More Top Picks Best E Readers With Text To Speech
The family has long feared Craig Stebic would sever those relationships, said Melanie Greenberg, Lisa Stebic’s cousin. He had barred her parents from the couple’s Plainfield home and had not allowed his wife or their children, ages 11 and 12, to speak to them for the last two years, she said.
When they attended parties for extended family members, the children were not permitted to speak to their grandparents, who often were standing in the same room, Greenberg said. She could not explain why.
Lisa Stebic’s sisters, Debbie Ruttenberg and Jamie Bouma, last saw the children alone about five weeks ago, after a fundraiser in Joliet. The women told the children how much their mother loved them and how she would never intentionally leave them. Greenberg said the children tried to change the subject.
“After that, Craig turned off the ringer to his phone and wasn’t accepting messages,” Greenberg said. “The sisters do not have the children’s cell phone numbers. There is no way for us to contact them directly.”
On Thursday, the Stebics’ daughter called Bouma, who told the girl about a prayer vigil planned for Tuesday to mark the six-month point since her mother’s disappearance on April 30. Bouma also spoke with Craig Stebic, inviting him to attend the event, just a few yards from the home he shared with his wife on Red Star Drive.
Greenberg said Stebic gave reasons why he could not attend the vigil.
“On Saturday, he spoke to Jamie’s husband, saying he didn’t want them around the kids,” she said. “He didn’t want them to try and call them or visit them.”
Greenberg said Stebic told his wife’s family that the children were upset by fliers hung throughout the neighborhood, and the billboards in Illinois and near their father’s cabin in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, alerting passersby to Lisa Stebic’s disappearance.
Lisa Stebic was getting a divorce when she vanished. Her husband was the last person to see her. He has denied any involvement in her disappearance. He could not be reached for comment Monday and has routinely denied media requests for interviews.
His attorney, Dion Davi, said he did not know anything about Stebic shutting out his wife’s family.
Plainfield Police Chief Donald Bennett said his department is working with the state’s attorney’s office, pressing to set up an interview with the children by calling them in front of a grand jury. Craig Stebic has not allowed authorities to speak with the children since early in the investigation.
Bennett said Stebic’s decision to cut off his children from his wife’s sisters is in keeping with what he’s learned of him so far.
“He’s been uncooperative since day one, and I’m not surprised that he has alienated himself from the rest of the family,” Bennett said.
———-