WESTON, W.Va. — Prosecutors believe they found significant holes in the story that Lena Lunsford-Conaway told police about Aliayah Lunsford’s disappearance on Sept. 24, 2011, highlighting discrepancies in the defendant’s claim her 3-year-old daughter was kidnapped.
On Tuesday, the second day of Lunsford’s murder trial, five members of law enforcement from local, state, and federal agencies testified about the early phase of the investigation.
FBI special agent Fred Aldridge told the court it seemed highly unlikely a kidnapper could have removed Aliayah from her bed, considering two of her siblings were sleeping nearby in the same room. Noting that the screen door to their Bendale home made significant noise when it was opened or closed, Aldridge suggested someone would have been heard breaking in — and there were no signs a break-in had occurred.
Weston police chief Josh Thomas also testified, mostly reading Lena Lunsford’s statement about the events of Sept. 23, 2011 and the following day when she called 911 to report her daughter missing.
Christopher Smith of the West Virginia state police testified about the protocol of searching homes in missing children cases.
The prosecution played audio recordings of a drive Lunsford took with an FBI agent following Aliayah’s disappearance. The FBI agent said the point of the ride-along was to establish a timeline and see where the mother to claimed to have looked for Aliayah.
The agent noted that Lunsford’s search consisted of mostly driving, with no searching on foot. She claimed she had “tunnel vision” and just hoped “someone had seen her.”
The defense, led by attorney Tom Dyer, is arguing that without a body, there’s no actual evidence the crime took place other than Monday’s testimony from the witness identified as DC, Aliayah’s sister, who was 9 at the time of the alleged killing and is now age 15.
DC testified that she witnessed their mother strike Aliayah in the head with a wooden bed slat.
State Police Sgt. Shannon Loudin recounted discrepancies, including that Lena Lunsford told police she had been looking for Aliayah around 9:30 Saturday, Sept. 24. Video surveillance shows the Lunsford family van leaving their Bendale home at 9:13 and going directly out of town.
At 11:27 a.m., the Lunsford van returned to their Bendale home. At 11:31 a.m., Lunsford called 911.
DC told the court Monday that the family was in the van with Lena Lunsford, en route to a small community called Vadis. She claims that’s where Lena Lunsford buried the remains of Aliayah.
Loudin recalled interviewing two of Lunsford’s other children during the initial investigation in 2011, sensing that their stories felt rehearsed and emotionless at the time.
Over the ensuing months and years, Loudin followed up on tips provided to law enforcement. Each one was disproved, including a wild claim that Aliayah had been seen at Disney World.
But he believed the information he received from DC in October 2016 might have panned out. Loudin said DC and another sibling, known as KC, were able to separately bring investigators to the same location where they claimed Aliayah’s body had been left in 2011.
It was Loudin who served the warrant for Lunsford-Conaway’s arrest in Florida in November 2016. He recalled her reaction upon seeing him:
“She said, ‘Oh my God. Did you find Aliayah? Am I in trouble?'”
Under cross-examine of Loudin, the defense suggested that there remains no evidence Lena Lunsford killed her daughter, no evidence that — if dead — Aliayah died from a blow to the head, and that the wooden bed slat never was taken into evidence.
Because Aliayah had been suffering from the flu at the time of her disappearance, Dyer raised the possibility that medication could have proved lethal.
Loudin testified that there is a “slim chance” of police finding Lunsford’s body in the Vadis area, due to the time that had passed since the disappearance. He suggested they might find bones and hair.
Following the conclusion of the second day of the trial, Judge Jacob E. Reger told the jury that the prosecution was “flying through the witness list” and he did not expect the trial to last the projected two weeks.
Alex Wiederspiel, Brittany Murray, and Carrie Hodousek contributed to this report.