Parents Criticize Police Investigation of Daughter's Death

McCanns call for new effort in investigation

The parents of Annie McCann publicly voiced their frustrations about the course of the investigation into the death of their daughter.

The 16-year-old West Potomac High School student was found dead at a housing complex in Baltimore in November 2008.

She had run away from her Fairfax County home a few days earlier on Halloween.

The Baltimore Police Department said McCann died from lidocaine intoxication.

The Maryland Medical Examiner's Office declared the cause of death as undetermined.

A bottle of medicine containing lidocaine was found with the victim's body.

Police say there is no evidence to suggest homicide but the McCann family is attacking the effort of investigators.

"Baltimore police never honestly investigated Annie's death," Daniel McCann said.

"Claims of a1,200-hour investigation are preposterous," he said, "and completely undermined by the fact that, more than four months after Annie's death, the lead detective didn't even have a photograph of Annie."

Anthony Guglielmi, the chief of public affairs with the Baltimore Police Department, said the department "has spent hundreds of investigative hours on Annie McCann's death investigation and found no evidence, physical or otherwise, to suggest that she was a victim of a homicide."

"The McCann family has suffered a great tragedy and experienced an immeasurable loss in the passing of their daughter, Annie," Guglielmi told News4. "On behalf of the entire department, please extend our deepest sympathies and condolences."

Guglielmi said the department is keeping the case open and looking for any credible information that could prompt the medical examiner to change the findings.

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