Parents questioned about daughter's trip to Texas

The Texas parents who authorities believe might have kidnapped their 19-year-old daughter because she had recently joined the LDS church were interviewed by law enforcement officers for most of Wednesday but were not placed in custody.

Daniel and Gloria Alonso traveled to Salt Lake City on Tuesday evening to meet with Salt Lake County Sheriff's officers. The Alonsos were questioned for nearly six hours as the sheriff's office sought to understand why they abruptly picked up their daughter Danielle Alonso, a University of Utah student, on Sunday and then ended up back in Texas.

"(The Alonsos) provided us with statements and were cooperative," Salt Lake County Sheriff's Lt. Don Hutson said. "They gave us some background information, as well as information on what happened the day of the incident and what has happened since then."

A sheriff's detective traveled to Texas and had hoped to meet with Danielle Alonso on Wednesday morning, but an attorney has now been hired to counsel her while she answers questions about her side of the story, Hutson said.

The detective was able to begin interviewing the 19-year-old, with her attorney present, Wednesday evening, Hutson said.

The fact that Danielle Alonso now has an attorney present as she answers questions into her own alleged kidnapping investigation is "not very common," Hutson said.

But the parents' Utah attorney, Steven Shapiro, says that it was not the parents who hired the attorney for their daughter.

"The advice that I gave them and that they have given to their daughter is to talk with law enforcement," Shapiro said. "She is a witness, and they wanted to talk to her and see she is OK. She may now be represented by an attorney, but that was not their intention."

Shapiro said it wouldn't be alarming to him if Danielle had decided to contact an attorney on her own after seeing the amount of media coverage the situation was receiving.

Before being located at her parents' house in Rockport, Texas, on Tuesday morning, Alonso had last been seen Sunday at her basement apartment in Holladay. She was reportedly worried that her father would come to her apartment because she had sent him a letter a week earlier telling him that she had become a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Daniel Alonso responded with an angry phone call, followed by a second call in which he threatened to travel from Texas to Utah to get her, the sheriff's office said.

Because of alleged past physical abuse, Danielle Alonso was reportedly scared and called the sheriff's office. Detectives told her to lock the door and call 911 if her father showed up, Hutson said.