MY TURN: Keyboard experts, go home

I would like to thank and commend the Cd'A Press for not jumping on the national media circus wagon coverage of the tragic quadruple homicides in Moscow.

Solving REAL crime, as opposed to solving REEL crime, like "CSI" & "Blue Bloods," does not have to be solved in the 42 minutes of the show. All these out-of-town media keyboard experts, with little, if any REAL world experience come in here and spout this theory or that theory without regard to what they leave in their wake.

They interview family members and friends of the victims, asking them loaded, leading questions that then cause them to question the ability of the investigators and crime lab personnel. To what end? The end is to lure people into watching “film at 11."

Their yanked-right-out-of-clean-air speculations serve no useful purpose and do far more harm than good, especially to family and friends of the victims.

Making statements saying X number of days and still no suspect or murder weapon only serves to undermine the investigators. DNA results take time, sometimes weeks to get an answer. In this case, where they may be dealing with as many as three people’s DNA on each floor, possibly co-mingled, it could take even longer.

When they do get answers, the investigators have no duty to notify the media or anyone else. If the Moscow police are withholding information from the public, they are doing so to protect the integrity of the investigation.

The First Amendment says the media can print/air whatever they want, it doesn’t say anyone must tell them anything.

I can’t tell you anything about the investigators at the Moscow PD, other than they were smart enough to call in the Idaho State Police to help with their investigation. They deserve our faith and trust at this point.

I can tell you about the personnel at the Idaho State Police Crime Lab. I worked there for about 39 months training their firearms examiner. I retired, as a deputy sheriff, from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department in 1999. My last 14 years there as a firearms examiner in the LASD Crime Lab, best job I ever had, matter of fact, I’m still doing it as an independent firearms examiner today.

While working at the LASD lab, I worked alongside most of, if not all of, the criminalists there. As hard-working, dedicated, professional, well-educated and well-trained group of people as you could possibly ask for.

I worked around that exact same type of hard-working, dedicated, professional, well-educated and well-trained group of people at the ISP lab here in Cd'A. We are fortunate to have them and I know they are working hard to assist the MPD and ISP to bring to justice the person(s) who committed this horrible crime.

So, to the Los Angeles, New York and D.C., etc. keyboard experts, go home and take your half-baked theories and your half-caff lattes and ideas with you. When we need you, we’ll call you.

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Dwight Van Horn is a Kootenai County resident.