It was a simple message, posted on the internet by what seemed to be just another well-wisher who had followed the agonising hunt for the missing schoolboy Shawn Hornbeck.
"How long are you planing (sic) to look for your son?" it inquired of the boy's parents, signing off as Shawn Devlin of Kirkwood, Missouri.
Only yesterday, as Shawn, 15, was reunited with his family after an extraordinary kidnap ordeal that lasted for four years, did it emerge that the message, left on the family's website in December 2005, may have been a cryptic cry for help from the boy himself. He was using the surname of his captor, Michael Devlin, who forced the boy to call him "Dad".
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I thought this was really funny
"There have been some instances where he has been aware of the efforts going on to find him. The only comment I've heard from him so far is that the age-progressed photo was an insult," Mr Akers revealed.
I find it interesting that he was missing for four years and only 30 minutes away from his home.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... dnap14.xml