Mother’s suicide not my fault, says host

A US talk show host whose techniques have come under fire when the mother of a missing boy killed herself a day after she was grilled by the TV presenter was unrepentant yesterday.

CNN’s Nancy Grace said she believed “guilt”, not her interview on Headline News, had driven Melinda Duckett, 21, to suicide.

The woman’s two-year-old son Trenton disappeared late last month.

On September 7, Ms Duckett was interviewed on the telephone by former prosecutor Grace, who repeatedly demanded to know whether she had taken a lie detector test.

At one point she pounded her desk and asked aggressively: “Where were you? Why aren’t you telling us where you were that day?”

The next day, before the interview was aired, Ms Duckett shot herself.

“To suggest a 15 to 20 minute interview caused someone to commit suicide, I feel is focusing on the wrong thing,” Grace, who is known for her tough questioning, told ABC’s Good Morning America.

It happened “because Melinda Duckett may very well know where her son was”, Grace said.

She denied that her hardline stance was responsible for making it harder for the police to find the little boy.

“My interview followed hours and hours of police interrogation of Melinda Duckett,” Grace said.

She added: “I did not go after Melinda Duckett. Melinda Duckett refused to answer questions to either myself or police about her child’s whereabouts.

“It is highly likely he is dead now because of that.”

Ms Duckett reported her son missing from their home in Leesburg, Florida, on August 27, saying he disappeared from his crib while she watched TV with friends.

Her family has disputed any suggestion that she hurt her son, saying the strain of his disappearance pushed her to the brink and the media sent her over the edge.

“Nancy Grace and the others, they just bashed her to the end,” her grandfather Bill Eubank said.

Investigators have stopped short of calling Ms Duckett a suspect but have focused increasing attention on her movements just before the boy vanished.

The young mother had told police when she went to check on Trenton, all she found was an empty crib and a 10in cut in the window screen above it.

Police have refused to say whether she left a suicide note.

Grace said Ms Duckett had admitted to her own lawyer that she had taken a shotgun, nappy bag and the baby hours before he went missing and gone on an “eight hour odyssey” through the forest “for target practice”.