Profiler brought into Sacramento manhunt

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Investigators are bringing in a profiler to help them in their search for Nikolay Soltys. The Ukrainian immigrant is suspected of killing six members of his family -- including his pregnant wife and young son -- in Sacramento, California, on August 20. Soltys has been added to the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list.

On CNN's "Burden of Proof," Greta Van Susteren discussed where Soltys might be hiding and what efforts are being made to find him with FBI agent Nick Rossi, Sergeant James Lewis from the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department and Kami Lloyd, KFBK radio reporter.

VAN SUSTEREN: First to you, Sergeant Lewis, what is the latest? Any tips, closer to finding this man?

MORE STORIES • Sacramento killing suspect may have extortion cash   • Case puts spotlight on Ukrainian-American community     EXTRA INFORMATION • Gallery: Sacramento killings rampage   • Map: Key locations in California slayings   • Anyone with information on Nikolay Soltys' whereabouts should call either (916) 874-5321 or (916) 874-5414     RESOURCES FBI: Ten Most Wanted Fugitives   FBI: Nikolay Soltys   Message board: Family violence

SGT. JAMES LEWIS, SACRAMENTO COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: Well, we're up to about 900 tips, in the process of going through, recanvassing some areas where the crime occurred, where the vehicle was recovered to try to generate fresh leads, hot trail.

VAN SUSTEREN: When you say you're recanvassing the area, give me an example, what are you actually doing, knocking on doors, asking people questions? What kind of questions are you asking?

LEWIS: Well, we're going door to door, handing out fliers to make sure everybody has got the message, and it's a dual purpose. We want to also do a welfare check on the people in those neighborhoods to make sure that there's not someone that's being held hostage or who has had contact and been threatened by Nikolay.

VAN SUSTEREN: Nick, you are with the FBI. It seems to me, if I was involved in the investigation -- obviously nobody's asked me -- but that I would be particularly interested in the area where the car was found, because he has no transportation, he's on foot, at least as far as we know, and probably not much money. Are you focusing on that area?

NICK ROSSI, SACRAMENTO FBI AGENT: Well, actually the area where the first car was found was one spot. But there was a subsequent sighting, and it was a fairly credible sighting, of him in a 1990s vintage green Ford Explorer. And so our best guess at this point is that he fled the spot where he abandoned his first car, which was a Nissan Altima, and then somehow got to a second vehicle and then fled the area in that, so we don't think he's on foot.

VAN SUSTEREN: Is that likely a stolen car? Was there a report of a stolen Ford Explorer, or did he have access to one?

ROSSI: Well, actually, it wasn't reported stolen, so that's one of the mysteries in this case, is whether or not it's a car that he already had access to, or whether perhaps he's got someone who is helping him either out of fear or out of compassion, who is helping him get away.

VAN SUSTEREN: What makes you say that it's a credible tip? What makes this any different from any other one?

ROSSI: What makes it a little bit more believable than the other tips we've received to this point is that the witness who made that sighting, made it before [Nikolay's] son Sergey had been murdered, and provided it with very specific information about the victim that had not been released publicly, and that led us to believe that in fact it was a true sighting.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, so if there's no carjacking reported, no stolen Ford Explorer reported, you know, it seems apparent that he's at least working with someone, or someone is helping him, right?

ROSSI: Well, it's hard to say whether someone is helping him or whether or not he simply had access to more vehicles than we are aware of. One of the things that we find in the community here is that a lot of the folks in the Russian-Ukrainian community in Sacramento are involved in auto repair and restoring salvaged vehicles, and so he may have had access to more vehicles than one would normally expect. Certainly it wouldn't necessarily have been registered in his name or anything like that.

VAN SUSTEREN: OK, to get a little bit more on the community, let's go to the phone. We have Lubomyr Hajda on the phone, the associate director of the Ukrainian Research Institute at Harvard University.

Lubomyr, what can you tell me about the Ukrainian community and how this may make it more difficult, or perhaps easier to investigate.

LUBOMYR HAJDA, HARVARD UKRAINIAN MEDICAL INSTITUTE: The first thing that should be said is Mr. Soltys, it appears to me, is ... a member of the new Ukrainian community, which is not part of the traditional community in the United States, and is not integrated into the larger community.

The Ukrainian community traditionally has consisted of people who have come over the last 100 years or so. They have been centered around the traditional churches, which are Orthodox and Greek Catholic, with an agenda of their own religious expression, and cultural and political matters.

The New wave of immigrants since 1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, includes people of a very different type who come here for different reasons, who have different religious backgrounds, and do not necessarily meld into the existing community. So it is difficult to speak about a Ukrainian community into which Mr. Soltys may be somehow connected, but rather, in particular, community in his area.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, let me go back to Sacramento.

Kami, covering this story, do you have a sense the community is uneasy about what is going on from the police?

KAMI LLOYD, KFBK RADIO: Absolutely, uneasy. The White Rock Elementary School, where two of the youngest victims of this murder rampage attended class, [had] counselors, they had extra security when school started on Monday of this week. Counselors were on hand, psychologists talking to students. And one school official says that students have gone up to them, and said, "What if he comes for me?" There is a lot of unease, a lot of fear in the Ukrainian community, since there is no idea where Nikolay Soltys is. They would like this guy caught as much as detectives would.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, we're going to take a quick break. We'll have more on the search for suspected killer Nikolay Soltys, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

VAN SUSTEREN: Police have been searching for suspected killer Nikolay Soltys since he allegedly killed his wife, son and four other family members. A $120,000 reward is being offered for information leading to the arrest of Soltys. In a minute, we're going to give you the phone number you can call if you perhaps have seen him or may know something.

But, let me go back to Sergeant Lewis. The funeral was this week, or last week, for the family members. Did you have police there to see if perhaps he attended it, and did you videotape the audience, or do anything like that to see if he attended the funeral?

LEWIS: Yes, absolutely. We did have a pretty strong contingency of law enforcement there, much like we would for dignitary protection. The funeral service went off without a hitch. We estimated there were over 5,000 people that attended the service. So, it was...

VAN SUSTEREN: Any chance he was at that service? Any tips that he was among the mourners?

LEWIS: We had one subject detained that resembled him, but as it turns out it wasn't. So, we have had no sightings as a result of that service.

VAN SUSTEREN: OK. Nick, the FBI has numbers that people can call in. For English-speaking people who might know something, what number should they call?

ROSSI: 1-800-471-1700.

VAN SUSTEREN: OK, now that's English. Now, if you're Russian-speaking, or Ukrainian, what's the other number to call?

ROSSI: There's a second number. That's 1-800-340-5100.

VAN SUSTEREN: Nick, I'm struck by the fact that -- I'm still fixated on the transportation thing. Obviously ... he has a Ford Explorer he can get. But I assume that the borders, the Canadian- American borders, are watching for him. Is that right?

ROSSI: Absolutely. We've spoken to Interpol. We've also talked to the [Royal Canadian Mounted Police] and other law enforcement agencies. We've put checks at the borders. It's tough, especially when you talk about the Canadian border, it's a relatively porous border, but we're doing what we can to make sure that he can't get out of this country.

VAN SUSTEREN: But you know, Nick, it would seem to me that if you are Ukrainian and you leave the community, that you are almost like a sore thumb, you're going to stick out. Isn't he easier to find at that point?

ROSSI: That's our hope. We've heard that he speaks English at about a fourth-grade level, and he's got a rather thick accent. So, it's our hope that if he does try to leave the community, if he tries to flee the country, that he will stick out.

The unfortunate thing is that there are pockets where he can fit in, and there are long-haul truckers, others who speak Russian, who speak Ukrainian, and who may -- impossible as it is to believe, with all the media coverage that this case has gotten -- may not know who he is or what he's accused of.

VAN SUSTEREN: Kami, I've read reports that he is a troubled man. What could you tell me about his history, if anything?

LLOYD: We'd like to find out a little bit more about Nikolay Soltys' history. A profiler is going to be brought in, and typically profilers are brought into cases when you don't know the suspect. In this case a profiler is brought in to give us a better idea of who the suspect is, take a look into the mind of Nikolay Soltys.

We've got dueling reports, we've got reports that he was a small-time crook who extorted money out of neighbors in the Ukrainian community here in Sacramento. We've also had reports that he was a lazy bum and would do whatever he could not to work. So, we're hoping that a profiler will give us a better insight into who this man is. If we can get a better insight into his personality, where he might be.

VAN SUSTEREN: Kami, though, are the reports that he -- that there was sort of -- that he was a disturbed man, maybe even beat his wife -- I mean, obviously I haven't verified it myself, but I'm always so curious. Are -- is there something we know about his personal background?

LLOYD: Well, detectives are also talking with detectives in the Ukraine. There were reports coming out of the Ukraine that Nikolay Soltys went after his wife there with an ax. That they had a history of domestic violence before moving to the United States. Nikolay Soltys came in 1998, his wife came about five months ago to the United States. There were reports that she didn't want to come because of the history of domestic violence between the couple.

Lyubov, the wife who was murdered, her parents say the couple had a history of domestic violence, and they said that to a Ukrainian newspaper. So, as I noted, detectives are investigating that aspect of their relationship.

They're also looking into reports that before coming to the United States, he tried to get into the Ukrainian army and was rejected because he was mentally unfit. Those are all aspects of Nikolay Soltys the detectives are trying to confirm, and hopefully give us a better insight into who this guy is.

VAN SUSTEREN: Nick, obviously disturbing background information. Armed and dangerous, I assume, is the way the FBI considers this man. What does it mean to be on the top 10? Does that mean anything in terms of whether or not he's more likely to be captured than not?

ROSSI: Absolutely. Over the history of the top 10, we've had about 466 fugitives on the list, 437 of those have been caught. They're being caught not only in the U.S., but outside the U.S. The last ... top 10 member to be caught, Eric Rosser, was arrested in Thailand just last week.

VAN SUSTEREN: What difference does it mean to be on the top 10? Does it mean -- you're not ignoring everybody else, right?

ROSSI: Absolutely not. But what it means to be on the top 10 is basically two things. Number one, it brings an additional $50,000 to the table in reward money; and number two, when we set leads, investigative leads to our offices across the country and overseas, and ask them to follow up on reported sightings, if it is a top 10 fugitive, that request goes to the top of the list of every other request they have gotten on a fugitive case.

VAN SUSTEREN: Sergeant Lewis, are you going to find this guy?

LEWIS: I sure hope so. We are very optimistic that he's still in the area, that we're going to be able to flush him out. Ultimately, we couldn't do this without the public's help, without the intense media coverage that it's gotten. We know that we're just one phone call away from a hot lead that's going to lead to his discovery.

VAN SUSTEREN: Again, the phone number, English-speaking, is 1-800-471-1700. If you speak Russian or Ukrainian, it's 1-800-340-5100.

Thanks to all my guests today. And thank you for watching.