Trenton's Bedroom

The above is the outside of Trenton's bedroom, showing the window.



This is the window raised to the fullest extent. Enough room to pass through and lift out a small child.



This is Capt.Ginny Padgett "examining the 10 inch slit" of the screen. Melinda didn't think the screen was taken out, because she didn't think they cut it only to set her up. She was blind-sided again.



Here are the crumpled blinds, showing someone had tampered with them.



Here is the blanket lying askew on the bed. Melinda folded it later that night in his bedroom as she waited for word about Trenton.



Here is a crime scene picture of the room. Notice the picture on the floor out of the frame that had been on the window sill. Notice also, that the blinds were not down all the way. Melinda left the window slightly open about 4 inches as was her habit to let fresh air into the room.


Here is a diagram of the layout of Melinda's apartment.



Here is a "straightened up" picture of Trenton's room.

This is what Melinda had to say about that night:

Melinda Ducketts words on Nancy Grace:

MELINDA DUCKETT, MISSING BOY`S MOTHER: The bed is underneath the window Well, it had only been cracked about three or four inches to begin with. And second of all, when I walked in there, that`s obviously not the first thing that I was looking for.

As soon as I saw him not in the bed, I was looking throughout the room and in the closet. He`s in a toddler bed right now. He`s not in a crib. And there`s a lot of things... Oh. It`s real low to the ground. It`s got a wooden frame on it, all soft curves and everything, soft edges, a regular crib mattress inside. Just basically what you use for an average toddler.

Yes, he was. But he was very good. He would -- you know, once he was tired, he would lay down. He wouldn`t, you know, fuss or anything. And he wouldn`t get out and, you know, start messing around or anything

GRACE: Was he sleepy that night? Was he ready to go to bed, or did he resist?

MELINDA DUCKETT: No. Extremely. He was tired. We had had a long day out. And my son is not a light sleeper whatsoever. You can move him from room to room, and he`ll still be asleep. And on top of that, he is very friendly and very outgoing to everyone. He can walk in a room full of strangers and make friends with people. And so I mean, if he met someone new, he would start playing with them. He wouldn`t cry. He never had tantrums or anything.

The bedroom is connected to the hallway. The living room is -- gosh, if you picture the apartment like a U shape, the front door would be at the bottom of the U shape. The living room would be at the top left-hand corner. His bedroom would be, I guess you`d say, catty- corner... ... from the living room. Quite a ways. Right. The TV`s at the other end of the living room, right.

GRACE: OK. Last time you saw him was around 7:00, when you put him to bed. And what time...
MELINDA DUCKETT: It was before 10 to 7:00 because that`s when I got the phone call that they said they were on their way. It was after the first movie that we had watched. We`d actually planned on two. We went back and we asked them what time we had called the officers, and they said, I believe, it was 9:14. So it was between that time period I`d say...10 or 15 minutes before.

GRACE: ... is all that had passed since you had checked on him. Now, it`s my understanding thought he was hiding, and you started looking for him.

MELINDA DUCKETT: Yes. He had just learned how to open up the closet door that morning. And I thought that it was, you know, really a moment, like a Kodak moment, there. So that was the first place that I looked. The window, the rest of the room -- there`s nothing there for him to hide or anything, so I didn`t even think about it. And he`s not one to go under the bed or anything like that.
MELINDA DUCKETT: Well, when -- after I checked out his room, I checked the bathroom and my room, which are right down the hallway, which he could have gotten to without me seeing him. Like I say, he doesn`t ever do that kind of thing, so it would have been extremely unusual, but you know, when you`re in panic, you, you know, want to check every possible thing there is. When I came back up the hallway, I looked in his room again, and there was actually a picture that had been on the windowsill and that had fallen. And that`s why I looked to the window because there`s curtains and everything else there. So it`s not like, you know, it`s just open to the world.

The window was open, and the screen -- I know they have taken measurements. It was cut up, up to 10 inches on one of the sides. and that screen -- it is not a hard-wire screen, where you`re going to get cut by it if you touch it. It is very soft. It`s very old because it`s been in that apartment complex. And so for them to say, Well, you know, we think that, you know, he`s fine and all this other kind of stuff, you`re not going to get hurt on that thing.

GRACE: OK, question. Did the person -- I mean, did they take the screen off in order to get the boy out?

MELINDA DUCKETT: No. No, and I don`t know why all these things are coming up. It was in the window. All it was was cut along the sides and the bottom. There was nothing that was missing. Yes. When they came in, the investigators, they measured everything, and they said it was 10 inches high.

GRACE: OK. I`m just -- so you think the person went in and out leaving the screen on the window?

MELINDA DUCKETT: Well, I don`t think it came off at all... because it was still there. They dusted everything for fingerprints. Unless someone was wearing gloves or whatnot, they wouldn`t have been able to do that. And we`ve gone over this a million and one times and thought of all the possibilities with it.


GRACE: So you think the screen stayed on the window and the person came in and out, out that window. Was there any other entrance to the bedroom, other than that window and the door?

MELINDA DUCKETT: No. There aren`t.

GRACE: To Melinda Duckett, Trenton`s mom, was it already dark at 7:00 p.m. there?

MELINDA DUCKETT: Honest to goodness I don`t remember. But I do know that when the investigators came in to do the visuals and everything, when they leaned in through the window they could hit the bed. God forbid if Trenton was up or something like that and he was standing up or what not. Nobody would need to crawl in the window. I don`t know if that would be a possibility or not, they`ve already gone over that. But the people, I mean they`d stretch in there and they`d be perfectly fine getting in and out.