Officials let down community in the search for missing prof

By the Journal Editorial Board | Friday, March 30, 2007

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In the sad and mysterious tale of Chadron State College professor Steve Haataja's life and untimely death, area residents are left with nearly as many questions as answers.

On March 9, more than three months after Haataja was reported missing, two ranchers found his body in a ravine southeast of the college near the outskirts of town.

Up until the discovery, authorities had little information about what happened to Haataja. There were no signs that he had planned on leaving town, no correspondences that pointed to foul play, no clues at all. After the body was found, it was revealed, too, that there had been very little effort by authorities to search for Haataja.

State and county officials say they were not asked to help in the investigation. Local police officials said they kept in contact with other law enforcement agencies but that the searches they did "were to put the word out." Regardless, the Nebraska State Patrol - which is in charge of the homicide investigation - is now facing significant obstacles in its efforts to find out what happened to Haataja.

As one forensic expert said, "Once the body starts decomposing, you're constantly losing information." And given that three months have passed, the likelihood that information has been lost is probable.

Part of the tragedy of Haataja's tale is that there were people willing to search for Haataja. One of them, Loren Zimmerman, was a homicide detective for the Los Angeles Police Department for 20 years. More than once, Zimmerman organized search teams that scoured the outskirts of Chadron in the days after the professor went missing.

However, the former detective said he was essentially waved off the investigation by local police. The local police department failed its community and the Haataja family with their thin investigation. The fact that the county and state did not assist in the search exposes what may be even larger problems in protocol and communications.

And ultimately, it is the family and friends of Steven Haataja who are left to suffer. Not only have they experienced grief of losing a loved one, but now, they may never know exactly what happened to Haataja because key evidence may no longer be available because of the time lapse involved.

It may be too late for their family, but we hope that the problems uncovered during this missing-person search are addressed at all levels of law enforcement in Nebraska.