Cindy Short.
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Chapter 3: Why were Deborah and Jeremy under scrutiny?
It's hard to say, honestly. I didn't know him very well. He and I were together for less than six months. And we only lived together for a couple of months of that. So I didn't really know him all that well. And most of the time that we were together, you know, we were using drugs together. It wasn't a healthy relationship where you learn... what somebody's capable of.
So we have an individual who's using methamphetamine, who's breaking into homes in the community, who has a history of arson in this same community. Meanwhile, he somehow ingratiated himself with a very nice couple, the Watsons, who live just several doors down from the Irwins, which means that he has an opportunity to really be watching what people are doing in this community.
He is a good little burglar getting to case the joint.
He knows who has children. John Jersey Tanko was interviewed by the police, and he denies any involvement in the disappearance of baby Lisa. The case remains open. Now I'm back with my go-to experts, Phil Houston and Bill Stanton. Let's talk about intruder. Now we have a name, potential name. Maybe, maybe John Tanko, the handyman, the good little burglar across the street.
The thing about the neighbors to the Irwins, the Parscals, both of them, seeing a man with a baby is huge. It's huge. Why doesn't that steer the whole investigation in a different direction when the Parscals tell both the husband and the wife, tell the cops they saw a man with a baby?
Because it's not Jeremy and it's not Deborah. And it throws a huge monkey wrench in the narrative. Now what? Now what? Now we have to rethink everything.
Who is this guy at a quarter after, you know, midnight, which lines up perfectly, you know, in the chill air without a blanket that they made such a note that it pinged on their radar where the husband calls the wife's honey, make sure you lock the doors. To your point, they should have been all over that and that should have been the main focus of the media, but it wasn't.
And then there's a third person who sees a man with a baby, this guy Mike Thompson. And yet they seem to dismiss that as well.
And one of the things that the police apparently did not do was to do what we call a fact pattern analysis, where they take each individual and compare that to the set of evidence and facts of the case that they have.
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