Detectives: Westerfield Might Have Gotten Away

SAN DIEGO -- Detectives who investigated Danielle van Dam's kidnapping say that the case might have ended very differently if it had taken a day or two longer to identify David Westerfield as a suspect.

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"If we hadn't homed in on him so quickly, it would have given him a little more time to think up better stories, do some more cleaning," San Diego police Lt. Jim Collins told the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Police might never have found his green sport jacket stained with Danielle's blood. Westerfield probably would have picked up clothing from the dry cleaners, Collins said, and authorities would not have learned about the physical evidence that convinced jurors he killed the second-grader.

"If things had not worked out the way they did in those first couple days, he may very well be walking free and this might be an unsolved homicide," Detective Johnny Keene, the first police officer to interview Westerfield, told the Union-Tribune.

On Feb. 2, when police learned of Danielle's disappearance, detectives didn't have anything to go on, and interviewing Westerfield wasn't a priority. "He didn't jump out as somebody we needed to talk to," Collins told the newspaper.

All that changed when detectives discovered that Westerfield was the only neighbor who hadn't been home during the weekend, and also that Brenda van Dam had run into him at Dad's Cafe and Steakhouse the night before Danielle's disappearance was discovered.

When Keene caught up with Westerfield on Feb. 4, his rambling explanation of his weekend adventures -- a recreational vehicle odyssey from Silver Strand State Beach to the desert and back to Silver Strand -- grabbed the detective's attention, according to the Union-Tribune.

Then Westerfield mentioned chatting with Brenda van Dam at Dad's, and told Keene, out of the blue, "I could have sworn she said she had a baby sitter. I didn't know her husband was home."

"That was just like a big red flag to me," Keene told the Union-Tribune.

Later that day, police interrogation specialist Paul Redden heard a series of warning signals while interviewing Westerfield for three hours. At the end of the meeting, Redden told Westerfield he was on to him, according to the newspaper.

"There's no doubt in my mind that you're somehow involved in the disappearance of Danielle van Dam," Redden reportedly told him. Westerfield denied it.

During the interview, Westerfield was clearly nervous. Sweat rings under his arms grew bigger as talks progressed. And he spoke slowly, taking his time answering every question.

"He wanted to make sure that each sentence fit the previous sentence," Redden told the Union-Tribune. "I think he was in somewhat of a panic all weekend to figure out how he was going to dispose of this little girl."

Westerfield was arrested on Feb 22 and Danielle's body was found a week later.

The same jury that found Westerfield guilty of kidnapping and murder in Danielle van Dam's slaying recommended on Monday that he be put to death for the crime. Sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 22.