It has been a little over three years since Acacia Bishop was abducted and taken to Idaho Falls, and next month marks her 5th birthday.
Acacia was just 19 months old when she was allegedly kidnapped by her grandmother, 39-year-old Kelley Jean Lodmell, on May 25, 2003, in Murray. Lodmell then drove to Idaho Falls, where police believe she jumped in the Snake River with the child.
Lodmell got out of the water. Acacia Bishop was never found, and police presumed she drowned.
But Acacia's parents, Adam Bishop and Casey Lodmell, have always contended there were too many unanswered questions and too many signs that pointed to their daughter still being alive.
This week, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children released a computer-generated photograph of what Acacia might look like today.
"They took a picture of me as a toddler and Casey as a toddler and blended it with (Acacia's) features," Bishop said. "It's really good on all fronts. It will give people a new picture to look at."
Adam Bishop believes that Acacia was handed off to another person by Kelley Lodmell before she jumped into the river. He believes his daughter is alive today and living with someone else.
"We've kept the same belief from the very beginning because of how Kelley eluded everybody. She changed her story three times," Adam Bishop said.
Lodmell wrote her daughter, Casey, and Adam Bishop a letter saying she hoped whoever had Acacia was taking care of her, he said. Furthermore, Bishop said he and Casey knew that Kelley had been "planning the abduction for a while."
In 2003, Bishop said Lodmell was incarcerated in the Salt Lake County Jail along with another woman who had just been arrested for investigation of abducting a baby from the ZCMI Center, an incident that prompted a Rachael Alert (later renamed the Amber Alert) to be issued.
Through the woman's mother, Bishop learned that Lodmell and the woman talked about kidnapping a child.
"She talked about what she would have done different. Kelley mentioned she wanted Acacia for herself," he said.
"There's more evidence of (Lodmell) passing (Acacia) off than she is dead," Bishop said.
In 2005, Lodmell was found not guilty by reason of insanity on a federal kidnapping charge in Utah and ordered to be held indefinitely at a federal medical facility in Texas. Following that decision, prosecutors in Idaho dropped charges of kidnapping and murder.
The recent case of a South Carolina girl who was kidnapped and held in an underground bunker for a week before being rescued is an example that anything is possible, said Bishop, who continues to hold out hope his daughter is alive.
Bishop said he still occasionally receives tips on possible sightings of his daughter.
"We're trying to get all these tips together to find the right one that will lead us to our daughter," he said.
When the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children receive what they believe is a credible tip they will saturate the area where the tip came from with fliers of Acacia's picture, he said.
Acacia was probably too young when she was abducted to know what happened to her, Adam Bishop said. But now she would be at an age where she is about to go to school as well as being able to comprehend what she sees on TV.
"We'd like to let her know we've never given up trying to find her," Bishop said. "We'll find the people eventually who have her or wherever she is at. We love her. We want her back in our family where she belongs. We won't rest until we have closure. We're not going to give up. We really feel and know she's out there. We know she's out there."
E-mail: preavy@desnews.com