True Kidnapping Stories

She Nailed Her Own Rescue: The Sneaker Note That Broke Him A weathered child's sneaker nailed to a fence post contained a foil-wrapped gum-sleeve note: "I am Rebecca Porter. He is Dale Taylor. Please call." That single photographed sneaker set a chain in motion that led to Rebecca walking out of a hunting cabin two hours after the note reached detectives-how did she manage to get that message out after eleven days missing? In this episode, we tell what the case file records in Rebecca Porter's own words and lay out the sequence from her disappearance after choir rehearsal to the discovery that forced the rescue-what did Rebecca do during those eleven days, and why did her appraisal work matter? Person: Rebecca Porter Date: September 8-19 Location: Aldervale, Millhaven County Status: Missing for eleven days then walked out of a hunting cabin Topic: Property appraisal dispute and disappearance - Rebecca Porter left choir rehearsal on September 8 at 8:45 PM and texted her daughter at 8:51 PM saying "heading home." - Her gray Subaru Forester was found September 9 parked at a gravel pullout on Aldervale Road three-quarters of a mile from her house, doors unlocked and engine off. - Wallet and phone were left on the passenger seat inside a canvas tote with no signs of struggle or theft. - A ransom demand for $350,000 was made to her daughter on September 10 via a pitch-shifting app, with a 48-hour deadline and no follow-up. - On September 19, contractor Craig Whitaker found a child's sneaker nailed to a fence post containing a foil-wrapped note that led Detective Chad Christensen to a hunting cabin where Rebecca exited alive two hours and thirty-five minutes after the note reached the sheriff's substation.

Six Digits on a Sneaker: How Marilyn Coded Her Rescue A discarded white canvas sneaker with six ballpoint digits on its sole became the only message a missing woman could send from a sealed root cellar. The single clue - three numbers, a hyphen, three numbers - led a septic driver to bag the shoe and set off a detective's race to find a woman who had been counting sounds in the dark for five days; how did that code point exactly to her location? In this episode, we follow the timeline from Marilyn Griffin's routine Wednesday dinner with her grandmother to the moment her car was found and Detective Erin Petersen received the missing persons report, and we trace how a single handwritten number on a sneaker became the critical lead that raised the question: who had prepared Marilyn to encode her own location and how did that code get verified? Person: Marilyn Griffin Date: August 13, 2019 Location: Dewhurst Street, Calloway, Linden County Person: Detective Erin Petersen Event: Shoe with six-digit code found behind equipment shed - The sneaker was found upright on a gravel path behind an equipment shed with laces tied and heel flush against a crack. - Marvin Dalton, a septic service driver, discovered the shoe on the morning of August 13, 2019 and bagged it after turning it sole-up. - The sole bore six digits written in ballpoint pen formatted as three numbers, a hyphen, three numbers. - Marilyn Griffin had been missing for 119 hours after being seen at 8:52 PM on August 7, 2019 at a gas station on Route Nine. - Marilyn turned 22 in April 2019 and routinely drove 20 minutes south every Wednesday to visit her grandmother, Evelyn Cruz, who is 81.

How She Sent a Note Across a Lake - The Secret Trail to Rescue A double-knotted sandwich bag hung from a birch branch at chest height, half a mile from any path, containing a printed receipt wrapped around a precise handwritten plea: "I am Monica Rice. I am being held. Please call police." The note was found at 6:12 a.m, on July 9 and by 9:45 a.m. Nancy Holt was in handcuffs three miles away-so how did a message cross open water and dense forest without anyone carrying it? In this episode, we lay out the timeline from Monica Rice's last confirmed walk on July 2 to the discovery of the note on July 9, following the movements, notebooks, and locations that connect her disappearance to Nancy Holt; can the route of a single message reveal the planning behind an abduction? Person: Monica Rice Date: July 2 (last confirmed sighting walking) and July 9 (note found) Location: Dunmore Lake birch grove (eastern edge) Person: Nancy Holt Location: Lakeside cabin three miles from the note - The note was discovered in a double-knotted sandwich bag at 6:12 a.m, on July 9. - Monica Rice had been missing for seven days when she walked out of a back room after the note led to her rescue. - Nancy Holt was arrested at 9:45 a.m. at a lakeside cabin three miles from where the note was found. - Monica's car was found locked in a gravel pull-off on Route Nine, three miles outside Ridgecrest, with wallet on the center console and walking shoes missing. - Nancy Holt, age forty-one, had parked a white cargo van beside the Pelham Grain Elevator at least five mornings before Monica disappeared and had written "service door, elevator, clear sight line, no camera coverage" in her spiral notebook.

She Vanished Behind a Perfectly Locked Door - Blind and Alone A sixty-two-year-old blind woman disappeared from her own home while her coffee pot brewed and her guide dog sat fed and alone inside - and the back door showed no sign of forced entry. How could someone leave a house locked from the inside without breaking the lock, and what had been hiding in plain sight for eighteen months? In this episode, we follow the timeline of June 8-9, 2011 and the first days of the police response, tracing the domestic routines, the precise details investigators relied on, and the single clue that shifted the case from missing person to abduction. What did the contractor visit in December 2009 have to do with a door that opened without force? Person: Marcia Thompson Date: June 9, 2011 Location: 4 Birchfield Court, Farwell, Indiana Status: Missing / Abduction investigation Case: Pepper the guide dog left alone inside the house - Marcia was 62 years old and blind since 2007 due to a degenerative retinal condition. - The coffee maker was programmed for 6:30 AM and had brewed on schedule; the coffee was cold when discovered. - Marcia had not missed a single Thursday volunteer shift in four years; her last confirmed call was at 4:50 PM on June 8 that lasted 11 minutes. - Neighbor Pete Galvan saw Marcia and her yellow Labrador Pepper on the sidewalk at 6:40 PM on June 8. - Farrell Home Services performed waterproofing and rear door hardware installation at the property in December 2009, two full days of work.

She Escaped Once - This Time the GPS Told the Story Fear tightens when everyday objects move without their owners: a yellow Garmin GPS found eleven miles from where its barefoot owner had been reported missing, still powered on and wrapped in a cardigan bound with a shoelace. How did a device travel that distance when the woman it belonged to had not left her building for nine days? In this episode, we walk through the evidence, the small-town routines, and the hard numbers that shaped the investigation, following the trail from a drainage road to a Pickard Lane delivery log. What pattern connects a shoelace, a receipt, and a scar remembered from a previous abduction? Person: Rhonda Sanders Age: 24 Date missing report opened: May 4, 2011 Found item date and location: May 14, 2011 - drainage road eleven miles from Harlow Falls Investigator: Raymond Henderson - GPS model: yellow Garmin unit found powered on and displaying coordinates - Item packaging: wrapped in a gray cardigan sweater and bound with a single shoelace - Distance: device located eleven miles from Rhonda’s building - Timeline gap: Rhonda’s planner entry stops after 7:00 AM on May 3, 2011; missing report filed May 4, 2011 - Prior abduction: incident in 2008 where Rhonda was held approximately six hours and escaped by kicking out a rear window

She Wrote a Grocery List and Escaped: Amanda's Eleven Days Hidden Fear that someone you trust can erase you from the world - Amanda Andrews was hidden in a nine-by-twelve space behind a false wall for eleven days, and the only clue that brought deputies to her was a twenty-three-word grocery list in three-millimeter letters. How did she plan a rescue in such tiny handwriting and stay alive long enough for it to work? In this episode, we follow the timeline from Amanda’s last normal Thursday bridge night to the moment deputies opened the barn door on April 9, 2019, and ask how routine habits and small details - like a grocery list and a missed weekly game - became the threads that unraveled her disappearance. Person: Amanda Andrews Age: 48 Event: Found after being hidden for eleven days Date: April 9, 2019 Location: Barn at 4 Sycamore Trace, Draper Falls, Keswick County - Found at 2:45 PM behind a false wall of tool shelves in a space roughly 9 feet by 12 feet. - Grocery list consisted of 23 words written in letters 3 millimeters tall on a yellow legal pad. - Amanda had worked 14 years as office manager at Hendricks and Sons and began a job at 4 Sycamore Trace on March 1, 2019. - Missing person report filed by daughter Lena Andrews on March 29, 2019 after Amanda missed three consecutive Thursday bridge sessions. - Clifford Tate, age 53, was still on the property and reportedly cooperative when deputies arrived.

He Fit Through a Vent: How a Missing Man Named His Captor Before Dawn A small strip of white cloth caught in the seam of a metal vent and a man who somehow escaped through a nine-by-fourteen-inch opening set off a search that would expose a volunteer with surprising access to the scene. The missing man, found conscious before dawn, named his captor by full name - but why had that captor been walking the same fields the searchers were combing? Who was Thomas Tillman, and what did his two-hour gaps during the hunt conceal? In this episode, we follow the timeline from the first morning the kitchen light stayed dark to the phone ping that placed Duane Rogers four miles from home, and we track the volunteers, files, and oddest details that shifted suspicion onto one search-and-rescue member. What do the vent, the cloth, and a volunteer's repeated presence on Marsh Road reveal about how Rogers disappeared and who held him? Person: Duane Rogers Date: March 11-14, 2019 Location: Marsh Road, Drayfield County Person: Thomas Tillman Status: Missing person case opened; Rogers found alive on March 14 - Vent dimensions found at scene: 9 inches by 14 inches - Time cloth still present: 5:30 AM on March 14, 2019 - Rogers's age: 32 years - Clarence the tortoise's age: 47 years in 2019 - Tillman's search-and-rescue service length: 6 years

The Four-Second Call: How a Meter Reader Found Her Cage A meter reader found a strip of cloth tied to a window seven feet up on a building listed as an empty parts warehouse, and eleven days of silence ended with a discovery that pointed to a decade-long pattern. Who was driving a delivery route past Ruth Pruitt’s road at 6:16 a.m., the exact instant her four-second call went dead, and why was the warehouse tied to prepaid accounts? In this episode, we lay out the timeline from the Tuesday morning discovery to the Wednesday morning disappearance, tracing calls, GPS logs, and lease paperwork to follow the only thread investigators had - could those details reveal who took Ruth and where she was kept? Person: Ruth Pruitt Age: 53 Date: January 29, 2014 (four-second call at 6:16 a.m.) Location: Cutter Road (car found), Sycamore Industrial Court (warehouse) Investigator: Detective Judith Armstrong - Meter reader Gail Whitley found a strip of cloth tied to a window bar seven feet off the ground at Sycamore Industrial Court. - Ruth called her sister Diane every Wednesday at 6:15 a.m. for 45 seconds to two minutes for eleven years; on Jan 29 the call lasted four seconds at 6:16 a.m. - Ruth’s gray Subaru was found locked on the shoulder of Cutter Road about 1.5 miles from her house with her purse on the passenger seat and phone missing; the phone hadn’t pinged any towers since the four-second call. - Analyst Troy Oberg matched commercial GPS logs and placed Grant Davis’s white box truck on Cutter Road between 6:10 and 6:20 a.m. on Jan 29; his route ran the industrial loop and Sycamore Industrial Court. - Unit 4 at Sycamore Industrial Court was leased to Hartco Storage Solutions paid with a prepaid debit card and listed a mailbox rental address with a phone number traced to a prepaid cell bought near Marchetti Hardware.

He Left a Seed Catalog Face‑Down - He Survived Three Days Silent Cold winter silence hid five words folded into a gardening glove and a seed catalog torn in the corner - clues that led to a man missing for three days in rural Morrow County. How did a size-large leather glove on a concrete parking stop and a face-down seed catalog become the breadcrumb trail that brought Douglas Hamilton home? In this episode, we follow the sequence of discoveries beginning January 6 that connected a fake visit, a missing man’s tidy routines, and an odd marker found nine miles north of Grissel, and we ask how those small, deliberate details solved what at first seemed inexplicable. Person: Douglas Hamilton Date: January 6-9, 2014 Location: Grissel, Morrow County Investigator: Warren Turner Finder: Wade West - Douglas Hamilton was 44 years old and a shift supervisor at a bottling facility in January 2014. - On January 6 Douglas told his sister he expected a visitor described as a quality auditor; the plant had no record of any home visit. - Neighbour Bev Ingram saw a white extended-cab pickup with an orange diamond sticker parked between 6:30 and 7:15 PM and then gone before 8 PM. - A seed catalog in Douglas’s kitchen was found face-down with the upper-right corner torn away. - On January 9 Wade West discovered a size-large leather gardening glove, palm-up and stiff with frost, on a concrete parking stop beside a shuttered grain elevator nine miles north of Grissel.

She Wrote a Number on Her Shoe - Found Alive After Eight Days A single children's size two pink-and-white sneaker with a seven-digit phone number written on its sole turned up in a drainage ditch 26 miles from where the missing woman would later be found-how did a shoe become the first clue in an eight-day disappearance? What did that tiny, deliberate act reveal about who was watching her and where she went? In this episode, we follow the timeline from a Saturday visit to an assisted living facility through a shoe found by a dog walker and straight into a missing persons report filed by a coworker, asking how predictability became the vulnerability that led to Wendy Stevens vanishing for eight days. Person: Wendy Stevens Location: Harrowood Preserve trail drainage ditch Date: December 9 Case: Missing person reported December 11 Event: Found alive after eight days - The shoe discovered at 7:14 AM on December 9 was a children's size two pink-and-white canvas sneaker. - A seven-digit phone number was written in small, careful handwriting on the sole of the right shoe. - The shoe was found wedged against a grate in a concrete drainage channel by Frances Carlson walking a rescue greyhound named Biscuit. - Wendy Stevens, age 28, worked as a billing coordinator at the Millhaven orthopedic clinic and lived 11 miles from the Harrowood Preserve trail. - A missing persons report for Wendy was filed by office manager Brenda Kopp on December 11 after Wendy missed her Monday shift.