Still the question remains, what happened to Kortne Stouffer in the early morning hours of July 29th (in Palmyra, Pa)? I thumbed back through my growing, voluminous file, convinced I must have missed something obvious. Had to catch up on the news of the two men Kortne was with that last night, since their identities have now been revealed (they are Milton Rodriguez Jr. and more importantly Cody Pruett).
Not that this revelation of identification is clearing matters up anymore (really)!
By using intuition only to guide me in my beliefs, I morph in the direction that these two men are telling the truth. They didn’t have anything to do with Kortne’s sudden disappearance at that ungodly hour, when night and morning are indistinguishable companions! Cody Pruett could well have been fast asleep when Kortne either drifted out of her apartment (on her own accord), or was led away by some abstruse, unidentified party (possibly, without her permission).
Well it could have happened in just this way, or it could be an entirely different sequence of events that would explain how she vanished. That’s what makes Kortne Stouffer’s case so challenging. For example, can we assume there’s some sort of logical cause and effect exists between what went down at the Hardware Bar and what ultimately became of Kortne (several hours later)? Or should we throw logic to the wind with this particular set of baffling circumstances?
Well, we don’t want to do that too readily, since we tend to believe every outcome (whether it’s positive or negative) has a billiard ball pushing up against it, causing it to move in the direction that it has to move, having been forced to do so by some other more controlling pool ball. Cause and effect, people! What about these two reported altercations? Could these be the malevolent pool balls?
It could be that the detectives in this case are systematically eliminating the most obvious ‘Usual Suspects’ hypothesis. This is what I’m doing, if only because of a gut instinct. I don’t sense that the four most obvious choices are the right ones. They are the neighbor Kortne fought with (over a barking dog), the woman she had a beef with at the Hardware Bar, and (of course) Milton Rodriguez, Jr. and Cody Pruett.
If we eliminate these four potential suspects (that stick out like throbbing sore thumbs), what are we left with? The possibility of drug imbroglios was mentioned on HLN last night. This is the direction of my thoughts, as well.
What if Kortne owed somebody some money? And what if this bad person dropped by around 4:30 AM to confront her about this little problem she was having? And what if she willingly left the apartment (while Cody Pruett slept) and went out with this person to try to deal with a problem she was having?
Too much speculation, I’ll grant you! But constructs need an application so they can unfold with an apparent unwinding of logical consequence. Could this unknown party (who paid her a visit) be an associate of her boyfriend, who may have been doing some drug dealing, and conceivably got Kortne mixed up in this Bad karma (of illicit money making)? Moreover, did this party follow her out of the Hardware Bar, then confront her after the first police call?
If this is true, then she was already gone by the time of the second police call. This is consistent with Cody Pruitt’s story, of being sound asleep when the police knocked on the door. Still this is weird! The police don’t usually knock too softly. Cody’s awareness or paranoia level must beat at a very low, instinctual decibel.
No, we’re missing a major piece of the puzzle here! Don’t fault me for trying to find a fit, even if I fail miserably. When we finally do find out how this (Kortne Stouffer’s story) played out, I doubt whether it will resemble any of our constructs (and that’s my final construct for the day).
Kortne Stouffer got into bar fight on night of disappearance – Las Vegas Crime | Examiner.com