I spoke with retired journalist Frank Santiago in January 2009.  Noreen said  he'd been involved in the case since the very beginning and she considered him a friend.  He took her out to lunch every so often.  He felt that there was more than one side to this story...

Johnny Gosch 's dad questions that his ex-wife saw their son in 1997

Des Moines Register,
By FRANK SANTIAGO
Register Staff Writer

John Gosch, father of missing newspaper carrier Johnny Gosch , said Sunday he is skeptical of a statement by his ex-wife that their son visited her in 1997 at her West Des Moines apartment. "Apparently, she's trying to get more publicity or whatever to get on a talk show so she could go where it's warm," said Gosch, whose marriage to Noreen Gosch ended in 1995. Noreen Gosch, whose disclosure Friday added another unusual twist to an abduction that has had a 16-year history of bizarre turns, said of her ex-husband's reaction, "I don't care." "I was under oath and I told the truth," she said. "My son came to see me and not his father." John Gosch maintained that if his son had returned to the area, as Noreen Gosch said, he likely would have gone to the former couple's West Des Moines home, where John Gosch was living. It was the same house Johnny Gosch had grown up in and left on Sept. 5, 1982, before he was abducted a few blocks away while delivering The Des Moines Sunday Register. Noreen Gosch had moved from the home in 1997, according to John Gosch. "It's time she took a lie detector test," he said. He said he has had no contact with his son since the abduction. Noreen Gosch created a sensation Friday when she maintained in testimony in federal court in Lincoln, Neb., that she had seen her son alive. She appeared as a witness for Paul A. Bonacci, who was suing Larry King, a manager of the defunct Franklin Credit Union in Omaha, whom Bonacci accused of sexually abusing him. Bonacci had claimed he took part in the Gosch abduction. Noreen Gosch plans to meet today with West Des Moines police, with whom she has met on several occasions since the abduction. She said she was "hopeful" the details would be pursued. Said West Des Moines police Sgt. Steve Hoffman, "We really don't know any more at this time than what anybody else knows. We will talk to her and investigate anything that appears to need investigation." Hoffman added, "I'm sure if I were in her shoes I'd be under a lot of stress. From our prospective, there has never been any hard evidence to point in any direction." In an interview Saturday, Noreen Gosch said her son, who would now be 29, came to her apartment early in March, 1997 with another man whose identity was not disclosed to her. She said she immediately recognized the visitor. She said they talked for about an hour or an hour and a half. She said she was told not to disclose the conversation to anyone because her life and her son's life might be in jeopardy if details were known.

Section: Metro Iowa
Page: 1M
Index Terms: Criminal Investigation ; Missing Person ; Gosch Johnny; Gosch Noreen
Dateline: Iowa
Record Number: des1999021109470465
Copyright (c) The Des Moines Register. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of Gannett Co., Inc. by NewsBank, inc.

February 8, 1999