<p>"Indiana University sophomore Lauren Spierer, 20, was last seen walking barefoot alone from a friend's Bloomington, Ind., apartment at around 4:30 a.m. Friday."</p>
<p>I just saw her mom on the news -- my heart breaks for her.</p>
<p>I feel like when I tell D to be careful at college, to be safe, it goes in one ear and out the other.</p>
<p>I hope and pray this girl shows up, safe, alive, and worst case -- a little dehydrated from a few too many drinks.</p>
<p>Thank you for posting the updated article…becoming clearer what transpired that evening…</p>
<p>so it was Rossman’s roomie who let her walk home alone (supposedly)…</p>
<p>there are alot of people involved with this according to the article…</p>
<p>^^I hope you are right!!</p>
<p>Terrible story but you gotta have common sense. Walking alone at four in the morning? Really? Wow.</p>
<p>I’m not familiar with Bloomington, but it wasn’t that uncommon to walk home by yourself where I went to school. Of course, Smith is in a small town and not a city, so again, it’s a little different. But according to the police report the girl lived less than half a mile from the boys’ apartment, so a few blocks at most. I don’t think she can be blamed for not wanting to stay at the apartment where one boy was passed out (and probably no where else to sleep). Would have been gallant of the other guy to walk her home, but he may have not been in a fit state to walk her either.</p>
<p>I only really clicked the link because it was from the paper that serves the three tiny counties around and including mine at home.
But yeah it’s a common sense thing, but on the girl’s part, not the guy’s. At that point she really should have either stayed the night or called a cab (or if the school has some sort of night escort). I’m wondering why her boyfriend wasn’t mentioned in the investigation? From quickly skimming the article, it seems like her boyfriend and the guy friend who is the suspect got into a physical fight earlier that night and the girl left with the friend instead of her boyfriend. I can think of a few different situations that could have led to this and almost all of them end up with an angry (to the point of physical fighting) boyfriend who didn’t really come up in the article at all.</p>
<p>The president of my sorority is best friends with this girl and just flew out to Indiana to help look for her. I really hope she is found soon, we are all doing our best to spread the word on Facebook :(</p>
<p>Who is the Rosenbaum male friend who claims to have been last to see her? Already lawyered up w Voyles who defended Mike Tyson!</p>
<p>Of course, he is “lawyered up”. If your college kid were considered the last to have seen a missing student and the police are questioning him and wanting DNA samples, you probably will get a lawyer. I would. That is attorney oked the DNA sample is a pretty good sign that the kid is not involved, If the kid had given any sign that there MIGHT be incriminating DNA on him–if he had been intimate or physical with her, the lawyer would have insisted his client refuse. It sounds ominous that someone was the last to see a missing person, but sometimes that is just chance. </p>
<p>The young woman is from our area, and IU is a school where a number of kids have attended that we know. This is a frightening event that strikes very close to home for me, and I am praying that it is not a tragedy.</p>
<p>Gina, I think she may have gotten into a car with someone. The area and all the usual places where she could have gone, friends, boyfriends that might have harbored her have been checked out …with dogs. No go. To disappear in thin air like that point to getting into a car and being whisked away outside of her usual haunts. There are simply too many people who know her for her to be in some student dig in the area, in my opinion, dead or alive. If a car is involved, she can be hundreds, even thousands of miles away by now. I would focus on any students or acquaintances who were in the area at the time she disappeared and who disappeared the same time she did, even if they are now back. If something happened, the thing to do to lower chances of getting caught would be to dump the body, many, many, many miles away where no one even knows about the missing gir.</p>
<p>I guess she wasn’t carrying a cell phone. The GPS feature is a great locator.</p>
<p>She left her cell phone in a bar earlier that night.</p>
<p>It’s been a week since she’s gone missing. Unsettling.</p>
<p>I went to IU and I know lots of people who would have walked 1/2 a mile at 4am. It happens all the time at Penn, too, and Penn seems less safe than IU.
This is horrible and I pray for her safe return.</p>
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<p>She would not be making good decisions or good choices if she were drinking enough to loose her keys, her cell and her shoes. Her shoes and cell were found at a bar, her keys on the sidewalk at a nearby but different location. There is a difference between walking home alone at 4 am awake and alert, say after studying, and walking home alone at 4 am intoxicated, so much so you have lost your shoes, your cellphone and your keys. Video surveillance shows she left the bar barefoot and just continued to visit other locations barefoot. She was withing a few blocks of her apartment the entire time she continued on barefoot. </p>
<p>I agree she might have gotten in a car with someone who offered her a ride and was never seen again.</p>
<p>This is so sad. However, she had prior citations for underage drinking, and her companion for part of the evening had those as well as a possession of marijuana charge. Look, college kids will drink and smoke, and I am not looking for arguments there. But she likely was not in control that morning. BIG DIFFERENCE.</p>
<p>I have been following this story with my own D, who is 19 and will be a junior. On top of everything else, the girl apparently has a heart problem.</p>
<p>I feel badly for her parents and I wonder if they were aware that she had a history of underage drinking issues. I also wonder - where there NO adults who saw this child (who I believe is not even 5’ tall) wandering in the middle of the night, half dressed and barefoot.</p>
<p>Poor thing, but I watch too much true crime TV to think that this will have a happy ending.</p>
<p>This could have been any of our children. College students walk short distances at night in areas in which they feel safe, often alone. I know I did years ago. Rather than passing judgment, please show support for the family and their efforts to find Lauren. For accurate updates, you can follow on twitter: NewsOnLaurenS, or on facebook: Official Lauren Spierer Updates from Her Family. Another good source for accurate information is the IU Hillel website: <a href=“http://www.iuhillel.org%5B/url%5D”>www.iuhillel.org</a></p>
<p>America’s Most Wanted will be covering this story tonight at 9:00 p.m.</p>
<p>I feel horrible for the family, but there are lessons to be learned here. We cannot just ignore the facts. And these facts need to be shared with our college-aged kids. The more we caution our students, the less chance it will be any of our children. I am not passing judgement, I am stating facts that help others to understand what occurred in the hours leading up to her disappearance. Of course we want her found safe and sound. But we want to protect others from the same fate.</p>
<p>I am not about to go into her problems and those of her classmates either. What happened here is too terrible and can happen to any of our kids who get careless. There are so many stories of kids who were careless and were injured, got in trouble and even died doing things college kids have been doing for years on end. The young man at Kenyon college who died walking home alone because he passed out, fell and froze over night. The young man who died in an electrical closet where he strayed. Another who fell down a stairwell. </p>
<p>One thing to tell our kids is to stay together. A single kid, inebriated or not, is just easier prey. Really, stay in a crowd with a designated “driver” whether a car is used or not. Someone should stay clearheaded. That won’t eliminate the hard core problems or freak accidents but will create fewer opportunities. </p>
<p>From what I have read and heard about this case, the areas where Lauren and other IU students spent there time have been thoroughly searched with dogs. I don’t think she is there.</p>
<p>^Cpt – totally agree. That’s why this story chills me – if we are all honest with ourselves, we know our own good, smart, level-headed kids, at age 19 or 20 or 21, can, with the help of way too many drinks, do stupid things. And show poor judgment. That’s the terrifying part of letting them out on their own. </p>
<p>Yes, technically, they’re adults, and yes, most of them won’t go missing and traumatize their parents with worry, but bottom line – they feel like they’re invincible and all the things mom and dad warn them about will never happen to them. And maybe they eyeball their new town and think, this looks safe. </p>
<p>But what do they know? I bet Harlem is now safer than some parts of the midwest. (No offense, people from the midwest). What I’m trying to say is some kids think they can gauge if an area or location is safe to walk alone, barefoot, drunk, and they may be very very wrong.</p>
<p>I really hope she shows up. I pray for her family.</p>
<p>I am hoping that she is doped up and shacked up with some people away from all of the publicity. It is possible. When I was out of a college for a couple of years, one of my former classmates disappeared suddenly with no sign of preparing to go. She had gone off on a drunk binge with some folks she met at a bar. Went to some festival for a week and just blew off life for a while. She had lost her job a few days before and did not want to go back home for the summer which was going to happen since her parents were not about to subsidize her in the college area. She scared all of us. But the police were not all pro active, and the parents were not notified for awhile, I am ashamed to say. She returned about 3 weeks after she was noticed missing. She really hurt her parents terribly, and scared all of us. But those days did not have the social networking or the concern we have when anyone goes missing. I hope this young woman is in the same situation. </p>
<p>She was certainly not in good shape when she left that bar, minus her shoes and cell phone, and was not in company that was aware of anything from the reports given. Too easy, to be scooped up in a car in an instant and whisked away somewhere. I’m hoping she joined some people willingly and they are in oblivion but safe. Better outrage and head shaking than the alternative.</p>
<p>Yes, it scares me, because any kid, mine included, will do unsafe things, and it just takes being at the wrong place at the wrong time for a tragedy.</p>