Statement Analysis: Phoebe DiPietro

Phoebe DiPietro, grandmother of Ayla Reynolds said:

"Again, I've given my theories and my opinions to the Waterville Police Department and detectives.

I just keep hoping that law enforcement is going to bring Ayla home and they are going to find her."

Does DiPietro really hope that Ayla will be found?  

After the case first broke, Ms. DiPietro told media that on the night before 911 was called, she heard nothing, and nothing out of the ordinary happened. 

Statement Analysis and Body Language Analysis agreed:  she was deceptive.  (see video)

That she was deceptive highlights the need for deception.  When someone repeats something erroneously, their language will not show deception because intent is not present.  It is the intention of deliberately misleading that is picked up in language, either through weakness, sensitivity indicators, or direct indicators of deception.  

Ms. DiPietro had a need to deceive the public about what happened the night before 911 was called.  Please note that on the night in question, which Ms. DiPietro wished to portray as "quite" and as 'normal', Justin DiPietro made a 160 mile round trip to Portland.  

We also know that in the Portland apartment of DiPietro's girlfriend's sister, was a large cache of drugs.  

6 weeks before reporting her missing, the unemployed single father, took out a life insurance policy not for, but against the life of Ayla.  He did not take out a policy for or against the life of his other child with another woman; only Ayla's, meaning that he stood to profit from her death. 

Ms. DiPietro had a reason to deceive.  Here, for the reader, is the question, "Does Ms. DiPietro, given her knowledge and need to deceive, have hope or expectation that Ayla will be coming "home"?

Here is the statement again, with analysis and emphasis. 

"Again, I've given my theories and my opinions to the Waterville Police Department and detectives.

I just keep hoping that law enforcement is going to bring Ayla home and they are going to find her."

Please note that this statement is out of chronological order.  

Note that she "just" keeps hoping (present tense):

1.  law enforcement is going to bring Ayla home

2.  they are going to find her. 

When someone is deceptive, linguistic indicators arise, like this one, where the logical order is disrupted.

Casey Anthony drove around with the decomposing body of her daughter, Caylee, in the trunk. 

When asked about the unbearable odor in the trunk, she said, "Dead squirrels climbed up into the engine."

This is similar to the dislodging of natural order.  Before Ayla can come "home", she must be found.  

Deception continues to be indicated from Phoebe DiPietro regarding her grandchild, Ayla, who's spilled blood was found near Justin DiPietro's bed, in Phoebe DiPietro's basement. 

On the night when Phoebe heard "nothing", she was later forced to admit:

She was not in the home.  Here is the context:

Now in an exclusive interview of CNN on Friday, Ayla's grandmother implied that she was in the house that night. She said she didn't heard a noise and wasn't the last one to go to bed. Now it she seems she is changing her story. Here's Susan Candiotti.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In a story full of twist, the latest, a bombshell, Ayla Reynolds grandmother wasn't home the night the toddler disappeared.

In an exclusive CNN interview, she left the opposite impression when talking about what happened that night.

(on camera): You didn't hear any noise?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I did not hear anything.
CANDIOTTI (voice-over): She didn't hear it because she was somewhere else she now exclusively tells CNN, another location she declined to publicly disclose.

Why not come clean from the start? Dipietro says she was trying to protect the investigation at the request of police, but then felt she needed to set the record straight.

What does it mean for an investigation entering its fourth week and with no sign of the little girl? Dipietro says it shouldn't matter. She says police have always known her whereabouts that night.

Outside her home this weekend, people continue to stop by, leaving gifts and praying for her safe return. She disappeared about a week before Christmas after her father says he put her to bed only to discover her missing the next morning when he called police.

(on camera): Who do you think would do such a thing?

PHOEBE DIPIETRO, AYLA REYNOLDS' GRANDMOTHER: Again, I've given my theories and my opinions to the Waterville Police Department and detectives. I just keep hoping that law enforcement is going to bring Ayla home and they are going to find her.

Note that it is out of order. 

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): But if police are any closer to finding the little girl, they haven't yet said so. Police suspect foul play, but from the start of the investigation, have refused to say who was home the night Ayla vanished. This was home video shot last fall of the toddler who would now be 21 months old.

DIPIETRO: She's quiet, very sweet. Her eyes, she has the bluest eyes and the longest eyelashes.

CANDIOTTI: This video, exclusive to CNN was shot in Phoebe Dipietro's living room steps away is Ayla's bedroom, which she shared with her cousin who is untouched that night. Her face is blurred.

(on camera): When you found out that she wasn't there, what did you think?

DIPIETRO: I thought that I didn't want my son to go get any of his friends and go kicking indoors looking for her.

Note that which is in the negative:  "I didn't want"

Note that the first thought was of violence. 
CANDIOTTI: I take it you don't think some stranger walked in off the street and did this?

DIPIETRO: It is a very creepy feeling to think somebody had been casing your house, that they had been watching the family's activities.

Note "your house" and not "my house" indicates distancing language.  Anyone who has been robbed knows how personal and up close this is. 

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): After Ayla vanished, her grandmother told detective some things around the house didn't look the same.

DIPIETRO: Some oddities that I had noticed and we told the law enforcement what those were.

Note pronoun change. 

CANDIOTTI: She would not reveal them to us. Ayla's parents never married and live apart. The child's mother, who has spent time in rehab, her family says, questions whether the father, Justin Dipietro, mistreated Ayla, suspicious about a soft cast she had on her left arm the night she went missing.

Justin's mother said she was home when her son tripped while carrying Ayla into the house. In other words, it was an accident. Police say both families are cooperating in the investigation. Although she wasn't there that night, Dipietro says none of the people who were there are responsible for Ayla's disappearance.

DIPIETRO: Justin is a great dad. He truly, truly is and I know he loves Ayla.

Note the "double sensitivity" about Justin being a "great dad" making the statement very weak.  

CANDIOTTI: This sparkling reds dress and books are among Ayla's Christmas gifts never wrapped.

DIPIETRO: I have to believe she is OK.

CANDIOTTI (on camera): Do you have anything to say for whoever took Ayla?

DIPIETRO: Please bring her back, please bring her back.

CANDIOTTI (voice-over): So she can see her dancing again.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: Susan joins us now. There are obviously been a lot of questions raised about this family. Why and did she on Friday tell you one thing, that she was -- or implied that she was in the house and didn't hear anything and then later admit she wasn't in the house or say she wasn't in the house.

CANDIOTTI: She said that she didn't mean to do it. I had interviewed her late at night. The next morning, I went over to see her and her son, Justin.

She took me in and said, I have to tell you something. I have to tell you the truth. I made a mistake. I told you the wrong thing.

But she said, I was trying to be so careful to follow the police's instructions about not saying anything about what happened that night that I screwed up.

She was really upset. You know, I felt sorry for her. I give her credit for telling the truth.

COOPER: She said there were oddities in the house that she told police. It's understandable why she wouldn't tell anybody else because if somebody is arrested, that could be part of the investigation.

CANDIOTTI: Exactly, exactly. She wouldn't tell us exactly. That's why. But I could tell you that the inside of the house was covered in fingerprint dust. It took them a long time. They were still cleaning it up when we went in the house.

If you look around the outside of the house, you can see that there are windows on the side and in the back. So if someone wanted to make entry that way, if they came in to take her and snatch her, kidnap her, there are a lot of ways they could have come in.

COOPER: When you asked her about who she suspected or what her thoughts were, was it a stranger, she didn't really answer that question?

CANDIOTTI: She answered her own question, but you're right, she didn't say it. Because the police have told her, keep your mouth shut, we don't want to give any clues away about what we know and that's why she wouldn't tell us.

COOPER: Susan, appreciate the reporting. Thank you very much. Here's Piers Morgan with a look of what's coming up in "PIERS MORGAN TONIGHT" -- Piers.

PIERS MORGAN, HOST, CNN'S "PIERS MORGAN TONIGHT": Thanks, Anderson. Tonight as Newt Gingrich battles to stay alive in the campaign, I'll talk to two of the women who know his best, his daughters.

Plus former GE's CEO, Jack Welch, we're talking about the candidate he says is most qualified from a business point of view that he's ever seen to be president.

And the indy filmmaker who's latest effort cost just $9,000. He's also the envy of men everywhere, Ed Burns, husband to supermodel, Christie Turlington. That's coming up at 9. Back to you, Anderson.

COOPER: Piers, thanks very much.