WATERVILLE — A lawyer representing the grandmother and aunt of missing child Ayla Reynolds said Monday his clients do not know the circumstances behind her disappearance.
Steve Bourget, a general practice attorney in Augusta, said Phoebe DiPietro, 47, and Elisha DiPietro, 23, retained his services in early January, a few weeks after Ayla was reported missing from their home at 29 Violette Ave. The DiPietros approached him to serve as “a buffer between the press and their personal lives,” Bourget said during a phone interview with the Morning Sentinel.
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Elisha DiPietro was one of three adults at the home on Dec. 16, the night before 20-month-old Ayla was reported missing. The other adults were Ayla’s father, Justin DiPietro, 24, and his girlfriend, Courtney Roberts, 24, of Portland.
Police have said the three adults aren’t telling the full story, but Bourget said otherwise.
“That’s not true,” he said. “As far as Elisha is concerned, she has been honest, open and told the whole truth.”
During the investigation of the DiPietro home, police removed several hundred pieces of potential evidence, including blood samples belonging to Ayla. Investigators have said they continue to study the evidence at the state police crime lab.
According to Elisha DiPietro’s account, Dec. 16 was a typical night, Bourget said.
“There was no party. It was a quiet evening. They went to bed at their regular times. There was no drinking. They don’t drink there at all, as a matter of fact,” he said.
Ayla was at the home when her aunt Elisha DiPietro went to bed, and she was not there in the morning, he said.
Bourget confirmed that Ayla’s grandmother Phoebe DiPietro was not in the home that night, but didn’t specify where.
“She was with a friend,” he said. “She was out for the evening and out for the night. She had other plans.”
Bourget said both of his clients are fully cooperative with the investigation. He said he doesn’t know if his clients have taken polygraph exams.
He also said no drugs were consumed or sold at the home.
“There’s a lot of misinformation out there,” he said. “My clients wish they knew the answer (to Ayla’s disappearance), but they don’t. They don’t know.”
The mother and daughter are the only DiPietro family members Bourget is representing, because “they are the only ones who asked me to represent them,” he said.
Elisha DiPietro graduated from Waterville Senior High School in 2007. According to Morning Sentinel archives, in nearly every quarter during her four years at the school, DiPietro was listed on the honor roll, sometimes with high honors. In the spring and fall semesters of 2011, she was named to the dean’s list at Kennebec Valley Community College.
Bourget has practiced law in Augusta for 24 years. He handles family, estate and criminal cases, he said.
Ben McCanna — 861-9239
bmccanna@centralmaine.com
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