Life returning to normal for family rocked by toddler’s disappearance

By Ed Runyan | October 14, 2015 at 12:08a.m.

NORTH BLOOMFIELD

Rainn Peterson at home

Rainn Peterson, 26 months old, returned to her great-grandparents' home from the hospital last week and could be found Tuesday running around the house and chasing her brother Lucian, 3.

For Dora Mae and Richard Peterson and their great-granddaughter Rainn Peterson, life is starting to return to normal – a little over a week after Rainn’s 48-hour disappearance made news as far away as England.

Rainn, 26 months, returned to the Peterson home from the hospital last week and could be found Tuesday running around the house and chasing her brother Lucian, 3, just like before.

“She’s a very active little girl,” Dora Mae said. “She’s a tough cookie. She can beat her brother up, but she’s also so kind and gentle.”

One thing that has changed is the level of security at the Peterson home: new locks on all of the doors to prevent people from entering or leaving, and motion sensors that indicate whenever someone is approaching the house.

“You have to have a key to get in, and you have to have a key to get out,” Dora Mae said.

The extra security is designed to prevent a repeat of Rainn’s disappearance, even though the Petersons and investigators working on the case still don’t know why she disappeared or whether anyone else was involved.

She disappeared about 7:20 p.m. Oct. 2 and was gone throughout that night and on a cold and wet Oct. 3. She was gone most of Oct. 4 before neighbor Victor Sutton found her in a field about a half mile away just before it got dark again.

She was cold and wet, but remarkably fine.

Sheriff Thomas Altiere said one hope is that analysis of the clothing Rainn wore when she was found will indicate whether anyone’s DNA is on her clothing to suggest whether someone took her – or found her and put her in that field.

It’s ironic that Rainn is right there with Dora Mae all day but can’t unlock the secret of what happened because of her young age.

“It’s a case where only she can tell us, but she can’t tell us, so we’ll never know if the officials don’t find out what happened to her – if something happened to her other than walking out the door,” she said.

Over about an hour of being photographed and videotaped and conversation with Dora Mae and Richard, Rainn played and interacted but said only one discernible word: “Goodbye,” she said at the door.

Dora Mae said that when Rainn disappeared, she, Richard, Rainn, Lucian and Rainn’s other brother, Legion, 4, had been in the house for several hours after Richard brought Legion home from preschool.

None of them had been in or out of the house, and Dora Mae thinks it’s unlikely that Rainn walked out on her own and pulled a door shut behind her on the way out.

All three children have lived with their great-grandparents since their infancy, and their mother, Brandi Peterson, also has lived there from time to time, Dora Mae said.

Whatever the reason for Rainn’s disappearance, Dora Mae opened her doors to several reporters this week just so she could thank the people who searched for Rainn and cared so much about her, she said.

“It’s unbelievable the people who were concerned about this little girl, loved this little girl, even though they never laid eyes on her,” Dora Mae said.

“They brought in toys, food. They searched. Everybody who had anything to do with the search,” she said. “We’re not used to being on the receiving end of that. We just want to thank each one of them, especially Victor Sutton, who found her.”