Source says Spierer ‘incapacitated’ night of disappearance, mother releases statement to public

Lauren Spierer appeared incapacitated in a surveillance video the night she disappeared, an anonymous source told the Journal News in Westchester, N.Y.

Bloomington police were unavailable for comment on the alleged video footage.

The source told the Journal News that Spierer appeared to be incapacitated and was helped by a male individual out of the Smallwood apartment complex during the early morning hours of June 3 when she was last seen.  

“She comes stumbling out of the elevator, trips several times toward the corner of the lobby where she comes to rest, falls to her knees and leans against the wall for support until a male companion comes to her aid, gathers her under his arm and escorts her out of the front of the building,” the source told The Journal News. “That whole sequence lasts less than 60 seconds.”

The source contradicts statements by Corey Rossman’s lawyer, Carl Salzmann, who said Spierer helped his client get home because Rossman had been knocked out in an altercation.

“As for this idea that she was Florence Nightingale and taking him back because she was concerned, she wasn’t in any condition to take care of herself, let alone another human being,” the source said, according to the Journal News.

Lauren Spierer was last seen on video at about 2:45 a.m. during the early morning of June 3 after a night out.

She was last reported to have been seen walking home at the corner of 11th Street and College Avenue at around 4:30 a.m. Spierer’s apartment is at Smallwood Plaza, a short walk away from where she was last reported to have been seen.

The Journal News also published excerpts of an expletive-filled Facebook exchange between a Journal News reporter and Lauren’s boyfriend, Jesse Wolff, in which he claims to have taken a polygraph test.

Wolff seemed to imply he passed the test, although he would not confirm who had administered the test.

Wolff cursed the press in general and the reporter in the exchange.

He also said, “I tell the police everything because they can actually help.”

Lauren’s mother, Charlene Spierer, also issued a statement  July 21, 50 days after her daughter went missing.

In the statement, she said she was heartbroken over the disappearance of her daughter and her life was transformed into a nightmare.

“It’s as if our lives before June 3 never happened,” Charlene wrote.

Charlene expressed the continued hope that her family will find out what happened to Lauren.

“As you wake every morning, the nightmare begins again,” she wrote. “You cannot give in. You cannot give up hope. Every day, you think this could be the day and every day I believe that with all my heart,”

In addition, she wrote she had learned a lot during the past 50 days about how to deal with the media, about using social networking sites as tools in the search and about how to manage her thoughts to avoid the emotional agony that accompanies her daughter’s disappearance.

But she also said she had learned some things that are much darker.

“I’ve learned there lurks an evil. A cruel, heartless element that cares more about themselves than the life of my daughter. That this element of humanity exists in the world is beyond comprehension,” she wrote.

She then directly addressed those responsible for Lauren’s disappearance.

“Your silence is deafening. Your lack of compassion is reprehensible. Your lack of respect for another human being which allows you to go day-by-day, watching is unimaginable.

“Everyone is put on this earth for a purpose. Everyone has a defining moment. In the blink of an eye, Lauren disappeared. Do not let this be your defining moment.”

She pleaded with whomever is responsible to come forward, asking, “What are you waiting for?”

— Zach Ammerman