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Police say the parents of a missing 10-month-old Missouri girl are no longer cooperating with authorities.
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Kansas City police spokesman Steve Young said Thursday night that Deborah Bradley and Jeremy Irwin have decided to stop talking to detectives. He didn't provide details, but he did say their failure to cooperate could hurt the investigation.
"They clearly don't want to participate," Young said.
Relatives of the couple later called their own news conference, where a sister of Irwin read a statement saying "we have never stopped cooperating with police."
"We've been cooperative from day one, and we continue to assist the police with the investigation," the statement.
Young also said the parents' claim that whoever took their daughter also stole their cellphones hadn't produced any leads.
Asked after the news conference what would happen to the investigation without the parents' cooperation, Young said he could not comment.
The sister said the parents would make a statement sometime Friday; she did not take any questions Thursday night. A call to police for reaction to the family's statement was not immediately returned.
Investigators have no suspects and few solid leads despite an intensive search for Lisa Irwin. Her parents say she was snatched from her crib sometime Monday night or early Tuesday.
Earlier Thursday, the child's parents described how they frantically searched their home for any sign of their daughter but found only an open window, an unlocked front door and house lights blazing.
The parents pleaded for their daughter's return on TODAY Thursday.
Video: Missing baby’s parents: ‘We just need her back‘ (on this page)“Please bring her home,’’ said a tearful Deborah Bradley, the girl’s mother. “Drop her off anywhere safe — the fire department, a church, a police station. Bring her somewhere safe, no questions asked. We just want our daughter back. We’ll do anything to get her.’’
When Jeremy Irwin, the father of 10-month-old Lisa Irwin, came home from his shift as an electrician at 4 a.m. on Tuesday, he discovered his blond-haired, blue-eyed infant daughter was not in her crib. Three cell phones were also found missing from the home.
By Thursday afternoon, the search for the baby had intensified. About 80 police officers and FBI agents conducted a thorough search of a heavily wooded area behind the family's home, said Darin Snapp, spokesman for the Kansas City Police Department, but police reported no new leads.
Story: Mom of missing Mo. girl: 'We just want our baby back'The parents are not currently suspects, according to the police. They have given police more than a dozen names as they try to think of potential suspects or people who paid especially close attention to the child, a relative said Thursday. Police dogs have searched the family’s home, and federal investigators wearing sterile suits to avoid disturbing the crime scene removed several bags of evidence from the house on Wednesday.
The couple does not know what the bags contained. The baby girl was wearing purple shorts and a purple shirt and had a cold with a cough at the time of her abduction, according to police.
“We don’t know a whole lot,’’ Irwin said. “We’re just hoping that we get her back soon.’’
A window without a screen has drawn scrutiny as a possible entry point, but investigators are puzzled about how someone could have entered through the window, walked all the way down the hall, snatched the baby and slipped out undetected.
Story: Amber Alert for 10-month-old girl last seen in crib“The only thing that we know absolutely is that there should’ve been a 10-month-old in that house and there isn’t, and we’re doing everything we can to find the child,’’ Kansas City police captain Steve Young told NBC News. “The longer the time goes without getting a conclusion, the more difficult it becomes, but that doesn’t mean that we’re letting up.’’
Crews looking for the baby have extended their search to a nearby heavily wooded area, an industrial park and the sewers. About 100 hundred officers scoured the industrial park and adjacent woods Thursday morning. One of the searchers told a reporter to leave the area and refused to comment on the investigation. Others lifted sewer drain covers and looked inside.
Randy Thurston, a warehouse manager, says officers had also been through the industrial park Tuesday, searching trash bins and pipes. He says the scene was much more intense Thursday.
Police investigators have conducted 300 “knock-and-talks’’ where officers knock on doors and ask to search homes. They also performed three shoulder-to-shoulder searches in the nearby woods with no concrete results. Police also have received 47 tips, some vague, from the tip hotline, but have not pursued all of them.
Of the 278 infant abductions nationwide in the past 28 years, only 12 of those children did not return home safely, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which is assisting the family with the case.
Parents and family members are often the main suspects in child abductions. Of the 800,000 children that are reported missing every year in the United States, an estimated 200,000 are abducted by family members and 58,000 by non-family members, usually with a sexual motive, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Irwin and Bradley were questioned by police until nearly 11 p.m. on Tuesday about any possible role in their child’s disappearance. Neither of them has any type of serious criminal record.
“We don’t know where she is or who took her,’’ Irwin told Curry. “We just need her back.’’
TODAY's Peter Alexander asked Irwin’s parents, Rick and Melanie, whether their son or future daughter-in-law had anything to do with the baby’s abduction.
“Absolutely not,’’ Melanie told NBC News. “They are kind, loving, wonderful parents, and that baby is everything to them.’’
Police say that the couple has been fully cooperative as they conduct their search.
“We were down at the police station for most of the day the other day, just going over everything, and making that sure they’ve got all the information that we have and giving them everything we can, time and time again,’’ Irwin said. “Hopefully something can bring her home.’’
Lisa Irwin is the youngest of three children who live in the home. Irwin and Bradley are engaged to be married, and also have two children, 8-year-old Blake Irwin and 6-year-old Michael Bradley, from previous relationships.
“We’re a close family,’’ Deborah told Curry. “My boys miss (Lisa), me and my father miss her. Everybody loves her. We have a good family, and she needs to be with us.’’
Anyone with information regarding Lisa Irwin’s disappearance is urged to contact the Kansas City Police Department.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
© 2012 MSNBC Interactive
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