Missing Baby Lisa Irwin: Family Targeted as ‘Kidnappers’ for Similar Baby

Lisa Irwin and Unrelated Stabbing Incident — A man questioned in connection to the case of missing baby Lisa Irwin has been charged with first-degree assault in an unrelated incident. Dane "Diggler" Greathouse, 28, has been charged for stabbing Greg R. May this weekend in Gladstone, Mo. Baby Lisa's parents, Jeremy Irwin and Deborah Bradley, claim missing baby Lisa was taken from her crib late Oct. 3, 2011 while Bradley was asleep and Irwin was at work. The one-year-old remains missing. Reuters

Baby Lisa Irwin has been missing for two months, but the one-year-old's parents, Deborah Bradley and Jeremy Irwin, continue to believe that their daughter was kidnapped on Oct. 4.

Despite Lisa's disappearance, Bradley and Irwin have been critizied for failing to cooperate with the Kansas City police department, sparking suspicions that baby Lisa might be dead or that her parents may know more than they let on.

The Irwin-Bradley family, however, is not the only one that has suffered from baby Lisa's disappearance. In the past two months, police have targeted hundreds of parents of children with a similar appearance to the missing Irwin. Police have received more than 1,200 tips and pursuing different leads has lead them to families with babies that look similar to the missing one-year-old.

One family in particular has been especially targeted in the Missouri area, reports the Kansas City Star.

I can't tell you how emotionally this has affected me, Amy, a mother of a girl who looks similar to baby Lisa, told the Kansas City Star. It's to the point where I'm afraid of going out. It's very upsetting.

Amy did not want to release her last name for fear that her daughter would be targeted.

My heart was with the parents, she said. Obviously, I have a baby the same age, so I could really identify with them.

Amy remembers first thinking how her daughter resembles Lisa with blue eyes and the same length hair when the one-year-old was reported missing over two months ago. She was not the only one who noticed the striking resemblance between her daughter, Lucy, and the missing baby Lisa.

But never in a million years did it dawn on me that someone would report us to police, she said.

I saw people peering down the aisles at me, the Overland Park mother told the Kansas City Star. But I convinced myself that they were probably just looking for a can of green beans or something.

In one incident, three women surrounded her inquiring the age of her daughter and pulling down Amy's daughter's blanket to check for Lisa's signature birthmark on her legs.

It makes you feel absolutely horrible as a person, the way they look at you, like you have a kidnapped baby, Amy said. I have no idea what my neighbors think with the police over here so often.

The police has also targeted Amy and her family. She has been interviewed and law enforcement officials have inspected her daughter over five times. The most recent incident was last week. She has been required to verify that her daughter is in fact hers by showing her birth certificate and insurance card.

Amy has also been stopped numerous times at the grocery store. In one incident, police officers took her baby from her and shoppers watched her suspiciously.

It was 15 minutes of me standing outside this store, having people look at me like I'd done something horrible, she said. Meanwhile, Lucy's going crazy because this stranger is handling her. She's at that age now where she is scared of strangers.

A source close to the investigation did not want to be named, but told the Kansas City Star that it is unfortunate that Amy's family has had to deal with this problem.

Not only were these people bothered, he said, we wasted more law enforcement time.

The case of missing baby Lisa continues to remain a mystery that began when Lisa's father, Jeremy Irwin, returned home on Oct. 4 after working overtime, to find the door open, the lights in his house on, windows tampered with and his daughter missing. Three cell phones were reportedly missing as well, but the evidence that the missing cell phones are related to Lisa's disappearance are unclear. Lisa's mother, Bradley, had allegedly put her daughter to sleep around 6:30 p.m. and proceeded to drink five to ten glasses of wine before passing out around 10:30 p.m. Since Oct. 4, authorities have scoured the surrounding area following all major tips and leads, but they have found no signs of baby Lisa.